Wise Serpents, Innocent Doves

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While you're standing, take out your Bibles and turn with me to the 23rd chapter of the book of Acts.
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For the opening of our message this morning, we're going to go to Acts chapter 23 and look at verses 6 and 7.
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The message today will actually be focusing on the whole of the chapter and cross-referencing it with Matthew chapter 10, which we had read for us earlier in the service today.
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But our primary focus will be looking at verses 6 and 7.
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It says, Now when Paul perceived that one part were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, he cried out in the council, Brothers, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees.
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It is with respect to the hope and the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial.
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And when he had said this, a dissension arose between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the assembly was divided.
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Father in heaven, I thank you for your word.
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I thank you for the truth.
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I pray, Lord, that you would keep me from error as I seek to preach the truth, and that I would preach this truth, Lord, with the conviction of the Holy Spirit and the power of God.
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Father, I pray for all in this room who know you, that they would understand that this speaks to a very real reality in the life of the believer, that we are to be wise and innocent in our walk.
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And yet, Lord, knowing that we do not have all wisdom, and Lord, we battle with innocence because of our flesh.
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So I pray, Lord, that we would understand the calling of today's message to be ambassadors for Christ and seek every day to grow in him.
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I pray also, Father, Lord, for those who are here who are not believers, Lord, that in this message they may hear the gospel and be saved.
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For you, O Lord, are the only one who can change a heart, and I trust you to do so.
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In Jesus' name, amen.
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It's okay.
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Have you ever done something and afterward realized that what you did was very unwise? That was supposed to be rhetorical, but everybody seems to be...
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You look at your behavior, your use of language, your attitude, and just say, boy, I really was not wise when I made that decision.
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More than unwise, have you ever done something only to realize that what you did was actually sinful or unethical? That one may be a little harder to admit.
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I don't hear everybody just running to answer that one, but we all must say, because none of us are perfect, that we have all at times been motivated by ungodly desires.
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We have all at times been motivated by things that are fleshly and worldly, and as a result, we all could say that, yes, we have done that as well.
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Now for a third question, maybe one that might be even harder to answer in the positive.
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Have you ever done something unwise or ungodly when you were in the position of being an ambassador for Christ? I've shared this story before.
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Some of you have heard it, some of you haven't, and it's not a story that I'm necessarily proud of, but I like to share it by way of example because it is a good example of when I messed up.
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A few years ago, I had had surgery, and as a result of the surgery, I was at my home recovering from the surgery, and I was on medication for pain.
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I was very uncomfortable in the situation that I was in, and it just so happens on this day, I had been left home alone.
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Jennifer had gone and taken the kids, and I was just there trying to rest in my easy chair.
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Well, as was often the case, as is often the case in our neighborhood, I heard a rap-rap-rapping on my chamber door, and it was, of course, the Jehovah's Witnesses come to call.
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And I answered the door in quite a bit of pain and with zero tolerance for nonsense, and I declared abruptly that their Watchtower Society was a heretical institution.
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I asked them to get out of our neighborhood and not to infect my neighbors with their false heretical teachings, at which case I closed the door and went back to my chair.
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Now, however true my words may have been, they were not seasoned with salt.
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They were not at all gracious.
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They were not wise, neither were they innocent.
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In the tenth chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus sends out twelve disciples to share the Gospel and to seek the lost sheep of the house of Israel, and in the midst of sending them out, he gives them instructions, and he gives them an instruction that for some might seem paradoxical.
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Matthew 10.16, which we heard read by Evan earlier, says this, Jesus speaking now, this is not something to be taken lightly, he's sending out his apostles, he's sending out his disciples, and he says, Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.
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Jesus goes on to say that they're going to be delivered into courts, they're going to be beaten, they would be forced to testify about their faith before governors and before kings, and so he references four animals, the sheep, the wolf, the serpent, and the dove, all having metaphorical significance as to how a Christian is to understand the world and how a Christian is to walk in the world.
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And Jesus told his disciples, and by extension, you and I, who are his followers, that we are to minister in this world with a balance, that we are to minister in this world with the balance of the wisdom of the serpent and the innocence of the dove, and I have found that, in my life, I often have the wisdom of the dove and the innocence of the serpent.
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Maybe you can relate a little, that often I fail both sides quite abundantly.
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And the reason why I point to Matthew 10-16 is because I think that it provides the perfect background for our study of Acts.
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You all know who's been here, we've been going through the book of Acts, and when you come to Acts 23, remember what has happened.
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Paul, in Acts 23, was giving his testimony, in Acts 22, was giving his testimony before the Jewish people in Jerusalem.
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He told about his conversion on the road to Damascus, but when he is said he was appointed to preach the gospel to the Gentiles, the crowd erupted and they wanted to kill him.
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And so Roman soldiers came in and they saved him from the crowd, they took him into the barracks and they were going to beat him.
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And Paul says, oh nay nay, he didn't really say that, but that's the modern vernacular, he said, wait a second, he said, is it right to beat a Roman citizen? And the guy who is the Roman guard, who is getting ready to lay hands on him, realizes that this could be punishable for him.
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If you beat a Roman citizen who's not been tried, if you hurt a Roman citizen who's not been convicted of a crime, this is a serious issue.
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So here's an example, in just passing, Paul using that wisdom of the serpent, he's avoiding what could have been a terrific beating by simply saying, hey listen, you can't do this, I have rights.
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You know, I mentioned a few weeks ago, it's not wrong for me or anyone else in the sense of if you have rights in a nation to call upon those rights, like when we go out to open air preach, somebody says, well who gave you the right to do this? Well, we have all rights under the constitution to go out and speak freely and the police often stand by and let us do it because they know there's no reason why we can't.
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In fact, I have a buddy who's not a police officer yet, but he's, what are they, the yellow things? Yeah, CSO, and he came up to me the other day and he gave me a big hug on my way out there because we were going out to open air preach and he says, well I'll be standing over here, I'll let you know if you start annoying me, but he was a real nice guy.
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But you understand, we have rights and so Paul called upon the right, you know, it's not right to beat a Roman citizen, is it, no, okay, then you can't beat me.
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I was born in Tarsus of Cilicia, I had my birthright as a Roman, you can't beat me.
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And so he got out of that.
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But then we come to chapter 23.
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And in chapter 23, the Roman guard, the man in charge, decides to take Paul before the Jewish authorities.
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This is the Sanhedrin.
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He decides, he says, you know what, we're going to get to the bottom of this.
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We're going to take you before, because as Romans, they didn't understand any Jewish laws, they didn't care about Jewish law, and they wanted to know why was Paul being assaulted.
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And so we're going to take you before your authorities, let them deal with you, let them, if there's going to be any condemnation, let them be the ones who do the condemning, since this has really got nothing to do with us at all.
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So they take Paul in, this is where we begin in chapter 23.
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Paul has been taken before the Sanhedrin, it says, and looking intently at the council, Paul said, brothers, I have lived my life before God in all good conscience up to this day, and the high priest Ananias commanded those who stood by him to strike him in the mouth.
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Then Paul said to him, God is going to strike you, you whitewashed wall.
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Are you sitting to judge me according to the law, and yet contrary to the law, you order me to be struck? Those who stood by said, would you revile God's high priest? And Paul said, I do not know, brothers, that he was the high priest, for it is written, you shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people.
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Now when Paul perceived that one part were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, he cried out in the council, brothers, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees, it is with respect to the hope of the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial.
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And when he had said this, a dissension arose between the Pharisees and Sadducees, and the assembly was divided.
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For the Sadducees say, there is no resurrection, nor angel, nor spirit, but the Pharisees acknowledge them all.
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Then a great clamor arose, and some of the scribes of the Pharisee party stood up and contended sharply, we find nothing wrong with this man.
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What if a spirit or an angel spoke to him? And when the dissension became violent, the tribune, that's the leader of the Romans, came in.
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After that, Paul would be torn to pieces by them, commanded the soldiers to go down and take him away from among them by force and bring him into the barracks.
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And the following night, the Lord stood by him and said, take courage, for as you have testified to the facts about me in Jerusalem, so you must testify also in Rome.
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I'm going to stop right there for now, just to make some comments.
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Paul has been brought before the Jewish religious leaders, and he says to them, brothers, he calls them brothers.
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Paul had a great affection for the Jewish people that never died.
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Paul never stopped having an affection for his Jewish brethren.
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In fact, in Romans chapter 9, he says very clearly, he says, if it were that I could die and go to hell, and that meant the salvation of my brethren according to the flesh, that's Jewish people, if I could die and go to hell and save them from hell, I would do it.
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So, Paul had a great affection for his Jewish brethren, and so he goes into this audience, and he wants this.
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You have to remember, Paul is not running from audiences.
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Remember earlier how he had been beaten, and he was taken into the barracks, and he says to the man, he says, can I go back out there and talk? Can I go back out and address the crowd? And he went back out and he shared the gospel of how he was converted.
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This is what we talked about last week.
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Paul is not afraid of the audience, Paul wants the audience.
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He says, brothers, I have lived my life before God in all good conscience up until this day.
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In essence, what Paul is saying, I am innocent of your charges, because what are they charging Paul with? You understand, Paul is being charged as a heretic.
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Paul is being charged as a false teacher.
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He is a part of the way.
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By the way, the phrase the way, that was what Christians were called in the first century.
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They were called Christians in Antioch, but in Jerusalem they were called followers of the way.
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What did Jesus identify himself as? I am the way, the truth, and the life.
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Jesus is the way, so people who followed the way were followers of Jesus, and Paul was known as being a follower of Jesus.
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And he comes in and he says, I have good conscience before you, why? Because I am no heretic.
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You will believe I am a heretic because you don't believe in Jesus, but you have to understand, that's not heresy, that's the fulfillment of your own scriptures.
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That's not what he said here, I am saying this is the attitude of Paul.
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I have a good conscience because I have done nothing wrong.
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I am not out preaching false gods.
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I am not out preaching false salvation.
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I am not out preaching false truth.
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I am preaching Jesus.
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I am innocent of heresy.
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I have a good conscience up to right now.
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I have not preached anything that is not in accord with the scriptures.
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And what do they do? The high priest Ananias commanded him to be wrapped across the face.
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Paul said, okie dokie.
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And he unleashed, as it were, a bit of a harsh response, because the man walked over and struck him in the mouth, and he looked at the high priest and he said, God is going to strike you, you whitewashed wall.
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Now, I understand in 2016, well, that was last year, in 2017, if you went out and called somebody a whitewashed wall, you are probably not going to ruffle any feathers because nobody is going to care, nobody knows what that means.
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But if you went up to somebody, especially a religious leader, and said God is going to judge you and condemn you, you heretic, you, I'm sorry, not heretic, you hypocrite.
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That's what I was trying to say, forgive me.
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God is going to judge you, you hypocrite.
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That's what he said.
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A whitewashed wall is something that's clean only on the outside.
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And you remember Jesus back in the book of Matthew when he was condemning the Pharisees? How did he condemn them? He says, you guys are like whitewashed sepulchres.
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A sepulchre was a tomb, a covering of a tomb.
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And Jesus said, it's like you came and you cleaned the outside of the tomb and the whole inside is still filled with a rotting dead corpse.
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And that's what the Pharisees were.
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They had a good outside and they had dead men, they were dead men inside.
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They had a dead inside and a good looking outside.
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And this is what Paul is saying to the head here.
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He says, you, my friend, are a hypocrite.
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Why was he a hypocrite? Because he wasn't obeying the law.
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The law forbid a man to be struck, read the Old Testament.
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The law forbid a man to be struck if he's not condemned and Paul is yet to be condemned.
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Paul is yet to stand trial and be condemned by the Sanhedrin.
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This guy heard something he didn't like, he nodded to his bailiff and the bailiff went over and wrapped him across the face and Paul said, what, that's not legal.
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You're supposed to be the keeper of the law and here you are breaking the law in front of everybody? You hypocrite.
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You're supposed to be the law keepers and you have right now broken the law in front of everyone.
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Now, the person standing by, possibly the person who just hit him, says, do you know who you're talking to? That is the high priest of God that you're speaking to.
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Now, people have conjectured and commentary writers sometimes they disagree and it really doesn't matter because on some of these things it's just really just sharing an opinion of what may be because we weren't there.
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But some people wonder why Paul wouldn't know that that's the high priest.
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Generally, the high priest identified himself pretty well by how he dressed.
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He was the guy in charge and it was well known by how he demonstrated himself.
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But perhaps he wasn't in his regalia or perhaps Paul's eyesight, because remember that was one of his issues, Paul's eyesight was a problem and he couldn't tell who was whom.
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And again, commentators tend to argue back and forth.
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Some people think he's being sarcastic, like I didn't know he was the high priest.
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I don't think there's sarcasm here because he identifies himself also as doing something wrong.
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Read the text.
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He goes on to say, he said, I didn't know brothers that he was the high priest for it is written, you shall not speak evil of a rule of your people.
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So he identifies himself, Paul identifies himself as breaking the law.
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Okay, I got on to him for breaking the law, I was wrong too.
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I shouldn't have called him a hypocrite right here in the middle of everybody.
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He is the high priest.
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And we don't know again why Paul didn't know that's who this person was.
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It could be that the high priest changes periodically, it changed annually in the old covenant and there was a change in the high priest and so it could be that Paul was gone when the change ever happened and he didn't know who he was talking to.
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That's whatever the reason is, Paul didn't know and when he realizes that he did something wrong, he actually addresses his own error and he fixes it.
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But then, verse 6, Paul begins to look, this is why I don't take the eyesight argument by the way, because he's going to now notice that half of them are Pharisees and half are Sadducees.
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And I think if there was an eyesight issue, he probably wouldn't be able to tell.
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So I don't think that's really one of the answers I would seek.
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He says, now when Paul perceived that one part were Sadducees, the other Pharisees, he cried in the council, brothers I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees.
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It is with respect to the hope of the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial.
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And when he had said this, a dissension arose among the Pharisees and Sadducees and the assembly was divided.
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Now you have to understand a little bit about Phariseeical theology versus Sadduceeical theology to understand what's happening here and most of you understand this, but for those who don't, I want to just very quickly help you understand.
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In the first century, there were two warring religious parties.
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When I say warring, they did work together but much like Protestants and Catholics today or maybe a better example might be Liberal and Conservatives today, sort of war with one another.
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There was a dissension among Pharisees and Sadducees about the truth of the Old Testament and the biggest truth question was whether or not there was life after death, whether or not there was a resurrection from the dead, and whether or not things like angels and demons and other spiritual things existed.
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The Pharisees believed that you could rise from the dead.
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The Pharisees believed in an eternity.
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They believed in angels and they believed in spirits of demons and all kinds of things.
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But the Sadducees did not.
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In fact, Ms.
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Hoffman used to have this cute thing in our Sunday school class when I was a kid.
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She would say, you know they're sad, you see, because they don't believe in the resurrection.
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So they're sad, you see.
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You know, they're sad.
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They don't have a resurrection.
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So it's a way to remember.
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And the Sadducees didn't believe in resurrection.
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They didn't believe in afterlife.
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They didn't believe in angels or demons or any of that stuff.
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They were the modern secularists, secular anti-supernatural religionists.
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You know there are people out there like that today, right? There's a guy in Australia who's an atheist pastor.
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I'm not.
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I talked about it in Sunday school this morning.
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The guy said, I'm an atheist, but I don't want to give up the traditions of my religion.
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So I'm going to maintain those traditions as an atheist.
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And he preaches and teaches as an atheist the traditions of Christianity.
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Yeah, it boggles the mind.
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But you go back.
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You have the Sadducees.
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This was the anti-supernaturalists.
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You have the Pharisees who were the pro-supernaturalists.
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And these two groups met together as part of the Sanhedrin.
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And Paul said, look, I'm on trial here because I have hope in the resurrection.
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And guess what that did? That divided the group.
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Because now the Pharisees are saying, we have hope in the resurrection.
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We believe in the resurrection.
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And let me say this.
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I don't think Paul was manipulating the group.
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Because I think the next step was Paul was going to give them the gospel, but he doesn't get a chance to.
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Some people see Paul here as kind of being shady.
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He's not being shady.
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He's just trying to remind that he has not given up his Pharisaical background.
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He was a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees, meaning he came from the Pharisees.
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He was taught at the feet of Gamaliel, the greatest of the Pharisaical teachers.
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And I'm here to tell you, I still believe in the resurrection, and that's why I'm here.
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And I believe the next words out of his mouth would have been, the resurrection hope is in Christ.
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The only problem is, when he said, I'm here for the resurrection, the Pharisees said, we agree.
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And the Sadducees said, we don't.
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And now they said, it would be like me walking into a church, and I got half Baptist and half Presbyterian.
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And I said something to the effect of, well, I believe in baptism by immersion.
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It might immediately split the crowd, if there is already a dissension there.
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You know? If I say, well, I believe in baptism by immersion, the Baptists would say, yeah, I agree, and the Presbyterians would say, well, we don't agree with that.
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I love Presbyterians, so don't think that was a Freudian slip or anything.
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But there would be an automatic divide in the group, because I'm siding essentially with one side.
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Paul is here trying to gain traction in the conversation.
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He's trying to gain a foothold so that they will listen to what he has to say.
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Look, guys, I haven't given up my Pharisaical roots, because the root of being a Pharisee is a guy who loves the Word of God, who trusts the Word of God, who believes in the resurrection, who believes in the supernatural, and I'm still that.
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I just understand what it means now.
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You understand? I am who I am in Christ.
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But the problem is, by Paul saying what he said, the group began to divide so harshly that they began to fight with one another.
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They say doctrine divides.
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It does.
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And it divided the group.
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And it became so hostile that the tribune came in, the leader of the Romans came in and took him out.
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So Paul does avoid the condemnation here in this situation by pointing himself as being still a part of this group.
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After this, and I'm not going to read the whole text, but I encourage you reading of this, some men came and put together a plot to kill Paul.
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Paul's nephew finds out about it.
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And so Paul's nephew comes and tells him about it in the barracks.
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And Paul tells the Roman centurion, the guards, he says, hey, they're going to try to kill me.
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In fact, it says in the text, it says in verse 13, it says there were more than 40 who made the conspiracy and they said that they were not going to eat until they killed Paul.
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Well, they never did get to kill Paul, so I don't know if they either broke their vow or they're just 40 hungry guys running around out there somewhere still trying to find him.
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But the tribune realizes what's happening in verse 23.
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It says, then he called to the centurions and said, get ready 200 soldiers, 70 horsemen and 200 spearmen to go as far as Caesarea at the third hour of the night.
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Also provide mounts for Paul to ride and bring him safely to Felix, the governor.
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And then he wrote a letter telling everything that had happened.
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And that's from verse 26 and following.
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And Paul's taken there.
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And what we see in this text is just again, God working everything out for Paul.
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And I love verse 11 because it says that the Lord told him, promised him that he was going to be there with him, that he was going to make sure that he made it to Rome.
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But I want to go back.
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I want to, now that we sort of understand what's happening here, I want to go back and talk more about what I said earlier about the serpent and the dove.
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Because Paul is not a perfect man.
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Sometimes we lift Paul up as an example, and he is an example of Christian fidelity.
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But Paul ain't perfect.
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He called himself the chief of sinners, but he was a man of God.
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And he was a man from whom we can glean a lot of life principles.
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And what we glean, I think in this story is the balance of wisdom and innocence, the balance of wisdom and innocence.
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So I want to expound for just a few moments as by way of application, I want to expound on our individual calling to balance wisdom and innocence in our own lives.
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So I hope you understand I'm not just trying to abandon this text, but I want to show how this text is an illustration on how we are to live as believers.
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But I want to do so by considering Jesus' command in Matthew 10.16.
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In Matthew 10.16, he gives us two animals.
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He says we are to live with the wisdom of the serpent and the innocence of the dove.
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What does it mean to be wise like a serpent? Well I will say this, a lot of people have problems with that comparison.
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Because generally in the Bible when we talk about a serpent, we're talking negatively.
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Think about it, the very first time we see a Bible, or the very first time in the Bible you see a serpent, it's the devil himself.
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And I got to tell you, every time I've seen a serpent since then, I think I've met him.
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Because I do not like snakes.
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And it's the devil, and I just hold to that.
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But through the Bible, serpents are not generally seen as positive things.
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Jesus called the religious hypocrites what? You brood of vipers? When Paul was talking about the sinful nature of man, he says you have the poison of snakes under your lips.
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He's talking about how we speak ill and hatefully to one another.
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But the serpent in this case, when Jesus says be wise as a serpent, the serpent is a symbol of virtue.
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How? What is it about the serpent that is good? Well the serpent is a cunning animal.
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A serpent has a tremendous sense of something called situational awareness.
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And situational awareness simply means identifying with your surroundings and the dangers that could be in your vicinity.
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They're keenly aware of the fact that there's so much that can hurt them because they're literally laying on their stomachs everywhere they go, and there's all kinds of things that could crush them, or kill them, or step on them.
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So a serpent is aware of what's going on.
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It's not a foolish animal.
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A serpent knows when to strike, but also knows when to retreat.
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Most of the time when you see serpents, what are they doing? Running away.
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Unless it's a Florida cottonmouth, they'll come after you.
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But generally, generally the serpent's moving out of danger, recognizing the potential threat and getting away.
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The wisdom of the serpent is shrewdness, cunning, and it's necessary to have this when you live in a world filled with wolves.
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Consider this for a second.
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The way of the wolf is the way of the world, but it is not the way of the kingdom of God.
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The wolf devours, the wolf destroys, the wolf deceives.
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The wolf is not wise, the wolf is wily.
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He thinks only of himself.
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He thinks of only filling his own belly, and he does so at the expense of others.
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And beloved, you are not commanded to be a wolf.
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You are not commanded to be one who devours, one who destroys, one who deceives.
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You are not commanded to do that.
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You are commanded to have a positive virtue of wisdom.
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Not like a wolf, but like a serpent.
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We're called to be like serpents in the sense that we're called to have an eye to our surroundings and to know what is happening.
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But we're not to be like serpents in that we're not to be underhanded, sneaky, or deceitful.
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Jesus did not say go out and be like snakes in the world and we think snakes are underhanded, deceitful, and all that.
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No, he said have the wisdom of the serpent, but balance that with something else.
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Balance that with innocence.
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The word innocent can be translated as harmlessness.
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If you have a King James Bible, that's what it says.
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It says be wise as serpents and harmless as a dove.
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Doves are the symbol of peace in the world.
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Do you know why? Because they're harmless.
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They don't hurt anybody.
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They have no guilt because they lack a power and desire to damage or hurt.
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No one ever talks about surviving the great dove attack of 1995.
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And we are called to maintain that type of innocence in our walk.
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Even though we have shrewdness and cunning, we must also not allow that shrewdness and cunning to be ungodliness.
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And I want to add to this.
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Being innocent as a dove does not mean that you're never going to offend someone.
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Because if you carry the gospel, the gospel is offensive.
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But it does mean that offense should not be our goal.
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I want to tell you this.
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We should not, I'm going to repeat this.
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We should not go out of our way to offend people for Christ.
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His gospel is offensive enough.
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You don't have to add to it.
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We are called to be ambassadors.
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And it is a poor ambassador who makes it his decision to go out and embarrass the one he represents.
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You say, well, what are you talking about, pastor? Westboro Baptist is ridiculous.
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Because they made it their point to go out and use vile language, use insulting rhetoric, and incite crowds with the most heinous of language.
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That is not wise as serpents and that is not innocent as a dove.
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Dr.
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James White used to go to the Mormon tabernacle and he would hand out gospel tracts outside.
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And he always made a point when he would go to dress in a jacket and a tie.
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And the reason for that is because he said, you know, if I go in street clothes, and the Mormons are very conservative in their dress, he says, I don't want my clothes to be a barrier to when I'm trying to meet these people.
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He said, so I'm going to make sure that I dress for that occasion and hand out gospel tracts.
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He says, but inevitably when he would go, there would be people out there for the purpose of shock, would have signs, and they would be shouting at them as they would go by, saying things like, it shouldn't be Mormon, it should be moron.
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Let me tell you something, if that's your way of trying to reach Mormons, just stop.
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That's not wise as a serpent and certainly not as innocent as a dove.
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Dr.
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White tells a story, one guy was yelling, it's not Brigham Young, it's Brigham Young.
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And he was referencing the fact that Brigham Young was allegedly a man who had inappropriate relationships with children.
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Is that the best way to reach these people? True or not, is that wise as serpents and innocent as a dove for you to sit there and shout things like that? I mean, be honest with yourself.
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Somebody may object, and you may object to me on the way out.
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You may say, well, Pastor Keith, the prophets used harsh language and even sarcasm when they were trying to get their hearers attention.
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Shouldn't we follow their example? Well, let me respond by saying this.
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That sometimes, sometimes a situation may call for a deliberate and aggressive tone.
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And sometimes there is such a thing as sanctified sarcasm.
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If we're trying to make a point, there is times where I may have to be a little more aggressive in tone and speak in a way that's intended to cut the heart and say, make you think about what it is you believe.
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But let me say this about, I want to tell you something.
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Years ago, and I hate to be using myself as an example, but I want to talk about my own failure here.
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Years ago, I was sitting down in my living room with a relative who I know hates the Lord.
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This person is an unbeliever.
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They don't believe in God, and they hate Him.
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That's what most atheists are that way.
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They don't believe in God, and they hate Him at the same time.
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And so I'm sitting there, and I'm trying to talk to this person about Jesus.
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And at one point, she said, why are you yelling at me? And I didn't realize that's what had happened.
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My passion for the truth had begun to incite my speech, and I was getting louder.
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And you can imagine me getting louder.
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I get louder and louder to the point that I was almost just browbeating her.
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And I had to stop, and he said, you know what, it's not my language that's going to save her.
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It's not me browbeating her that's going to save her.
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But all I am doing right now by shouting her down is putting up a wall.
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Wise as serpents.
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Innocent as doves.
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A pastor I recently heard share a story.
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Not me, but a different pastor shared this story.
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He said he was at work.
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And he worked for a company where he had to share space with another man.
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And the other man was an unbeliever.
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And the guy was constantly walking around using the Lord's name in vain.
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Just constantly throwing out that terrible foul word.
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Bah, bah, bah, all the time.
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And he said, you know, I'd go into work, and I was upset.
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Every day I'd get mad.
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Oh, I'm going to have to hear that foul language every day.
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Every day I'd get upset.
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I'm going to have to hear that using the Lord's name in vain.
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He said, so one day, I got so fed up with it, I looked that guy right in the eye.
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And told him, you are offending me.
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And I want you to stop that because I'm offended by what you're saying.
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And he said, you know what, the guy stopped.
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And he said, and some of you might say, hooray for shutting the mouth of the heathen.
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He said, but later he realized that that wasn't wisdom.
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Because he didn't share the gospel with that man or explain why he needed grace or why he needed Christ.
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Instead all he did was talk a sinner into changing his behavior.
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And if all we're doing is trying to convince sinners to change their behavior, we're not practicing evangelism.
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If you take a sinner and you just tell them about their sin and they stop sinning in your presence, that doesn't get them an inch closer to the Lord.
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And he said, this pastor said, and I was not wise as a serpent or innocent as a dove.
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I was more concerned about that man offending me than him offending God.
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One of the great things that we see in chapter 23 of Acts is Paul is demonstrating wisdom and innocence.
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But I want to finalize my message today with one point.
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Paul messed up and he says he messed up.
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As wise as Paul was, he wasn't perfect.
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As innocent as Paul was, he wasn't beyond making a mistake.
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Even the most mature believer can have moments where he fails to maintain the balance of wisdom and innocence.
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And that's where God's grace fills the gap.
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Wisdom and innocence are what we're called to.
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Their opposites are foolishness and licentiousness, neither of which we are called to.
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But when we do experience moments of foolishness, when we do experience moments of failure and even sin, we have a Savior who is much better at being a Savior than we are at being sinners.
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God calls us to wisdom.
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He calls us to innocence.
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But he never says, find your salvation in those.
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He says, find your salvation in Christ.
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Because in Christ is perfect wisdom and perfect innocence outside of which there is no hope.
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Let's pray.
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Father, I thank you for your word.
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I thank you for the truth.
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And I thank you that in Christ all the riches and glories of the wisdom and holiness of God are found.
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And I pray, Lord, that we have understood our calling as ambassadors for Christ.
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That we would not seek to embarrass our Savior.
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That we would not seek to shame our Savior.
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But that in our standing for him we would stand as ambassadors.
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Filled with the wisdom of the Lord which comes from the word.
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And the innocence which comes from the work of the Spirit in our hearts.
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And I pray that we would seek a balance of both in our lives.
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But understanding that while in this life we will not be perfect.
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So we ought always cling to the cross.
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Because outside of that cross is damnation.
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But when holding to that cross we know that we have life forever.
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Thank you, Lord, for your word, for your truth.
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May you use it to move our hearts.
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In Jesus' name.
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Amen.
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Let's stand and sing and prepare our hearts for communion.