THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH
Chapter 1 ............Apostolic Confrontation: Paul at Athens
Chapter 2 ............Apostolic Perception: Eternity
Chapter 3 ............Apostolic Purpose: The Church
Chapter 4 ............Apostolic Realities: The Principalities and Powers
Chapter 5 ............Apostolic Character: Blamelessness
Chapter 6 ............Apostolic Service: Priestliness
Chapter 7 ............Apostolic Preaching: The Authoritative Word
Chapter 1
Apostolic Confrontation: Paul at Athens
"Let us pray together for the Word:
Precious God, we ask Your marvellous grace. You alone are the High Priest and the Apostle of our confession and we know that this word is dear to You. You have made it the very foundation of Your glorious Church and now we ask that from this first speaking, you shall begin to open to us its meaning. Show us the anatomy, the heart, the substance and the Spirit of that which is apostolic. Breathe upon this text now and penetrate our understanding. Show us what is timeless and universal and eternal, the thing to which we ourselves are called. Let your Word become an event for Your Church throughout the Church. In Jesus' Name. Amen.
...."Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was being provoked within him as he was beholding the city full of idols. So he was reasoning in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles, and in the market place every day with those who happened to be present. And also some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers were conversing with him. And some were saying, "What would this idle babbler wish to say?" Others, "He seems to be a proclaimer of strange deities," - because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection. And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, "May we know what this new teaching is which you are proclaiming? For you are bringing some strange things to our ears; we want to know therefore what these things mean." (Now all the Athenians and the strangers visiting there used to spend their time in nothing other than telling or hearing something new) And Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said "Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects. For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription, "TO AN UNKNOWN GOD." What therefore you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands neither is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything - since He Himself gives to all life and breath and all things; and He made from one, every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times, and the boundaries of their habitation, that they should seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, 'For we also are His offspring.' Being then the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and thought of man. Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all everywhere should repent, because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead." Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some began to sneer, but others said, "We shall hear you again concerning this." So Paul went out of their midst. But some men joined him and believed, among whom also was Dionysius the Areopagite and a woman named Damaris and others with them"....
There is a design in these last days: the Church is built upon the apostles and the prophets (Ephesians 2:20). Paul's "confrontation" upon Mars Hill is an ultimate confrontation, not just an historical oddity or curiosity. It is not just an episode in the life of an apostle, it is the quintessential confrontation between the "foolishness" of God and the wisdom of the world. And if you can see by the eye of the Spirit, it is a confrontation towards which we ourselves are now presently tending. God is shaping us to be an "apostolic presence", and we are going to meet the spirit of the world in this final hour - our weakness against its' strength - the foolishness of the Cross and the resurrection against the world's wisdom. We must open our hearts to hear the Word of God with another kind of hearing, as something for which we ourselves are to be fitted and prepared.
We, as children of God, must come to understand what is the inception of an apostolic "event". It did not come by the premeditation of men. It had nothing to do with that which is religiously planned. When it came, it came suddenly and circumstantially, but it was God. Paul was brought by other men, we read, they conducted him to Athens, only to await his colleagues who would join him. But while he waited there, his spirit was stirred within him when he saw the whole city given to idolatry. And so we come to a point of apostolic beginning: then, now, and in every hour, his spirit was stirred within him. That which is apostolic begins with the inception of the spirit. An apostolic man is eminently a man of the spirit. He, himself constitutes an "event". Wherever he comes and wherever he is brought, he is instant in season and out. It has nothing to do with careful theological preparation. It is a man brought by circumstance, by other men, that is to say, by God. And as Paul was grieved, as he saw the city wholly given to idolatry, the Word states: "he disputed in the synagogues with the Jews". You may scratch your head in bewilderment and ask "how does the one lead to the other?" "What has idolatry to do with the Jews and the synagogues?" And your bewilderment reveals where you are. You have not yet an "apostolic perception". For there is nowhere where idolatry is more blatantly to be found than in the synagogues of the Jews or the Gentiles. That is to say, that, in whatever nominal, religious form there is that gives men a sense of religious satisfaction and absolves them from any responsibility to truly follow God - this is the logic of these verses and we need to see them. We need far more than that; we need to have our spirit grieved as we see our cities wholly given to idolatry. God is waiting for such a man through whom the grief of God can be expressed. We need to come to this kind of seeing but I have the sense that if you were there, you would be admiring the Greek architecture. You would be going to the cultural places of interest. You would be very impressed with the sophistication of the Greek philosophers. You would be very deferential to the Jews in the synagogue. Can you sense the cry of God even in this present hour for truly apostolic men who are not the reflections of their own time or culture but who occupy another place apart from those influences that enable them to "penetratingly" see through them because they have their citizenship in Heaven, and in Him they live and move and have their being. The world is too much with us. It has conditioned and affected our thoughts, and our silence condemns us in that we give affirmation to the assumptions and premises by which the world lives. Not so Paul! "The God whom you ignorantly worship, I declare unto you." "I perceive that in all things you are too superstitious." What an abrasive man! How mindless he is of whether he is upsetting the sensitivities of those whom he is addressing. He instinctively goes right to the jugular vein -"I perceive that in ALL THINGS you are too superstitious." Can there be any insult more calculated to offend intellectuals full of self-congratulations, seekers after truth, every day assembling to hear some "new thing", always seeking the truth but never coming to the knowledge of it, and what a lovely plaque at the foundation of their monument: "to an unknown god". Doesn't it sound spiritual? They really do have a sense for spiritual things, but Paul was not at all impressed. He saw right through the subterfuge, telling them that not only was God unknown to them, but also that they were "wilfully" ignorant of Him! But Him I declare unto you, Paul said. Apostolic boldness, apostolic authority - it needs to be sounded again by an apostolic people and nothing less than this will suffice. We have been too accommodating to the "spirit of the world" and have not seen through its disguises which need to be unmasked and revealed by the kinds of things that Paul both saw and said.
....The God who made the world and all things in it since He is Lord of Heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands"....(vs.24)
I just want to caution you here. You are going to hear a complete theology. You are going to hear a complete cosmology, for in one statement he sums up the whole purpose of human existence. What men spend their whole lives purporting to find - he announces in a moment:
...."God who made of one blood all nations of men and established the bounds of their habitation, that they might seek after God, if haply they might be found of Him"....
Do you recognize this for the "absolute" statement that it is? He is saying quite clearly that the whole purpose of human existence is to be found of God. And everything and anything else is only supportive to that end or it is a distraction or a deception. What an absolute view! How singular - for it will not consider any other alternative. The only purpose of human existence in this life is to "be found of God", to establish that relationship with Him which will be eternal. And for that reason God has made of one blood all nations of men and established the bounds of their habitations, made them national entities, not that they should pursue culture or advanced technology - for these are secondary things - but that they should seek to be found of God, for indeed there is only one real purpose and that is to be found of God. Do you believe that? Do you live as if you believe that? Do we live with that kind of apostolic absoluteness?
There is a reason why Paul's words that day pierced the hearts of these Stoics and Epicureans - because there is a special penetration in the speaking of a man who lives what he speaks - who lives as if he "believes" that this is the only purpose for his existence. His very presence is convicting. This is true apostolicity and it is foundational to the Church that God is raising up in this hour. These perceptions, this mind-set, this absoluteness, this uncompromising insistence, this total unimpressiveness with contemporary culture - because the Church is to be build on the foundation of the apostles: not only their principles or their teaching but what they are in themselves as men (in Christ).
"Imitate me", Paul said. "Follow me, as I follow Christ". He made himself both a model and an example. He said:
.... "Him whom You ignorantly worship, I proclaim to you"....
It sounds like uttermost arrogance and conceit. It is actually the opposite. It is uncommon meekness. The God who made the heavens and the earth, He is the Lord of the Heavens and the earth. Notice the comment of every single statement; completely unpremeditated coming forth spontaneously on the spot, not by a man who has a head full of "religious ideas", but by the Word that has been inwrought in him - he is the very Word himself - made flesh, and in one statement he connects the issue of creation with the issue of Lordship - "the God who created the world is also the Lord, not only of Heaven but also of earth" - which includes Athens. And in one statement, we have moved from abstract philosophical considerations to a place where the life of men is impinged or gored. Can you understand Paul? He is not going to allow men the luxury of their deception. He will not allow them this wilful ignorance of an unknown God. He is going to make Him known as He is - both as Creator, and because He is the Creator - also the Lord, not just of Heaven which we might allow Him to rule but also the earth, including where you yourselves live. You have an obligation to know that and you will be held accountable from this day forth, you will not be able to stand before God with excuse because God has appointed a day in which He will judge "all" men by that One whom He has raised from the dead - even Jesus Christ. And Paul said that without embarrassment when he referred to Jesus and when he referred to the resurrection - he didn't look sheepish. He didn't make any apologies by saying: "Excuse me, I am now moving from philosophy to religion." Paul does not have such categories, for there is only one category and it is all life and reality and being - and Jesus Christ, and His resurrection and His right to judge the world, is at the heart of this reality. This is the reality, though it is unseen, and I proclaim it unto you. God is waiting for that proclamation today. I won't ask you to raise your hand if you believe in the doctrine of resurrection. It does not qualify you to go up to the "Mars Hill" of your generation. It is too thin and too brittle - it does not persuade men. If we are to speak of the resurrection there is only one basis for that speaking and that is that we "know" Him who is the resurrection and the life. We cannot speak of Him except out of the burning conviction of Jesus Christ crucified and resurrected. This is foolishness to Greek philosophers, but Paul made no apology. He did not say that this was intellectually tenable. A German theologian has rightly stated: "True faith begins where the atheist thinks it should end" - in the foolishness of God - Christ and Him crucified. Paul made no apology because he believed that this Gospel is the power of God unto salvation - not intellectual explanation - not a sophisticated apologetic, this Gospel is itself the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Gentile (Romans 1:16). Paul stated and proclaimed this fact but not abstractly, not academically, not merely technically correctly, but out of the demonstration of the grace of that Gospel which is wrought in his own life. Paul speaks of "my" Gospel, the Gospel of the grace of Jesus Christ. How many of us speak like that about the Gospel. For us it is a "technical formula" which we invoke for witnessing purposes and even then we are a little embarrassed by it.
There is a proclamation for which the world is waiting of an apostolic kind that is linked to a demonstration of the reality of that Gospel. Do you know it that deeply? "Him I proclaim unto you" - not the theology about Him, not the correct doctrines - that has its place, but Mars Hill is too earnest an encounter for mere theology. "Him, I declare unto you", and they said. "What will this babbler say?" And some said, "We will hear again this matter", but they never did. But as much as they did hear, for that they will stand eternally accountable before God. To meet an apostle is to have a total confrontation with God and the same is true for an apostolic Church. I am not talking about the name of a "denomination". I am talking about a glorious organism that has this perception, moves in this authority, proclaims with this boldness and moves through the world without being impressed by it. It is beyond what we have institutionally understood as Christianity, and God is calling for it to be restored, in order that there might be a "final confrontation" at the end of the age, by men who say that God is not served by human hands; He is not impressed with your philanthropy, seeing that He gives to all life and breath and all things. Do you believe that? All things?! The Paul of Acts 17 was also the Paul of Acts 16 and I don't even know that his wounds had yet healed from when he was publicly disrobed and beaten with a whip thirty nine times and thrown into an inner dungeon and bound band and foot, far from his own home, abandoned and lost. But at midnight, in the darkest hour, Paul and Silas prayed and sang praises unto God. They had such an absoluteness in their view of the total sovereignty of God ; not just for those things which we would call blessed but that which we receive as "suffering for righteousness' sake", so that when he stands in the 17th chapter of Acts on Mars Hill, he can speak with authority to men of the God who gives to all men, all things. Do you wish to speak that with authority? Are you willing for "stripes" and imprisonments and "humiliations"? And when they come will you praise God ? This is apostolic! What will this babbler say? Many of us could not even tolerate being so addressed. Our feelings would be wounded, our dignity offended - after all we are ministers. "But some clave unto him and believed". I praise God for that phrase, that did not just subscribe to an abstract doctrine, they clave unto him and believed!
I have had one such privilege in my twenty years in the Lord and the lady is here tonight through whom it came. A Jewish woman, a professor in a university in America, many years in pain with her back, for which there was no medical solution - one who would never consider hearing anything from a Christian. But desperation had brought her to that place. And when she first came I did not greet her with kind and comforting words. My first words were these: "How arrogant must your Jewish pride be that God has allowed such calamity to come into your body?" - or else you would never have considered Him". She was astonished and shocked as I was myself because they were not my words, they were the Lord's. When the issue of eternity is at stake , God is not careful to coddle men, and if they need to be "slapped" into consciousness and wakefulness - this is the very love of God! Even if it offends your sensibilities, for men have elevated their "sensibility" above the Spirit of the living God, which itself is idolatry. Little wonder that their spirits are not grieved, for they do not see their cities wholly given to idolatry. What they are "seeing" is dulled as they subscribe themselves to the idolatries of their own generation. An apostolic man is a separated man - and they clave unto him and believed. I invited the Jewish woman to the meeting where I was speaking that night. "Oh", she said, "I can't come, my pain is so great that I cannot sit for any more than 15 minutes". I said, "Let me pray for you that you might sit." So she allowed me to pray and she sat right in the front row, in one of the worst meetings in which I have ever had to participate. It was an "evangelical horror". A singing group on the platform - everything "calculated" to turn a sensitive intellectual person "off", and I had no message. I was tired and I looked out over this audience (people who were well fed and burping, coming to see the "novelty" of a Jewish person). I groaned before God in the hopelessness of that situation. I will tell you what children, if there is not resurrection, we of all men are to be pitied. And if that resurrection is not available to us in moments as inauspicious as that, then we of all men are most to be pitied. Can you trust God in such a moment? - when a life is at stake before you? "Exactly the same situation as tonight", you say, "I don't see that anyone's life is in danger tonight?" That is because, you don't see. You think perhaps that this is just a meeting and that it will either be good or bad. You will either like it or you won't like it, and afterwards you can have your critical fun examining the speaker and how he expressed himself. If so, you do not see this night as God sees it. He sees this night as being of an enormous eternal consequence. Life and death is hanging in the balance by the word which is being spoken. No wonder Paul said, "Who is sufficient for these things?" Very few have ever groaned that in an entire Christian lifetime. And do you know why? You are living "beneath" the apostolic requirement. There is not that great a demand upon your participation in life. You have a much more casual view of things. You do not see things as urgently and ultimately as the apostle sees. You are well able, out of your own ability and intelligence, to conduct religious affairs. Examine yourself and see whether or not you are in the faith! The faith once given to the saints - the apostolic faith! Everything else is idolatrous - a distortion - something less than that which is a glory to God.
So she sat there in the front row looking up at the platform and I sighed and groaned "Who is sufficient for these things?"! And I opened my mouth by faith and I don't even remember what I said, but it made an impression on her and she was not quick to leave when the meeting was over. We were sitting in the steps of a hall way in the high school and she was complaining to me - "my Jewish life has not been a preparation for me to believe these things. My intellectual background tells me I cannot believe in virgin birth, or a resurrection but I believe in you." And because she believed in me, she took my hand and followed me like a child in a sinner's prayer and she would not let me leave that city that night until I could find a church somewhere where she could be baptized. You come and examine tonight this trophy of God, who no longer is a chain-smoker, suffering agonizing pain, but is a glory to the God, Who saved her because she claved unto me and believed. We need to become our message. Mere correct words are not enough for the Epicureans and the Stoics of our generation. We need to steep ourselves in the apostolic scriptures and make that the foundation of all our "seeing". You need to make a wilful choice about what it is you give your attention, your thought, and your time. What are the true foundations of your reality, What is the basis for your seeing? Only a "true" worshipper can discern a city given wholly to idolatry. An apostle is nothing if he is not true. He sees that which is invisible and eternal. He sees that greater weight of glory that make his present sufferings a "momentary and light affliction" (2 Corinthians 4:16-18). He is without fear and he cannot be intimidated. He can go up a hill without the guarantee that he will come down, and yet speak abrasive and challenging words to men without fear of consequence. He can speak of the judgement which is to come by that One whom God has raised from the dead, and speak of it with such solemnity and authority that men shall be caused to tremble in the fear of God, or they shall call him a babbler. Paul says that we shall be judged for all that we do in our bodies. Knowing the terror of God, he said, "I persuade men". We need to know that terror. We need to restore the fear of God to the church because if it is apostolically missing with us, of what shall we persuade men? - that God has a plan for their life - that they should accept Him that they might receive the benefits? "Knowing the terror of God - I persuade men". We need to come into a wholly different mind-set - an apostolic one - to fulfil the purposes of God in our own generation. We need to know nothing but Christ and Him crucified and it will take a determination, for every other kind of knowing wants to crowd in and diminish the message of the Cross. This absoluteness this single-eyed seeing that God has one purpose in human life: that men might seek after Him, that haply they might be found of Him - for God has winked in times past but He commands now all men everywhere to repent. It is not an option - it is an "absolute declaration" and it needs to be made again, for we are much closer to the judgement of which Paul spoke and it can only be spoken by one kind of people - those that are like Paul - absolute - unmasking and revealing the false value of the world; not impressed with their monuments to an unknown God. I am going to be speaking in these days about what it takes to fashion such a man and we shall discover what apostolic character, authority, seeing and conduct are.
This account of Mars Hill is a day in the life of an apostle; one which he did not plan. But God had His man in his place in His time and only a few clave to him and believed. We must be an apostolic people whose intention is large in God and we must be willing to be formed at His hand - the God who gives all things - to live and move and have our being in Him - these things must become real to us.