Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / June 19, 2016 | Route 66 - Acts

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June 19, 2016 | Route 66 - Acts · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

0:00
SPEAKER_00: Happy Father's Day.
0:03
SPEAKER_00: Rob and Janie, that's so cute.
0:05
SPEAKER_00: How did two shy parents get Richie?
0:08
SPEAKER_00: Richie's up there.
0:09
SPEAKER_00: He's just so he's tapping his heel.
0:11
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you, Richie.
0:12
SPEAKER_00: You are like so outgoing.
0:14
SPEAKER_00: You'd like to be up here right now, wouldn't you?
0:16
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you want the mic?
0:17
SPEAKER_00: You're on, buddy.
0:19
SPEAKER_00: Man, that's amazing.
0:21
SPEAKER_00: If you've ever met that kid, he's been that way since birth, by the way.
0:25
SPEAKER_00: Um listen, uh, baptism.
0:27
SPEAKER_00: Hope you come to baptism tonight.
0:29
SPEAKER_00: Baptisms are just, they're just awesome.
0:32
SPEAKER_00: That's why I put that uh, had you watch that little marine video a couple weeks ago.
0:37
SPEAKER_00: I baptized about, you know, we took this Israel tour.
0:40
SPEAKER_00: It's just great.
0:40
SPEAKER_00: Hope you can go sometime.
0:42
SPEAKER_00: We're in the Jordan River.
0:43
SPEAKER_00: We always have a baptism right, Lee and Janet, over there, and had about a dozen people baptized, and we're singing and clapping, and it was really cool.
0:53
SPEAKER_00: And then at the end, you know, so I think it's over, and I get this little tap on my shoulder.
0:57
SPEAKER_00: I'm out in the water, I'm hoping to get out of the water because they've got all these fish that are pulling the hairs right out of my leg.
1:03
SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, we're trying to be reverend out there, but all of a sudden I feel this little tap on my arm, and it's this shy little guy and his wife, and they're they're effusive little girls, sort of the rich, you know, a girl version of Richie.
1:17
SPEAKER_00: And and and in broken language, you know, uh, because I don't speak Spanish, they said, Can we get baptized?
1:26
SPEAKER_00: It was so neat.
1:27
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Where are you from?
1:28
SPEAKER_00: And they said, Columbia, South America.
1:31
SPEAKER_00: And this husband and wife and their daughter had watched her baptism and come out in the water and just crept a little closer, and you know, then at the end, and oh, it was it was so moving to baptize them.
1:42
SPEAKER_00: And I said, How old's your little girl?
1:44
SPEAKER_00: And they said, almost six, and she knew that you can't even exaggerate on your baptism day, and she said, I'm five.
1:50
SPEAKER_00: And so baptized her, and everybody was clapping and crying, and it was wonderful.
1:56
SPEAKER_00: So, baptism is just so special on heaven and on earth, and I hope you'll come tonight at 6:30.
2:04
SPEAKER_00: So uh we're back uh after about a month's break.
2:08
SPEAKER_00: Thank God for Tim Collins, he's awesome.
2:10
SPEAKER_00: We're back on Route 66.
2:12
SPEAKER_00: We're taking a journey through the Bible if you're just visiting, and we've gotten to the fifth book of the New Testament.
2:18
SPEAKER_00: It's called the Acts of the Apostles, and I want to start by asking you whether you are an optimist or a pessimist.
2:26
SPEAKER_00: Maybe I should ask, what would your wife or what would your husband call you?
2:30
SPEAKER_00: Are you glass half empty or glass half full person?
2:34
SPEAKER_00: Light at the end of the tunnel, optimist, you're sure it's a sunny day, it's new, bright, bright future ahead.
2:40
SPEAKER_00: Uh pessimist like Charles Barkley, say it's a train, the light of an oncoming train at the end of the tunnel.
2:47
SPEAKER_00: And if you if you're more of the pessimist today in America, well, you can be, I suppose, forgiven because life in America today in 2016 is sort of like riding one of those brand new huge roller coasters.
3:00
SPEAKER_00: There's some ups and there's some downs, but if you're not screaming once in a while, then your eyes must be closed because there's some wild stuff happening in America.
3:09
SPEAKER_00: A Huffington Post headline recently, Top 12 Reasons this is the most depressing election ever.
3:16
SPEAKER_00: Washington Post, a bleak look at America's future.
3:19
SPEAKER_00: I was uh in California uh for a week last week, uh, some mission stuff.
3:24
SPEAKER_00: And last Sunday I sat in church with a friend, uh uh a Christian leader from Australia and a Christian leader from Europe and a Christian leader from South Africa and a Christian leader from Canada.
3:34
SPEAKER_00: And that afternoon we were sitting together uh grilling steaks, and and every single one of them shared a story that's so familiar that they've either had just had an election or about to have an election, and and the rise of secularism in their country and a political leader in charge of their country who's just nobody they ever guessed, no one in their wildest imagination could have ever guessed they would have.
4:00
SPEAKER_00: And so there's a tendency today to cry out and say, what is happening?
4:05
SPEAKER_00: But the problem is that pessimism is bad for the soul, and pessimism is bad for your heart.
4:11
SPEAKER_00: Pessimism is bad for your body.
4:14
SPEAKER_00: John Maxwell, I think, is right.
4:16
SPEAKER_00: Where there is no hope in the future, there's no power in the present.
4:21
SPEAKER_00: So it's so good that we have come this morning to the book of the Acts of the Apostles in the New Testament, because in my view, the best theme sentence for this book is it just keeps growing.
4:31
SPEAKER_00: Speaking of Christianity, it just keeps growing and growing and growing.
4:37
SPEAKER_00: All right, grab your study sheet for a second.
4:39
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna read a few sentences from the front of it.
4:42
SPEAKER_00: If you're just listening online, uh uh we have these study sheets.
4:46
SPEAKER_00: If you write our office, we'll send them to you.
4:49
SPEAKER_00: But some of what's uh written on this study sheet goes like this Jesus' last words are called the Great Commission.
4:55
SPEAKER_00: You shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the ends of the earth, chapter 1, verse 8.
5:01
SPEAKER_00: The book of Acts, which Dr.
5:03
SPEAKER_00: Luke begins, where he left off in his gospel, is the story of how God spread the gospel of Jesus from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth through his witnesses.
5:14
SPEAKER_00: And some people divide the book up that way geographically.
5:17
SPEAKER_00: Jerusalem, chapters 1 through 7, Samaria, Judea, 8 through 12, ends of the earth, chapters 13 through 28.
5:24
SPEAKER_00: Others split this book up between the witness of Peter, chapters 1 through 12, and Paul.
5:29
SPEAKER_00: But if you look at how Luke writes it, Luke himself divides his book into six sections with little summary statements in six, seven, and so forth.
5:38
SPEAKER_00: I'll show you those.
5:39
SPEAKER_00: And in each case, he pauses for a moment, then takes off as the gospel expands in a new direction.
5:46
SPEAKER_00: The story moves constantly forward from its Jewish start in Jerusalem with Peter and the twelve to its end in a Gentile church in Rome with Paul as the leader.
5:56
SPEAKER_00: What God wills, the Spirit carries out.
5:59
SPEAKER_00: God's will is that this gospel will spread and the church will grow, leading people to life in Christ.
6:06
SPEAKER_00: It's book so encouraging about the future, about the faith, and about hardship.
6:13
SPEAKER_00: Flip your sheet over.
6:15
SPEAKER_00: You'll see there's only two lessons, two major lessons, I think, from this book.
6:18
SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna, I hope I'll make them clear enough so that you'll remember them and they will encourage your heart.
6:23
SPEAKER_00: But before we get to those, I'd like to do what I've been doing the last six months, and that is to sort of rehearse a half a dozen of the greatest verses of this book.
6:31
SPEAKER_00: Verses which I hope you're familiar with or even have memorized.
6:35
SPEAKER_00: So let's say some of them together.
6:37
SPEAKER_00: Acts 1.8, together, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth.
6:52
SPEAKER_00: Now, three verses later, just after Jesus goes up into heaven, the angels ask, men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven?
7:02
SPEAKER_00: This same Jesus, say it with me, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw him go into heaven, coming of Christ, back down unto the Mount of Olives.
7:16
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 2, 21, and everyone together who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.
7:22
SPEAKER_00: And there is no salvation.
7:24
SPEAKER_00: This is such an important verse.
7:26
SPEAKER_00: With John 14, 6, these are the two great verses in the New Testament that remind us that there is only one door to heaven, and that door is named Jesus.
7:36
SPEAKER_00: There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.
7:47
SPEAKER_00: In the next chapter, there's a line that the apostles use to the government, which helps us understand church-state relations, we ought to obey God rather than men.
7:59
SPEAKER_00: And maybe the most famous verse in the book, and one you certainly should know by heart, the jailer confronts Paul and says, as the doors are swinging open, what must I do to be saved?
8:10
SPEAKER_00: What does Paul say?
8:12
SPEAKER_00: Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.
8:18
SPEAKER_00: One more verse I want to point you toward.
8:21
SPEAKER_00: Very easy for children to memorize.
8:25
SPEAKER_00: Interesting thing about this verse is we have no record of Jesus saying these words, but Paul says that Jesus did.
8:32
SPEAKER_00: It is more blessed to give than to receive, Acts 20, 35.
8:37
SPEAKER_00: Some great, great verses that you should know and uh hopefully know by heart.
8:43
SPEAKER_00: So, what are those two lessons that uh that Luke gives us, Dr.
8:47
SPEAKER_00: Luke?
8:48
SPEAKER_00: Well, the first lesson of this book, the overriding lesson of this book, the encouraging lesson of this book, the lesson of this book directed toward pessimists is concerning Christianity, you can't stop it.
9:05
SPEAKER_00: You can't stop it.
9:07
SPEAKER_00: Now, I want to take you through this book quickly and show you how this is the major message of this book.
9:13
SPEAKER_00: So I want you to picture that you are there when the curtain rises on the drama of this book, a drama in six scenes or six acts.
9:23
SPEAKER_00: The whole book begins on a hilltop.
9:25
SPEAKER_00: The hilltop is called the Hill of Olives.
9:27
SPEAKER_00: It has olive trees on it.
9:29
SPEAKER_00: You can look down in the city of Jerusalem.
9:31
SPEAKER_00: Let's just say that you are there invisibly, and beside you there are 12 others.
9:36
SPEAKER_00: There are 11 apostles, no Judas anymore, and there is the person you most admire, and his name is Yeshua or Jesus.
9:45
SPEAKER_00: And someone says to Jesus, Jesus, what happens now?
9:50
SPEAKER_00: I mean, are you gonna bring the kingdom in, kick the Romans out, you've died, you've risen again?
9:54
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said, Hey, been great knowing you guys.
9:57
SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna answer that question, but I am gonna tell you that after I leave, if you hang around in Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit's gonna come down on you and absolutely transform your lives and transform the world.
10:09
SPEAKER_00: And at that moment he leaves.
10:11
SPEAKER_00: You just sort of like, though you don't know anything about anti-gravity pills back then, he just sort of seems to just start floating.
10:19
SPEAKER_00: He levitates up and there's this cloud about the size maybe of an 18-wheeler, which sort of opens and receives him.
10:26
SPEAKER_00: And then it turns around, you know, on its back wheels and changes from diesel to rocket fuel and zooms up and is gone.
10:33
SPEAKER_00: Just like that, it's gone.
10:34
SPEAKER_00: And there you are, and the rest of the apostles with your heads jacked back and your mouths flopped open like you're catching popcorn, when a couple of bright beings beside you, angels, tell you, close your mouths and do what Jesus told you to do.
10:48
SPEAKER_00: Go to Jerusalem and wait.
10:50
SPEAKER_00: So you do that, and you go to Jerusalem, and there you are, and you're waiting with the 120 Jesus followers.
10:57
SPEAKER_00: That's about how many of you there are.
10:59
SPEAKER_00: And it comes the second great feast of the Jews comes along.
11:03
SPEAKER_00: It's called Shavuot, or it's an agricultural feast of the harvest.
11:08
SPEAKER_00: And so you have the day off, and and and there you are, and you're praying with the rest of them on this on this day of, well, we call it the day of Pentecost.
11:17
SPEAKER_00: That's what it begins, becomes known as.
11:19
SPEAKER_00: When all of a sudden, as you're praying, there's this sound like a hurricane, you know.
11:24
SPEAKER_00: Except it turns out it's not a hurricane like wind that, you know, blows your hair off, but but it it's it turns out it's the wind of the Spirit, and you know that because you feel the Holy Spirit Himself just dropping right into you and just just changing you from inside and making you incredibly bold and wanting to witness and tell a whole world about Jesus.
11:45
SPEAKER_00: And you open your eyes and then you see this strange thing.
11:48
SPEAKER_00: You see these flickering like flames of fire hovering over everybody's head, except again, it's not a fire that's burning your hair or theirs.
11:57
SPEAKER_00: It's actually like they're like flickering tongues that are speaking the word of God, and you know that because your tongue has begun to sort of flicker in rhythm with it, and it's making sounds of a foreign language that you don't know.
12:11
SPEAKER_00: It's really crazy, and you're jabbering away and you're all happy, and then all of a sudden the 120 of you find yourselves outside.
12:18
SPEAKER_00: And you're all and you know that what you're doing is you're preaching about Jesus and talking about him, and it's so exciting, and you're jabbering away, and they're because it's the huge feast, there's a hundred thousand people around, and they start gathering around you, and you're scared because all of a sudden these tall black guys from like Africa, Jewish people come and they're huddled around you, and it's like they can understand you, and they begin then to beat their chests and cry and wail and repent, and in the midst of it all, your your sort of leader, Peter, he stands up on the top step there outside the temple, and he calls on everybody with a loud voice, and he says, You all need to repent to escape the wrath of God because you've crucified his son and so forth.
12:59
SPEAKER_00: And people do.
13:00
SPEAKER_00: People start repenting and believing in Jesus by the droves, not just by the dozens, but by the hundreds, and then by the thousands.
13:08
SPEAKER_00: And by the end of that day, it's unbelievable.
13:11
SPEAKER_00: 3,000, 3,000 people have joined you, and all of a sudden you're a tiny little struggling, timid group of people.
13:19
SPEAKER_00: It's no longer tiny, struggling, or timid.
13:22
SPEAKER_00: It's now 3,120 and you're bold, and and it's you know what it is.
13:29
SPEAKER_00: It's it's it's what Jesus promised.
13:31
SPEAKER_00: It's the beginning of his church.
13:33
SPEAKER_00: It's started, it's starting to grow, and you wake up the next day and you wonder if it's gonna be over.
13:39
SPEAKER_00: But no, it's just amazing the gospel's spreading, they're telling their friends, and the church just keeps on growing.
13:47
SPEAKER_00: But you're thinking, wow, Israel's in such a mess, you know, to today with all of the rigmarole and the bad government and everything else, and and the priests have got to have the limelight.
13:58
SPEAKER_00: It's gonna take an absolute miracle to turn this thing around.
14:03
SPEAKER_00: But that's what happens.
14:04
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the miracles.
14:05
SPEAKER_00: Well, you're walking up into the temple a couple days later with a couple of the apostles, Peter and John, and there's this crippled little Jew who's been there for years.
14:13
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he's he's been crippled since he was born.
14:15
SPEAKER_00: Peter chats with him and then lifts him up, and and the and the guy's healed.
14:21
SPEAKER_00: He it's a miracle.
14:22
SPEAKER_00: And he begins jumping around like a jack in the box, going into the temple and praising God, and and a whole crowd gathers, and Peter turns around and he preaches to them, and now 5,000 people, 5,000 Jews become Christians, and you're going, oh my goodness, where are we all gonna meet?
14:39
SPEAKER_00: And it's it's just amazing how the gospel is spreading and the church keeps growing.
14:44
SPEAKER_00: And of course, light attracts bugs, and honey attracts wasps, and so there start being these attacks from outside.
14:50
SPEAKER_00: The, you know, the you know, the muckety mucks don't like being out of the limelight, so they throw you all in prison, but God opens the doors and then he drops the spirit on you again, just so you won't get timid, just so you'll continue being bold.
15:05
SPEAKER_00: And then there's then the wasp attack from inside the church.
15:08
SPEAKER_00: You've got a group of people who say we're not being fed, and and others who are lying about the money they're bringing, Ananias and Sapphire, but in the end they lie dead, and seven of your best people are helping out the poor, and and and again, the gospel keeps on spreading, and the church keeps growing, and that's the end.
15:26
SPEAKER_00: You say, well, that's a lot story.
15:28
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's just the end of panel number one, and Luke concludes it by saying, and the word of God kept on spreading, and the number of believers greatly increased in Jerusalem.
15:37
SPEAKER_00: Many of the Jewish priests were converted, too.
15:41
SPEAKER_00: And he rears back and then he takes another run at it.
15:44
SPEAKER_00: And now the next section of the book of Acts is all about how the hostility really gets serious and they start killing people.
15:51
SPEAKER_00: Your friend Stephen sure doesn't deserve to die, but but they trumped up charges and they stone him and they kill him.
15:57
SPEAKER_00: And yet, in the midst of that, the greater the heat, the greater the expansion.
16:02
SPEAKER_00: And now God starts saving people in weird places.
16:05
SPEAKER_00: There's an Ethiopian government guy in a chariot that gets saved out near Gaza, and then there's this brilliant Jewish intellectual who gets knocked down by a bright light from heaven that makes the sun look like a 40-watt bulb, and he blasts them to the ground, and he hears a voice from heaven calling his name in Hebrew twice.
16:24
SPEAKER_00: Shaol, Shaol, how come you're fighting against me?
16:27
SPEAKER_00: And when Saul gets his wits about him, he looks up and says, Who are you, Lord?
16:32
SPEAKER_00: And to his astonishment, to his astonishment, since he's got a goons squad heading up to Damascus to wipe out the followers of Yeshua, he hears back, My name is Yeshua the Nazarene, whom you're persecuting.
16:47
SPEAKER_00: It's astounding, and that moment changes, changes Saul's life.
16:52
SPEAKER_00: After that, he takes his Roman name, Paul, he goes up to Damascus.
16:55
SPEAKER_00: He's blind for three days, gets baptized, the spirit falls on him, but but the whole ch the whole history of the world changes at that moment.
17:04
SPEAKER_00: Not just Saul's history, because he's going to be the man who will replace, in a sense, the twelve apostles.
17:10
SPEAKER_00: Take the gospel out to the uttermost parts of the world.
17:15
SPEAKER_00: And when that section is done, the curtain falls, and we read Luke's summary statement in Acts 9.31.
17:22
SPEAKER_00: The church throughout all Judea, Samaria, Galilee, and Samaria had peace, built up and continued to increase.
17:29
SPEAKER_00: It rears back and takes another run at it, and now the next section is the Apostle Peter coming out from Jerusalem because Peter's the one who's going to be the first to take the gospel to Gentiles.
17:41
SPEAKER_00: Because back then, of course, the Christianity was all Jewish.
17:45
SPEAKER_00: Gentiles become Christians?
17:47
SPEAKER_00: That was weird.
17:48
SPEAKER_00: Of course, it's just the opposite today, right?
17:50
SPEAKER_00: Gentiles are Christians, and Jews go, that's not for us.
17:54
SPEAKER_00: That's a Gentile, really?
17:55
SPEAKER_00: Well, well, Peter is one of these guys who can't believe it would go to the Gentiles.
18:00
SPEAKER_00: So God has to give him a strange dream, and then he has to get a knock on the door and go visit a guy named Cornelius and see God work in a great way.
18:09
SPEAKER_00: And all of a sudden, that door which is locked shut by the synagogue and by the Jews is kicked open for the Gentiles.
18:16
SPEAKER_00: And Luke's summary is the word of God continued to spread, and there were many new believers.
18:22
SPEAKER_00: And so now we follow the history of Paul as he goes here and he goes there.
18:27
SPEAKER_00: And at the end of each one of these Acts, we find statements like Acts 16 5.
18:32
SPEAKER_00: The churches were strengthened in the faith and increased in number daily.
18:36
SPEAKER_00: Acts 19.
18:37
SPEAKER_00: So the word of the Lord continued to spread and grow in power.
18:41
SPEAKER_00: And fast forward to the end of the book, the last verse in the book, Acts 28, 31.
18:46
SPEAKER_00: Paul finally goes to Rome.
18:48
SPEAKER_00: He was preaching, we read, in the kingdom of God and teaching concerning the Lord Jesus Christ with all openness.
18:54
SPEAKER_00: Unhindered.
18:55
SPEAKER_00: Interesting word in Greek.
18:57
SPEAKER_00: Last word of the book.
18:58
SPEAKER_00: Clearly, Luke selected a word with special meaning.
19:03
SPEAKER_00: What is the meaning of the word unhindered?
19:05
SPEAKER_00: Scottish theologian, brilliant guy I've met him, Howard Marshall, just passed away.
19:10
SPEAKER_00: Nothing can stop the spread and final victory of the gospel.
19:14
SPEAKER_00: That's why he uses that word unhindered at the end of the book.
19:18
SPEAKER_00: Howard Marshall puts the theme of Acts so clearly.
19:23
SPEAKER_00: Nothing can stop the spread and final victory of the gospel.
19:27
SPEAKER_00: In a dark day, in a day when we're tempted to be pessimistic.
19:31
SPEAKER_00: This is a book that says, hey, the church, you can't stop it.
19:34
SPEAKER_00: It just keeps growing and growing and growing.
19:39
SPEAKER_00: You say, really?
19:41
SPEAKER_00: I mean, is that true?
19:44
SPEAKER_00: And the answer is if you look at the statistics or follow them, it is precisely true.
19:49
SPEAKER_00: The most recent survey put out one year ago, recorded in the in the uh the premier uh missions journal, the International Bulletin of Missionary Research, IBM R, came this year's report from the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary reporting that yes, it really is true that the church just keeps growing and growing.
20:14
SPEAKER_00: One summary statement went like this: the world's becoming more religious, and that's because the world's largest non-religious populations, former communist countries, especially China, are becoming more religious.
20:28
SPEAKER_00: But let me excerpt for you five trends that this article shows just to encourage your hearts.
20:34
SPEAKER_00: Can I do that just to show that Acts is telling the truth, that God is telling us that the church will just keep growing and growing and growing?
20:43
SPEAKER_00: Number one, the church is growing around the world, even in those places where you don't think it is.
20:49
SPEAKER_00: Even in Europe, where it's just growing a teeny bit above, uh, but it's growing faster than the population.
20:56
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and in America, where it's not growing the way it used to, but but even then, in 19, the year 1900, do you realize that your great-great-grandparents, that only 20% of Americans attended church in 1900?
21:12
SPEAKER_00: We're usually here that we were such a religious country in the past and we're not anymore.
21:17
SPEAKER_00: 20% of Americans went to church in 1900.
21:20
SPEAKER_00: Well over twice that number attend church on the average, attend Christian church in 2016.
21:28
SPEAKER_00: And if you if you look beyond America and Europe, the church is seeing jaw-dropping growth in Asia, India, and China, for instance.
21:39
SPEAKER_00: Africa and South America.
21:41
SPEAKER_00: Take Africa.
21:42
SPEAKER_00: In year 1900, there were only 9 million Christians in all of the continent of Africa.
21:49
SPEAKER_00: 9 million.
21:50
SPEAKER_00: Today there are over 550 million Christians in the continent of Africa, with 33,000.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: People trusting Christ are becoming Christians every single day in Africa now.
22:07
SPEAKER_00: 33,000, well above, well above the growth statistics, the birth statistics in Africa.
22:14
SPEAKER_00: Jaw-dropping growth.
22:16
SPEAKER_00: The church, now the center of the church and the world is not America.
22:21
SPEAKER_00: It is primarily in Asia and in Africa and in South America.
22:26
SPEAKER_00: Number three, Christianity is easily, easily the world's largest religion.
22:31
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I thought it was Islam, you say.
22:34
SPEAKER_00: No, Christianity has 2.4 billion, 2.4 billion adherents out of about 7 billion in the world.
22:42
SPEAKER_00: Islam is 700,000 behind that, about 1.7 billion.
22:48
SPEAKER_00: Number four, atheism has peaked.
22:50
SPEAKER_00: You say, not from what I read.
22:52
SPEAKER_00: I'm constantly reading in the media or hearing in the media about some famous atheist.
22:57
SPEAKER_00: Yes, it is.
22:58
SPEAKER_00: It is no longer.
22:59
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the atheists have come out of the closet.
23:01
SPEAKER_00: But the number of atheists in the world peaked in 1970 with 165 million.
23:07
SPEAKER_00: It's presently about 136 million and dropping to 125 million in another nine years.
23:14
SPEAKER_00: Atheism has peaked.
23:15
SPEAKER_00: Throw in the agnostics, those who question but are not sure that there's no God.
23:20
SPEAKER_00: You have about four times that many, but still, it's only a smaller fraction of the world.
23:26
SPEAKER_00: Number five, God's word is getting to more people than ever before.
23:31
SPEAKER_00: We are now putting out many more copies of the Bible.
23:35
SPEAKER_00: This year, over 80 million copies of the Bible will get into people's hands around the world.
23:39
SPEAKER_00: We're headed toward a hundred million, five billion pieces of scripture will be published this year and get into people's hands.
23:47
SPEAKER_00: The church, it just keeps growing and growing and growing.
23:53
SPEAKER_00: So the first lesson of this book is you can't stop it, but just as important a lesson, especially for those of us who perhaps are on the border, perhaps you're seeking, not quite sure where you are, is you may not be able to stop it, but you need to know something.
24:07
SPEAKER_00: You can believe it, you can rely on it.
24:10
SPEAKER_00: Now, you say, um, was that an issue back then?
24:14
SPEAKER_00: Huge issue in 60 AD when Luke wrote.
24:18
SPEAKER_00: Huge issue.
24:19
SPEAKER_00: People are going, really?
24:20
SPEAKER_00: I mean, can I really believe what you're telling me about Jesus being the Messiah of the Jews and the Savior of the whole world?
24:29
SPEAKER_00: And I mean, look at how everything's changed.
24:32
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is gone.
24:34
SPEAKER_00: By the end of the book, those 12 apostles are gone.
24:37
SPEAKER_00: You know, aren't you supposed to have 12, like the 12 tribes and the 12 apostles?
24:41
SPEAKER_00: Now all you've got is this short, bow-legged guy with bad eyes and balding and a big nose.
24:47
SPEAKER_00: So I'm supposed to listen to Paul.
24:49
SPEAKER_00: And it's no longer in Jerusalem.
24:51
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that where the whole thing happened?
24:53
SPEAKER_00: Now we're in Rome, right?
24:55
SPEAKER_00: And it's no longer Jewish, it's now more of a Gentile religion.
24:59
SPEAKER_00: So you have all of these people going, can I really believe that this is true?
25:05
SPEAKER_00: And Luke's answer is listen, Christianity is not only unstoppable, it's reliable, it's believable, you can trust it.
25:13
SPEAKER_00: And one of the ways he shows this is by portraying Paul as the legitimate descendant of Jesus Christ, as really like Jesus Christ risen from the dead.
25:24
SPEAKER_00: So he portrays him, Paul like Jesus, born into a conservative, a fundamentalist Jewish home, and followed the Torah his entire life.
25:33
SPEAKER_00: Grew up, and when he got baptized, the Holy Spirit fell on Paul just as it did on Jesus at his baptism and stayed on him the rest of his life.
25:43
SPEAKER_00: And then Paul went to the synagogues first the way Jesus did.
25:46
SPEAKER_00: And Paul had the exact same message, proving from the Old Testament that Yeshua was the true Messiah, the descendant of all of those promises that were made.
25:56
SPEAKER_00: That was Paul's message.
25:58
SPEAKER_00: And just like with Jesus, the synagogue rejected him.
26:01
SPEAKER_00: They kicked him out, they tried to stone him.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: Actually, with Paul, they succeeded, unlike in Nazareth with Jesus.
26:10
SPEAKER_00: And so Paul took his message just as Jesus did and started leading Gentiles to a knowledge of faith, to a knowledge of the Savior, to a knowledge of God.
26:20
SPEAKER_00: And just like Jesus, the Apostle Paul, proved his merit by healing people of their diseases, by casting demons out of people, and by, get this, raising people from the dead.
26:31
SPEAKER_00: Just like Jesus, so Paul.
26:34
SPEAKER_00: And then eventually, just like Jesus, Paul, knowing it would kill him, set his face toward Jerusalem and headed that direction, despite the advice of everyone else, knowing he would die, but willingly faced Jerusalem.
26:47
SPEAKER_00: And just like Jesus, Paul endured four trials, show trials, false trials, at which a Roman governor said, I see no fault in this man.
26:56
SPEAKER_00: But crowds said, We still want him dead.
26:59
SPEAKER_00: And as a result, the Romans still crucified, still killed Paul the way they crucified Jesus in the midst of criminals.
27:07
SPEAKER_00: And Dr.
27:08
SPEAKER_00: Luke is saying, Listen, do you realize Paul is a legitimate follower, a descendant of Jesus Christ and the 12 apostles?
27:17
SPEAKER_00: Christianity is reliable, it is true.
27:21
SPEAKER_00: Let me stop and just say, if this is something you're wondering about, you question it, you know that this is a growing phenomenon across the world, perhaps.
27:31
SPEAKER_00: I need you to know that not only is it a growing phenomenon, not only can it not be stopped, but it's something you genuinely can believe.
27:39
SPEAKER_00: You can believe that Jesus Christ came to earth, lived, died for your sins, and rose again to give you eternal life.
27:46
SPEAKER_00: Christianity can't be stopped, but it can be believed.
27:50
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
27:52
SPEAKER_00: So uh here's what we ask.
27:54
SPEAKER_00: We ask, okay, really?
27:55
SPEAKER_00: Uh the light at the end of the tunnel.
27:58
SPEAKER_00: Should you be an optimist or a pessimist?
28:00
SPEAKER_00: Well, when it comes to the most important things in life, not politics, not the next week or the next year, or the next decade, but when it comes to the glory of God and the kingdom of God and the gospel in the church, you should be an optimist because you can't stop the church.
28:18
SPEAKER_00: It just keeps growing and growing and growing.
28:21
SPEAKER_00: Let me give you several things, several encouragements that I personally feel I'll just share with you.
28:26
SPEAKER_00: I'm so encouraged when I look at this church.
28:28
SPEAKER_00: This is a church in Southwest Cairo.
28:30
SPEAKER_00: This is a church composed of tens of thousands.
28:33
SPEAKER_00: Get that, tens of thousands of trash people.
28:37
SPEAKER_00: They call them garbage people because they pick through garbage dumps.
28:40
SPEAKER_00: They're very poor people.
28:41
SPEAKER_00: And they meet in a giant cave, huge cave, huge cave, Cairo.
28:46
SPEAKER_00: This is in a Muslim country, and they meet by the thousands to praise Jesus.
28:51
SPEAKER_00: Or we go to China.
28:52
SPEAKER_00: This encourages me, where not only thousands, but millions, millions of young Chinese are turning to Christ in the greatest revival, perhaps, that mankind has ever seen.
29:03
SPEAKER_00: Ever.
29:04
SPEAKER_00: The church is growing fastest in China of all places.
29:08
SPEAKER_00: Now, much smaller numbers, but when you go to Israel, if you lead one Jew to Christ, that's great for a whole month.
29:17
SPEAKER_00: I mean, Jews are just, it's just so hard for them to become believers in Israel.
29:22
SPEAKER_00: But yet a couple of weeks ago, we had Dan Sarod, the leader of Jews for Jesus in Israel, come to speak to our tour group.
29:28
SPEAKER_00: It was the last day of their campaign in Samaria.
29:31
SPEAKER_00: They had the most response ever, even though it was a very conservative, fundamentalist Jewish group.
29:36
SPEAKER_00: 43 Jews trusting Christ in just 11 days, 25 at one meeting itself, saved in Samaria.
29:45
SPEAKER_00: Or I'll give you, here's another one.
29:47
SPEAKER_00: This is from GQ Magazine this year.
29:50
SPEAKER_00: GQ Magazine.
29:52
SPEAKER_00: 14-page article.
29:53
SPEAKER_00: I suggest you look at it.
29:55
SPEAKER_00: It's a story about Hillsong Church there in New York City, the article written by Taffy, a young Jewish woman who says, who spends time with Carl, who is sort of the leader pastor of the Hillsong Church.
30:07
SPEAKER_00: And while she ends up writing a critical article called What Would Cool Jesus Do, is you read the article, you find out, you understand.
30:15
SPEAKER_00: She's absolutely moved by the fact that as she spends time with Carl and at this church, she feels irresistibly drawn.
30:22
SPEAKER_00: She's just, despite the fact, I hate, I hate everything he stands for politically.
30:27
SPEAKER_00: I hate his view on gay marriage, I hate his view on abortion, I hate his view on all these issues, and yet there's something there when they sing about Jesus and when they call, and she says, I'm I'm just blown away.
30:38
SPEAKER_00: Here's Justin Bieber, Justin Bieber with drugs, and he's living with Carl for over a month, and he repents and he weeps and he has to be baptized.
30:47
SPEAKER_00: And over there's Kevin Durant, and she says, this is just a church that's leading, that's just bringing people that I just don't understand.
30:54
SPEAKER_00: And you and I have to say, we don't understand what God's doing in the world, right?
30:58
SPEAKER_00: Every church does not look like our church, but God's doing incredible things in the world, amazing things in the world, and the church just keeps growing and growing and growing.
31:08
SPEAKER_00: And one of the most encouraging stories, and I'll end with this one, here's a picture from just this week over in Germany.
31:14
SPEAKER_00: Picture from this week, from a couple that went out from our church, Trent and Tammy, who just a year ago they're talking with Syrian refugees and with fellows from Muslim countries and so forth up there, and people are coming to Christ.
31:27
SPEAKER_00: No, they're not.
31:27
SPEAKER_00: They can hardly get conversations with people, but something's happened just a few months ago, and there's something exploding over there.
31:34
SPEAKER_00: And I must say a little comment because I'm going to show a video right now that cannot be on our website.
31:40
SPEAKER_00: If you're listening to this, if you're watching this online and you want me to send you this, I will send you a link to this, but we cannot put it on our website.
31:49
SPEAKER_00: Look at this video of what's happening right now over in Germany.
31:56
SPEAKER_00: Listen to me.
31:57
SPEAKER_00: I don't know, you don't know who, you know, what the future holds.
32:00
SPEAKER_00: Am I right?
32:02
SPEAKER_00: But we know who holds the future.
32:05
SPEAKER_00: And the one who holds the future says nothing, nothing, nothing can stop the growth and spread of the gospel.
32:12
SPEAKER_00: Listen to me carefully.
32:14
SPEAKER_00: You need to be a part of that.
32:15
SPEAKER_00: You need to be a part of what God's doing in the world.
32:17
SPEAKER_00: Somehow, you need to get on the wagon of what God's doing in the world.
32:21
SPEAKER_00: It's amazing.
32:22
SPEAKER_00: The church just keeps growing and growing and growing.
32:26
SPEAKER_00: Let's thank God for that.
32:28
SPEAKER_00: Father, I ask that everyone in this room, everyone who hears me, would determine they'll be a part of the great thing that you are, that you've been doing for 2,000 years, you are doing right now more than ever in the world, that everyone would get on board and be a part of this exciting thing, the spread of the gospel and this growth of the church in Jesus' name.
32:48
SPEAKER_00: Amen.