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7.28.21 MOC Session #7 Pastor Nathan Anderson · HBCWestminster

• 0:00
  So as I said, we're getting through to the end of our study. We are going to be finishing off tonight our character study. Next week we'll be looking at Romans chapter 12, verses 3 through, I can't remember if it's 9, I think it's verse 9, where Paul is giving the charge to people to utilize their gifts. And this summer, as we've gone through this character study, we've been looking at different men who in the early church used their gifts
• 0:29
  to serve the church, to serve alongside the Apostle Paul. And I hope as we have gone through this study, as you guys have seen some of these guys, guys like Zenos, somebody who we probably have never heard a lesson on, but who was used by the Lord in the church, in the building of the Lord's church. I hope you guys have started to grab a hold of this theme of this purpose of this summer is to
• 0:55
  Consider what God has gifted you with and how you can use that in this church, in this body of believers. I hope you guys have been blessed as I have, as we have been going through and enjoying some fun times together, as we've done minnow races, as we have tied Twizzlers in knots, as we've done music quizzes. It's been a really fun time of fellowship. And guys, I have absolutely, I don't know about you guys, but I have absolutely been blessed.
• 1:22
  by the worship. Singing together as men is just one of the best things that we get to do. I so appreciate, Scott, you leading us in that for the summer. It has been an absolute joy to do that with you guys. As we end our character study, we are going to be looking at a man named Silas. Silas or Silvanus as he is referenced in 1 Peter chapter 5.
• 1:48
  Each week we have been, as I said, looking at these different men, which has little about them written in the Bible, right? Not many of these guys have lots written about them, but we have seen how they have been used to impact the early church.
• 2:04
  And tonight, I believe, will be no different as we look at Silas. We will be mainly in chapters 15, 16, and 17, just looking at a few verses in each of those at Silas and his life, his character, what it is about this man that made him unique and special and stood out to me as we were preparing to do this. And as you turn to Acts chapter 15, as we get ready, I have a question for you guys to think about in your life.
• 2:33
  Someone, anyone, who you can think about, who when you think about them, it's just encouraging just even to think the thought of who they are. Someone who, whether you spend two minutes with them, two hours, or two days, you walk away feeling refreshed, encouraged, and uplifted. I'm sure each one of us have someone like this in our life. It might be another guy, it might be our wives, it might be our kids.
• 3:00
  It might be any number of people. It might be a coworker. But think about that person who just always leaves you encouraged. I think tonight as we look at Silas, we are going to see a man who was an encourager, who encouraged all those that he came in contact with. And as I thought about him and I thought about how that connected with my life, I thought about a situation a few years back.
• 3:30
  I was going through a really hard time, a really, really hard time. And our middle daughter, Jane, and I were going to the grocery store. And she knew that I was going through a difficult time. And as we were walking in to the grocery store, it was just the two of us, and I was holding her hand. As we were walking into the grocery store,
• 3:56
  And she just stopped. She literally, like we were just walking and she just stopped right there. And as she stopped, she just said, Daddy. And so I stopped for a second. I didn't know what she was going to ask me. I figured she was going to have some idea of something that we needed from the grocery store that probably wasn't on the list. But we just stopped for a moment and she looked up at me. And she was about seven years old when she did this. And she said, Daddy, she just spoke this.
• 4:26
  The exact right words. She knew I was worried about something. And she said, Daddy, you don't have to worry about that. You're a good daddy. And I love you. And you're the best daddy. And she just knew exactly what I needed to hear. And it was so impactful in that moment. That actually in the middle, in the entrance of King Soopers, it brought me to tears. Because she had encouraged my and uplifted my spirit so much.
• 4:55
  Words are powerful. Encouragement can be an incredible thing. You speak words of encouragement to somebody and they can turn from being discouraged to ready to run through a brick wall with you. As we look at Silas and his life, I think we're going to see a man who lived a life of encouragement. Took every opportunity to impact others.
• 5:28
  With his life. And I think as we consider him. What I hope that we come away with. As we think about how we as fellow brothers in Christ. Can impact each other in a positive way. So that as the book of Hebrews says in chapter 10. That we can stir one another on. Towards love and good works. As we consider Silas.
• 5:50
  As we get ready to look at his life, we're going to consider him in relation to three aspects or three things that I think are revealed about who he was. Namely, that he was a faithful man, that he was a fearless man, and that he was an encourager. But first, who was this dude, Silas?
• 6:11
  Silas was a leader in the early church, a fellow missionary with the Apostle Paul, and he is referenced as a faithful brother many times, but I can never say that word specifically. 1 Peter chapter 5 verse 12 calls him a faithful brother of Paul. He was a Hellenistic Jew who, it seems, was also a Roman citizen. Acts chapter 16 verse 37 reveals that, and he is, as I said, referred to as Silvanus.
• 6:38
  In Paul's epistles several times. One time in 1 Thessalonians chapter 1 verse 1. That's who Silas was. That's information about him. That's a little bit of his back story. But let's consider what stands out about Silas. His character. Who he was. First we find that he was a faithful man. If we go to Acts chapter 15 verse 22. We're going to read through verse 27. It says this.
• 7:09
  Then it seemed good to the apostles and the elders with the whole church to choose men from among them and send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. They sent Judas called Barsabbas and Silas, leading men among the brothers. With the following letter, the brothers...
• 7:29
  both the apostles and the elders, to the brothers who are the Gentiles in Antioch and Syria and Sicilia, greeting, since we have heard that some persons have gone out from us and troubled you with words unsettling your minds. Although we gave them no instructions, it seemed good to us, having come to one accord, to choose men and send them to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, men who have risked their lives.
• 7:59
  For the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, we therefore have sent Judas and Silas, who themselves will tell you the same things by word of mouth. The first thing that stands out to me about Silas in this passage may not stand out to you at first, but prior to Silas' calling to serve alongside the Apostle Paul, he was already a revered man.
• 8:29
  In fact, he was already, as it says in verse 22, a leading man among the brothers. This is a man who was a leader among leaders. Among those who were the elders in this church who met at this council, he was considered a faithful brother, a leading man. He was also a man who helped to correct...
• 8:54
  wrong teaching we see that earlier in acts chapter 15 where there was some wrong teaching going on and these elders met together and they combated that wrong teaching to correct the church and because of that they are they then go and realize that there's other
• 9:10
  wrong teaching in other churches. In these three places, they say they're going to go to Antioch, Syria, and Sicilia. And they need to send some people alongside Paul and Barnabas to make sure that they can combat this incorrect teaching. And so they choose two guys among these other elders, these other leaders, and they choose Silas and Judas to go and do this, to go and combat this wrong teaching. He was already a faithful
• 9:39
  Man, he was already a leader. They chose these two men, Judas and Silas. We see, I believe, in this situation that this standing, this being faithful to the truth of the gospel and the word of God was no small thing. They stood up against this wrong teaching. It tells us that they were risking their lives for the name of the Lord.
• 10:09
  And as we consider this reality of this faithful man of Silas, I think there's two things that stand out to me in this portion. First, faithfulness does not spring up overnight. Faithfulness does not spring up overnight.
• 10:26
  Silas and this situation, his opportunity did not just come by happen chance. He was living a faithful life leading up to this situation, showed himself faithful in a difficult situation for the early church, and was given more opportunity. He was living a faithful life and then given a real tangible way to show his faithfulness.
• 10:56
  He first does this by standing for the truth and then by saying yes when called on by his brothers to serve alongside Barnabas and Paul. Just a side note, the way that they choose these two guys, Judas and Silas, is very much the way that we choose leaders in this church. We don't really look for guys that are going to be elected to an elder board or a trustee board who aren't already fulfilling that role.
• 11:24
  We look around and the board and the trustees and the pastors look around and say, that guy's already doing it. Why don't we just make it official? Right? That's finding somebody who's already being faithful in what they've been given and giving them an opportunity to lead among leaders. So first we note that faithfulness does not spring up overnight. He had a life of faithfulness. He was known as a faithful man already. Next, we notice that faithfulness does not come with a promise of convenience.
• 11:57
  The promise of convenience to be faithful is to not consider personal ease and comfort, but to consider what God is calling us to do. It would have been very easy for Silas, as he's called to leave his home in this local church, which he had just kind of calmed things down in with his fellow brothers, to say, you know what, I don't really want to go find more problems. I'm not really interested in going and finding. You're sending me to three different areas where there's issues.
• 12:25
  Why would I want to go do that? Because he's a faithful man, because he's a faithful brother. Faithfulness does not come with a promise of convenience. I think we see these things vividly as we look at Silas and we look at even a few weeks ago when we looked at Priscilla and Aquila. Faithfulness does not come with a promise of convenience. And Silas knew that and responded.
• 12:58
  Faithfulness does not spring up overnight. It's all those small decisions that lead to a lifetime of it, and when we have a lifetime of it, we get opportunity for more. The call to faithfulness does not come with a promise of convenience. Silas knew this, lived this, and I think it led him into this next aspect of what I think is revealed about him, that Silas was fearless.
• 13:25
  Silas was fearless. Turn over to chapter 17. We're going to look at verses 13 and 14 of Acts 17, 13, and 14. Say this. But when the Jews from Thessalonica learned that the word of God was proclaimed by Paul at Berea also, they came there too, agitating and stirring up the crowds. Then the brothers immediately sent Paul off on his way to the sea.
• 13:56
  But Silas and Timothy remained there. I had a buddy in college named Arthur Lilly. He was the most fun guy to hang out with. He was an absolute blast to hang out with. Just happy-go-lucky dude. But he also didn't really have that gene that senses danger. And so he did all kinds of, looking back, very dumb things.
• 14:27
  There was one, just to illustrate this for you, there was one time where we were working, me and Arthur and a couple other friends were working at a tree farm. And this tree farm had, we'd been working for for a while and they wanted to build this large enclosure where they could put all the trees when they were either getting prepped to go out or when they would get delivered to us. So before we got them into the ground to get watered and all that, they wanted to get them out of the sun because in Wyoming there's no trees.
• 14:56
  So you have to build enclosures and all that stuff. So we're working on these. I mean, they're huge pipes, right? And we're setting them into the ground. And they're about 20, 25 feet up in the air. And then they're going over. We're building the frame to a building, basically, right? And we get all of that stuff together. And then we're putting across kind of cross members to make it a little bit stronger. Because it also blows really bad.
• 15:24
  In Wyoming, it's really, really windy. And so you have to make it extra, yeah, you have to make it extra strong. And so we're putting these, I think they were, they might have been three or four inch steel pipes, right? And they're, this is a huge, it's like, I can't remember what the square footage of this thing was, but it was gigantic. So they're pretty long. So we got to shimmy across these posts. But we're on, we're also standing on, most of us,
• 15:53
  are standing on either buckets, skid steer buckets. We probably should have had some other things, but we had skid steer buckets we're standing on and then the back of like a container and fixing all of these things together with bolts and everything. Well, we have one that needs to, it needs to be fixed out a little bit further out. And so Arthur decides that he's going to climb up on this thing and shimmy out on it. And so...
• 16:22
  he's about 25 feet in the air and he shimmies out and we're just like, Arthur, like, just be careful. Like, please just be careful. He's like, yeah, it's fine. I'll be fine. He's got his tool belt around him. He's got the bolts ready to go out. And then he gets out there and he's probably 15 feet out from us. And he sits up on this thing and he starts dancing around on it, like goofing around and everything. And all of a sudden we see Arthur.
• 16:49
  start to tilt. It's a circle, right? So it's not like you can lock yourself in. He's got his legs locked around and he just goes over. And then he starts swinging like this. And we're like, Arthur, just stay there. We're going to go get the skids here. We'll get you down and everything. And the next thing you know, he's dangling by his arms and he's swinging around, swinging by one arm. Then he flips back up and then flips back on the top and then shimmies back down. I was like, that was the dumbest thing.
• 17:17
  You have ever done. He outdid that later on with other things. But I think sometimes as guys, we get foolishness and fearlessness confused. Silas was fearless.
• 17:34
  And the reason why I read those two verses to you guys was because in this situation, the other leaders, the other brothers who were on this missionary journey with them, become so afraid of the crowd's reaction and their hostileness towards the message, towards the gospel, that they actually decide to send Paul away. But did you guys catch? Silas and Timothy stayed back.
• 18:03
  They stayed back with this hostile crowd to continue to preach and teach the word of God. Paul was no slouch in terms of being not afraid. I mean, he certainly was not fearful. I think they sent him along because they knew he was a powerful speaker and a powerful proclaimer of the truth and wanted him to move on in his missionary journey. But these two guys, Silas and Timothy, stay behind.
• 18:33
  In this dangerous situation. This was after he had been imprisoned with Paul. Just in chapter 16 we see them imprisoned together. Actually 15, is it 15? 16, yeah it is 16. Yeah, the Philippian jailer is converted. They are, so he has answered the call to...
• 19:03
  leave his comfort of his church to go and combat a bunch of heresy that's being taught, goes to prison, and now has another opportunity to actually escape what will probably end up in a prison time for him. But he stays back to preach the gospel, to continue to encourage and strengthen the early church. I just see this fearlessness about him, a willingness to go wherever the Lord calls him.
• 19:32
  May I encourage us, though, brothers, to make sure that we understand the difference between fearlessness and foolishness. I think a really good distinctive in terms of what is foolish and what is fearless is when there is danger involved and the reward is kingdom or self. Right? We like to take risks that reward ourselves as guys.
• 20:00
  but often we'll shrink away from those times where it's a little more dangerous, but it's for the church, where it puts us a little bit on edge, makes us a little bit uncomfortable for the church. We will often take risks on our own part for our own reward, and that is foolishness. But when we risk things for the kingdom, that is being fearless.
• 20:25
  Silas was fearlessly risking his own life for the kingdom, not for personal gain. He certainly knew the difference between fearlessness and foolishness. Last, as we look at this faithful man, this fearless man, we see a man who through these traits, I believe, as well as through his words that he spoke to people was an encourager. He was an encourager. Acts chapter 15.
• 20:55
  Go back to Acts chapter 15 and verse 32. It says of Judas and Silas in Acts 15, 32. And Judas and Silas were themselves prophets and encouraged and strengthened the brothers with what? Many words. Many words. Flip with me over to Acts chapter 16, verse 25.
• 21:25
  You may have to turn a page. I don't in my Bible. But Acts chapter 16 verse 25. This is as he and Paul are in prison in Philippi. We see at about midnight it says. Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God. And the prisoners were listening to them. I want to stretch this scene that is.
• 21:53
  given to us in 16 verse 25 too far, but this is the only time, Paul is in prison a lot. This is the only time where it's recorded that he is singing. Now certainly we know from the book of Philippians that Paul considered all his trials pure joy, right? He was not a man who shrunk away from hard times and did not struggle with proper perspective. But this is one of the only times
• 22:22
  that I'm aware of where he is singing in prison. And he's with Silas. And they are singing songs of praise in the midst of trial. Silas just seems to be that kind of guy that when you're around him, you are encouraged by the very atmosphere that he creates. As he faithfully walks alongside you, fearlessly coming alongside you,
• 22:57
  speaking those words of encouragement, living those words of encouragement in his life. As Paul and Silas are in prison, they're singing praise to God. If I was going to be in prison, there are a lot of guys in the Bible who I think would be great. I really do think if I was going to be in prison, Silas would probably be the guy I would choose.
• 23:24
  is just a faithful, faithful brother. He is a man who had proper perspective, who would draw your eyes away from the earthly situation to a heavenly reward. As they're sitting there, I can just picture him encouraging Paul as he did those other brothers in verse 32, as he spoke those words which strengthened and encouraged them. He, in that moment, as they're sitting in jail,
• 23:55
  is telling Paul we are considered worthy of the gospel through this trial brother may we praise God that we get to man who in the midst of trying times would point your eyes heavenward and remind you that God is in control and still worthy of praise Silas was a really faithful brother he was fearless
• 24:27
  held nothing back, traveled with Paul. Later on, after staying back in Berea, he goes and meets with Paul once again and travels with him alongside Paul for many years. A faithful, fearless encourager to his fellow brothers. And because of that, I believe he was used mightily in the church. I think we can see his hand in correcting the errors.
• 25:02
  He was a man who was used to deliver messages alongside Paul for his entire missionary life. You know, as John Mark fades away for a moment, Silas is faithful. If you guys remember John Mark, the guy who wrote the Gospel of Mark, he kind of shrinks away in the midst of all of these difficult times, but not Silas.
• 25:35
  Silas stays strong, he stays faithful, he stays fearless, and he stays alongside the Apostle Paul's throughout all of this. Brothers, what a joy it is to have the opportunity to uplift and encourage one another. It is a blessing from the Lord that we can encourage one another, that by words of encouragement, by...
• 25:58
  living a life that affirms one another, we can actually, as Hebrews says, stir one another on towards love and good works. I think we see that in Silas' life, that he was a man who did this. And I hope...
• 26:13
  That we can consider how we can. There are some questions I have for you guys. How we can do that for one another. We certainly need that in our lives. Do we not? I need faithful men. I need faithful brothers who want to encourage me. Life is hard. Being a dad is hard. Being a husband is hard. We need faithful brothers who will come alongside us and encourage us. I encourage you guys to look over those questions. Talk over them.
• 26:44
  There is one specifically that I would really like for you guys to do. It talks about thinking about that one person who has been a faithful encourager in your life. And within the next week, I would like for you guys to not text, to call them and thank them and speak words of encouragement back to them.
• 27:06
  They have been a faithful brother in your life, a faithful friend in your life, whether that's your kids, whether that's your wife, whether that's another friend. Do that in this next week. That is my encouragement. That's my challenge for you guys. I'm going to pray and close, and you guys have some time to talk. Father in heaven, as we consider this man Silas, a man who had lived his life faithfully up until a moment of decision, as he was met with that decision,
• 27:35
  Met it straight forward, Lord, and combated the heresy, the wrong teaching that was happening, Lord, and then you called more from him. You gave him opportunities to be even more faithful. You called him into situations which would have made many fearful. God, but he was fearless in the face of these difficult times, Lord, and you saw him through it all. God, you used him to encourage.
• 28:06
  the Apostle Paul, and many other brothers in those early church settings, God. I pray that you would use us for that. That we would be those faithful, fearless encouragers of one another. That we might stir one another on towards love and good works. Father, we pray these things in your name. Amen.