This recording is from Christ Kingdom Church in Waterford Lakes, East Orlando. Visit us online at ChristKingdom.org for our calendar, driving directions, and more audio recordings. We are looking at the life of the early church. Soon after Jesus' resurrection, 2,000 years ago, the Book of Acts gives us a detailed account of what is happening and what is going on. Those 12 disciples who were often getting the trouble wandering off, you know, at least as far as what they knew about Jesus and what they understood, and those that had deserted him even the night that he was betrayed, become radical men on fire, filled with the Holy Spirit, living for the very purposes of God, experiencing the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit and it changed them and it changed history. And you are not sitting here today because of that, as that work and that gospel went forth through that. We're looking here through Acts chapter 15 through 8 and 18, the section of the second missionary journey of the Apostle Paul. We're not reading in its entirety because it's quite long and lengthy, but I'm going to make references to it and kind of do some overview. And I've entitled this sermon today called scenic views because as I look through the second missionary journey, Paul had three primary missionary journeys. He'd be counting his journey to Rome at the end before his death. You might even say he had four, but this is the second of the main three that we're looking at here after he's just gotten back. But we're going to see some things along the way. One of the things that we see along the way, that thought was very significant, that we're going to focus on this morning is how conflict came into play, how opposition came into the play in life. Well, before we dive in that officially here, let me give you a quick overview here of what was going on here with this second missionary journey. Let me get out of the way so most of you can see here. Here is where they're starting over here in Antioch, over here. And different the last time they started out going to Cyprus in the first missionary journey and went this way, well, Paul wants to go back and check on some of the work they've done before plus go beyond that. So they're starting out here from Antioch and they're working their way over here and they're going to go all the way around here. It's about a 2,700 mile process. About half of that is going to be on foot. Now, to put this in perspective, 2,700 miles is roughly Atlanta, Georgia, to Seattle, Washington, to give you a perspective. Now, imagine walking half of that by foot over a three-year period of time. We know if a year and a half or a half were told that Paul spends time in Corinth. So a year and a half is here. Part of the other time, the other year and a half is this journey and this process. So this was a major undertaking for anybody to do in this day and age. Imagine if you're doing it half of it even by foot in the distance of that. Well, as we look at this journey, one of the things that, again, that stands out to me is the kinds of opposition that the Apostle Paul had to face along the way. And the reason why that's important is because you and me today face opposition in following God and seeking to follow God's will. Opposition is not something that's optional that you might feel. You might experience it's a guarantee that you will. So as we look at that, it becomes very, very important for us not only see how the Apostle Paul dealt with it, but to see how we are called to continue to deal with that. Because it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when, it's a matter of how, it's a matter of what it will look like. There's always opposition. And one of the key principles here for this morning that I wanted to point out is this, following God's will is never without opposition. But opposition will always serve God's will. What an incredible truth and principle that that is that we're going to unpack it through this morning. We're going to look at four conflicts that he faced on the way. There was many more, but I just picked four, and there's many different kinds of conflicts. But the four that we're going to look at this morning was one, a personal conflict, a demonic conflict, a physical conflict, and then fourthly, a public conflict. So that's kind of where we're going. Sorry, there's not a real detailed outline in your ultimate. There is a sheet there for taking notes if you want to jot some of these down on the way. And one of the things interesting in this journey, which starts by the way in Acts chapter 15, verse 36, it doesn't take long on this missionary journey. The second one before the first conflict arises. In fact, it arises before they even set out. And we're going to look at that here more specifically. First, the personal conflict that we see that happens here in this text. This is Acts chapter 15, verses 36 through 41, if you want to follow along with me. But it says this. Some time later, Paul said to Barnabas, let us go back and visit the brothers and all the towns where we preach the word of the Lord and see how they are doing. Barnabas wanted to take John, also called Mark with them. But Paul did not think it wise to take him because he had deserted them in Pamphelia and had not continued with them in the work. They had such a sharp disagreement that they parted company. Barnabas took Mark and sailed for Cyprus. The Paul chose Silas and left, commended by the brothers to the grace of the Lord. He went through Syria and Selissia, strengthening the churches. So right from the beginning, before they even leave, there is a personal conflict that comes up. And by the way, when it says in verse 39, they had a sharp disagreement, it's very strong language in the Greek here. It is saying this was a very heavy heated disagreement. This wasn't, well, who do you think we should take on our journey, Barnabas? And they set around the table, sipping some coffee at Starbucks and kind of talk through the pros and cons. This was a huge disagreement. In fact, Barnabas had been the one that brought Paul along the way, if you remember. He had been the one that helped encourage and strengthen Paul. These guys were close, these guys were strong. Barnabas was an encourager. He was Paul's encourager. And this was a strong enough argument and disagreement that they split ways. Now, one of the things I like about access that it doesn't candy coat everything. You get some real reality, real pictures of what life is really like. Because let's be honest. In our lives, there's real conflict sometimes. There's real personal conflict. How many of you are married? I don't need to say anything else, do I? How many of you have children? Exactly. How many of you have parents? All right, I think I've covered just about everybody here and something. There's personal conflicts that happen here. Paul and Barnabas disagree and what to do with this guy, John Mark. And by the way, this is the guy who wrote The Gospel of Mark. This is a guy by the way whose Barnabas is cousin. We're told in one other place in scripture, which kind of gives you an idea why Barnabas may have had a predisposition in these families. It's blood to go along with John Mark. We also know Barnabas was an encourager. We also know Barnabas was optimistic. We know that Barnabas had strong relational things. And most scholars believe that Paul early on in his Christian life here, this was an area of growth that he needed. He was one that was quick to say, look, do you remember what happened last time with John Mark? We were going on our way and he abandoned us. So from Paul's point of view, to take John Mark was to threaten the mission. But from Barnabas's point of view, apparently, taking John Mark was part of the mission, not just to reach new people, but to help disciple encourage the current ones we have. So that disagreement happens here. The cost of this disagreement is split the team up, Paul and Barnabas, which was an amazing team. Following God's will is never without opposition, but opposition will always serve God's will. If this is true, then this is also true. Conflict is always an invitation to trust God. Conflict is always an invitation to trust God. Maybe one that you're not really anxious to open up and see how you're invited, but it is. And a loving God knows the purposes and the importance of us learning to trust him, so he invites us with opposition to do that. And the important thing to realize here in this opposition is how they responded. Both Paul and Barnabas trusted God by focusing on the mission. You know, they could have abandoned the mission at that point. They could have said, well, maybe we're just not supposed to go. They could have given up on that. They could have said, you know, we just had big counsel and Jerusalem to discuss some things. Let's take it here and let these guys, I mean, they could have gotten off track, but they did it. They continued on. And then they humbly along the way learned what God had to teach them, especially the possible. The reason why I say this, because we know that later on, he comes back and he's reconciled with John Mark. And later on, we know that he actually commends John Mark. We know that later on in Rome, when he's in prison, before he's going to die, who's with them? John Mark, but they didn't let them disraile them from following the vision. God used it. And here's the key. Let me look at some of the ways that God used it. He divided one mission, trip up to two. God used it. He had another opportunity now for another disciple, another follower to be trained, where was just going to be Barnabas Paul and John Mark. Apparently, now we have Silas brought on the scene. Paul has a chance to raise him up. There's no doubt that it was a topic of conversation. Can't you imagine that Barnabas on that first sailing out to Cyprus had a lot of time to talk on the boat about why Paul wasn't with them? So no doubt Barnabas and John Mark had a lot of time to talk about what was going on. Maybe that was part of the time that God used that to strengthen John Mark, to remind him of the importance. Part of the reason why they made it easier for him to be reconciled later. God obviously had things to teach Paul as we know that he was later reconciled in this situation. So here's the question I want to ask you this morning on this particular area. Is there a need for reconciliation between you and someone else? Is there a need of reconciliation between you and someone else this morning? Jesus said, we must ask this question and we must act if the answer is yes. And why do I say that? Because he says this in Matthew 5, 23-24. Speaking on the sermon in the mount, Jesus says this, therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and they remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother and then come and offer your gift. More important than your offering is an act of worship to God is, according to Jesus, to go and be reconciled with your brother or with your sister if you know that they have something against you. Following God's will is never without opposition, but opposition will always serve God's will and God uses that time. I know for us specifically, I could think of an example as I was searching through this, even as I thought about the situation with Paul and Barnabas and John Mark, it came to my mind the story of our journey and my personally with Russ and Amy Andre. And by the way, I shared this story with their permission. Amy used to be our children's ministry director here for several years here at the church back in the early years. And as through difficult challenges and times came up, we came to a place where, you know, I couldn't quite see eye-to-eye what was going on, where we needed to go and what was going on, what was happening. And we had a very difficult time. It was one of the hardest things I've had to experience in the seven years we've had as a church. And unfortunately, we had to agree to disagree. And that relationship not only with the church, but with us split several years ago now, maybe five years ago now. I'm sad to say there was about two years that we didn't talk at all. Now, I had married Russ and Amy Andre. I had helped introduce Russ and Amy Andre together. I was their pastor at University Presbyterian Church. They were both on the worship team, which was one of my primary responsibilities there. We knew each other pretty well. So during those two years, and I remember Lauren and I were thinking through that time and we were trying to figure out along the way, you know, once the dust kind of settles and you look back, we begin to look back and go, man, I hit the way that happened. I hit the way that ended. You know, these are good friends. These are people that love the Lord. These are people that love us and people that we love. And now we're not even talking what was going on. A couple years later, after praying, even through the course of several months praying about it, we took the initiative just to call them up and say, hey, we need to get together. We took them out to dinner and we sat down with them and we jumped right in it right from the get goes, a little awkward, right to sit down on the table for the first time when people you haven't talked to in two years. When you're their former boss or employer and you're sitting down through this. But by the grace of God, we sat down and we just opened up our hearts. And there was a lot of things I needed to take responsibility for with that. I needed to share and they were genuinely gracious and received and received that and responded graciously. We were blown away. I mean, Laura will tell you this is one of the greatest testimonies and stories of her seeing the grace of God that she's ever known in her life. And I would say the same for me as well, too. And their relationship was sweetly restored as we look back and saw and learn from things and mistakes that we've made. I was able to take responsibility for things that need to take responsibility for. And you know what? They started coming back to church here, which how difficult is that? You know, when a job hasn't worked out to go back to the place where you were working. We had the gracious, you can call it that time to be able to walk through them going through the difficult time of losing their child. If you remember that a couple years ago to see Amy this past December come back who has been a former children's ministry director on staff here willingly volunteered to lead our children singing at the nursing home in the fall was an act of mercy and grace display of God's amazing story of reconciliation. And we genuinely miss them now they've gone and continue to stay in touch with them. But I just want to tell you God is always working opposition to serve his will for his glory, for his honor. And the bond is stronger than ever with them. What an amazing story. Is there an opportunity that he's calling you to be reconciled in? Maybe to go and take responsibility for something you need to maybe to share with somebody who doesn't even know that they've offended you and you just haven't had the honesty to share it with them. But it's hindering the relationship following God's will is never without opposition and personal conflict is one of those. But remember about opposition will always serve God's will and glorify him. Well personal conflict is just one type that was her faith was faced for the possible and silas on the second missionary journey. Another one was demonic conflict. And I need to be honest with you here I was a little hesitant to use the word demonic. I thought well I could say spiritual warfare or spiritual attack because demonic sounds a little bit kind of you know twilight zoneish and a little bit intense and a little bit extreme. And you know I don't want people to question my theological camp and things like that if I'm to be honest with you with it. But let me just say very plainly demons are real Satan is real and these are not magic you know you know magical made up figures and characters. These are real persons as real as the Holy Spirit is real demons are real. These are real angels are real demons are real as real as Jesus the son of God is real Satan who used to be called Lucifer and was an angel in heaven is real. As real as there are angels in heaven to one third of them fell according to the scriptures and became a legend to Satan. And I would do you great disjustice to not talk about demonic activity this morning. Paul would not have described spiritual armor as he does in Ephesians 6 if we didn't need it. In fact he talks about this sort of the spirit being the word of God and we must know it we must believe it and we must use it because it is the sort of the spirit. It is the only offensive weapon given to the Christian in which to attack our enemy. All the rest of the equipment we have a shield of faith, a helmet of salvation and so on are defensive things to protect us. And those are very important but your offensive weapon is the word of God. Listen to what happens in Acts chapter 16 verses 16 through 18 early on in the trip.
Luke writes about this that says Paul says once when we were going to the place of prayer we met by a slave girl who had a spirit by which she predicted the future. She earned a great deal of money for her owners by fortune telling this girl followed Paul and the rest of us shouting these men are servants of the most high God who are telling you the way to be saved. She kept this up for many days. Finally Paul became so troubled that he turned around and said to the spirit in the name of Jesus Christ I come in you come out of her and at that moment the spirit left her. Now think about this situation at first you think well what's so bad about that somebody's come along going these men are the servants of the most high God who are telling you the way to be saved. And is that a good thing is that good PR good advertisement. Well the problem is it says this she kept this up for many days and it doesn't say she kept it up for like she said it once a day. You get this picture that she was following them and that she was almost heckling them along the way this no doubt became not only annoying for them but it was probably a distraction for sure. There's something that hindered their efforts to sure the gospel this was something that begin to be a burden to them. This was problematic conflict is always an invitation to trust God. And what it all do he trusted God by calling on the name of Jesus Christ to cast the demon out and deliver the girl following God's will is never without opposition but opposition will always serve God's will. And how did that happen here in this how did God use this well here's a slave girl who had been exploited who had been set free now from the demonic possession that she had. Yes it given her the skills and the gifts but it had kept her bound kept her following exploited. Although it led to persecution and imprisonment they get to experience a miraculous power of God releasing them from prison. If you remember the story we've heard it from them being in the flippy and jail. This is the story where they're in jail and all of a sudden in the middle of night as they're singing praise songs the doors fly open in the jail. And the jailer is so freaked out because it was death if you lost a prisoner he decided he was about to take his own life because that was surely what was going to wait in the next day and pause and say no no no no no no kill yourself we're still here. Okay we just got a little more air coming in and out now the cell okay that's that story we see God working using here in this amazing way they see the jailer come to faith in Christ. That's how God used the situation along the way Satan no doubt was trying to get in the way was trying to hinder the process and he knew that if this girl wasn't annoying enough as soon as they took care of the girl which Paul did the name of Jesus. Her owners came in who were upset now because they lost their way of making money came in and created these lies about Paul and Silas and had him arrested. You know you can see Satan working this out here all right. I've got this one girl that's totally under my control manipulation I'm going to use her to annoy Paul and Silas here and even in the process of it the whole thing is going to backfire on him because rather than being people coming hey you set this girl free of a demon we want to believe in Jesus they're going to put in a jail. Because of the lies and that are made up from that you can see his tactics working and moving but opposition will always serve God's will and God uses it in the midst of that even spiritual warfare even demonic attack for the little girl specifically in demonic oppression they were experiencing through her so here's my question for you this morning is there disguise demonic activity in your life. Don't think too hard because I can answer the question for you yes 100% if you are follower of Jesus Christ it is absolutely completely true that there is some level of demonic activity going on in your life let me explain what I mean by that one who is filled the Holy Spirit we understand this Christians is not one who can be possessed but it is one who can be oppressed and it is one who can be attacked. This Paul experiences a numerous occasions as Jesus himself experiences right out in the desert Satan comes and tempts him say to himself so it is Jesus said hey however they treat to me they're going to treat you whatever I experience you can expect experience the same as a follower of mine. Paul's experiencing it you as a follower Christ will experience it as well. Here's the question but will you recognize it will you use the sword of the spear will you use God's word to attack it or will you use logic. Will you use good psychology will you focus on the surface issue rather than what's underneath will you use mental relaxation techniques to help you process what's going on will you ignore it will you self help techniques will you pretend it's not there at all. You see the main way from the very beginning that Satan continues to play mankind is through deception is through lying. In fact Jesus said himself Satan is a deceiver and he's the father of lies in the garden what is the very first interaction that Adam and Eve have with the serpent he says this did God really say you should not eat of any of the tree in the garden. What's his very first tactic to have them question and to confuse them about what God said that was the beginning and do you think he stopped that tactic now me what version of that did Judas here were told that Satan enters Judas what version of that did he hear. Did Jesus really say he's the son of God did Jesus really heal all those people in the name of the father he's still at it let me read some of the common lies that you will hear. Because this deception it's lying and you hear it between these two ears and your soul things like this if God loved me life wouldn't be so hard or this would not have happened. He loves whispering that into our hearts or your outward appearance or success defines your worth or he might say this if you are truly faithful to God then you won't have opposition in your life. And if you do have opposition then you need to be a little more faithful or he might say God has forgiven your sin but now he must tolerate you until you get to heaven. You ever feel that way sometimes God's kind of alright I bought you with the price price of my son you know but I kind of got buyers remorse. Yeah because you're kind of a mess how many times have you thought that or at least felt that way or my life isn't justified unless I have blank you can fill in the blank. Jesus is one way to heaven that's a very common one these days or he might say this desire situation stands in the way of being who God wants you to be. You need to satisfy that desire or God helps those who first help themselves or it is more important to people think I am this is what you're thinking yourself it's more important to people think I am than who I really am. Or here's a very popular one Satan and demons are just psychological religious tools to keep weak minded people in line and out of trouble. Satan is just fine if you don't believe he exists at all in fact he would prefer that. So the question is not if you are hearing temptation to believe the lives of the enemy the question is simply what are they what are they and when are they coming. And then the most important question are using the sort of spirit God's word to combat them. Tuesday morning I was meeting with the elders as we normally do to talk and pray and share about lives and I was telling them how good it had been and been a good stretch of life for us recently and then Wednesday hit. And I don't know what happened Wednesday. It is not an understatement to feel like how I felt at least that Wednesday was a day from hell just felt like all hell broke loose. Relationally in the family and the marriage of things going on and it had been just an incredible season that we've been having. And the only thing I could contribute it to in the fact that in his lawyers and I looked back and looked at it is that it was a demonic activity going on. There was lies that were slipping into our thinking before we knew it the fuse that hit the TNT and boom things exploded. Some of you I text and ask you to pray and you'll know that you remember that that's what was going on there is real enemy that we serve and real enemy that seeks to attack us. But we're not under equip the scripture say greater seed that's in us that's in the world. But it's the sort of spirit that we must wield as we attack the enemy following God's will is never without opposition but opposition will always serve God's will. Well third conflict they face was physical conflict physical conflict X 16 22 and following the crowd joined in the attack against Paul and Silas. By the way this is right after all that's happened with the casting the demon out of the slave girl and the magistrates ordered them to be stripped and beaten. And they had them severely flogged they were thrown into prison that jailer was commanded to guard them carefully. And upon receiving such orders he put them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in the stocks. About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God and the other prisoners were listening to them. But why is circled in and zoomed in on that? Because you can quickly repast all this and forget the fact that there was severe persecution physical persecution they were experiencing. This picture I'll zoom in on it. This is actually a picture that those in Philippi modern day Philippi now say was an excavated prison cell where Paul and Silas were kept. Now that's the beta whether or not it's exactly the right place or things like that but it gives you a picture of what the the situation was like and we're told it was the inner cell so what's cut out here is how they've shown you what it looked like. Okay it didn't have a door like that. The scripture say it was the inner cell it was the most safest place in the prison but I just want to give you a real life picture of where they were being kept. And this was after being flogged. Did you see the passion of Jesus and see Jesus flogged 39 times. Paul tells us later on that he was flogged five different times and this is one of them so they were flogged sitting in prison. They were shackled not even free to move. Can you imagine the physical anguish they were in plus they had been traveling. Remember we talked about how far they're going and traveling by foot these guys are exhausted then they're beaten like this and then they're left in jail. All because of being faithful to the mission God had given them. Jesus promises that opposition will come but he promises that he's going to use it as well. Comfort is always an invitation to trust him and Paul and Silas trusted God how by worshipping him exhausted wounded and in prison worshipping him or even told the rest of prisoners quit their chattering and they just listened. Because nobody ever had been in the philip high prison and worship God through the night till they heard and met Paul and Silas. What a perspective to rejoice that they were suffering in the name of Jesus for being faithful to him. God used it too. Again they get experience the power of God releasing them from prison when in the middle of night the prison doors are wide open the jailer himself will come to faith and the jailer actually ends up washing their wounds. The guy who probably ridiculed him and harassed him when he shackled him up probably had some derogatory things to say about him. He's the one that's ministering to their wounds hours later in the middle of the night because he's blown away. They get to go to this house for dinner in the middle of the night. Can you imagine his wife getting woken up honey I need you to whip something together pretty quick. Well who's the guest all the prisoners and then they go back in the jailers family is saved and baptized apparently in the middle of the night. In fact they go back that night because they want to make sure that they don't get the jailer in trouble and they're back in prison this time as guest. I'm sure you didn't even lock the door behind him this time. So the next morning when the magistrates come they're right there following God's will is never without opposition but opposition will always serve God's will. So let me ask you this can you trust that God has a purpose for your physical conflicts this morning that he will use them for his glorious purpose. The scripture say that Jesus by his scars we are healed. There's no greater example of our Lord and Savior by his physical struggles from being obedient to God that we are healed through that and save for eternity to him. Second Corinthians 12 7 through 10 talks about the possible Paul himself later on writing in fact he's going to be in court on this part of this journey that he says there was given me a thorn in the flesh a messenger of Satan determined me a thorn in his flesh there was something going on physically with him that was an anguish. Some scholars have thought maybe he had maybe with his eyesight they weren't sure what the deal was going on but Paul was healing people Paul himself raised people from the dead. What does he say three times I'll feed him with the Lord to take it away from me the possible Paul. First time but he said to me my grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weakness so that Christ power may rest in me. I have a friend named Jan Holsclaw some of you know her she was on our worship team back at UPC that's her and her husband with some grandkids well six and a half years ago she got diagnosed with an advanced form of varying cancer many women don't survive from this stage six and a half years she's still struggling with it. It's gone away and it's come back and she has all the blood work and it's always up in down roller coaster where she's going to be at so I asked her this week we talked about her journey and let me just read from her what she wrote to me in an email. She said early in the journey maybe day number two we were determined this is day two of finding out the advanced stage of varying cancer that we determined that no matter what even if I died within days of being diagnosed with advanced ovarian cancer that we wanted God's glory to win the day every day. Whenever I go to doctor appointments chemo hydration labs except for the two days each cycle that I'm so sick and pretty much out of it my goal has been to be on a lookout for someone I can encourage God always bring someone my way whether it's someone on staff or chemo patient. I think my thankful list has had a lot to do with this when my heart is focused on being thankful it seems like God allows me opportunities to tell the person that even though I've been in this battle for six and a half years I'm thankful to God that I'm still alive I'm incredibly thankful for every day of life he's given me since that day I was diagnosed and literally didn't know if I had days or weeks to live. That almost always opens up a conversation on days that feel really crummy off and tell God well today there's nothing I have to be thankful for sorry God and immediately he begins to bring to mind things I am truly thankful for sunrise cool breeze on our morning walk beautiful blue sky rain or Skype with our Beijing grandkids phone calls from him ever et cetera et cetera and what happens next is that I realize my whole focus has changed I'm no longer thinking about me but about God how much he loves me. And on and on being thankful having grateful heart is the thing that keeps me focused on wanting to encourage others in the midst of the battle. I followed up an aster about have you ever thank God for having cancer she writes I have never told God that I'm really thankful that I have cancer however the blessing of it all has a new has the blessing of it all is the new arena of ministry he's given us in this chemo suite with my medical team and among my many rope holders about 300 families from around the world. Who are praying for me they often tell me how I've been a blessing to them but I just shake my head and and think oh dear God how could this be they are the ones that are blessing me. You get the picture that God is using opposition to serve his will well last area we see this is public conflict public conflict. Verses 17 verses 4 through 5 me chapter 17 verses 4 through 5. Some of the Jews were persuaded enjoying Paul and Silas as did a large number of God fearing Greeks and not a few prominent women but the Jews were jealous so they rounded up some bad characters from the marketplace formed a mob and started a riot in the city they rush to Jason's house in search of Paul and Silas order to bring them out to the crowd. They didn't have well wishes in mind for them when they try to get them. They faced public conflict they were facing slandering discrediting lies they were facing a damaging of their reputation but conflict is always an invitation to trust God and so they do. They trust God by focusing not on their reputation but on God's glory they disregard how they're being slandered how they're being spoken about evenly and they focus on is who Jesus is going forth in the message of the gospel. Because you see following God's will is never without opposition but opposition will always serve God's will and it did it created more interest in their message it got people talking long after they had left a town it gave them new platforms in which to speak. In fact this picture right here is the picture of the Arabagus that were told in Acts chapter 17 Paul is taken in fact they hear his message they say hey we're going to take you to the place where we more people can hear this and we can interact and here's a picture from their crop list modern day what it looks like this big old rock where the people would gather and listen and all this happened because there was this stir up and this was commotion that was this public conflict and God used it to give them a greater pleasure. You get them a greater platform because you see following God's will is never without opposition but opposition will always serve God's will. So question I have for you how do you respond when you are misrepresented or discredited as a follower of Jesus how does the church respond because it's happening more and more often here even in our country right can't watch the news or see this or that in a story or paper or hear something about something going on. Jesus is the only central figure who came to be defamed he came to be mocked he came to be rejected he came to be insulted and he came to be humiliated. Do you know of all the world religions and of all the ones who have those religions that have a central figure like for example Islam with Muhammad and so on none of those leaders came to be humiliated. None of those came to be considered sin even though they had no sin in them that the righteous of God might be made perfect for those who are their followers. Where does that come from only Jesus Christ in the gospel Muslims will react very strongly if you criticize the fame in any way Muhammad. Jesus invites the humiliation and welcomes the slander and the abuse and the ultimate form of that is him hanging on across dying as a thief a common thief a blasphemer mocked as king of the Jews.
So what sure attitude be as Christians as we face opposition slander public conflict when people say things that just aren't true when people make accusations we fix your eyes on Jesus who made it about the glory of his father and being faithful to his father's call we fix your eyes on Jesus and make it about him and his offer of love and repentance and forgiveness. Part of the amazing glory of Christ is his humiliation when we are ridiculed or slandered as Christians for a testimony of him we share in his sufferings the scriptures say. And that is why one of the reasons God said you are the body of Christ you are to continue the work of Christ following God's will is never without opposition but opposition will always serve God's will. I just mentioned four that you can pick from the second missionary journey here there's lots more what are yours what are you experiencing do you doubt the God will use it for his glory to serve his will stop doubting that's how powerful he is. That's why we can claim the verse in the promise that all things work together for good to those that love the Lord and call to court this purpose. There is no power in that verse that this is not true or when Joseph realized that what his brothers intended for evil God intended for good looking back on his life so that he might save his family from the famine and bring them safely to Egypt and by the way save most of Egypt and most of the living world in that area. God does amazing things through opposition and conflict what is he about to do through yours let's find out a spray. God just asked that you would come and you would meet with us now you would guide us and lead us that you would remind us of the hope that we have that this opposition we face that we experience whatever it might be you have good purposes you have incredible purposes. God to show your glory and your power would you work in the midst of that and would you meet with us and pray this in Jesus name amen.