All Things to All Men

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Amen, and you may be seated.
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While you're sitting down, I encourage you to take out a Bible and turn to the book of Acts and find your way to the 16th chapter beginning at verse 1, which we will be reading in just a moment.
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It seems obvious and should go really without saying that the face of modern Christianity, especially that which identifies itself as evangelical Christianity, has changed a great deal within the past generation.
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In the past 20 to 30 years, maybe a little longer, churches have really changed even in the way that they look.
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They've gone from looking like cathedrals to nightclubs.
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And even the very names of the churches have become very club-like.
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Elevation, Encounter, Bold City, you know, all these names which really seem like, you know, again, you wouldn't know the difference.
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And it makes sense because the atmosphere is also often the same.
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The worship area is filled with smoke and moving lights and the messages are very pithy, very short.
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You leave feeling like you've been an observer of a show rather than a participant in worship.
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And if you ask why this is, and I have, I've spoken to several ministers on several occasions, and I say, why is it that that is the new trend? What has motivated the trend? Well, the answer is almost always the same and it's very simple.
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It reaches people.
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It works.
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That's the methodological, what we would call the pragmatic answer.
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We do it because it works.
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And that's certainly not untrue.
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Churches that have adopted the club atmosphere are very appealing to mass audiences.
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They don't feel like church.
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So unchurched people, unsaved people are more likely to attend and feel comfortable.
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And when you inquire further with such persons and say, well, what is the basis upon which you make this change? What's the scripture that you would use? Because I would hope that a person who is leading a church would at least have a scriptural basis upon which to found their methodology.
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What's the basis for your decision? One particular passage seems to rise and stand out above all else.
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And that is what we read in our call to worship this morning, which was 1 Corinthians 9, and particularly verse 22, where the apostle Paul says, I become all things to all people that by all means I might win some.
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This one passage has become the place that people appeal for all kinds of behavior in the name of Christian witnessing.
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And people argue, well, I'll just do whatever it takes to win people for Jesus.
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And while that's certainly encouraging to see someone with zeal for the lost, it does seem like there's been a stretching of Paul's intended meaning.
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It can even be contorted well beyond Paul's meaning for people who say, well, I even engage in sin because it allows me to win the lost.
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I've heard people say that.
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Well, I know this is wrong to do, but I do it because it's what allows me to reach people.
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And that's certainly not a right understanding of what Paul was saying.
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Well, today we're in the book of Acts in chapter 16.
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And we're going to be looking at what I believe is the practical and visual application of Paul's words in 1 Corinthians 9.
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Paul said, I become all things to all men that I might win some.
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He said that.
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But in Acts chapter 16, we see the application of that.
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And we see what Paul meant when he said that and how it looks in reality.
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We see a living example of being all things to all men by doing what is needful to remove obstacles which are there in our sharing of the gospel.
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So let's stand together and read Acts 16.
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Can we stand to give honor and reverence to the word of God? We're going to read verses one through five.
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Acts 16, verse one.
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Paul came also to Derbe and to Lystra.
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A disciple was there named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer, but his father was a Greek.
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He was well spoken of by the brothers at Lystra and Iconium.
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Paul wanted Timothy to accompany him and he took him and circumcised him because of the Jews who were in those places for they all knew that his father was a Greek.
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As they went on their way through the cities, they delivered to them for observance the decisions that had been reached by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem.
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So the churches were strengthened in the faith and they increased in numbers daily.
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Let us pray.
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Father, I thank you for your word.
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I pray even now that as I begin to preach your word that you would keep me from error for I am certainly capable of preaching error and I pray that you would keep me from it for the sake of my heart and conscience, for the sake of your people, and for the sake of your name.
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I pray, Father, also that you would open the hearts of your people to hear your word, that if we have placed obstacles in the way of reaching people with the gospel, that we would be willing to remove those obstacles.
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But, Lord, also that we would never in any way, shape, or form compromise your holiness, but that we would understand, Lord, that to stand on anything other than Christ is to stand on shaky sand.
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So, Father, today, lead us, guide us in a right understanding of this text.
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Help me again to teach your word.
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And, Lord, if there are those among us, which there certainly are those, who have not confessed Christ, and who sit lost in their sin, I pray that they would hear the gospel today, that they would be saved by your Spirit, for it is the work of the Spirit to regenerate the soul.
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We trust you with that work alone.
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In Jesus' name, amen.
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For those of you who have not been a part of our normal worship over the last few months, we study the Bible verse by verse, and we've been in the book of Acts for several months.
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We did take some time off for Holy Week, the week between Palm Sunday and Resurrection Sunday, so we did take a few weeks off.
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But the last time we were in the book of Acts, we were in chapter 15.
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And so, again, just by way of reminder, I kind of want to remind you where we are.
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Acts 16 begins on the heels of one of the most important events in the history of the Christian church.
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Acts 15 begins with men coming to Antioch, to where Paul and Barnabas are preaching.
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These men come to Antioch and say, unless you're circumcised, you cannot be a Christian.
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Unless you're circumcised, you can't be saved, because you have to first become a Jew before you can become a Christian.
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Paul and Barnabas say, no, that's not true.
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You've added to the gospel of Christ.
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You've perverted the gospel of Christ.
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There is no small debate among them, it says in the Scriptures.
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And so they take their issue to Jerusalem, back to the apostles, James and Peter and the others.
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And they lay it before them.
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And at the end of the day, as the conversation is coming to a close, they decide, yes, it is true.
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A man becomes a Christian by grace alone, through faith alone, and not of works, any work, including the work of circumcision.
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No matter how old the tradition, no matter how ensconced it is in the people, the work of circumcision does not make someone a Christian.
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It is grace alone, through faith alone, and Christ alone that makes someone a believer.
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So that, again, sets the stage for a new movement of the church, because now the Judaizers have been condemned.
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That's what they were called, the Judaizers.
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Those who would argue that you must become a Jew before you can become a Christian.
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Those men have been condemned.
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Those men have been shown to be false.
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And so now the apostle Paul decides he wants to go on another missionary journey.
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Remember, he was already been on one.
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Him and Barnabas went all through Cyprus and Pamphylia and Derbe and all these places.
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They've already been on one missionary journey.
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Now he wants to go on another one.
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So he goes to Barnabas and he says, pack your bags, we're getting going.
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And Barnabas says, well, I want to take John Mark.
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And Paul says, no, I don't like John Mark.
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That's not what he said, but giving a quick little paraphrase here.
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He says, no, John Mark left us the first time.
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He's not coming a second time just to abandon us again.
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Well, Barnabas had a soft heart towards John Mark.
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He loved him.
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He was his cousin.
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He was also an encouraging man.
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He didn't want to leave John Mark behind.
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So what happened is Paul and Barnabas split.
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Barnabas takes John Mark and they go to Cyprus, which was an island.
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And that's also where Barnabas grew up.
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So they started back in his hometown, again, sharing the gospel and again, going to the churches that had already been evangelized.
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And the apostle Paul takes Silas and they go a different direction.
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And they come to a place called Derbe and Lystra.
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And while they were there, they meet a young man named Timothy.
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And that's where he brings us to our text today.
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And we're going to look at three things.
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I've given them to you in your worship folder.
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I've given you an outline today.
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Normally I do an outline of the application, but because I'm going to be making application as I go through the text today, I've just given you an outline of what we're going to look at.
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We're going to look at the parents of Timothy, the procedure of Timothy and the position of Timothy.
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And I don't always do alliteration, but I figured I would give you a gift today and do alliteration.
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I'm just kidding.
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But we're going to look at the parents of Timothy, the position of Timothy and the procedure for Timothy.
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Because all these things are important.
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And I hope that it helps us to understand something.
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And this is really the focus of today.
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God has called us to seek the lost.
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God has called us to go out into the world and be evangelists.
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He's called us to be ambassadors for Christ.
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Amen.
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There are times where God calls us to forsake a liberty on behalf of someone else.
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There are times when God calls us to forsake certain freedoms that we have if it means the winning of a soul.
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And ought we to put the value of a soul above the value of our own freedom? You see, a lot of times we don't though.
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A lot of times we're unwilling to put the value of a soul of another person over the value of our own freedom.
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And that's what we're going to see today.
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The Apostle Paul valued the souls of the men he was going to preach to.
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He knew there was going to be a wall between him and them, and he asked and encouraged Timothy to cut down that wall.
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Anyway, that's literally, we're going to talk in a minute how that worked out.
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But let's just begin with the parents of Timothy.
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Verse 1, he says, Paul came also to Derbe and to Lystra.
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A disciple was there named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer.
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But his father was a Greek.
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He was also well spoken of by the brothers at Lystra and Iconium.
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Now, for all of us, and from a biblical perspective, any one of you who's been in the church for any length of time, Timothy is a pretty well-known name.
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I mean, there's two books of the Bible.
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When you learn the books of the Bible, the two books of the Bible bear his name.
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We know that he would ultimately go on to become a missionary and a pastor, and he was a pastor whose mentor was the Apostle Paul.
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I've kind of thought about that this week.
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I've thought about the fact, could you imagine that your mentor in the faith, your prayer partner, the man who is leading you in learning of Christ was the Apostle Paul? Let's just meditate on that for a moment.
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Just think about it.
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That's who Timothy's father in the faith was.
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One of the greatest Christian missionaries, one of the greatest teachers of the Word of God to ever live was the Apostle Paul, and this was this guy's teacher.
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It's an amazing thing.
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Well, the text begins by making a reference to Timothy's parents.
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It says that his mother was a Jewish woman and that she was a believer, but that his father was a Greek.
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And some of the translations say, and it does sort of bear this out in the original language, that he had been a Greek, indicating that at this point he might possibly be dead.
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We don't know, the text isn't explicit about that, but we know at least this, he was a Greek when Timothy was born.
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In either event, Timothy had been raised in a divided household.
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But even though he was raised in a divided household, he was not raised without a biblical education.
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His mother and his grandmother had seen to it that he learned the Scriptures.
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In fact, we learn in 2 Timothy 1, verse 5, the Apostle Paul talking about Timothy says, I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and now, I am sure, dwells within you.
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It's likely that Lois and Eunice had seen the Apostle Paul in Barnabas on their first missionary journey.
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It's likely that these women had been converted through the preaching of the Apostle Paul and Barnabas on their first journey.
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And it is possible also that these women had from that, led this young man to Christ and taught him the Scriptures.
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Some people say, well, no, Paul led him to Christ because Paul talks about being his father in the faith.
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Well, being his father in the faith can also be a reference to a mentor.
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It doesn't necessarily mean he won him to Christ.
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We don't know for sure.
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We do know this, even if Paul is the one who led him to Christ, it was Lois and Eunice who made the soil ready for the seed.
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It was those who taught him the Scripture from birth.
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It was those who raised him up.
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It wasn't his father because his father was a Greek.
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His father didn't believe as the mother did.
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At least the text doesn't say that he did.
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And certainly, he didn't follow in the customs because he was not circumcised and neither was Timothy.
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Because remember, to be a Jew meant that you were circumcised when you were born.
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It was part of your ritual, part of becoming a part of the Jewish family.
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It was part of becoming the Jewish nation.
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And even if you had only one Jewish parent, even if only your mother was a Jew, you still would be circumcised because you were still considered part of the Jewish nation.
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But Timothy didn't have that.
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Which means in some sense, and likely, again, I'm having to conjecture some here, but in some sense, his father probably stood in the way.
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There's no reason why his mother would have said no.
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But the father being a Greek, the father not believing in the Jewish system, not believing in the Jewish religion, had said, no, my son is not going to receive that sign.
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But in either event, we know this.
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His mother and his grandmother taught him the Word of God.
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Even though he had not received the sign of being a part of the people of God.
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So he was not circumcised.
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And it could have been that his mother's relationship with the father was a scandal.
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This is something that, because a lot of people say, why is this important? Why are we even talking about the circumcision of Timothy? Why is this even in the text? Why does the Holy Spirit of God spend five verses telling us about this young man, Timothy, and telling us the fact that he started out as an uncircumcised young man, the son of a Jewish woman, and that he wasn't circumcised, and Paul tells him to get circumcised.
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Why is that even a point in the story? It is likely that his mother's relationship with the father was a scandal.
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Because the mother's relationship with the father was outside of the bounds of what was part of Jewish culture.
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Jewish women don't marry Greek men.
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And so her marrying a Greek man becomes then a scandal, and now the son is not accepted within the community.
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You have a Greek daddy, and you're uncircumcised.
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You're not one of us.
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And it's likely that that scandal went well into the community and maybe even past the community.
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So here comes the Apostle Paul.
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He comes in and he sees this young man.
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This young man who is obviously fit for ministry.
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This young man who loves God, who loves His Word, who loves Jesus, and he's well thought of by the Christian community.
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And Paul wants this young man for a missionary.
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I want to take this man with me, and I want to use this young man.
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I want to grow this young man.
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I want to mentor this young man.
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God is going to use this young man, and I want to be a part of what God is going to do with this young man.
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But, every time we go into a synagogue, this is going to be an issue.
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Because this young man has not been circumcised because his father and his mother had a relationship that the community did not accept.
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Now, we see in verse 3 the procedure for Timothy.
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We see Paul wanted Timothy to accompany him, and he took him and circumcised him.
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For what reason? Well, the text tells us, because of the Jews in those places, for they all knew his father was a Greek.
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Now, this is a place where we can become somewhat perplexed.
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Because the majority of chapter 15, Paul is arguing one thing.
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You don't have to be circumcised to be a Christian.
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Isn't that weird that almost the whole chapter 15 is all about the fact that you don't have to be circumcised.
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And the very next thing Paul does, he meets a young man who is not circumcised, and what does he do? He circumcises him.
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You're like, wait a minute.
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Is Paul backing off of his conviction here? Is Paul rolling back on his heels? Because, well, now I'm acquiescing my point.
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Am I reneging on what I said was true? No.
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And nothing could be further from the truth.
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Paul has not given up his conviction that salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone.
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But he does recognize that there is a social stumbling block which is going to inhibit Timothy's success in reaching the Jews.
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Hear that again.
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He recognizes that there is a social stumbling block that is going to inhibit Timothy's success in reaching the Jews.
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Again, Timothy is well known among the brethren.
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The scandal involving his mother would have probably also been well known.
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People were aware of his mixed heritage.
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They knew his not having been brought up in the community of the covenantal sign would have been an issue, and this would have been a major issue for the Jewish community.
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A child of a Jewish mother was a Jew.
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But he must receive the sign.
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And he had not.
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Paul did not want this social divide to become a stumbling block to the witnessing of the gospel.
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Remember this, folks.
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Where did Paul always go first? Every time he went into a new city.
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Every time he went into a new area.
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He went to the Jews first.
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Why? Huh? It's a sort of riot.
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Okay.
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Well, he went to the Jews first.
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He even says the gospel is for the Jew first and also to the Greek.
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He went to the Jews first because it's there that you're going to be able to speak from the Scriptures.
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You're going to be able to speak to the people on at least somewhat of a common ground.
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You're going to be able to speak to them about something they know.
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The Jews understood the law of God.
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The Jews understood perpetuatory sacrifice.
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The Jews understood the priesthood and the temple and how God worked through the mediator of the priest and the prophet.
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So the Jews understood certain things that those outside of the community of the Jewish people did not.
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And so the apostle Paul, in trying to reach any community, would go to the Jews first.
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He wouldn't remain there.
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He wouldn't stay there.
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He would go out into the marketplace.
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He would go preach in other areas.
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But he always started with the Jews.
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And here he has a young man in tow who is going to make that an issue.
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He did not want the issue surrounding Timothy to be the first and most important issue that would come up in people's mind.
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Just remember one thing.
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This was not an issue for Paul.
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Paul is not having an issue with Timothy being uncircumcised.
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It's the audience that's going to have the issue with Timothy being uncircumcised.
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So he wants to remove this from the equation.
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And again, I think this is in perfect alignment with 1 Corinthians 9 where Paul says, I do this to win people.
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I do this so that I don't have a stumbling block.
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Turn with me to 1 Corinthians 9.
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I know we read it in our call to worship, but I want you to hear again the words of the apostle Paul and what he's saying in 1 Corinthians 9.19.
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Because I think that, again, this is totally expressive of his heart on this issue and what I think should also be our own.
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1 Corinthians 9.19 Apostle Paul says, For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them.
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Paul says, I'm not bound to this.
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I don't have to do this to be saved.
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I don't have to do this to necessarily please God in the sense of my own salvation.
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But I do make myself a servant of other people.
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And he says in verse 22, The Jews, I became as a Jew in order to win Jews.
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I didn't go eating pork chops in the middle of the synagogue.
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I'm just saying.
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I mean, you know, pork chops are awesome, but I didn't walk in with cracklings, pork cracklings when I went in and sat down in the service, you know.
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That would have been offensive.
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To those under the law, I became as one under the law.
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Not myself being under the law, that I might win those under the law.
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I'm not under the law.
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Not the old covenant.
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I'm no longer under that.
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I can eat pork.
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I can wear mixed fibers.
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I can worship on the day of my choosing.
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I'm not under the covenant of Moses.
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I'm under the covenant of Christ, the new covenant.
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Things have changed.
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But there are people who are still bound by that.
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And if I don't respect them, if I don't show them deference, then I'm ruining any opportunity I'm going to have to speak to them.
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And he says in verse 21, To those outside the law, I became as one outside the law.
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Not being outside the law of God, but being under the law of Christ, that I might win those outside the law.
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Again, who is he talking about there? He's talking about the Gentiles.
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The Gentiles are not under the law of God in the sense that they're not part of that covenant.
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They don't even understand it.
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He says that when I go to them, I'm different.
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I behave to them as they need.
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And I deal with them as they need.
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Verse 22, To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak.
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I become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some.
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And I do it all.
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This is the key.
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Verse 23, And beloved, this is the verse.
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You underline it.
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You circle it.
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You engrave it on something and put it on your wall as you leave your house.
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I do it all for the sake of the Gospel.
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That's the most important thing.
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The Gospel stands as paramount.
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And the Gospel is more important than my freedom.
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The Gospel is more important than my diet.
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The Gospel is more important than what I wear.
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The Gospel is more important than how I dress.
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The Gospel is more important than any of that.
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The Gospel is paramount.
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And I do it all for that.
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For the sake of the Gospel that I may share with them in its blessings.
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Because when I bring them the Gospel, I'm bringing them freedom.
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They don't realize how bound they are.
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I'm bringing them the Gospel of Grace.
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I'm bringing them freedom.
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But how will they hear it if they're still under bondage if I come in flaunting the freedom and they will not listen? You see, Timothy had the freedom not to be circumcised and be right with God.
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Timothy didn't have the freedom to remain uncircumcised and be right with them.
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That's a thought.
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He was right with God.
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Timothy was already saved, y'all.
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This circumcision did not affect his salvation.
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This medical procedure didn't make him saved.
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But it made him usable.
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Made him more usable.
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Wisdom dictated that he not exercise his complete freedom.
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Now, some might take issue with Paul here.
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And I've heard people say, well, is Paul saying that we have to bend over backwards to reach lost people? What if the lost people are all drunks? Should I start getting drunk to be with them? What if the people were all thieves? Should I start stealing stuff just to be with them? And again, I said earlier, some people take that really excessive view of this and they say do whatever it takes even if it means you have to sin.
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Well, I think the biblical principle is simpler and more noble than that.
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The first, I think, you need to ask yourself, do you even care about winning the lost? That's the first question.
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Do you have a desperation in your heart to reach people? Are you desperate to share the gospel with people? If there is something which you can do to remove obstacles to the gospel, should you? And the answer is yes.
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I'm gonna give you some examples and I really tried to be very, very cautious because examples in this scenario can really run the gambit of bad.
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So I tried to be very, very cautious.
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First example, I thought, if I was going to preach the gospel to a tribe and all of the men had shaven faces because they believed that beards were a sign of offense.
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Now, I did shave a little this week.
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My beard had gotten a little unruly so I cut it back some, but I still got a little.
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But, if I'm going to a tribe where every man's face is shaven because they believe a beard is a sign of ungodliness, unruliness, anything, would I be a fool not to shave my beard? Would I be a fool to just walk in with that freedom? And I have the freedom to have a beard.
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God bless that freedom.
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And I can wear it as long as I want until the elders tell me to cut it back.
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But would it not be appropriate that I take that hair off my face if it meant that it was going to offend these people? And I knew that going in.
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Now, I might not know it.
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I might go in not realizing.
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And that's different.
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There's something to be said for ignorance.
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But I know guys who'd say, no, my beard's more important than reaching that person.
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What? How about this? And this happened to me.
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This one really happened.
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You all know I preach from the English Standard Version of the Bible.
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I study textual criticism.
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I'm very confident in this translation.
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I think it's good, along with the New American Standard Bible, the King James Bible.
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There's a lot of great translations out there.
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But I know a lot of people only like the King James.
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And they only use the King James.
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I was invited to a church to preach the gospel.
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And I knew that this church only used the King James Bible.
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Would I not have been a fool to walk in and preach from the NIV? And you might say, well, you have the freedom to do that.
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Of course I do.
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But they don't.
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And why would I want that to be the stumbling block for me preaching the gospel to them? Just because I have a translation that I like? Could I not submit my freedom and use the King James for that day? And certainly I did.
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Let's say I have an opportunity to share the gospel with a Muslim.
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Am I going to serve him pork chops over dinner? And check your heart because some of you are saying, yeah, check your heart.
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You have an opportunity to share Christ with somebody who's lost in Islam.
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Are you going to put something in front of them that's intentionally going to offend them? I become all things to all men that I might win some.
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This is Paul.
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The most important thing in the world is the gospel.
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Anything which gets in the way of the proclamation of the gospel needs to be put away.
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Even if it's a liberty.
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Even if it's a freedom.
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Even if it's something that I can have.
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It's not more important than the person.
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Now I have had people stretch this to ask more broad questions and I do want to address a few of them.
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One, in our dads and dudes, by the way, if you're a man, I don't mean to make an appeal during a sermon, but if you're a man, the first and third Tuesday nights we gather together, we pray, we talk about our concerns as men.
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We worship God through reading and studying the Bible.
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We encourage you to come be with us because we have very good conversations.
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Well, this conversation came up and we talked about it.
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Somebody says, well, if I'm witnessing to people who have tattoos, and it wasn't Mike who asked, just by the way.
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But, you know, somebody says, if I'm witnessing somebody who has tattoos, should I get a tattoo? And my response, you know, at the time I said, well, I think this is an issue of conscience because number one, some people can't get a tattoo and not affect their conscience.
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Some people can't get a tattoo and it not affect their conscience.
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And if so, I don't sin because if you do something that violates your conscience, that's a sin for you.
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So don't do that even if you think it might help.
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But number two, even if you have no qualms with a tattoo, ask yourself the question, is what you're doing simply finding a reason to do something you already wanted to do? Or is it really a legitimate thing that you're doing that would help you? And here's the example I have for this.
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Scott Phillips was here a few months ago.
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He's a missionary and he went to Indonesia and he met the Tao people of Indonesia and he preached the gospel to people who had never seen a white man.
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And I don't know how many of you remember when Scott was here, he preached from this pulpit.
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Every time he turned to the left or to the right, you saw a silver shiny thing inside his nostril.
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That little silver shiny thing was a bolt that's used to keep the hole open in the cartilage area between his nose.
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Because when he was there with the Tao people, everyone in the tribe wore a shaft of wood through their nose and it was a symbol to them of beauty.
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It was part of their culture to wear this shaft in their nose.
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Scott did that to assimilate to the culture, to be part of them and to feel like he had drawn close to them and he had that shaft of wood.
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Now he didn't have it when he came here.
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Isn't that interesting? Because probably if you walked in with a guy with a bolt through his nose, you probably would have been a little awkward.
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You would have said, wow, what's this guy doing with a stick in his face? So when he went over there, he had it in.
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And when he came here, he took it out.
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So I think the question becomes, is there anything in my life which I can do to help me reach someone by removing a wall of division? And as I said, I believe in my heart and I'm not talking to anybody in particular.
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You search your own heart.
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You ask yourself this question.
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I believe in my heart though that there are some of us who love our liberty more than we love people.
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We love our freedom more than we love other people.
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We would fight tooth and nail for our freedom, but we won't lift a finger to reach somebody with the gospel.
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And we need to repent of that.
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We need to search our heart and repent of that.
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If we're more concerned with ourselves than we are with others, we have not yet understood the gospel.
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If we are more concerned with ourselves than we are with others, we have not yet understood the mercies and grace of God that come to us through Jesus Christ.
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We get so infatuated with ourselves and we lose our heart for the lost.
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Thirdly and finally, we see the position of Timothy.
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It says in verse 4, As they went on their way through the cities, they delivered to them for observance the decisions that had been reached by the apostles and the elders that were in Jerusalem.
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So the churches were strengthened in the faith and they increased in numbers daily.
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I wanted to finish this by showing you something from this last two verses in the text.
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God does a mighty work through the ministry of Timothy.
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It would be easy for us to get bogged down on the issue of circumcision here.
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But the reality is there is more important things that happen after this.
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This circumcision simply opens a door and removes an obstacle for Timothy's ministry under the tutelage of the apostle Paul to begin to flourish.
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God used Timothy mightily because Timothy was an obedient servant.
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When called on to do the difficult thing, Timothy did not hesitate.
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He obeyed and he became part of one of the greatest missionary teams in history.
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They went about preaching the salvation of God by grace through faith alone and Christ alone and they saw people getting saved daily.
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Through obedience, Timothy went from a disciple to a missionary and finally to a pastor.
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And that's how God used his obedience.
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Imagine what God would do with you if you would submit to His call on your life.
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Imagine how God could use you if you would give up your disobedience and submit to Him.
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Paul used Timothy mightily.
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I'm sorry, God used Timothy mightily.
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How is God seeking to use you? And what obstacles are in the way? I want to end with an illustration.
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W.B.
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Reilly used to tell a story of a man who was walking the streets of Philadelphia and he was looking for employment.
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One day he went into the office of a well-known businessman by the name of Mr.
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Garrard.
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Very influential, very important businessman.
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Mr.
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Garrard sat behind his desk and the man walked up to him and he says, I need work.
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I'm desperate.
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I've been searching.
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I've been walking street to street and business to business looking for somebody to hire me.
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I just need somebody to hire me.
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Mr.
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Garrard sat back in his chair and he rubbed his face for a moment and he said, okay, if you look outside, you see my backyard? He said, there's a pile of bricks back there.
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The man looked out the window and said, yeah, I see your pile of bricks.
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He said, I want you to take that pile of bricks from where they are now and I want you to bring them up here to the front door.
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I want you to take them all up here and I want you to stack them nicely by the front door.
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So the man said, yes, sir.
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You're going to hire me for today.
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I'll do that.
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I'll do your brick laying job.
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I'll go do it.
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And he went out there and he grabbed one at a time because they're big heavy bricks and he took them out one at a time all the way around, set them right at his front door and he was tired, he was sweaty and he was worn out and he went in and he said, all right, Mr.
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Garrard, I'm done for the day.
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He says, can I come to work tomorrow? And he says, yes, come to work tomorrow.
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When he got there the next morning, Mr.
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Garrard said, did you see that pile of bricks? Put them back.
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So he said, yes, sir.
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And he went out and he took all the bricks back to where they went and for seven days, he would come in every morning and he would say, move the bricks back in front and bang, he did it for seven days.
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Never complained, never argued.
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He was told he did it.
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Finally, on the eighth day, Mr.
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Garrard called him into his office and he said, they're bidding on a load of sugar downtown.
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He said, this is one of the biggest orders we do all year.
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He says, I want you to go and be my representative.
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He said, why? He said, because you never asked the question.
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You did what you were told.
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You were obedient and now I trust you.
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Are we obedient to God when he calls us to do things? Are we obedient? Are we submissive? Or do we demand our own way? Timothy was obedient.
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Paul knew what was needful and he was obedient.
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Are we too obedient? Let us 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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I thank You for the call to obedience.
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The call that in reaching the lost, we might have to lay down a freedom.
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But Lord, in laying it down, we see so much more precious things before us.
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When we lay down the freedom, we see a soul, a person that we might reach with the Gospel.
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Lord, use us to reach the lost.
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Give us a heart of fervor to reach the lost with the Gospel that we might know that You have used us, unworthy servants as we are, for the sake of Your Kingdom.
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Thank You God for the Gospel.
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Thank You for the salvation which comes by grace through faith.
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I pray Lord, if there are those among us today who do not know that salvation, that don't know that salvation comes not through works and not through being a good person, but comes through the only good man who has ever lived, and that's Jesus Christ.
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I pray Lord, they've understood that today.
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They've understood that He calls us to a life of obedience.
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But it begins with trusting in what He has already done on our behalf on the cross.
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We thank You for Jesus and all that He has done.
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And it's in His name we pray.
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Amen.