Paul in Athens & Idolatry - Acts 17:16-34

Southeast family, how are we doing this morning? Everybody all right? All right, both of you who are awake, thank you for responding to that. The rest of you, we'll just trust in faith that you'll come along for this service. My name is Tom Fitzgerald. I'm the executive pastor here at Southeast. That was my kid, thank you. Aaron is in Israel. You know when he says, "Come with me to Israel."? He does actually go. So he is there now, they're walking through the Bible. They're, walking where the fathers of our faith walked and we want to commend them and bless them and keep and pray safety over them. And then also at the same time, be a little bit jealous. That's okay. You're human and that's just fine. But this morning, the first thing we want to do is we want to continue worship by giving of our tithes and offerings.

Here at Southeast, we believe that tithing biblically is an integral part of following Jesus. It's not a suggestion or just a good idea, it's a command. So if you want to give online, you can do so Southeastcc.org/give, you can give on our app, or if you're old school and you brought a check or cash, there are black boxes at every exit to this room, you can feel free to drop your tithe in there. But we also want to say, thank you so much for your generosity that keeps us doing what we're doing and serving and building the kingdom of heaven. Today, we are featuring the Alternatives Pregnancy Center, and we would love for you to find them in the lobby and talk with them, hear a little bit more about the mission that they've set out to accomplish.

Unwanted pregnancy is not going anywhere. No matter what happens in legislation or in the Supreme courts, this is not a problem that's just going to magically disappear and go away. And so this organization, Alternatives Pregnancy Center, they want to walk alongside men and women who are facing an unplanned pregnancy, regardless of what their choice to do with the life involved is. They want to walk alongside moms and dads, prospective moms and dads, people who are terrified and scared with no idea what on earth to do. They want to hold their hands and love and serve them in the name of Jesus. So again, in the lobby, feel free to check them out. So this Wednesday, the 18th at six o'clock here in the church, not in this room, but in one of the meeting rooms that we have, we are going to be launching a class called healing from church hurt.

Many of us have got it, many of us are dealing with it, and you're struggling with asking the questions, what do I do when I'm hurt by the people who are supposed to represent Jesus? Well, we would love to come alongside you and help you. So this Wednesday at six o'clock, the 18th, here at church will be starting that class healing from church hurt. If you want, you can get out your phone and go to Southeastcc.org right now and register for that class. Please, if you want to attend the class, please do register. That'll help us know how much material, how many materials, how many books, et cetera we need for the class. All right, that's enough announcing. If you're a guest, two things are important. One, we do these announcements every week and that you kind of just have to sit through them if you don't know what we're talking about. The good news is we will not make you stand up and greet your neighbor or the person behind you.

Can I get an amen? All right, we are continuing in our series on the book of acts. We are in acts chapter 17, and we're on the back half of it, where we're seeing Paul in Athens. And this is big time. We can even show you a little bit of what Athens looks like. This is a more modern picture. So if you see the scaffolding there, that's not original to the time of the ancient Greeks and neither are the hotels, but it is a really cool picture. So Paul finally makes it to Athens. Remember Paul wants to get to Rome. He believes that if he can get to Rome and he can convert the emperor, then he can convert the whole world. But God keeps on stopping him from getting there. He keeps on zigging when he wants to zag, he keeps on going right when he wants to go left.

And so he has these practice moments in certain cities, Thessalonica that we talked about is one of them. Athens is a big dog. This was no longer a political center in biblical Asia minor or modern day Turkey. It's now an educational center. This is Havid. This is where you go if you're the best of the best, the brightest of the brightest, the smartest of the smart. Ancient philosophers called this home. Guys like Socrates, Plato, Aristotle. Some of those kind of folks. I'm thinking about the princess bride right now. Socrates, Aristotle, Plato, morons. Classic film. Athens is where you find them. This was an incubator and a birthplace and a landing place for all of these ancient philosophies. Two of which Paul is going to confront in the sermon that he preaches here in acts chapter 17.

He is doing such brilliant work with culture and Bible and faith and secularism and religion. He's combining them together in just the perfect way for his audience to hear and understand, but he's using so much context, that we have to take a second and realize we're going to need to lean really heavily into context to understand what Paul is up to. What do I mean by context? I'm so glad you asked, because I have a picture to show you. These are the six lenses of context. When we look at the Bible, it is a living document. It is a living book and the Holy Spirit does jump off the pages and into our hearts, but the Bible was also written to a people, in a place, at a time, and that is critical. We never want to just grab a Bible verse and make it our favorite, regardless of what it actually means within its context.

We always want to take the scripture back to its original context and then see with a fuller understanding how that scripture applies to our modern context. So these are the six lenses of context. Obviously there's historical. What are the events of the day? What is going on around this passage of scripture that will help us understand it? There's cultural. What are the philosophies, the thoughts, the prevailing ideas? What is the zeitgeist? What's running underneath everybody's motives that maybe the cultural context are the assumptions that are made in the text that you'll understand, without letting you know that an assumption is being made. Tell you what I mean. When I say, "Gosh, remember the pandemic?" I don't need to say anything else, and it paints a huge picture in your mind. You were locked up in your house. Maybe some of us, I rebelled.

Well, there was no one at my office. There was no one in the offices so I was like, well, I can either quarantine at home or go to where there's also no one. So I went to the offices, don't at me. So when I say pandemic, you immediately have a list of assumptions. A set of emotions and feelings and mental images that go into that, just by me saying that word. The same is true for some of the statements made in scripture. When Jesus says... We'll pause on that and use that example later, but the idea is that these are the assumptions, the things that go unsaid and if we don't catch those and pick up on those, we might miss some of the bigger meaning of the scripture.

Third lens is geographical. This stuff happened in a place. The land tells the story. No better example than Aaron and a tour of students walking through the holy land right now, understanding how the land, the geography, opens up scripture. What does the Bible mean when it says wilderness? What's that like? What does the Bible mean when it says hot? When it says it was dry or it was barren. Or what does the Bible mean when the Psalmist writes, "Deep calls to deep at the noise of your waterfalls. All your waves and billows have gone over me." When you stand in the place that inspired those words, the text comes alive. The Bible is geographical. Then there's the visual context. No self-respecting rabbi would teach a lesson without something to point at. I have an LED wall. Paul had statues. Beat that, Paul. There's always a visual cue. Here's the example that I was going to use earlier.

When Jesus says, "Anyone who wants to follow me must deny himself, take up his cross and follow me daily." What's the problem with that statement? Jesus hasn't been crucified yet. So take up cross? Help me understand what that means. In any Roman town or city, there was two streets. The Cardo ran North-South, and the Decumanus that ran East-West. These main roads and particularly the intersection of those main roads, are where major events would happen.

Announcements, executions, things like that. Prior to Jesus saying, "Take up your cross and follow me." There was a rebellion. The rebellion was squashed by crucifying men, women, and children along this Cardo and this Decumanus, and the order was given that the bodies had to stay on the cross until they fell off by themselves. So Jesus is speaking to these men and women saying, "You must deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me." Pointing to a row of crosses stretching as far as you could see, and everyone knew exactly what he meant. Then there's the linguistic context. Hebrew, Greek, Aramaic are the languages of our text. They're brought forward into English through many faithful and some less faithful translations. We have to understand what the original language is saying. When I say the word pool to you, there's a lot of things that I could mean.

And depending on what I'm saying, depending on the context and the message, it's important that you know what I mean by pool, otherwise you'll completely miss what I'm saying. Same is true in the Bible. Linguistic context is important. Then there's the literary context. The Bible's a library. It is a book with a single cohesive narrative because God is amazing and he can do that across many books from many authors over many years. We have a unified text, but it is a library. And in that library are histories, in that library are poems, in that library are songs and letters, apocalyptic writing. And depending on what style of literature the author is using, it might mean something different, and we have to know the context, the literary context as well, as we explore what scripture means. So when you look at these six lenses of context, these are useful tools.

I know you're thinking this is super intimidating. I have to know all this stuff to read the Bible. Hey, there's this awesome guy called Holy Spirit. And as you open your Bible, the Holy Spirit will whisper the secrets of God's word to you. You don't need to be some giant theologian to read the Bible. You just need a Bible. But as we continue to study and learn the word, these tools help open the scriptures to us. Erin often says that context matters, exclamation point. Context is important. We have to understand what's going on around the passage. So here's what I want from you guys, okay? Do me a favor.

Aaron's gone, and he's been saying context matters and getting about the same response that I got. So it would be really cool if when he comes back and he says, "Context matters." You guys shout, "Exclamation point." back to him, it'll completely throw him off his train of thought, which is when Aaron says the best stuff. We all know that. His ADD world is hilarious sometimes. So the next time Aaron is here and he says that word, I want you guys to say it back super loud. So let's practice. Context matters.

Exclamation point.

That is going to mess him up so much. That's awesome. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for helping me serve my friend. Really that's what it's about. I'm here to bless and to... No, I'm kidding. All right, so the six lenses of context. We are going to particularly lean into the historical and the cultural lenses today to get a good understanding of what Paul is up to in the back half of Acts, chapter 17.

So here we go, our text for the day. Acts 17, 16 through 18. It says this. "While Paul was waiting for them in Athens," he's waiting for some of the disciples he left behind to come and stay with him. Says this, "He was greatly distressed to see that the city was full of idols." It's kind of weird. "So he reasoned in the synagogue with both Jews and God fearing Greeks, as well as in the marketplace, day by day, with those who happen to be there." Okay, pause. Paul is in Athens, Greece, and he's like, "What are all these idols doing here?" Are you kidding me? That'll be like going up to Fort Collins and going, "What are all these breweries doing here?" It's just the way it is, there's idols everywhere. So why is he surprised and distressed? Well, remember Paul always starts his ministry in a synagogue.

And so here is what I think. I don't think Paul was upset about the idols in Athens. I think idolatry had crept its way into the synagogue and Paul is saying, "What on earth are you doing?" Let me show you an example. So in Matthew, let's see, Matthew chapter 11 versus 20 and 21, it says this, "Then He, Jesus, began to denounce the cities where most of his mighty works had been done, because they did not repent. He said, 'woe to you Chorazin. Woe to you, Bethsiada, for if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes." So I want to show you something. I had the privilege of going to Israel and walking through the Bible and we went to Chorazin. We went to the synagogue at Chorazin.

Jesus would have taught in the synagogue at Chorazin. I got to stand where my savior stood and that's a thing. That's a big deal. And if you have the opportunity to go to Israel, you've got to go. You'll never read the Bible the same.

Anyway, here's what we saw in the synagogue at Chorazin. Look at that. Beautiful black columnar basalt rock, incredibly hard and intricately carved. So this was a big deal. This was thoughtfully built, intentionally constructed. You can see the inner Portico, you can see what would've been called the chief seats. Not the cheap seats, the chief seats. And then there would've been what's called Moses' seat. Remember when Jesus said, "Do not do what the Pharisees do, but listen but do what they say, for they sit in Moses' seat."? Moses' seat wasn't metaphorical. It was a literal thing. Every synagogue has a seat that you sit in that was called Moses' seat. And this was the chair that the person who was going to be reading from Torah, would sit in. That's why Jesus said, "Do what they say." Because they're reading from Torah when they sit in Moses' seat. So we're walking through this synagogue. We're hearing these lessons. We're hearing these amazing stories. Being stunned by the fact that we're standing on the pages of the Bible, and then I saw this.

So you can see there's a face there and there's a starburst, sunburst carved all around it. It's a face of a woman and you're thinking, oh, the woman has curly hair. Those are snakes. Can you think of a woman with snakes for hair? Medusa. What in the heck is a carving of Medusa doing in a synagogue? "I am the Lord you're God, you will have no other gods before me. You shall have no graven images." What is this doing in a synagogue? So this isn't central to our sermon topic for today, but I wouldn't be being faithful to scripture if I didn't say this. Paul is distressed over the idols that have crept their way into the synagogue. He's saying, "Don't you see what happened in Chorazin? Look at the place, it's in rubble. It has fallen down and fallen apart.

Judgment has come on it. Don't you understand what compromise in your faith does? Don't you understand what inviting mixture into your faith does?" See friends, we are called to be set apart from the world and sometimes we look so much like the world, that our testimony is indistinguishable from the evening news. In our pursuit of relevance, let's not forget the cross. In our pursuit of culture, let's not compromise and bend to it, lest we have a prophet come to us and say, "Woe to you." All right, next bit. That part was for free. Let's keep going in our texts. Acts chapter 17. Now we're at 18. We're going to go through verse 28 if you're following along. So Paul is in Athens and he begins to preach. The scripture says, "A group of Epicurean and Stoic philosophers began to debate with Paul.

Some of them asked, 'What is this babbler trying to say?'" And this morning I'm like, Paul, I feel you buddy. "Others remarked, 'he seems to be advocating foreign gods.' They said this because Paul was preaching the good news about Jesus and the resurrection. Then they took him and brought him to a meeting of the Areopagus." Now Areopagus means the hill of Aries or the hill of Mars, Mars hill. This is where the temple to Aries would have been. So the Areopagus is both a literal place and a governing body. The people who would meet on Mars hill were also called the Areopagus. So Paul is speaking to the cultural authority in Athens. Where they said to him, "May we know what this new teaching is that you are presenting? You are bringing some strange ideas to our ears, and we would like to know what they mean." Reasonable ask. "All the Athenians on the foreigners who lived there, spent their time doing nothing but talking about and listening to the latest ideas." Isn't it funny how throughout history, everything changes, but everything stays the same?

These people were scrolling their Twitter feed, they were scrolling Buzzfeed, they were scrolling whatever, looking for the latest and greatest. Now it was actual scrolls for them, but they're so caught up in what's new and what's news, that they don't know a savior yet, but Paul's going to try to take care of that, so let's keep trucking. "Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said, 'People of Athens,'" I don't know if that's how he sounded but, "'I see that in every way you are very religious, for as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found altar with this inscription to an unknown God.'" Just in case there's one out there we're missing, we're going to hedge our bets, we're going to cover our bases. We'll keep going in our text. And it says, "The God who made the world and everything in it, is the Lord of heaven and earth, and does not live in temples built by human hands."

Now pay attention here, because Paul is going to start to quote their own philosophers back to them, to try to give ground to Christianity in the resurrection. "And he is not served by human hands as if he needed anything. Rather he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. From one man, he made all of the nations that they should inhabit the whole earth, and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands." All right, let's keep going. "God did this so that they would seek Him and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far from any one of us." Thank the Lord for that. And he says, "For in him we live and move and have our being, as some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.'"

So let's pause there. You see the quotation marks around, "For in him, we live and move and how our being."? No, you don't, because that's a blank screen. But earlier it did. And they're there. So there's was a guy who came on the scene 600 years before the events that we're reading about showed up in Athens. His name was Epimenides. Say that with me, Epimenides. It's kind of fun. Epimenides was a prophet or a seer and philosopher who lived in Crete. In Athens, a huge plague broke out and people were dying left and right, and they're trying to figure out what to do. So they reach out to this guy Epimenides. Now some of this is historical, some of this is legend, but that all was one in the same to the Greeks. Epimenides shows up in Greece and he looks, and he sees this plague happening and he says, "Here's what we're going to do. Get a bunch of sheep and just release them in the city and where the sheep lay down, whatever temple is nearest the sheep, we'll sacrifice the sheep to that God and the plague will go away."

Well Epimenides, what if the sheep doesn't lay down next to a temple? Epimenides said, "Oh, we'll sacrifice the sheep to the unknown God, because the sheep must know that there's a God out there that we don't know about." And so that happened and the plague lifted. And so all over Athens, you have these temples to the unknown God, and Paul begins to borrow from Epimenides. Now the other important thing about Epimenides is he has a famous quote.

He's talking about the people of Crete claimed that Zeus was dead, to the point that they built a grave for Zeus in Crete and Epimenides has an issue with that. "Zeus isn't dead." He says. So this is a poem, a part of a poem that amenities wrote. "They fashioned a tomb for you, holy and high one," That would be Zeus. "Cretans, always liars, evil beasts, idle bellies, but you are not dead. You live and abide forever, for in you we live and move and have our being." Paul is borrowing from their own poetry, their own history. Everyone in Athens would've known who Epimenides was. He was the hero, he was the savior of the city. And Paul borrows from that to say there is a resurrection. God is not dead, He is alive, He is risen and we can be one with Him.

Let's keep going in acts chapter 17. "Therefore, since we are God's offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image made by human design and skill. In the past, God overlooked such ignorance, but now He commands all people everywhere to repent. For He has set a day when He will judge the world with justice, by the man He has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising Him from the dead." These philosophies, the people he's talking to are Epicurean philosophers and Stoic philosophers, did not believe in a resurrection. And Paul has his whole message hinges on the resurrection of Jesus. So he has to figure out a way to bring credibility to the idea of resurrection. He says, "One of your own poets, Epimenides said that Zeus was resurrected. Maybe if I quote that back to you." Context matters.

Exclamation point.

Oh, you all got to do better than that. I'm counting on you. I'll practice again. Context matters.

Exclamation point.

There it is, that's what we want. "He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead, for when they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some of them sneered, but others said, 'We want to hear you again on this subject.' At that, Paul left the council." Never to return, he's done. Puts a period at the end of his sermon and his next stop is Corinth. "Some of the people became followers of Paul and believed. Among them was Dionysius, a member of the Areopagus." A member of this governing body of Athens, this guy Dionysius gets converted and believes. He would go on to become the Bishop of Athens. "Also a woman named Damaris and a number of others."

Now there are lots of ways to look at this passage of scripture. Some would say, "Oh, what happened here is Paul preached a bad sermon. He didn't preach enough about Jesus, and so only Dionysius and Damaris and a few others were converted." And you can tell because he goes on to Corinth and he says, "I preach Christ and him crucified." And his results in Corinth are so much better and so much more amazing. So common scholarship, common knowledge and understanding of this text is that Paul preached kind of a stinker of a sermon. I can relate. Been there, done that. And that the results weren't great. Here's what I think. I think Paul took the people of Athens as far as they were ready to go. And he used their own understanding, their own philosophy and their own culture to do it, because Paul is a flipping genius and has the Holy Spirit living inside of him, which is a deadly combination. So here's the deal. We're going to walk through what it means to be an Epicurean philosopher and what it means to be a Stoic philosopher.

Please don't get up and leave or fall asleep. There is a point and it's going to be pretty good. I promise, cross my heart. But we have to understand this context, to understand what Paul is doing and how he's using these philosophies to help make sense of the cross, because you see, all truth is God's truth. If it is true, then it's true, and truth comes from the Lord. Even if it's from a source outside of the Bible or an unexpected source, if it's true, it's from the Lord, because God is a God of truth. He's the source of it all. It looks like a duck, it walks like a duck, it talks like a duck, it's probably a duck. So Paul is grabbing from the truth of these philosophies, contrasting them with the errors and leading people to the feet of Jesus.

Let's see how he goes about doing it. Let's learn about Epicureans first. Epicureans were the right feelers. If you could just get your feelings lined up, if you could get your internal world lined up, if you could just get yourself integrated, if you could just get your vibes right, if you could get yourself into a Zen moment, if you could do some grounding exercises. Now I love grounding exercises, don't get me wrong. But if I could just get my heart and my feelings in the right place, then I'll be at peace. Epicurean philosophy was a materialist philosophy, that shunned superstitions like religion and afterlife and divine intervention.

They believed that gods existed, but they were either one of two things. They were either a materialist god, meaning a literal physical god existed, but they just don't care and intervene. Or they were an idealist god. The gods were personifications of the ideal components of what it is to be a human being. But they didn't believe that gods had anything to do with daily life. They said that the ultimate good of man is ultimate pleasure, and pleasure was attained by walking into two different states of being. The first is called ataraxia or freedom from fear, sounds pretty good.

And the other is aponia, the absence of bodily pain. And we have a Jesus who says, "Don't fear men who throw you into jail. Fear God, who is able to put both the soul and the body in hell." And we have a Jesus who walked around healing and raising from the dead. And so this absence of fear and this absence of pain isn't in and of itself evil. It's a little naive, right? I wish life was that easy, I wish I could just go through life painless and unafraid. And these guys are saying, this is the ideal.

What I'm trying to get at here is in both of these philosophies, there is something to celebrate and there is something to grieve. Somewhere in these philosophies, we see the image of God, it's just twisted. And Paul's work is to untwist it so people can see Jesus, rather than just ideas. Here's a quote from Epicurus about what the Epicurean philosophers meant, when they would say, "The chief end of man is the pursuit of pleasure."

He says that when we say that pleasure is the end and aim, we do not mean the pleasures of the prodigal or the pleasures of sensuality, as we are understood to do by some through ignorance, prejudice, and willful misrepresentation. By pleasure, we mean the absence of pain in the body and trouble in the soul. That sounds great. "Peace I leave with you," Jesus said, "Not peace as man offers, but the peace that passes understanding." Remember, it's off, but not all that far off, and Paul is trying to steer them back. Paul is seeing the design and the image of God and their philosophy and he's untwisting it, so that it's crystal clear.

"It is not by an unbroken succession of drinking bouts and of revelry, not by sexual lust, nor the enjoyment of fish and other delicacies of a luxurious table, which produce a pleasant life. It is sober reasoning, searching out the grounds of every choice and avoidance, and banishing those beliefs through which the greatest tumults take possession of the soul." Something to be celebrated. Sober decision making, of being careful about what you choose to do and what you choose to avoid. Being shrewd as serpents, but harmless as doves and hanging on to the truth. This quote, it says, "Banishing those beliefs through which the greatest tumults take possession of the soul." Paul would go on to say things like, "If anything is good, if anything is lovely, if anything is pure, if anything is holy, if anything is of good report, meditate on these things."

Not far off. So what do we do when the truth starts looking or starts coming from a source that we don't expect? We have to honor it, and we have to see how the image of God is being represented and or twisted and misrepresented. So let's keep trucking. Epicureans would believe that immortality is nonsense. They'd reject it out of hand. The soul exists, but it's material and it decomposes and dies the same way your physical body does. Let's see, we talked about the gods they had. This was the bottom line. If we had to bottom line the Epicurean philosophy, it was with this statement called the Tetrapharmakos. Say that, Tetrapharmakos. So Siri just picked that up on my watch and returned web results for what that means.

Thanks Siri, helper. Tetrapharmakos, it means the four part cure. And I could have just said the four part cure, but Tetrapharmakos is fun to say. So the four part cure. They would say this, they'd say, "Don't fear God, don't worry about death, what is good is easy to get, and what is terrible is easy to endure." Something to celebrate, something to grieve. The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. Here are some spaces where they need to be corrected back onto the path. So that's Epicureans. Let's look at Stoics. Stoic philosophy informs a ton of our thinking today, and you'll see what I mean as we walk through it. Stoics are the right thinkers. If I can have my mind and my thoughts and my ideas and my ideals lined up, everything in life will be good.

They would say the ultimate goal is flourishing by living an ethical life. They're not going to completely shun emotions, but what they're going to do is say that self-control and fortitude are the means of overcoming destructive emotions. Grin and bear it, grit your teeth, white knuckle your way through it, suck it up. These are the Stoics. My dad maybe had a little bit of Stoicism in him. The Stoics, they would say that living in harmony with nature is how you move toward ultimate peace. They would say that somebody who's not living right or living well, is like a dog tied to a cart. And the dog is dragged around wherever the horse and driver decide to go. They would say that a person living in harmony and moving toward peace would be like a dog riding in the cart. Just along for the ride. Not happy, not sad, just here.

That's the ultimate goal of a stoic. Here's a great quote from Stoic philosopher named Epictetus. He says this, "We're sick and yet happy. In peril and yet happy. Dying and yet happy. In exile and happy. In disgrace and happy." It starts to sound familiar, doesn't it? Philippians chapter four. Let's start at verse 10. Again, Paul's words. He says, "I rejoiced in the Lord greatly that now at length, you have revived your concern for me. You are indeed concerned for me, but had no opportunity. Not that I'm speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I'm in, to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger and abundance and need." Then the famous, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." Remember what we talk about with context. Philippians 4:13 is the single most misquoted passage in the entire Bible.

Philippians 4:13 doesn't help you do better at football, Philippians 4:13 doesn't help you score a touchdown. It doesn't help you hit a home run. Philippians 4:13 says that whether I'm debased or whether I'm doing awesome, whether I'm homeless or whether I'm in a mansion, whether I'm starving or whether I'm feasting, I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength, okay? This is not about sports.

It's about suffering well. It's about being content, and the stoic got it. They were missing the savior who made it possible. And this is Paul's work. Something to celebrate and something to grieve. You can see in their philosophy, the image of God. It's just twisted. So how do you untwist it? And friends, this is our work in the world today. Paul's work is the same job that we're doing today. Here's the thing. The enemy, his primary means of attack for you, is almost certainly in the way that God designed you. Let me say that again, but better. The way God made you, is the primary way the enemy will attack you.

God made these Stoics and Epicurieans, He made them brilliant. He made them thoughtful. He made them careful and observant and the enemy twisted it and said, "You don't need a savior. This Paul who said that God has revealed these things to you, that by groping and seeking, you might find him, you don't need that savior. You've got your philosophy." The image of God in them was twisted.

The way God made them was the way the enemy attacked them. What do I mean by that? God putting you, a glorious and beautiful design, and the enemy hates it. Remember last time I got to preach, we talked about how the enemy is not a government or a system, the enemy is the devil. The enemy wants to twist how God designed you, and to turn it into your primary space of sin. Let me tell you what I mean, are you stuck in anger? Are you just an angry person? And you're like, "I wish I wasn't like this. Gosh, dang it. Why am I angry all the time?" Are you an angry person? Maybe what's happening is inside you lives a champion for justice. When the oppressed are pushed down, it ticks you off. Maybe there's passion in there for justice, for things to be set right.

Maybe your anger is the enemy twisting God's design, that you're actually a champion for justice. Are you ambitious? Is it the next rung on the ladder? Is it the next zero on your paycheck? Is it the next? Instead of constantly clamoring and climbing and having and never having enough, maybe what God made in you was a visionary. Rather than being ambitious and nothing's ever enough, maybe God put in you the ability to see the long run, to understand the course and to be able to walk it. Are you competitive? Is everything a competition? People who say life's not a competition, I'm like, "People who believe that are losing."

So keep up the good work while I win. I'm a competitive jerk you all. It is what it is. Are you competitive? Is everything a competition? Are you that annoying guy, when someone's playing catch, you run in and intercept it? Don't be that guy, come on. Maybe your competitive drive is actually a desire for excellence. Maybe the enemy is taking the image of God in you that desires excellence, that's pushing for everything to be the best that it can be, and he's distorting it and it's controlling your life.

Speaking of control, are you a control freak? Does everything have to be just so? Does everything have to be perfect? Do you have to be able to manage all the variables and make sure it's all just right? Maybe what's inside of you that's twisted is an artist. Someone who understands beauty, and if it could just be a little bit, it would be even better. Are you critical? Uh oh, preaching now. Are you critical? Is nothing ever good enough? Are you always able to see the flaw? Are you always able to see where the problem arises? Are you always talking about where the flaw is and everybody wishes you would shut up?

Maybe that criticalness inside of you is the image of God twisted. Maybe really, you're a teacher. Maybe you're a counselor. Maybe you're a refiner. Maybe you have the gift to see an idea and say, "But if it were just like this a little bit, it would be even better." Are you afraid? Are you stuck in fear? This fear holds you back and holds you down. Maybe you're a paralyzed visionary. Maybe you can see it, you can see the whole thing, but it's how to get there that's so scary. Maybe God has created you to be a visionary and you're just paralyzed for the moment.

Are you insecure? Do you always defer to other people? Are you always like, "Well, if don't mind, if that's okay." I tell you what. When I stop becoming a people pleaser, you guys better look out. If it's okay with you... Never mind, sorry. One of my favorite T-shirts that I've ever seen is this shirt that says, "Sorry, I'm so awkward." Up top, big. And then down below in little letters, it says, "Sorry." Are you insecure? Maybe it's God's design in you to be a servant leader. Maybe it's God's designing you to be empathetic, to see the way people are made and to love them in it. The enemy wants to twist your design.

Are you addicted to pornography? Yeah, we went there. Are you addicted to pornography? Is that the thing that keeps you stuck? Maybe what's happening is the enemy has twisted God's design in you for a remarkable capacity for facilitating connection. A capacity for facilitating intimacy. People who facilitate connection and facilitate intimacy are often pastors. So this is why so many pastors are addicted to pornography. The enemy has twisted the image of God inside of us, and it's time to call him on his nonsense, it's time to shine the light of the truth on the design in our lives, and celebrate the way God has made you, instead of being stuck in sin.

Are you full of shame and are you full of self hate? Friends, I'm familiar with this one. I'm a recovered alcoholic. You want to talk about shame? Looking in your children's eyes when you're drunk and having them look back at you, insecure and scared and afraid. You want to talk about shame? I know shame. I know shame well, but thank God, He's the conqueror of shame.

Maybe your shame, maybe the self hate. Gosh, I just am such a piece of junk, I can't believe I did that again. Why do I do that again? Maybe that is really a zeal for holiness, a zeal for righteousness, a zeal for justice that the enemy has twisted.

The enemy's primary means of attack is the way God designed you, and it's time for enough to be enough. It is time to recognize the plans and plots of the enemy and say, "Devil, I'm not going to stand in the way that you're trying to tempt me. I'm going to stand in the way that I'm designed by the God of the universe and the king of Kings. I'm not going to sell short on how God made me, just because you say I'm shameful. Just because you say I'm addicted." Friends, your sin does not define you, God does. Your sin is something you did and that matters, but it's not someone you are. The devil wants to take your sin and name you with it. He wants to say, "You're a porn addict. That's all you are." He wants to say, "You're angry." He wants to say, "You're shameful, you're insecure. You'll never lead." And God wants to call out your design.

Sin is something you did, it is not who you are. I remember I picked up the phone and I called a mentor in my life, because I had just messed up. I had screwed up. I'd done something stupid and I called him to confess. I had just sinned, just normal stuff, but not great. So I called him and I tried to downplay it. Hey, so I was on the internet and this friend years ago, and I'll never forget it. He told me these words. He said, "Tom, I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you for calling me. I'm proud of you for having this conversation. I respect you more now than I did before, not less. And remember, this sin is something you did not someone you are."

Maybe it's time to pick up the phone. Maybe it's time to call that person. Maybe it's time to have that conversation with that mentor. Maybe it's time to get free. Maybe it's time to not be stuck anymore. Maybe it's time for the chains to fall off. Maybe it's time for freedom to wake up. Maybe it's time for your arms to be lifted in worship, because you're actually free, because you're living in line, in alignment with how God made you. Not stuck in sin, but untwisting the image of God that lives inside of you, so you can express who God made you to be, in the way God made you to express it. This is what Paul is teaching the Epicureans and the Stoics. He says, "You're so close." Now, let me ask you this. Do you have the same ability? Do you have the same patience with the person who you know, who's critical?

I can't stand that person, all they ever do. Do you see them as a frustration or do you see them as designed by God to be a refiner? Do you see them as annoying or as a gift? That person who's angry. Man, that dude's a hot head. Short fuse, that one. Short temper. Do you see that person as someone to keep at an arm's length or someone to help gain the understanding of what they are as passionate and driven and full of zeal?

But the image of God has twisted inside of them and it's time to untwist it. Be restored, be made whole be set right. The way we represent our savior matters. And it matters eye to eye, person to person, heart to heart. When you look at somebody else, you are not seeing a mere mortal. You are seeing an eternal being, either destined to be eternally glorious and beautiful or eternally depraved and dead. And your words might help change their trajectory. If you can see their design and call it out, it might help change the entire trajectory of their life.

So I have a lot of implications for us this morning, but I really want to settle in on these three. The first one is simple. It's that every weakness is a strength, overextended. When you look at somebody who's like we said, who's angry. They have this weakness, anger. I heard these beautiful words from a wise friend who said, "Anger is the bodyguard of fear." Come on. Anger's the bully that's trying to keep the little scared heart behind it safe. When you see somebody who's angry, do you see somebody who's just bombastic and to be written off, or do you see somebody who is afraid and maybe needs love? Do you see somebody who's passionate and just needs to know that every weakness is just a strength, overextended. The second implication is this. Moral superiority mutes the message of the gospel and alienates the people who are looking for the hope it offers.

As we've heard our lead pastor say, "If your good news is, did you know you're an abomination, I don't want to hear your bad news." If you look down your nose at those people. And whoever your those people are. Maybe it's the lesbian, gay, bi, queer trans community. Maybe it is Democrats. Maybe it's Republicans, maybe it's libertarians. Maybe it's the green party, if that even exists anymore. Who knows? Who are your those people that you look down your nose at? Your moral superiority is driving them away from the cross.

As a pastor, I have to tell you in love. Being morally better than somebody else is not going to change their life. That doesn't mean you get to go run and sin because you are to be an example, as we talked about earlier. But when you look, you look with love. Let's read a passage of scripture that'll help us understand. John 6:13 says, "When the spirit," that's a capital S, "Of truth comes, He will guide you into all truth. For he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears, he will speak and he will declare to you the things that are to come."

What's that mean? Truth is the Holy Spirit's job. Not your job. Beating somebody over the head with your truth is not going to help them. Truth is the Holy Spirit's job. Love is your job. Truth and love partner and change lives. Let the Spirit be the Spirit of truth and you be a person of love. Does that mean that everybody has greasy grace? No, but when we speak, we speak the truth in love, because inside every person, is the image of God. There are no mere mortals here. And the final implication is just simply this. The way God designed you, may be the primary way the enemy will attack you. You are not your sin. You are not only as good as your last mistake. You are not the bad things that you've done. Your name is not what you've done, that you regret.

Sin is something you did, not someone you are. Don't identify yourself with it. You don't get to tell you who you are. The enemy doesn't get to tell you who you are. That's God's job. And He says, "You are fearfully and wonderfully made." He says that you are beautiful and precious in His sight. He's numbered every hair on your head... I don't know, some of us might be loved by God more than others as I look around the room. He's numbered every hair on your head, not just knows the number, but has each one numbered. God loves you. He loves you. Is sin a problem? Yes, but we have a savior who took care of it. Stop nailing yourself to the cross that Jesus took on for himself.

Accept his forgiveness, accept his redemption, and in the words of our savior, "Go and sin no more." Stop letting the enemy lie to you about who you are and what you are. You are a child of the most high God. With those thoughts, let's start moving toward the Lord's table. And as we contemplate communion, I want you to sit and think about this. What is the sin in your life? What's that one that you just cannot get over? And how is that the image of God in you just twisted a little bit? If you can see the other side of your sin, you might be able to see God's design. If you can untwist and say, "Maybe I'm not just mad. Maybe I'm passionate and I want it to be right. Maybe I'm not just critical. I just know how things could be better, and maybe there's some wisdom in how I can use that. Maybe that's a strength overextended."

And then think about that person in your life. The one that drives you crazy, that one, know that guy? Think about that person and think about what it is that they do that drives you nuts, and how is that just a twisted representation of the image of God and how can you, as a loving, living, walking, talking encounter with Jesus, go and call the identity out of them?

Go Ahead. On the night Jesus was betrayed, he took the bread and he broke it. And he said, "This is my body, which is given for you. As often as you come together, do this in remembrance of me." And take the bread. The same way after the dinner, he took the cup and he said, "This is my blood of the covenant, which is shed for you. As often as you come together, do this in remembrance of me." Let's drink.

Father, we ask for freedom today. Lord that as we sing this next song, Holy Spirit, would you just come and walk through this room and begin to work in only the way that you know how. Set hearts free, Holy Spirit. Would you begin to call to mind, the spaces where our design to represent you has been twisted and would you untwist it. Would freedom pour out in this room. Would your spirit pour out in this room as we worship you. Thank you for the cross, thank you for opening the way to express the image of God that's born inside of us. And we pray that we can do that effectively. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.