Lechem Panim #202 “Mighty Men on The Move” (Acts 18:19-24) Pastor Cameron Ury

Hello and welcome to Lechem Panim. So glad you could join us today as we study the Word of God together. You know, I don’t know how you are in the are of gratitude, but I have had the Lord point out to me numerous times how poor I often am in this area. I don’t usually forget to thank people. But for some reason I do often forget to thank God for both answered prayers, but also even just the everyday blessings. You know, devout Jews thank God every morning for the gift of life. And lately I have been trying to change the way I start my day; to thank God for His gift of life and acknowledge my dependence on Him the moment I wake up in the morning. Now I mention this because when it comes to the life of Paul, I am amazed how much he always managed to live in that grateful orientation of heart. Here in Acts chapter 18 we find him leaving the city of Corinth for Syria (where Palestine is). And he does so with his companions Pricilla and Aquila. But when they reach Cenchrea (the port town of Corinth) Paul has his hair cut on account of the fact that he had taken a Nazirite vow, which was a vow of special devotion to God that Jews would sometimes take as a symbol of thanksgiving to God for a special blessing they had received from Him. And Paul had received a special blessing; the fulfillment of God’s promise to both protect him and bless his ministry in Corinth. But now that his vow has been completed, he has his hair ceremonially cut and will eventually complete the ceremony (where you would burn the hair) when he eventually arrives at Jerusalem. But what is remarkable to me is that, as he’s moving around from place to place now, he is carrying around this lump of hair with him (a symbol of his thanksgiving towards God) which he hopes to be able to offer at the temple in Jerusalem. And this week that caused me to stop and ask myself what symbols there are in your life and in mine to remind us to live in constant awareness and thanksgiving for what God has done for us. Something to think about. Now in verse 19 it says…

Acts 18:19a (NKJV)— 19 And he came to Ephesus, and left them there;

Dropped Off— Left who there? Priscilla and Aquila. It’s funny how Paul always seems to be dropping people off. It must’ve been such an adventure to follow Paul, because you never knew where he might place you. He’s dropping off Timothy and Silas here and there; and Priscilla and Aquila are getting dropped off places and then picked back up later. You never knew where you were going to be when you were with Paul and where Paul might place you and then leave you to carry on the work. And here he places them in Ephesus. It is about the year 52 and its not until year 57 that they appear again in Rome. So they could have remained here as long as five years. But what is awesome to see is that Paul writes back to the Corinthians, saying, “The church has been established in their house.” So once again, we see how effective Paul’s ministry strategy was. Now while Paul is here in Ephesus, it says…

Acts 18:19b-23 (NKJV)— but he himself entered the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews. 20 When they asked him to stay a longer time with them, he did not consent, 21 but took leave of them, saying, “I must by all means keep this coming feast in Jerusalem; {(and now we know why Paul is in such a hurry to get back to Jerusalem. There is a festival in Jerusalem; during which he wants to complete his vow as an expression of thanks to God. We don’t know what feast it was; very possibly the Feast of Pentecost, which would be extraordinarily significant because it was also during Pentecost that the Holy Spirit had been given, who would empower all Christians to live in such a way that the Nazirite vow only anticipated. But whatever feast it was, Paul no doubt turns these new Ephesian converts over to Priscilla and Aquila for further discipleship and then says)} but I will return again to you, God willing.” {And he leaves. But he does keep that promise to return, which we will see later. But for now it says:} And he sailed from Ephesus. 22 And when he had landed at Caesarea {(that’s the Mediterranean seaport west and just a little north of Jerusalem)}, and gone up and greeted the church {by which Luke means “the church in Jerusalem”, because you always go up to Jerusalem because of how much higher it is than everything around it. You don’t have to mention the city; the preposition gives it away. And it is here in Jerusalem that Paul no doubt went through all the rituals related to his vow, after which it says}, he went down to Antioch. 23 After he had spent some time there, he departed and went over the region of Galatia and Phrygia in order, strengthening all the disciples.

Paul's 3rd Missionary Journey— And what this means is that Paul has now started his third missionary journey. Where did he go? All the places he went on his second missionary journey? Where were those places? Well, they were all the places he went on his first missionary journey.

Start With A Few— A famous missionary once said this: “No man has the right to hear the gospel twice until every man has heard it once.” Let me tell you, that is absolutely false. Paul (not to mention Jesus) would totally disagree with that principle. Paul went back to the same group of people three times. And that’s because the kingdom of God isn’t built by people running all over the globe, frantically trying to quickly share an overly simplified version of the Gospel at least once to every person. No, the way you change the world is like Jesus did; like His apostles did. Start with a few, pour into them. Give them the full Gospel; declare (as Paul says in Acts 20:27) the whole counsel of God. Take time to show them how to bring all of their lives under the authority of Christ; train them to disciple others. And then they will go and do likewise. And God’s kingdom will grow not a mile wide and an inch deep, but will grow exponentially both in scope, but also in depth.

Back To Ephesus— Now, as I said, this marks the beginning of Paul’s third missionary journey. But at this point the narrative shifts away from Paul back to Ephesus, from which he had recently departed and left Priscilla and Aquila to carry on the ministry there. And Ephesus was a very pagan city, as it was the center of worship of the Greek goddess Artemis, whose Roman name was Diana; a multi-breasted fertility god whose temple there in Ephesus was so magnificent, it [was considered one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.] However, during Paul’s time we see that while the city had been an important political and commercial center, at this time it had lost some of that importance and [was turning more to the temple to support its economy.]

Apollos— Now it is in Ephesus that we meet an extraordinary man; a man who happened to come there at the right time for Priscilla and Aquila to minister to and lead to Christ; a man by the name of Apollos. It says in…

Acts 18:24a (ESV)— 24 Now a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus.

Alexandria— And so we see that Apollos is from Alexandria, which of course is in Egypt. There was actually a very large group of Jews living in Egypt during this time, estimates running in at around 1 million. You had four different sections/quarters of the city that were populated by Jews. And it is important to remember this whenever we think about the flight of Joseph, Mary, and Jesus into Egypt. We always have this image like they were strangers in a foreign land, when in reality (although they were outside of Israel) they were living in and amongst a very significant Jewish population. And this is relevant to our discussion of Apollos, because although he was in Egypt, we will see that he is still very much a part of Jewish society and education. And Alexandria in general was an Egyptian city that was very much centered on education. In fact it was [the most learned city in the Greco-Roman world.] It boasted of both a university and a library; the library containing almost 700,000 volumes. And we’re not talking printed, but hand-copied volumes; a massive treasury of very valued knowledge. And this man Apollos had been raised there in Alexandria and we see was very educated, being especially grounded in the principles and practices of Judaism and especially in the scriptures. It says in...

Acts 18:24b (ESV)— He was an eloquent man, competent in the Scriptures.

an eloquent man— And the phrase “eloquent man” is actually a translation of a very unique word in the Greek; in fact it doesn’t occur anywhere else in scripture. It is a word that combines the idea of learning with eloquence. And so what it tells us is that not only was the content of his preaching rock solid, but his presentation (his skills and giftedness as an orator) were tremendous. In fact, he may have been a much better speaker than Paul was, which might be inferred from 2 Corinthians 10:10, in which Paul says…

2 Corinthians 10:10 (ESV)— 10 For they say, “His letters are weighty and strong, but his bodily presence is weak, and his speech of no account.”

δυνατὸς— And so it seems that Paul’s writing was where he shined best. His physical presence wasn’t very impressive and his oratory skills even less so. Now that’s not to put down Paul. But it does help us to understand the power and might of this man Apollos. He was a very gifted speaker, but even more so, he was (the text says) competent in the Scriptures. Now that is a very boring translating of a powerful Greek word. The word translated “competent” is actually the word δυνατὸς. It means “mighty”. In fact δυνατὸς is where we get our English word “dynamite”. And so here is a man who knows how to rightly divide the Word of Truth, but also how to deliver that truth in a powerful and compelling way. He is eloquent, dramatic and dynamic. You never fell asleep and fell out of a window, and died on impact while listening to Apollos. By the way, that actually happened during one of Paul’s messages, which we will see when we come to chapter 20. But nothing like that ever happened with Apollos. You were wide awake for every one of his messages. He was eloquent and mighty in the scriptures.

Mighty In The Word— And let me tell you, we need more men and women of God who are mighty in the scriptures; who have saturated themselves with the Word of God and can accurately teach it, defend its truth and be able to safeguard it against those who might want to twist it to their own ends. Now you and I want to be able to do that, but that kind of knowledge and ability comes at a cost.

Give The World— There was once a [young man who came to a Bible teacher after he taught and he was so overawed by the teaching and the strength of the man and his teaching and the – and the ability and the power and the knowledge. And he said to him, he said, “I just was so thrilled by your teaching.” He said, “I’d give the world to be able to teach the Bible like that.” And the man said, “Good, because that’s exactly what it will cost you.”] And you know, he’s right. Christ can use anybody, but the extent to which He can use you may be limited by your dedication and willingness to pursue the knowledge He has already made available to you in His Word. If we want to be effective, we must first know Him; and the only way to know Him is in and through prayerful engagement with His Word. And so let that be our challenge this week. Let’s be intentional about making time to engage with God in and through His Word so that He might equip us with everything we need for life and for ministry. Amen.