Acts 11:1-30 (November 12, 2023)

Heritage and Mission in Acts 11

Acts chapter 11. We've been going through the book of Acts for the last several months and we find ourselves in Acts 11. We'll go through the whole chapter today. And in this chapter we basically have two scenes.

And these two scenes happen in two cities. First is in Jerusalem. The second is in Antioch. And there's something of, at least at the beginning of the passage, there's tension. By the end of the passage we see relationship or connection between the two.

But we have heritage and mission in this chapter. And these two cities represent both. So Jerusalem represents heritage. It represents the roots of the old covenant people of God. Jerusalem is the, it was the center of Israel's religious and political life.

And Jerusalem is the center of Christianity at this point in time. It's the, it's the mother church, so to speak. And so when we see Jerusalem here we can think about heritage. Antioch represents the mission.

Antioch is a large Gentile city. And what we see here is that there's a church planted there. And the new covenant people of God are not geographically tied to the land of Israel or to Jerusalem. And it so happens that Antioch then for a time becomes kind of the new center of Christianity as missionaries are sent out from Antioch to plant churches.

And we see that in chapters 13 and 14 especially that we'll see in just a little while when we get there. And Antioch kind of becomes a mother church of its own. And so what we see is just what we saw last week.

The kingdom is expanding and the church is broadening. And so what I want us to do this morning, I want us to go through this passage, Acts 11, and I want us just to see just what it says. And I want to make application for us about this tension and connection between heritage and mission.

So let's begin by reading verses 1 through 3. And here we'll see that the word of Peter and Cornelius and what happened there, word of that event traveled quickly back to Jerusalem. So let's read verses 1 through 3.

Now the apostles and the brethren who were in Judea heard that the Gentiles had also received the word of God. And when Peter came up to Jerusalem, those of the circumcision contended with him, saying, You went in to uncircumcised men and ate with them.

So Paul's the story right there. When Peter returned to Jerusalem, he was met by a faction within the Jerusalem church. Those of the circumcision is how verse 2 puts it. And they contended with him. Now it's important we see this isn't the whole church here, but it's a party within it, those who are zealous for the law.

These are likely the people that became, as they spread out, that became the Judaizers that we encounter later in the New Testament, specifically in the book of Galatians. Those who believed that Gentiles must become Jewish in order to become Christian.

And in verse 3, they charge Peter. It says, You went in to uncircumcised men. You went in to Gentiles. You went in to those who were unclean and you ate with them. You see, the issue wasn't that Peter preached to Gentiles.

And the issue wasn't even that he didn't circumcise them. The issue was that he shared table fellowship with the Gentiles. He went in to them. He accepted their hospitality. He sat at the table with them and he ate with them in this show of fellowship with them.

This was not to be done with Gentiles, they thought. And they were appalled by it. So Peter, that's the charge against Peter. And in verse 4, he begins to make his defense. We read about it in verses 4 -17.

But Peter explained it to them in order from the beginning, saying, and here he recounts what we saw last week. It's a retelling of that story. He says, I was in the city of Joppa praying. And in a trance I saw a vision, an object descending like a great sheet, let down from heaven by four corners.

And it came to me. When I observed it intently and considered, I saw four-footed animals of the earth, wild beasts, creeping things, birds of the air. And I heard a voice saying to me, rise Peter, kill and eat.

But I said, no, not so Lord. For nothing common or unclean has at any time entered my mouth. But the voice answered me again from heaven, what God has cleansed you must not call common. Now this was done three times, and all were drawn up again into heaven.

At that very moment, three men stood before the house where I was, having been sent to me from Caesarea. Then the Spirit told me to go with them, doubting nothing. Moreover, these six brethren accompanied me, and we entered the man's house.

And he told us how he had seen an angel standing in his house, who said to him, send men to Joppa and call for Simon, whose surname is Peter, who will tell you the words by which you and all your household will be saved.

And as I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell upon them, as upon us at the beginning. Then I remembered the word of the Lord, how he said, John indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit.

If therefore God gave them the same gift as he gave us when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God. Amen. This is God's word to us. We see here, Peter, he recounts that whole story of his going to Cornelius and how that came about, the vision that he saw, the vision that Cornelius saw, how God orchestrated all those events by his Spirit, and how he goes and by his Spirit he proclaims, and as he is preaching, as he is proclaiming the gospel to them, the Holy Spirit falls upon Cornelius and his household.

But at the beginning of this recounting, he identifies with those of the circumcision party there in Jerusalem, because he tells them at first he resisted. When I first saw it, I said, no, not so, Lord.

He had never eaten anything unclean. He had never eaten anything common. He protested against the Lord's instructions in the vision. But then he tells of the Spirit. We see it in verse 12, the Spirit told me to go with them, doubting nothing.

The Spirit told me to go with them, doubting nothing. He went because God literally told him to, God the Holy Spirit. He had witnesses to this too. We see that in verse 12 as well. It said, Moreover, these six brethren accompany me, and we enter the man's house.

Now, if you remember back to your Old Testament, how many witnesses were required to establish a fact in a court case? Two to three. He had two to three witnesses to establish a fact. And so what we have here, Peter has double the amount of witnesses required to establish the work of the Spirit among the Gentiles.

Six men go with him, double the requirement of three, and they can give witness to the fact that the Holy Spirit had fallen upon the Gentiles as well. Just as the Spirit had fallen upon these Jewish believers at Pentecost.

And then he sums up his defense in verse 17 again. He says, If therefore God has given the same gift he gave us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God? See, the Spirit of God led Peter to Cornelius and his household.

The Spirit of God fell on Cornelius and his household in the same way that it had fallen on the Jews at Pentecost. Who was Peter to stand in the way of what God was doing? The Spirit falling is what convinced Peter, and as we see here, it's what convinces those in the Jerusalem church.

Because if they share in the Spirit, they all share in fellowship together. And we see that in verse 18. It says, When they heard these things, they became silent. And they glorified God, saying, Then God has also granted to the Gentiles repentance to life.

You see, their mouths were stopped. They became silent. They had nothing else to say. They had no other line of attack. No other charge to bring. Their mouths were stopped. They had nothing left to say, because they didn't want to oppose God either.

You see, the Spirit had spoken when He came upon the Gentiles. And so they reached the conclusion that God had granted Gentiles repentance unto life, and they glorified God for it. So that's the scene in Jerusalem.

The Church in Jerusalem and the Gentiles

So we had two cities, two scenes. That's Jerusalem. Now we move to Antioch. Now Antioch was the third largest city in the Roman Empire at the time. It was a large city. It was a wealthy city. It was a very cosmopolitan and influential city.

It was about five miles from Daphne, which was a center of worship for Apollos and Artemis. And so that probably accounted for the very loose and lax sexual morals of the city. Most of the population was Syrian, but the language was Greek.

There was also a significant Jewish population in this Gentile city. And so that's the context that we're going to move into with this next part of the story. A difficult, diverse, pagan, multicultural, polytheistic, wealthy city.

That's Antioch. So let's read in verses 19 through 21. What we'll see here is about the founding of the church, the planting of the church in Antioch and how that came to be about. Verse 19, God's word says, Now those who were scattered after the persecution that arose over Stephen traveled as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch, preaching the word to no one but the Jews only.

But some of them were men from Cyprus and Cyrene, who when they had come to Antioch, spoke to the Hellenists, preaching the Lord Jesus. And the hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number believed and turned to the Lord.

So this goes back to Acts chapter 8. So this is after Stephen was stoned. There was a great persecution that broke out against the believers there. And the believers were scattered. We read about that earlier.

And so here we see the believers, they were scattered to Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch. And everywhere they went, they went preaching the word. But they preached to the Jews only here at Antioch. But then verse 20 tells us about some Greek speaking Jews who came from Cyprus and Cyrene, who had come to faith in Jesus, and then they started doing something new.

They started preaching to the Greeks, the Hellenists. And so what we see is further movement of the church toward the Gentiles. We see further movement of the church toward the Gentiles. And God blessed this preaching so much so that the hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number, it says, believed and turned to the Lord.

This was the beginning of the church at Antioch. This is the beginning of a church in this large pagan city, and now there's a small and growing group of believers. But what did it? What brought about this church in this type of city?

What was the catalyst for this church that we're going to read about when we get to chapter 13 and 14? It starts sending out Paul, Barnabas, and missionaries, and planting churches, making significant impact on the kingdom in that part of the world, in that region.

What was it that started this church? Verse 20. Some of them were from Cyprus and Cyrene, who when they had come to Antioch, spoke to the Hellenists, preaching the Lord Jesus. Preaching the Lord Jesus is what started the church.

Preaching the Lord Jesus is what started this great movement that came out of Antioch and spread out across the region. It was preaching the Lord Jesus. This is always how the kingdom grows, by preaching the Lord Jesus.

And so look, we don't preach other things. We don't preach behavior modification. We don't preach moralistic, therapeutic deism. We don't preach positive thinking. We don't preach social justice. We don't preach seven steps to a more fulfilled life.

We don't preach the latest headlines. We don't preach our opinions or our feelings or our axes to grind. We preach Christ and Him crucified. We preach Christ and Him crucified because it is the Lord Jesus that saves.

It is Jesus Christ who builds His church. Christ is the one who has all authority in heaven and on earth. It is Christ that washes away your sins. And so we preach Christ. It is the preaching of Christ that all the great movements of God begin with.

Preaching the Lord Jesus

Verses 22 -26 then tell us of the work of Barnabas. It says, Then news of these things came to the ears of the church in Jerusalem, and they sent out Barnabas to go as far as Antioch. When he came and had seen the grace of God, he was glad and encouraged them all that with purpose of heart they should continue in the Lord.

For he was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and of faith, and a great many people were added to the Lord. Then Barnabas departed for Tarsus to seek Saul, and when he had found him, he brought him to Antioch.

So it was that for a whole year they assembled with the church and taught a great many people, and the disciples were first called Christians at Antioch. The church in Jerusalem had heard about what was going on in Antioch and Phoetia and Cyprus, and so what they did, they sent Barnabas to go check on things.

Remember the apostles are in Jerusalem. They have authority. They have an interest in how the church is doing as it spreads out into new regions and new cities to new people groups. They have an interest in the health of the movement of churches spreading across the empire and to the Gentiles.

So when Barnabas arrived, he saw the grace of God at work. And it's interesting, his response wasn't to try to nitpick anything. His response wasn't to try to micromanage anything. He saw the grace of God and what did he do?

He rejoiced and he encouraged them, continue in the Lord. Continue in the Lord. No doubt this was a tall task. For new believers in a large pagan immoral city, an immoral lifestyle they had come out of when they came to Christ, it's a tall task for them.

But the Spirit was at work in them and among them. And by the grace of God, by the Spirit of God, they could continue to walk in holiness. And that's what Barnabas encouraged them to do. Walk with the Lord.

Continue in the Lord. Keep obeying the word of the Lord. And a great many people, verse 24 tells us, were added to the Lord. That means there's more work to do. You see, they were faithful. You know what you get when you're faithful?

With a little bit? You get an opportunity to be faithful with a lot. The reward for good work is more work. And so, Barnabas went out looking for Saul and Tarsus to come and help him in the work of teaching and discipling the church in Antioch.

When he finds them, they go back to Antioch and they spend a year there among the church, teaching, instructing, discipling, training the church in Antioch. And what we see at the end of verse 26, it says, and the disciples were first called Christians in Antioch.

We're called Christians. It goes back here to Antioch. This is where we first got our name. Now some commentators will tell you that Christians was a term of derision that the believers adopted. That might be the case.

I'm not sure. It's unclear. More likely they were called Christians because they spoke about Christ. They became known as the Christ people. Christians. I remember when we lived overseas, I remember a specific conversation with our teammate Drew.

He talked about how he wanted us to be known as the Jesus people. That the people who always spoke about Jesus, and if people saw us and they thought, oh, here comes the Jesus people again, then that would be okay.

Because it is a profoundly good thing to be identified with Jesus. And so here's a question for you. Could you be accused of being among the Christ people? Could you be accused of being a Jesus person?

If you were to get a nickname based on what you talked about, would your nickname have anything to do with Christ? If our church was to get a nickname, would it have anything to do with Christ? You see, the disciples in Antioch were the Christ people.

They came to faith hearing the preaching of the Lord Jesus and they continued in the Lord and they spoke of the Lord and they became known as the Christians. Then at the end of this chapter we see the character of the Antioch church.

Christians at Antioch

Verse 27 -30. You see, when they learned of the hardship that was coming to Judea, they took up an offering to sin for the relief of the brethren there. Let's read about it in verses 27 -30. And in these days prophets came from Jerusalem to Antioch.

Then one of them named Agabus stood up and showed by the spirit that there was going to be a great famine throughout all the world, which also happened in the days of Claudius Caesar. Then the disciples, each according to his ability, determined to send relief to the brethren dwelling in Judea.

This they also did and sent it to the elders by the hands of Barnabas and Saul. See, hearing the prophecy of this famine that was going to come, it ended up happening in about the year 44 -45 A .D. during the reign of Claudius.

When they heard about this famine, they decided to honor and to help their brethren in Judea and they collected an offering and they sent relief by the hands of Barnabas and Saul. And so in this passage we see, like I said at the beginning of the mission, by the end of the passage it's a connection, it's a relationship between heritage and mission, between Jerusalem and Antioch.

And the Christ people, the Christians, they resolved this tension and they maintained this connection by being rooted and reaching. Rooted and reaching. The new church is rooted in the apostles teaching.

The new church is rooted in the Jerusalem church. Those who went out preaching were sent out and scattered out from Jerusalem. They're rooted in the Old Testament people of God. There's connection because the people of God have always been those by faith.

So they're rooted but they're also reaching. They're reaching new cities, new regions, new people groups. The kingdom is expanding and the church is broadening. It's what we see here at this point in the book of Acts.

Now today we're at a different point in redemptive history, right? But the relationship between heritage and mission is one that endures for us all. We all must relate to the past and we also must relate to the future.

We must relate to where we have been and to where we are going. And so what I want to do here in just the last few minutes of this sermon is to apply this passage to us. Apply this concept of heritage and mission to our work at being rooted and reaching.

How we relate to our heritage and how we relate to our mission. And so what I want to do is just give five rules for being rooted and reaching. Five rules for being rooted and reaching. The first one of those is to follow the Spirit.

You see the Spirit told Peter to go to Cornelius. The Spirit fell on Cornelius' household and the Gentiles by the Spirit. The hand of the Lord was with them as they preached at Antioch. And Barnabas it says was a man full of the Spirit.

We too need to be a people who follow the leading of the Spirit. We too need to be a people full of the Holy Spirit. Of course this raises the question, how do we know if we are following the Spirit? Because it's possible for someone to claim to be following the Spirit but not actually be following the Spirit.

For not every thought that crosses our mind, not every opportunity that presents itself to us is of the Spirit or from the Spirit. The Spirit has been blamed for many bad decisions. So how do we know?

Well we keep this principle in mind. The Spirit works, the Spirit of God works with the Word of God. The Spirit of God always works with the Word of God and not contrary, never contrary to the Word of God.

The old catechism question tells about how the Bible is written. It asks who wrote the Bible? And the answer is holy men who were taught by the Holy Spirit. See the Word of God is breathed out by God therefore the Word of God is the work of the Spirit of God.

So if you're not following the Word, you're not following the Spirit who breathed out that Word. When we think about how we approach our past or how we approach our mission and ministry in the future, we must do it by the Spirit that is in accordance with His Word.

And walking by the Spirit in the Bible is always contrasted with walking by the flesh, walking according to the flesh. So if we walk according to the flesh, our church will be marked by selfish ambition, dissensions, envy, anger.

Those are works of the flesh, Galatians 5. But if we walk by the Spirit, then we'll be marked by love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. That's the way to navigate the tension between heritage and mission with the fruit of the Spirit.

That's number one. Second is remain rooted. Second rule for being rooted and reaching is to remain rooted. The Antioch church was rooted in the Jerusalem church. And they honored their mother church, they honored their mother by sending relief in response to the famine.

We see that at the end of the chapter. And so we never want to forget where we have come from. We want to honor our mothers and fathers in the faith, especially those who have come before us here. And so we're blessed here at First Baptist.

We have 110 years of faithful ministry. We celebrated that back in May. A hundred and ten years. We have a good number of members here in this room today who have been here for a good long while. And you've been active in ministry here at First Baptist some of you longer than I've been alive.

You've given sacrificially of your time. You've given sacrificially of your money. You've been here at First Baptist in times of plenty. You've been here at First Baptist in lean times. But you've never given up on the mission of Jesus through First Baptist Church Travel Address.

Now we do have a mission before us. We do have a community to reach. Travel Address in 2023 looked a lot different than Travel Address did, let's say, in 1993. And so we're going to have to adapt to certain conditions and we'll tweak some ministry programs.

But I want to be clear. We're not going to do any of that in a way that dishonors those who have come before us. We're not going to do any of that in a way that ignores those among us who have been here and been serving Jesus here the longest.

And so if you've been a member here at First Baptist Church for a long time, I want you to hear me say this clearly. We love you. We need you. And the ministry of First Baptist in 2023 is rooted in your decades of faithfulness.

We praise God for that. And if you're a new member here, I'd say over the last year or so, I want you to hear me say this. We love you. We need you. And you've joined into a ministry that's been going on since 1913.

And this church's history is now your history. And you're part of this particular expression of the people of God. And all of us together are First Baptist Church of Travel Address. And so, yes, we are moving forward.

But no, we are not cutting ties. We maintain the relationship between heritage and mission by being rooted. And part of that legacy that we have here at First Baptist is being rooted in God's Word. And so again, I want to emphasize the role of God's Word in how we do this.

We're going to do ministry by the Bible. Because the Bible is authoritative for our ministry and it's sufficient for everything that we need for life in godliness. So we're rooted not only in our history, we're rooted in the scriptures.

But while we are rooted, we don't want to be stuck. The Judaizers that we read about, they were stuck. They held on to things that they shouldn't have. And in so doing, they attempted to withstand God.

And so we must not be stuck in any habits that are contrary to God's Word or that hinder our mission. We must advance. But we don't advance without our roots. Because if we're cut off from our roots, we die.

Following the Spirit and Remaining Rooted

Number three, third rule for being rooted and reaching is to engage in the mission. You see, we're rooted but we're not resting. We're advancing. We're committed to engage in the mission of God to disciple the nations, including and especially our own.

Discipling the nations, baptizing them, and teaching them to obey everything that Jesus commanded. See, the believers scattered to Antioch, which was a large, influential, immoral city. And when they were there, what did they encounter?

A lot of opportunity for the gospel. A lot of people to preach to who needed Jesus. There was lots of opportunity for the gospel there. And so what did they do? They got right to it preaching the Lord Jesus.

You can look around our world today and you'll see lots of opportunity for the gospel. Now you could look around the world and you could lament that state. And you could see the decay and be discouraged.

You might even be a little bit angry about the state of things. But I want to encourage you this morning to look around the world and see opportunity for the gospel. See opportunity for the kingdom of Christ to expand and for the church to broaden.

I want you to see opportunity to win glory for King Jesus. For when you have a decaying society, it's because there are a lot of idols that have been set up. That means there's a lot of opportunities for idols to smash, for high places to tear down, for enemies to be put under the feet of the church of Jesus Christ.

I heard a pastor a few years ago encourage young families at a conference. He said not to worry about the state of the world that your kids are inheriting. He said your kids, they were born for the problems of 2040.

He said it would be a shame if you raised little dragon slayers and they had no dragons to slay. In other words, see the opportunity and get to work wielding the word of Christ for the glory of Christ.

We want to be a church that is actively making a difference in traveler's rest. We want to be a church that is actively making a difference for Christ in northern Greenville County. There's a lot of opportunity for it.

Of course we're going to have to be willing to pay the price to do so, because yes there is glory to be won for the name of King Jesus, but the biblical pattern is always suffering before glory, death before resurrection.

We need to engage the mission. Fourth, we're going to preach the Lord Jesus. Fourth rule is to preach the Lord Jesus. The blazing center of our ministry is the Lord Jesus Christ. We preach his life. We preach his death.

We preach his resurrection. We preach his ascension. We preach his kingship, his rule, his reign. Being rooted in our past and reaching out to our world, we must be the Christ people who speak often of Jesus Christ.

Christians ought to do many other things. We ought to engage in mercy ministry. We ought to organize for political action. We ought to engage in business and our jobs and do those very well. We ought to give a Christian education to our kids and so forth.

We ought to do those things, but none of those things that we do are disconnected from the Lord Jesus Christ and our preaching of him. So we preach Christ, because everything is connected to Christ. And this church and every church is built on Christ, the cornerstone.

So it's like the old hymn says, my hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name. So our heritage is found in Jesus Christ.

Our mission is found in Jesus Christ. Christ is everything. Let's pray together. Our Father in heaven, let us make much of Jesus Christ. In everything we do, may we do it for King Jesus. Grant us the vision to see and grant us the courage to act for the glory of King Jesus, in whose name we pray.

Amen.