Acts 13 - Going Global 20
Tom Shrader examines Acts 13:1-12, marking a pivotal moment when the church at Antioch sends out Barnabas and Saul on their first missionary journey. He emphasizes that these were ordinary people whom God used extraordinarily, and applies this principle to modern believers who serve as informal missionaries in their everyday places - at work, home, and community.
“You're a missionary right now, and your responsibility is to make the invisible God visible and to speak the truth boldly.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Acts
Recorded: 2017
Duration: 35 min
Themes: missions, calling, service, obedience, purpose, witness, evangelism, faithfulness, feeling called to ministry, workplace witness, missionary, church planter, stay at home parent, young adult, feeling ordinary, seeking purpose
Scripture: Acts 13:1-12, Acts 12:23-25, Acts 1, Romans 1, 2 Timothy 4:9, 2 Corinthians 5, Matthew 5
Theological Themes: missionary calling, great commission, ecclesiology, church planting, apostolic ministry, divine sovereignty, providence, missiology
Full Transcript
Open your Bibles to the book of Acts, and we are in chapter 12, the very end of chapter 12. The title of the book is The Acts of the Apostles, and there's a sense, when you turn to the end of chapter 28, you read it, and the book just sort of ends. That's prompted people to suggest that there's a sense in which we're still writing the book of Acts. The Acts, the movement of God as He expands the church, continues today. Even as we look at this story this morning, I want to take however long we need to understand what's happening, and then bring it right forward into our life today.
So we pick up the story, chapter 12, verse 23, and we look at Herod, and it says, immediately, an angel of the Lord struck him. What we're seeing here now is something supernatural. God is moving, and He struck him down. Here's why: because he didn't give glory to God. It's the same thing we see laid out for us in Romans chapter 1, where Paul said that the wrath of God is being poured out on those who, even though God is evident through creation, they did not give Him thanks, they did not give Him glory.
That may be you here today. You may be one of those people who, just at communion, you passed communion by, and you were saying, I'm not a follower of Christ. That's a very significant moment. As you pass that element by, you're saying, in essence, no thank you to God, no thank you to His glory. Now, I'm not suggesting that you're going to be struck down and eaten by worms. But I am suggesting that you've pitted yourself as an enemy of God, and there's consequence to that. That's Herod's demise. That's where we left off in the story.
God's Word Continues to Grow
Verse 24 says, the Word of the Lord continued to grow and to be multiplied. That's what God has done from the very beginning. Redemption and restoration, the restoration part of that, continues today. What I want you to see, and hopefully you'll see, and we'll agree by the end of this lesson, that you're part of that, that we need to understand that God is at work. God struck down, and the Lord continues to grow.
I am old, and I've concluded this by two things. One, the calendar, and I have a mirror, and I can see I'm old. But the other thing, I'm starting to do what old people do. Sandy gets up every day about 4:20, and that's pretty early. So I sleep until 4:30. Then I get up, and I do a couple things. You don't care about them. Then I get my coffee, and I go and sit in the chair, and I turn on TV, and I check channel 3 and channel 10 weather. So you're starting to see this is what old people do.
Those are my two favorite weather people, and I like them both, and I compare and see who's right, because one will say 109, and the other will say 108. Well, I want to know who's right. Who can I trust? Then, this is the second way I know I'm old, I'll go and check and see if there are any hummingbirds at the feeder. That's what I do. Then I'll go, by now Sandy's left, and I'll turn on the news. Within five minutes, there's a bombing here, if it's an international thing. There's a flight that's happened. If it's local, there's hit and run, or a shooting, or some... so that I am going, man, things are out of control.
But I got to remember this: God's in control. He called, and it's the same thing as in the church, in the body of Christ. This will continue. Why? Because He'll cause it to grow. He'll cause it to multiply. What I'm suggesting is He invites you, not He's coming into your story, He's going to invite you into His story, into what He's doing.
Setting Up the Mission
Verse 25 tells us in this story, Barnabas and Saul returned from Jerusalem where they fulfilled their mission. They were taking along with them John, who's also called Mark. We saw in Acts chapter 11, they were sent by the church at Antioch to the church at Jerusalem to bring them some financial aid, support, some assistance. They are now returning back to Antioch.
Now, the assignment I have today is chapter 13, verses 1 through 12. I was walking out Tuesday, out of the offices, and Tim was standing by the back door. He said, are you ready for Sunday? I said, it's Tuesday, buddy, I'll be ready Sunday morning at 8. That's how I do it. I said, I read the passage a couple of times, and there's not a ton in there. He said, let me give you the outline. I said, okay. He said, you can remember it. So, I did, and I turned it into a slide. I didn't, but somebody did. Turned it into a slide for you: God uses real people in real places for real impact.
I emphasize the word real. These are not make-believe stories. They're not fables. They're not fairy tales. These are real people. We tend to, and this will be our flinch as we read it, we tend to elevate them and try to make them into something extraordinary. But by and large, they're pretty ordinary people that become extraordinary as the Spirit of God infuses them and they obey. What I want to suggest, and more than suggest, what I want to plead is that you understand that you're a real person in real places that God will use for real impact. I want you to look at the story and Photoshop yourself, if you will, into it and experience, try to see, feel, touch what they do, but then go, what does this mean to me?
A New Section Begins
As we set up chapter 13, let me read you insights from a couple guys. James Boyce writes this: no matter how a person chooses to outline the book of Acts, it is evident that chapter 13 begins a new section. Another author writes this: chapters 13, 14, 15 begin the story of the mission to the ends of the earth. So back in chapter 1, we got the mission key value of the entire book. You will be my witnesses, both in Jerusalem, in Judea, Samaria, to the remotest parts of the earth. That's what's playing out in this chapter. That's a pivot point, the turn. Ray Stedman writes, the 13th chapter is the turning
A Turning Point in Church History
This is a crucial point in the book of Acts. It's what Winston Churchill would have called one of the hinges of history. It marks the beginning of the third phase of the Lord's great commission. So it's a key part. We're turning the corner. Though we have 28 chapters in the book, and we're at chapter 13, we're turning the corner. But this is the part of the book that you're engaged in - the witnesses to the remotest parts of the earth. That's you.
The Church at Antioch
Chapter 13, verse 1, we're at the church at Antioch. In this church, there are prophets and teachers. There are guys using their gifts. Prophets and teachers in a functional way are very similar. They're proclaiming the Word of God.
Anytime you have a church, a good church, there's the proclamation of the Word of God. This is what we hear all the time, and we have from the beginning. We continue to hear today. When somebody new walks into Gilbert, they'll talk about different things, and they'll say, "I like this, I like this, I like this." But a common thread is "you teach the Word of God." People say, "Chapter by chapter, I know where I'm going. You're teaching the Word." That's what's happening there.
The Five Leaders
Luke, who's writing the book of Acts, identifies five guys. First is Barnabas. We learn more about him - his real name is Joseph, but he's called the son of encouragement, Barnabas. I don't know how he got that name.
Let me hit the pause button and apply. You need these people badly in your life. You never outgrow the need for encouragement, and you need to be an encourager. I'm teaching in two weeks at Bethany Bible Church, and I'm going to talk about the tongue, speech. The power of life and death is in the tongue. If you're a parent and you tell your kid, "You're big, fat, and dumb," you're going to end up with a big, fat, dumb kid, or a sick overachiever - one of the two. But you need the encouragement, and you never outgrow it.
The Power of Encouragement
I'm out of physical therapy, and I'm into strength training, but it's modified for people who are older. So it's not like I'm doing P90X or any of that. We're in there the other day, and we're doing our stuff that we start with. You know, the cat thing, and Superman - we're on the floor planking. I can plank for 60 seconds. Yeah, thanks. I'm closing in on the world record. I'm a little bit short. The world record is eight hours and one minute. So I got the minute part, but I don't need eight hours.
When we're doing something called bird dog, we're on all fours, and I would have my left arm out and right leg back. We're doing it for balance. Every 19 seconds, an elder in the country, in the United States, goes to the emergency room as a result of a fall. Every 29 minutes, an elder dies because of a fall. I just say that to cheer you up, let you know what's going on in the future. But balance is a big deal.
So I'm doing this - left arm out, right leg back - and Shelly is leading us. Shelly says, "Everybody look at Tom. He's doing it perfectly." Not good, not great - perfectly. Well, I'll give you this in real time. She said, "Look, everybody look at Tom. He's doing it perfectly." And immediately I could feel that leg get longer and that arm get stronger. Immediately. You need that.
A Diverse Leadership Team
Barnabas is part of this group. Then there's a guy named Simeon, who was called Niger. In Greek, that word means black - reason to assume in our context, someone from Africa. Also there is Lucius of Cyrene. We don't know much about him. And Manaen - we learn a little bit about him. He had been with Herod the Tetrarch, probably raised with him. He was a man of some status and social standing. And Saul.
If we look at this church, and I don't know if it's the intention that Luke has when he mentions these five, but we see a diverse group - racially, economically. The way that God works, God brings together people. He's not a respecter of persons. He doesn't favor one color, one nationality over another. We can tend to make Jesus a very white, or at least a very American Jesus. But He's working all over this world. He's not a respecter of persons. And He tells us not to be either.
Managing Diversity and Unity
That's going to produce tension. I'm teaching the book of James right now, every Wednesday morning at seven o'clock in the commons. Love to have you join us. We're going to be there until the end of June. But as we look at the book of James - chronologically, the first book written in the New Testament - James is already beginning to address tension within the church. He says you're showing favoritism. You're favoring one group of people over the other.
That's always going to be the case. In a mixed group, in a diverse group, there's always going to be tension. There's always going to be a challenge. That's why it's important to remember we're all about diversity in terms of race and background and all those things, but not in terms of doctrine. The unification we have is in the person of Christ. All saved, all sinners saved, delivered by grace through faith.
Ministering to the Lord
Verse two: while they were ministering, and they were ministering to the Lord, they were serving one another, but their audience was Jesus. They weren't concerned about pleasing people, but about pleasing Him. And they're fasting. If you see in verse three there, they're fasting and praying. It seems to be that they're not just pleading with God, but they're anticipating that God is going to do something. And He does.
It says in verse two, "The Holy Spirit said, 'Set apart for Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.'"
How Does the Holy Spirit Speak?
Now, to me, and so I would assume you, that immediately raises a question. How did the Lord, through the Holy Spirit, how did the Holy Spirit say it? Were they sitting in this room and they heard that voice? "Set apart for Me."
Ray Stedman talks about the insistent unanimity in a group. He's not advocating always unanimity in every decision, but he seems to be saying that when you pray, when you fast, when
God's Sovereign Direction Through Human Community
You deliberated, and everybody's landing at the same spot—that could well be God working in the group. Twenty-six years ago, literally right now, this time of the summer in 1998, there were a group of guys who were contemplating whether God might do something in a church in the East Valley. The result of that: East Valley Bible Church, Redemption, Redemption Gilbert.
I wouldn't say it just voluntarily, but if pushed, I would say God said do it. I get nervous right there. But I would say there was an insistent unanimity. There were a group of guys who said we think, we look, and frankly, we're not going to suspend common sense at this point. God's working sovereignly, and yet He's using people to do it.
You see in verse four, they're sent out by the Holy Spirit, and they went to Seleucia, and from there to Cyprus. Why Cyprus? Don't know. It seems that was God's intention from a common sense perspective. This is kind of—Barnabas is from there.
Common Sense and Divine Direction
I can see he and Saul sitting around and saying, "Obviously God's doing something." "I guess so." "I think we're supposed to go on this missionary journey." "I guess so." "Where should we go?" Well, they could get a map and do one of those. But I don't know, it's true. It doesn't say it in the text. But I think Barnabas might have said, "I know a bunch of people in Cyprus. We could get started there. I know where we could stay, or some guys that could run a room, or at least make introductions."
I don't know, but they sailed. They reached there, they proclaimed the word of God. They go to this synagogue—that's where Paul always started. And they've got this guy with them, their helper, John.
The Story of John Mark: Failure and Restoration
John becomes an interesting story, and I don't want to do a spoiler alert, but coming up, John blows out. He's Barnabas' cousin. In our terminology, he's really an intern on this trip. He becomes a magnificent picture to me of a guy who ultimately blows out, who we're going to see in a few chapters. Paul and Barnabas head out on another journey, and Barnabas says, "Let's take John Mark," and Paul said, "I'm not going to take him." And there's a huge breakup over this.
But at the end of his life—and Paul's the one who's saying, "I don't want this guy"—at the end of his life, Paul writes to Timothy in 2 Timothy chapter 4, verse 9, and he said, "I'm here all alone. Only Luke is with me. Demas has deserted me. Do Timothy come quickly and bring Mark with you? He's useful for service."
You may be here today, and you may be somebody who's really screwed up. We call it sin, and it's a big deal. You failed. So did John Mark, so did Peter. And here's what I want to say: Not only did God say He'd forgive you, and you might believe that He'd forgive you, He'll still use you.
God's Movement and Inevitable Opposition
Mark's with them, and he's there as a helper. Verse 6: "And when they'd gone through the whole island as far as Paphos, they found a magician." God's moving. He's directing these people. And where God's working, inevitably, there'll be opposition.
This is actually a pretty cool story here. There's a false prophet named Bar-Jesus who is with the pro-consul, the governor, Sergius Paulus, a man of intelligence. And Sergius Paulus summons Barnabas and Saul and sought to hear the word of God. Talk about God moving! Here's one of the, if not most powerful guys in the area that they're working, and he sends a message and says, "Hey, come, I want to hear this truth." That's what God does. As you're faithful and as you're sharing, God begins to open doors. God will do that in your life.
Paul's Bold Confrontation
There is a magician at this point who is working in the area. He's watching this go on. His name is Elymas, and he's opposing them. And he's trying to intervene and turn Sergius Paulus away from them. Verse 9: "But Saul speaking"—and he said he filled the Holy Spirit, that's the key—he said, "You are full of deceit and fraud. You're not the Bar-Jesus, you're not that son of Jesus, you're the son of the devil. You're enemies of righteous. Will you not cease to make crooked the straight ways of the Lord? Stop it, knock it off."
Next verse, verse 11: "While he's speaking, behold, the Lord is upon you," he said, "and you will be blind and not see the sun for a time." And immediately, the mist fell on this man, and he went about seeking those who would lend him a hand. It's pretty extraordinary, isn't it? Sergius Paulus thought so too. And he believed when he saw this happen. And he was amazed at the teaching of the Lord.
The Pattern of God's Sovereign Action
This is what you see all the time. God moves sovereignly. He moves through the book of Acts, He moves through your life, and yet you're responsible to move. Let me go back to the slide that we used earlier: God uses real people in real places for real impact. I've got 11 minutes—that's not 11 minutes. So let's drive this home.
Get rid of "real." God uses you in places that you're in, and He puts you there for impact. Paul's on a missionary journey. When we hear that, we think passport, visa, shots. You're a missionary. Paul uses, the terminology he uses in 2 Corinthians chapter 5: you're an ambassador for Christ. You are right now.
Your Role as an Ambassador
You're in real places. And your responsibility, and we've used over the years, is to make the invisible God visible and to speak the truth boldly. As you go out from this place, it's how God has always expanded the church. History tells us this.
In his classic work, The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire, Edward Gibbons writes, "It has become the most sacred duty of a new convert to diffuse, spread out among his friends and neighbors the blessing he had received." One of the early historians write, "The feat of Christianity"—meaning its expansion, its growth—"was accomplished by means of informal missionaries." That's you.
We did this idea of witnessing, and all of a sudden, we got classes, we think we have to decide to do it, all that. That's all fine. What I want to see is that witnessing isn't optional, it's not mandatory, it's inevitable. You're a witness right now. You just had a week of witnessing.
You might have done a lousy job of it, or you might have done a great job, but you didn't. You are to go, and in Jesus' words, let your light shine in such a way that people see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven, wherever you go.
Salt and Light in Everyday Places
I am driving down Rae Road the other day, and I see a sign. It's a real estate sign, open house with an arrow, and the realtor's name is on it. I recognize the name as somebody that I know, somebody from church. I thought, well, I'll just pop in, sit in an open house. It was light. I can't remember what day of the week it was, but I thought, probably sitting there, could be lonely. I'll pop in, say hi, get out.
I go in, and she's all bubbly, all excited. She starts telling me, I said, this is really kind of a cool house. She said, oh, I sold these people this house. I think she said 14 years ago, it's a great house. Now they're downsizing. Here's what I thought. I thought, isn't that amazing? For most people, this is the biggest financial decision they'll make in their life, and she's there in the midst of that. Think of the opportunity to be salt and light in those person's lives.
I need a haircut, but the lady who cuts my hair, she goes to church here. You talk about an opportunity to witness, to share. She's got you in her sink and in her chair for getting a cut for like 20 minutes. Well, not for everybody. I know. Sorry, I didn't mean to ruin it for you. But if you're doing a color and a cut, it's an hour and a half. You tend to go in there and open up, and there's all this stuff that is going on. That's a missionary.
One of my doctors goes to church here. He's a cardiologist. He's dealing with life and death stuff. His opportunity, and just, I mean, he had to come in and do this, whatever they were doing and come out to Sandy and say, we need to do something more than this. We're going to need to do a surgery. Think of the opportunity you have there.
Being the Hands of God
I was thinking about this. You're a tow truck driver. You've got somebody, it's 178 degrees out there, and your car is broken down, and they need a tow, and you pull up, and you walk in, and all of a sudden, you are physically the hands of God there to be a cool drink, to alleviate them in a time of real need. You can have an interaction where they look at you, and they say, there's something different about you, not odd, different. She looks different. You're at the gym. I mean, you can play this out a thousand ways.
You're a teacher. You've got kids around you all day that you can influence for the rest of their life. My kindergarten teacher was a lady by the name of Miss Julie. I was five. I could take you into that room. The room was set up as a small room. Our desks were at an angle.
Think about the power of life and death in the tongue, and we have a coloring assignment, and it's two kids playing in the snow. We color it, we turn it in. Miss Julie says, look up here, look up here, who drew this? Tom, Tom, which one of you is Tom? I want to say thanks for getting to know us so well. Which one of us is Tom? Tom, Tom, Tom, everybody look up here. Tom drew this, see this, Tom drew it. Do you see that this kid's in a red snowsuit and this one is in an orange snowsuit? Don't you ever put red and orange together, ever, ever.
Now that's 62 years ago, I mean I'm way over it by now. I've lost track of Miss Julie. I assume she's in hell. Chained for all eternity next to a kid in a red snowsuit and an orange snowsuit. Well I mean, think about that all coming back. That's the power you have, you know. That's the power you have in the tongue as a teacher.
You're a mom staying home all day with kids. You manifest Jesus, you live the gospel out, you speak it.
Everyone Is Watching
Now once you start to get serious about this, understand everybody's watching. I taught last Sunday at Scottsdale Bible Church. We came home and we changed and Sandy said, do you want to do something? I said sure. She said, would you like to go to Fashion Square? Now that's more my idea probably than hers. She's not a shopper, she doesn't want to typically, but I said sure.
So we go to Fashion Square. We're walking through Fashion Square. We get something to eat and walk out. Four people stopped me and said, I saw you this morning at Scottsdale Bible Church. Now I assume there might have been others.
My point is this, when you say to somebody, I'm going to Redemption Church. Come to my small group. Will you read this? Will you come to Easter? They're watching you. I say that just as a reminder. It's not a burden, it's a privilege. They're watching you.
Larry Wright used to say it this way. You might be the only Bible some people ever read. Now, I don't know, that could get a little goofy and out of whack, so I don't know. Here's what I know, they're watching you. To them at this point, you are the Bible. That doesn't alleviate the responsibility they have. That's to talk to you about the privilege you have, not duty.
Love Compels Us
Right before Paul says that you're an ambassador for Christ He says this, the love of Christ compels us. Why do you do this? Not out of duty or obligation. If you do that, I can tell you what's going to happen. You're going to poop out and it'll become very much like a Pharisee. You'll be going through the hoop and checking boxes. That's not why. You do it because He loves you.
Some of you a little old enough to remember this, but the first time that maybe you're in this situation, you're dating and you're trying to figure out do I say it? Remember, I was in high school and I'm dating this girl and she said, I love you. I said, I love you. I thought, what happened here? Where did this come from? Well, I don't understand what just happened. Well, here you go. The minute you hear I love you, your flinch, just like a reflex, that's pretty impressive. I couldn't do that a year ago. But your flinch
is to say I love you too. Here's Jesus on the cross and risen from the tomb and He says, I love you. And your whole life is a I love you back. And that's not duty. That's an act of love and privilege.
He's called you into His story. This isn't about you. This is about Him. And just like the Lord sent out Barnabas and Saul and John Mark, He's going to send you out.
Where? Well, wherever you go. If you're looking for a mission field, go home and put on shorts and a t-shirt and take a walk and you're going to find mission people all around you, people that need to hear and see that gospel. At the gym, start to see everything that way.
It's the book of Acts continuing right here. I would say, to be continued next week. Neil picks up right here next week.
Father, take this truth, drive it home in our life and in our mind. God, thank You for loving us, saving us, and using us. We pray that in Jesus' name, amen.