Through the Bible - Acts - Part 2 — Zac Poonen

The Gospel Reaches the Gentiles

Turn to Acts of the Apostles and chapter 10. Here we read of the word of God going to the Gentiles. You know, Jesus said that you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and the outermost parts of the earth.

And we saw how it started in Jerusalem in Acts chapter 2 and then the regions of Judea. Acts chapter 8 it went to Samaria and it's gradually now going to the outermost parts of the earth to people who are non-Jews.

And Peter was the one who was given the privilege to open the door to the Jews in Acts chapter 2 and also given the privilege to open the door to the non-Jews in Acts chapter 10. I want you to notice something here that when Cornelius was praying, he was a man who knew nothing of the Bible, nothing of God, he did not worship idols, but we could say he was praying to the God in heaven who he did not know who he was.

Like a lot of people today, they are not necessarily idol worshippers, they are not Christians, but there are some people seeking after God like Cornelius. And the amazing thing is, it says here in verse 4 that while he was praying, the ninth hour of the day, while he was praying, he was a very devout man, verse 2, one who feared God, gave a lot of money to poor people, prayed to God continually, knowing nothing of the Bible, nothing of Jesus Christ.

And in the three o 'clock in the afternoon when he was praying, he saw a vision. An angel of God appeared to him and said, the last part of verse 4, your prayers and your alms, the money given to the poor, have ascended as a memorial before God.

Now some of us may think that God does not listen to the prayers of such sincere people who are praying not knowing anything about the Bible or about Jesus. If that were the case, you would have to say that verse 4 is not true.

But God sent an angel from heaven to this Cornelius who did not know anything about the Bible, anything about Jesus. He was praying and God said, I've heard your prayers. I've seen the money that you were giving to the poor.

You know, God, with God there is no partiality. And wherever people are sincerely seeking Him, He meets with them. Sometimes beyond our understanding. Now we can have a prejudice like Peter had. No, no, no, no, no.

God cannot meet with them. That is impossible. God only meets with us. Peter was like that. God can only meet with us. And God had to change Peter's opinion to enlarge his heart. See, Peter had this opinion, we are clean, those fellows are unclean.

And so God gave him a vision when Peter was praying one day. It says he had a vision of a great sheet coming down from heaven, verse 11, with all kinds of animals inside, clean animals and unclean animals.

And the voice said, arise, Peter, kill and eat. There are pigs there, kill and eat it. And Peter said, no means, Lord. I will never touch anything unclean or unholy, verse 14. And the voice came and said, what God has cleansed, don't call unholy.

And this had to happen three times before Peter got convinced, verse 16. And while he was perplexing, what does this vision mean? What is God trying to…. He knew it was a vision. It was not an actual pig or a lizard over there.

But it was a vision of unclean animals, which he knew that the law of Moses forbade him from eating. And God was saying, eat it. What does this vision mean? And then as soon as he was thinking like that, these people from Cornelius' house reached Peter's house.

Because God had told Cornelius through the angel, go and ask Peter to come and give you a message. Now, I want to ask you a question. When the angel came to Cornelius' house, did the angel know the gospel that Jesus had died for the sins of the world and Jesus rose up from the dead?

What do you think? Did he know the gospel or not? He certainly did. Why couldn't he preach the gospel himself instead of waiting for three days for Peter to come? That's a very important question. You need to know the answer for that.

What was it that Peter had that the angel did not have? I'm sure the angel could have explained the gospel 10 times better than Peter. Definitely. But there was something that Peter had which the angel did not have.

And that was the experience of salvation. Only Peter had the experience of salvation and only one who has had an experience of salvation can speak about salvation. That is a principle in the Acts of the Apostles.

What did we see in Acts 1 .1? He did and taught. We have the experience, then we teach it. The angel did not have an experience and so even though he knew the gospel very clearly, he's not permitted to speak it.

What is the message for you and me? If you don't have an experience, don't speak about it. Learn a lesson from the angels. Even though they know it better than anybody else, they keep quiet about it because they're sorry we can't speak it.

We don't have the experience. Please send for that brother. He can't explain it half as well as I can, but he's got the experience so he can teach you better. Remember this, with all your Bible study and knowledge, if you don't have the experience, you cannot speak about it.

You're wasting your time. Peter had to come. He may be a humble brother who knows less than you, but he's got the experience and he's the one who's going to speak about it. And when Peter was thinking like that, the Lord told him, see, three men are looking for you.

Go and don't have any misgivings. Then he understood what this vision meant, that these are unclean people, Gentiles. I must not go and eat with them. And when he came to Cornelius' house, we read that Cornelius fell down and worshipped Peter.

Verse 25, and Peter said, get up. I'm just a man. And then he said about this vision that God gave him and said, now I have understood what this vision means. Now I understand, verse 35, 1035, now I know that in every nation, in every nation and every denomination, the man who fears God and does what is right, is welcome to him.

Is that right? I believe it is. God will lead such a man onwards to Christ. I'm not saying such a man is saved. Cornelius was not saved. Definitely not. But God leads such people on. He welcomes them.

He hears that person who doesn't know the truth crying out to him and he welcomes him, he receives him and he longs to send you. To tell that man about salvation. What if Peter had said, Lord, I'm not going to go.

Like today, God calls somebody and the man says, I'm not willing to go. What would happen? Will Cornelius get lost because of Peter's disobedience? That would be very unrighteous of God to make Cornelius suffer for Peter's disobedience.

No. If Peter had not gone, God would have sent James or John or somebody else. If you don't go, well, you miss the opportunity. God will give that privilege to somebody else. God will give your ministries to somebody else.

The Anointing of the Holy Spirit for Service

So that's all there is to it. Acts chapter 10 verse 38. When Jesus' ministry is being described by Peter, Peter expresses it like this. Beautiful word. You know Jesus of Nazareth. God anointed him with the Holy Spirit and with power.

Power. That's the mark of the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Jesus never spoke in tongues throughout his life. He did not need to speak in tongues. You know the reason why Jesus never spoke in tongues?

It's very important to know the reason for that. He never had the gift of tongues. He had the gift of healing, miracles, discernment, prophecy, everything. But he never had tongues. What is the reason for that?

See, tongues is because our fellowship with God is so imperfect that he gives us another language to be able to communicate with him more perfectly. When we get to heaven and our communication is perfect, tongues, there will be no more tongues.

When Jesus lived on earth, his communication with the Father was so perfect that he never needed the gift of tongues. That's the reason Jesus never spoke in tongues. And it says Jesus is anointed with power and he went about doing good.

When you are anointed with power, what is the first thing you'll do? Good to other people. If you do not know how to go around doing good to other people, brother, seek to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

You need to be anointed with the Holy Spirit and with power. So that you can go around doing good to people, number one. Secondly, you will go around delivering people who are oppressed by the devil. We are surrounded by people who are oppressed by the devil.

People committing suicide, people who are discouraged, people who are sick, people who are demon possessed, people who are harassed, wives who are being harassed by their husbands and husbands who are being harassed by their wives and all types of things are going on in the world around us.

And God has placed us in the midst of such a world to go and deliver these people from the oppression of the devil. You need to be filled with the Holy Spirit for that. Even Jesus needed to be anointed to do that ministry.

How much more you and I? And he did it. Why? Because God was with him. And when you are anointed with the Holy Spirit in your ministry, it will be written about you. God was with you. When you went to deliver that person, God was with you.

When you stood in the pulpit, God was with you. This is how God is with us. Through the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Okay, we move on to chapter 11. Number of things there about the spread of the gospel.

Giving to the Poor and Learning to Pray

I just want to go down to verse 27. At this time some prophets came. I want to speak to you a word about prophets. There was a man named Agabus who stood up and began to indicate by the spirit that there will be a famine all over the world.

He didn't say when. Because the times and epochs are not for us to know. Acts 1, 7. But he said, God has shown me there's going to be a famine. Pretty soon, perhaps. I don't know when. And this took place in the reign of Claudius.

And what did the disciples do? When they heard, oh, there's going to be a famine. Then we must collect money. Because these people in Antioch were rich. So they heard that the people in Jerusalem were poor.

So they collected money and sent a contribution, verse 29, for the relief of the brethren living in Judea. All collection of money that you read of in the New Testament, whether it is here or 1 Corinthians 16, verse 2, or 2 Corinthians chapter 8 and chapter 9.

Always the collection of money was for poor people. You never see Paul telling people, take a collection for me. Never. He always said there are poor people there. Please give it to them. And he wouldn't touch it himself.

So there is an exhortation in the New Testament telling believers to give money. But if you read carefully, it was always asking them to give money to somebody else. Not to me. Not saying, give it to my ministry because I need to buy a house or rent a house and I want you to support me.

I am the Lord's servant. No, Paul trusted the Lord to provide his need. But he did urge believers to give money because there were poor believers who needed help. So they took a collection and sent it.

And this they sent through Barnabas and Saul. So God used the famine to bring these Gentiles in Antioch closer to the Jews in Jerusalem. You know, there was a big division between the Jews and Gentiles.

And here in Antioch, we read number of Gentiles were getting converted as we read in Acts 11, 21. How to bring these Jews and Gentiles together? The Lord says, let's send a famine. And when the famine comes, these rich Gentiles will send money to the poor Jews and they learn to love one another.

What do we learn from that? Some of the troubles and trials God sends into our life and into our churches is in order to bring believers together who are far apart from each other. Yeah, some believer is in hospital, sick.

And all the other believers rally around and provide food for his family and provide money for his hospital expenses. What is the result of that? Not just his sickness. He comes out of the hospital after three weeks, but he comes out much more closely linked to the body of Christ.

Through what? Through some message? No, through sickness. So God uses sickness, famine, all types of things to bring believers together, to make them one, give thanks for everything God permits. And the other thing we see here is that Barnabas and Saul were the ones who went from here to Jerusalem.

OK, keep that in mind. And in the next chapter, we read about James being killed by the sword, verse 2, and Peter being delivered from prison, because it says here when Peter was imprisoned, verse 5 of chapter 12, fervent prayer was made by the church to God.

And who were the people watching this fervent prayer? Barnabas and Saul, who had just come. Chapter 11, verse 30, with the money. And they had never seen a prayer meeting like this. Terrific prayer meeting, morning, night prayer meeting, and they see one day Peter is at the door.

He has come out of the prison. And that really shook them up. In Antioch, they were doing a lot of teaching. But now when they came to Jerusalem and they blessed the people in Jerusalem with money, they got a blessing in return.

What is that blessing they got in return? They got a vision of what prayer can do. And they came back to Antioch in chapter 13 and they began to pray over there. Where did they learn how to pray? In Jerusalem.

What did they go to Jerusalem for? To give money. And they got a blessing in return, learned how to pray, and came back in chapter 13 and started praying with the others. And God spoke to them in the middle of that prayer meeting and said, separate me, Saul and Barnabas, for the ministry.

See, God is using all these means to teach one another. Whenever you bless somebody else, that person blesses you in another way. You may bless him materially, he may bless you spiritually. You may bless him spiritually, he may bless you materially.

But God makes the body of Christ linked with each other. You see that again and again. One more thing I want to say to you from this prophecy of Agabus, Acts 11, 28. It's very important to know that in the Old Testament, people went to the prophets and said, what shall I do?

And the prophets said, do this, go here, go there. Why did the prophets have to say that in the Old Testament? Because none of these other people had the Holy Spirit. Only the prophet had the Holy Spirit.

Prophecy and the Guidance of the Holy Spirit

But in the New Covenant, the Lord said, they shall not teach every man his neighbor, saying, know the Lord. In the New Covenant, Acts chapter, sorry, Hebrews chapter 8. But all shall know me. So there's no need for the prophet to tell that person now, you can go here, or you shouldn't go there.

No. Then the prophet is taking the place of the Holy Spirit. In my lifetime, many, many, many, many people in many, many places have come to me to find the will of God for their lives. And I have never tried to do it.

I said, I will not find the will of God for your life, because that will be taking the place of the Holy Spirit in your life. And I dare not take the place of the Holy Spirit in your life, because I'm a man who fears God.

Some other fellow who doesn't fear God may take the place of the Holy Spirit in your life, but I will not do it. I want the Holy Spirit to have the rightful place in your life, so I will not find God's will for you.

I can give you advice. When you ask me, should I do this or should I do that? I can tell you with the certain amount of wisdom I've had, walking the Lord for so many years, these are the advantages, these are the disadvantages, consider this, consider this.

So what should I do, brother? Think of all the things I told you, go and pray to God. And God will tell you whether you should take this job or travel here or not. Should I marry this girl? I say, I don't know.

I can tell you what I know about this girl or what I know about this boy. I can give you, but you got to find God's will yourself. Don't ever try to find God's will for somebody else. Don't ever try to take the place of God in somebody else's life.

Oh, there are multitudes of people who call themselves prophets today who are taking the place of God. Like it says in 2 Thessalonians 2, the antichrist sits in the temple, takes the place of God. There are these prophets today who are sitting in the church, taking the place of God, telling people what to do, taking the place of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit will guide you. He's a jealous spirit. He does not want to give his place in your life to some wretched prophet, false prophet. No, he wants to tell you himself. So what should a true man of God do?

A man of God should give you advice, show you the advantages, disadvantages and point you to the Holy Spirit. What did Agabus do here? Read carefully. Did Agabus say, there's going to be a famine, so take a collection?

No, he knew where to stop. Today's prophets don't know where to stop. He said, there's going to be a famine, full stop, that's all. I'm not going to say anything more. What should you do about it? I'm not going to tell you.

You got the Holy Spirit, seek God. They sought God and God told them to send a contribution, they did that. Agabus did not tell them what to do. Directive prophecy is never found in the New Testament.

Directive prophecy is an Old Testament feature because people didn't have the Holy Spirit. Very, very important to understand that if you want to be saved from the deception that goes by the name of prophecy.

There's plenty of it in here in Kerala, plenty of it in Northeast India and the states over there in different places, particularly like this. People who sit with them, they take their fees, prophet's fees.

It's just like a doctor's consulting room. You go there and you pay your fees and get your prophecy and go. It's all a deception. And you find people who go there, never grow in the Lord because they have no contact with the Holy Spirit.

Next time they want to find something, they're going to contact the prophet again. This is all deception. Don't be deceived by it. Agabus was a true prophet who said something and left it for people to decide what to do.

Later on, you read in Acts 21, Agabus said, thus says the Lord, the man who owns this girdle, that is Paul, he will be bound in Jerusalem. Full stop. He didn't tell Paul whether to go or not to go. There were other self-appointed prophets over there who said, no, the Lord says don't go.

Paul said, rubbish, I'm going. Agabus knew where to stop. Those self-appointed false prophets there in Acts 21 did not know where to stop. We find both categories of people today. A prophet in the Old Testament never, never, never told other people what to do in the New Testament.

In the Old Testament, they did. OK, God's sovereignty, we see in Acts chapter 12 in delivering Peter, but allowing James to die. I don't know why James died. God could have delivered James just as he delivered Peter.

He could have sent an angel three days earlier and delivered James from prison. But when a man's time is up in God's diary, God does not send an angel. He just takes him to heaven. When God's time is not up, then he will deliver him.

Jeremiah and Uriah both prophesied. We saw Uriah died, Jeremiah lived. James died. Peter was alive. And Peter comes to the meeting and testifies, God delivered me. And sitting in the meeting is Mrs. James, perhaps thinking, why didn't God deliver my husband?

Do you wonder why God did not do something for you, which he did for another brother? Humble yourself and say, Lord, that's your sovereign plan. I'm so happy that you did it for that brother. That's what Mrs. James should say.

My husband died a few days ago. He was killed. Lord, you could have delivered him like you delivered Peter. He's standing here now. Mrs. Peter is so happy. And I want to rejoice with Mrs. Peter for the work you have done for her husband.

Even though you allowed my husband to die. That is a godly woman who recognizes the sovereignty of God in delivering one and allowing another person to die. So often sicknesses, one person is healed, another person is not.

Learn to rejoice when God deals like that with that person, if he's not dealt like that with you. So there are many lessons like this we learn. Acts chapter 13, we read about the first great missionary movement out of Antioch.

Fasting, Worship, and God's Call

They come back and they've learned how to pray. And the Lord says in verse 2, it's a very important principle of missionary work here. You read in Acts 13, verse 1 and 2. There were a number of prophets and teachers there and they fasted and worshiped the Lord.

They were not only fasting and praying, they were fasting and worshiping, asking for nothing. Lord, we worship you. Thou alone are worthy. Fasting and worshiping, it's a wonderful thing to fast and worship.

And while they were fasting and worshiping, the Holy Spirit spoke in a way that all those five people there got a deep conviction, this is what God is saying. Set apart for me, Barnabas and Saul. It didn't stop there.

Set apart for me, Barnabas and Saul, for the work to which I have already called them. I'm not calling them now. Some people think this is the call of Saul and Barnabas. No, I have already called them.

The call of God is always personal and private. It may be confirmed in public, like this is a public meeting where the call was confirmed, but this was not the call. Don't ever get a call when somebody says, Blessed is the Lord, you are called to go here or you're called to marry so and so.

Garbage, throw it in the garbage bin. If God wants you to do something, He'll speak to you privately. He may confirm it through other elders publicly, but always to the work to which I have already called them.

Saul and Barnabas already heard the call. They were thinking about it, thinking about it, and suddenly in the meeting, the other elders say, hey, we get a confirmation you should be like this. It's wonderful.

I remember when the day when God called me. I mentioned it the other day. It's the 6th of May, 1964. And I remember nobody knew I was sitting, reading the scriptures. I was in the midst of traveling. I was on leave that time.

I was traveling around in an evangelistic team, having meetings. And I was reading the scriptures and God called me very clearly. It was personal, private. It was very clear. And while I was seriously considering, and I just thinking of quitting my job, a man of God, who was the greatest man of God I've respected in this country, in my life.

He's dead now. Came to me and said, are you thinking of leaving your job? When are you leaving your job? It was prophetic. That man was a prophet. And that was an external confirmation to what God had already called me.

If God calls you, He'll call you personally. The confirmation may come from other godly men. But you must get the call yourself. That's what we see here. And they went out, sent out by the, and the power of God was with them.

Serving One's Generation

And you see a number of things there. Let me show you one thing in one of the sermons that Paul preached. In verse 36. It says about David, that he served his generation in the will of God and then fell asleep.

Do you know my brothers and sisters, that you can only serve your generation? In another generation, God has to raise up another man, another woman. But in your generation, make sure you serve God's purpose and fulfill all of God's will in your generation.

Before you pass on. And if you want to do that, you must be like it says here, I have found David, a man after my own heart. That's the type of person you are to be. And he served in his own generation and he died.

If you also like David, are a man after God's own heart, then like it says here in verse 36, you can serve your generation in the will of God and move on. So verse 22, where it says, I found David after my own heart, is linked with verse 36.

Persecution and Perseverance in Ministry

Okay. We move on to chapter 14 and we read of the signs and wonders that the Lord did there. And it's very interesting that we see that in one place where at one moment they were almost worshipping them.

Verse 13, they brought garlands and wanted to offer sacrifice with the crowds to Paul and Barnabas, because they saw them doing a miracle. A few moments later in verse 19, they were stoning them to death, going to stone them to death.

See how fickle minded the crowd is. One moment they are praising you. Next moment they want to stone you. We read of Jesus in Nazareth in Luke chapter four. He started preaching. People said, what gracious words he's speaking.

And then he said something to hurt them. And they stopped him in the middle of the sermon, pulled him out and took him outside to kill him. But they didn't succeed in killing Jesus and they didn't succeed in killing Paul.

They stoned Paul, verse 19, dragged him out of the city, supposing him to be dead. Does God allow his greatest servants to be treated like this? He does. I remember once hearing a story of a man who was an unbeliever.

Somebody was witnessing to him and that man's son had died in some bad way. Some others had killed him or something like that. And so this unbeliever said to this believer who was witnessing to him, where was your God when my son died?

And the believer told him God was in the same place where he was when his own son died on the cross. He didn't stop evil people from killing his son. He didn't stop evil people from killing Peter, Paul, James, all the apostles, except John, as far as we know, were killed.

The greatest servants of Jesus Christ in history were killed and God did not stop them from killing his greatest servants. This is not like the Old Testament. In the Old Testament, God did not allow anybody to kill Abraham or Isaac or Jacob or David or Elijah or Joshua.

They all died natural deaths. But we are in the New Covenant now and in the New Covenant, almost all of God's greatest servants, the apostles were all killed. But only in God's time. It was not time for Paul to die.

So he allowed the people to think that Paul was dead. They dragged him out. And you know, if you look at the time factor, when Paul wrote 2 Corinthians 12, he said, I knew a man 14 years ago who went up to heaven and came back.

He was talking about himself. The time factor relates it to this particular time. This is probably the time when Paul went up to heaven and came back. When he was dragged, thrown outside, stoned to death, but God rewarded him with a trip up to heaven and came back.

And he's never told us what he saw there in heaven. Now, you can be sure that if God allows you to face intense suffering, he will give you some intense rewards also. Great suffering comes with great rewards.

Verse 22. And after that, it says Paul went somewhere and verse 21, returned to Lystra, to the same place where he was stoned. He was not afraid. He came back and he strengthened the souls of the disciples and don't get discouraged.

They stoned me. And through much tribulation, verse 22, we must enter the kingdom of God. And when a man like Paul stood up and said that with all the scars on his face and the wounds, which are still healing.

And such a man says through much tribulation, you've got to enter the kingdom of God is much more impressive than me standing here and saying it. So those who are called to be, God gives them the honor of being persecuted for the kingdom's sake.

They are extremely valuable in God's eyes. The second thing Paul did there was verse 23. He appointed elders in every church. You never find in the New Testament pastors being appointed in any church.

Never. No church in the New Testament was run by one pastor. Pastor is not an office. It is a gift. It's a shepherd. It's a gift of shepherding people like apostle is a gift. Evangelist is a gift. Ephesians four.

It's not an office. The offices is the office of elder. And always there was more than one elder in every church. They appointed elders in every church and prayed with fasting because in New Testament ministry it's not like one Elijah, one Abraham, one Elisha, one Moses.

No. In New Testament ministry you need a minimum of two people to express the body of Christ. Because Jesus said where two are gathered together there I am in the midst. So you have to have two elders for the Lord to be present there to manifest his power when they bind Satan and lead the church on.

And also the balance. Separate me not Saul alone but Saul and Barnabas. Not Peter alone going to pray. Peter and John. We read in Acts 3 going to pray. Saul and Barnabas. Two elders. Always in the New Testament you find this principle of two.

Jesus sent out his disciples two by two. This one man pastor is never found anywhere in the New Testament. It's I know it's practiced in Christendom like a hundred and one other unscriptural practices are practiced.

But all I'm trying to show you is if you have the courage to believe it it is not found in the New Testament. They appointed elders. Acts chapter 15 we read of a controversy concerning circumcision and the apostles did a wise thing.

They came together. Verse 6 to look into this matter because they wanted didn't want any controversy. Remember this is a time when scripture was not written. We don't have such controversies today because we got the New Testament.

But they were living in a time when the New Testament was not written. They were in that transition period and the apostles spoke the word of God. There was no written New Testament those days. So they needed to come together to clarify these things.

Building the Local Church and Handling Disagreement

And after some days verse 36 Acts 15 36 Paul said to Barnabas let's go back and visit some of these brothers. Let's go back and establish them. Now we learn something from this. I don't think the world has ever seen a greater evangelist than the apostle Paul.

A greater man who had a greater burden for reaching the lost and reaching lost souls. Many times he used to say I want to preach Christ where he's never been named. I don't want to build on another man's foundation.