When You Come to the End

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically from the audio and may contain small errors.

We can come to you and know that it is for your glory and our good that we open up your word. It's no free, we know that it's for your glory and our good that we are here this morning, that we're singing praise to you, Lord. Help us to believe that even whenever that's difficult to see and it's your name that we pray, amen. Amen, if you want, you can open up to Acts 27 and 28. Acts chapter 27 and 28, we are gonna be finishing our series on Acts called Uncharted and we are also finishing the book of Acts. So it's kind of a monumental time.

When I was younger, my mom used to take my brother and I to the mall, the Acadiana Mall is what it was called back in Lafayette, Louisiana. It was not a huge mall, but as a kid, it was easy to get lost because I was a kid and I didn't have a good sense of direction anyway. And so this is where I first experienced the power of a map. Okay, a typical map in a mall kind of looks like this. There's numbers, the numbers correspond to a legend. It's a little confusing, but what makes a map really powerful is that little circle. Or sometimes it's a star. Sometimes it's like a circle with a little line down like on Google Maps or Apple Maps or whatnot. But it's that locator, it helps you know you are here.

That little piece of the map is actually so integral that if you are not looking at that, if you don't have that, if you just have the map, for example, then you really don't know where you are. You're looking at a map, you're like, okay, I'm in here somewhere. But unless you can begin to kind of recognize something around you or like your bearings or something like that, it takes you a lot longer to figure it out if you ever do. And if you're a seven year old and a Katie in a mall, you might never figure out where you are. But there's that little mall map and it has a you are here sign. That you are here, it allows you to get your bearing, it allows you to find direction, it allows you to take action, okay? My mom said that we were gonna meet in Dillard's. I'm here, so now I gotta go to Dillard's, okay? How many of y'all remember Dillard's? Okay, just a few, okay.

Dillard's. Last week as a metaphor, we said that Paul was going through a storm. We talked about how Paul was getting tossed around by the waves of political favors and he was in jail, stuck in jail in Caesarea, and he had made an appeal to Caesar and he was going to Rome. But all of this was pretty tumultuous, okay? This is where Acts 27 picks up. Look at Acts 27 verse one. It says, and when it was decided that we should sail for Italy, that's Rome, they delivered Paul and some other prisoners to a centurion of the Augustan court named Julius. So in the previous week, whenever we were looking at Acts 25 and 26, we were firmly in the metaphor, okay? In Acts 27 and 28, today, we are firmly out of that metaphor and we are into the reality that Paul is actually going to get on a ship and will experience being shipwrecked, will experience winds and waves, will have his boat torn apart, okay,

as he's actually headed to Rome. They're blown way off course. They don't know where they are. And in the middle of that moment, the Holy Spirit begins using Paul as a you are here sign for everybody else. For Luke, who's probably with him in this moment, for all the other crew that's on the ship, for all the other prisoners on the ship, this is like, they have like 250 people on this ship, Paul becomes this you are here sign. He helps other people get their bearings, find action, right, Paul is the catalyst. And Paul, the way that this begins to happen, you kind of see it in the opening verses, that Paul is beginning to receive some ordinary favor from the Holy Spirit, okay? So you see, and just real quickly, in verse three, Paul is shown unusual favor by his jailers. His jailer, Julius, really likes him and is showing him favor. Verse 31, Paul, on his words alone,

stops a couple of other soldiers from stealing lifeboats. Verse 43, just because Julius doesn't wanna kill Paul, he spares all the other prisoners. So you have the Holy Spirit giving favor to Paul, kind of putting this shield of protection around him, kind of putting this kind of glowing aura, okay? And for some reason, everybody on that ship is listening to him, loves him, doesn't wanna kill him, and will do what he tells him to do. And the biggest step, the biggest kind of favor, it moves out of the ordinary and goes into something a little more miraculous. When the ship, so they're sailing along, and if you kind of read it through, you can kind of see there's all these logistics that get them where they are, but by the time we hit verse 20, they have gone through tempest after tempest, they have gone through storm after storm, they have been thrown against the side,

they are blown way off course, and this is where it left them. Look at verse 20. Acts 27, verse 20, it says, when neither sun nor stars appeared for many days and no small tempest lay on us, all hope of our being saved was at last abandoned. That's the last journal entry that you write, okay? That's what you write when you think you're done. It says, when neither sun nor stars appeared for many days. That's significant because that was their you are here sign. That was how they were going to navigate. And if there's cloud cover and they can't see,

then they can't navigate. They don't know where to go. And it says, no small tempest lay on us, so tempest are kind of like storms on the sea basically, and this sea storm would not let up. It wasn't just that they couldn't see the stars, they couldn't navigate, it wasn't just that. It was also that they were just getting beaten down by rain. And if there were any rescue ship near them, all of those storms would have driven those rescue ships away.

All hope of our being saved was at last abandoned. This is despair on the highest order. And in the midst of that, at that moment in time, right when they lost all hope, when they had abandoned all hope, Paul stands up. I'm gonna pick it up in verse 22 and 23. Here's the gist of what he tells them in verses 22 and 23. Yet now I urge you to take heart, for there will be no loss of life among you, but only of the ship. For this very night there stood before me an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I worship. Okay, this is not just ordinary means. This isn't just people looking at Paul and saying, man, I really like this guy, I definitely don't wanna kill him. Or, man, I'm really gonna show him some favor. It's beyond that something miraculous is happening. And so he has their attention. He is saying God has promised there is gonna be no loss of life.

Look at the next two verses to see a little bit more. Here's what the angel said. The angel said, do not be afraid, Paul. You must stand before Caesar and behold, God has granted all those who sail with you. Has granted you, excuse me, has granted you all those who sail with you. So take heart, man, for I have faith in God that it will be exactly as I have been told. Okay, I want you to imagine yourself on this ship. You are a prisoner, not Paul. You have abandoned hope. There is a tempest laying, like just bearing down on you right now. You can't navigate, you can't see stars. You've heard stories about this. You've heard stories of people being lost at sea and never being seen again or just really horrible things happening.

And if you are listening to that, if you're listening to Paul tell you that. Man, even if you are the hardest skeptic, you're curious, you're intrigued, even in the slightest. You wanna stop and say, okay, Paul, let's just pretend I believe you. You're telling me, you're promising me right now that nobody on this ship is going to die, that we're gonna lose the ship, but nobody's gonna die. How's that gonna happen?

And he's like, I don't know. I had an angel stand before me and tell me these things and I believe him. I believe that angel. Okay, did anybody else see the angel? No, just me, okay. Only you saw the angel. Okay, even if you're a little skeptical, you are totally curious and really deep down, you don't admit it, but you're hoping it's true. You're hoping there's some life on the other side of that. You're hoping for it. In your life, you are going to meet people in the middle of a storm. And you don't know where they are on that storm process, but they might be at a place where they are abandoning hope. They might be at a place where they are deeply frustrated. Maybe it's family, maybe it's career, maybe it's personal, maybe it's just emotional. And they are beaten down by a storm and there's no stars in the sky. They are lost at sea. They don't know what to do next.

They are frustrated, tired at their wit's end and they're having some intrusive thoughts and they don't sound terrible. What the Holy Spirit wants to do whenever you are in a position like that, the Holy Spirit wants to give you favor. Now, you need to listen to me very, very carefully. Okay, there are people that will tell you that all God wants to do is throw favor at you, okay? All God wants to do is make your life super great. That's not what I'm saying right now, okay? In fact, if you look at Paul in Acts 27, Paul's life was not super great. Paul was a prisoner on a ship, okay? But despite that, in the middle of that, the Holy Spirit is giving Paul favor in that particular situation. So when I'm talking about the Holy Spirit giving you favor, I don't mean that your bank accounts fall and that you have everything you want and that that's not what I mean. I mean that the Holy Spirit is giving you favor

with that person in that situation. That the Holy Spirit has just, for some reason, has just made you a person that they wanna talk to. And what the Holy Spirit wants to do, the Holy Spirit wants to give you favor so that you can be a you are here sign for other people. The Holy Spirit is giving you favor in that moment, okay? Again, we're not talking bank accounts and cars. We're just talking about Holy Spirit favor. Sometimes it's ordinary favor. Sometimes it's miraculous favor, okay? And don't ignore the ordinary and don't mistrust the miraculous, okay? Sometimes it's one or the other, it's fine, but it's Holy Spirit favor and it is for you to be a you are here sign about God's plan to other people.

So maybe they respect you, maybe they trust you, maybe they think that you're really wise or they think that you're really honest, right? And you could be flabbergasted by that. I have had people tell me, they're like, Drew, I just really trust you. And inside I'm going, why? Why do you do, like, you, well, how, why do you trust me? What's, you know, what's going on? And you don't have to understand it, okay? But there's, you're just gonna have these moments and you have some favor. In that moment, you need to remember this is not about you getting favor. The only reason that you get favor or that you get blessing is the same way a water comes to pipes, right? It's to move it along. It's not, you got pipes, not buckets. You understand, right? Like that blessing, that favor is not just for you to just get it all and then store it for a rainy day or something. No, no, it's for you.

It's for you to be a blessing to other people. God's plan, right, God's plan, we're gonna talk about that in just a second, but God's plan, the thing that you are a, you are here signed for, God's plan is bigger than you, right? It's for you, for others, okay? I really want you to hear that. It's for you, for others. Both are true, it's still for you, but it's for you for others, okay? It's for you, for others.

And so whenever I say that the Holy Spirit is starting to use you as a, you are here signed, it means that you take what the Holy Spirit is saying and you share it just like Paul did, right? So in a conversation, in a text, if you are recommending a podcast, right? And so I want you to think about just like what you know, what you experienced even in this past week, right? Was there a verse that like particularly struck you? Was there a podcast that was like, did you watch like a little 10-second video and you're like, that was a big encouragement. Did you have a verse memorized? Did somebody text you something and you're just like, that was a huge encouragement to me. Great, it's for you, for others.

It's for you, for others. Sometimes that's the Lord reminding you of a promise. Sometimes that's you just really, really just singing loud and feeling a worship song and you're like, man. And it's not just for you, it's for you, for others. And you might say, well, look, I don't have angels coming in the middle of the night, giving me God's promises. And that's true, most of us do not. That is an uncommon occurrence, even in scripture, it's a somewhat uncommon occurrence. But what's not uncommon and what's just as beneficial as that is taking time to listen to the Holy Spirit through the word and through prayer. These are ordinary means, these are ordinary things that the Holy Spirit wants to use to speak to you. Right? And so you might say, well, you know, Drew, I don't know if, you know, I feel like I'm lost at sea. I feel like, look, I get it. You're not always gonna feel like you're the calm one.

Okay, I understand. But what I'm trying to help you see is that even if you are in a shipwreck, even if everybody else has lost hope, even if there are no stars for you, even if the rain is coming down on you, and somebody else is with you, the Lord still, even in that moment, even when you feel disqualified, sometimes, especially when you feel disqualified, the Lord is going to give you favor, give you these ministry spots, or you're just gonna kind of walk in like you've just wandered in something, and you're just gonna have something to say to this person because the Lord has blessed you and it's not just for you, it's for others, right? It's for you, for others. What we see with Paul and his crew is that that promise that they received is coming true, that nobody is harmed. And Paul reminds them of that promise, and he says this, he says, and look at, skip all the way down to 35,

excuse me, 33 through 35, 34. I can't pick my 30s here, here we go. Here's what Paul said to the crew. Therefore, I urge you to take some food for it will give you strength. And then here's the reminder, for not a hair is to perish from the head of any of you. And when he had said these things, he took bread and giving thanks to God in the presence of all, he broke it and began to eat. Paul, in this moment, is simply exercising faith. He's not taking a pole to see who believes him. He's not waiting around for people to say, well, Paul, I think you're right, I think I agree with what you're saying. Paul, no, the brother's just eating.

He just eats. He eats in faith. He says, essentially, look, I know I'm not gonna die. I know you're not gonna die, so I'm gonna eat. I would encourage you to eat too. Let's all eat, because we're not throwing it away. We're not throwing our lives away. We are going to live. This promise will happen. Look at verses 36 and 37 and 38. It says, then they were all, they all were encouraged and ate some food themselves. It's a big moment. Let's just stop here for just a second. They were all encouraged and ate some food themselves. What does that tell us? That tells us that the crew is beginning, at least in some seminal form, at least in a little tiny way, they're beginning to believe what Paul is telling them. Because you're not going to eat if you believe you're going to die. You're going to give up well before that. You're not gonna have some big feast. They were all encouraged and they ate some food themselves.

And then 37, it says, we were all 276 persons in the ship. And when they had eaten enough, they lightened the ship, throwing out the wheat into the sea. Why are you throwing out wheat into the sea? Why are you lightening the ship? So that you can handle storms better. Why? Because you want to survive. These are measures being taken. These are actions being taken because they want to survive and they believe they will now. Even if it's imperfect, even if they kind of have doubts, even if there's kind of some mixed motivations going on, it doesn't really matter at that point because they're taking food and they're lightening the ship. They're doing something about what Paul has said, about what the Lord God in heaven has promised. The Holy Spirit is giving favor to Paul and Paul is saying, this promise is true for you. So let's act on it. And they do. This is part of being a you are here sign

is that you are going to have to act on hope even if it's just you. Even if you don't have a whole lot of company. Now we have a church family. I'm thankful, thankful for our church family. You can have people that are praying for you. You can update people on what's going on. Some people can even go with you in the midst of being a you are here sign. But you can act on hope. What does that look like in real time? In real time, if you're acting on hope, look, don't ask someone if they want to have a Bible study before you're just willing to crack open a Bible or recite a verse from memory and just share that with them. Just share a promise with them. Just share something either that you have memorized or something, you're like, oh, I was reading that this morning and it just made me think about you. And here's the promise that I read. And I just thought about you.

I don't really know why or how, but I did. Or you're talking to somebody and you say, man, that sounds like a really heavy burden. I don't really know how you're even not in bed shriveled up in a corner, like with a hidden in pillows and blankets right now. I'm surprised you're like dressed in that Walmart right now. I can't believe that you're kind of responding in any way. Can I pray for you right now? Can I pray for you right now? Can I tell you, I have been a pastor a long time and there is something really beneficial about praying for somebody right then, even if it's over the phone. And I know for many of you, I've been on the phone with you and we've just been talking about it. And the Lord has just impressed upon me to pray. And I was like, can we pray right now? I'm like, sure, let's pray right now. And that's kind of the response I get very often. It's like a surprise, but almost a relief.

Like, oh yeah, yeah, we can pray right now, can't we? I'm like, yeah, let's pray, let's do it. And it's good. And look, I'm not the, I mean, hopefully, I'm not the only one who could pray, okay? When you are on the phone with somebody, when you are talking with somebody, when you're texting with somebody, man, text out a prayer. That's okay. Text out a prayer to somebody. You don't have to use your thumbs. I don't know why I did that. But you can text any way you want, okay? You don't have to hold the phone a certain way. But text right then, right there. Pray right then, right there, on the phone, in conversation with them, over text. The Holy Spirit wants to, is blessing you to bless other people.

The Holy Spirit's giving you favor for you, for others. Back to the story. We're gonna kinda keep moving. We gotta go through two whole chapters, so we gotta keep that story moving. The crew finally has run aground on the island of Malta. Okay? So we're into Acts 28 now. Look at 28 verse two. Here's what they find on Malta. On Malta, the native people showed us unusual kindness. For they kindled the fire and welcomed us all because it had begun to rain and was cold. Okay, so the Holy Spirit is giving them all favor now with these native people. And just take a second. Like, if you are a prisoner on that ship, okay, what have you experienced in this moment? You've experienced complete despair, a promise from God that was not given to you but was given to Paul, so you're just kind of riding the coattails of that promise. You've experienced the fulfillment of that promise.

You're not dead, but your ship is gone, and you're on this island of Malta, and over, and just over on top of all of that, the people on this island are welcoming. They're not treating you like invaders, even though there's 276 of you. They're not treating you like invaders. They're welcoming you, they build fires. They, you know, I don't know if they have blankets, whatever they have, they're covering you, okay? The Holy Spirit's giving them favor, and then the Holy Spirit performs a miracle right after Paul is near the fire, and there's a viper kind of near the fire, and the viper, like, attaches himself to Paul's arm hand. Think it was his hand.

Look at verse four, 28, four. This is right after a viper bites Paul's hand. It says, when the native people saw the creature hanging from his hand, they said to one another, no doubt this man is a murderer. Interesting interpretation of that snake bite. Though he has escaped from the sea, Justice Capital J has not allowed him to live. It is very prevalent in our world, in Burleson, Texas, to talk about the universe, capital U, or to talk about karma, capital K, or to talk about justice, capital J. And what is being attempted in that moment is to say,

even people who don't know the Lord God understand that there is a personal force making things right, okay? Now look, it's imperfect, okay? I get it. And so when somebody that you're talking to is saying, yeah, the universe just doesn't want me to do this today, okay, what that person is expressing is that they believe in some kind of personal force, but they are definitely not naming that God, okay? That person who's talking to you is telling you a lot about themselves just by saying that word. We're learning a lot about the islanders on Malta when they say capital J, justice, justice has not allowed him to live. So according to their culture, Paul is being judged.

And when you are a you are here sign, when you are that for other people, the Holy Spirit is going to use times where you will be disparaged, discounted, sidelined, maligned, misrepresented, reviled. The Holy Spirit's gonna use those times to bring glory to God. You though, in the midst of it, are going to kind of have to suffer that fact that you're being reviled. You're gonna have to suffer the fact that your reputation is getting torched at work right now. You're gonna have to suffer the fact that you aren't in the in crowd, at least for a while. You're gonna have to suffer the fact that you might have some friendships that are never gonna be the same after that because of what they heard about you and they're not coming back to you to learn that it's true or not. They're just kind of torching you. Look at Acts 28, five and six. Paul, however, shook off the creature into the fire

and suffered no harm. They were waiting for him to swell up or suddenly fall down dead. Maybe they were taking bets, I'm not sure. But when they had waited a long time and saw no misfortune come to him, they changed their minds. And they said that he was a god. That's kind of a quick turnaround. But look, just understand what's going on. These Maltese, Maltese, sure, we'll call them Maltese. These Maltese people, they see something bad happen to you. They see something bad happen to Paul and they're waiting to see what happens. And look, that's you, man. If you are ministering to people at work, when something bad happens to you, they're definitely watching to see how you respond to that. When something doesn't go your way, they're definitely seeing what's gonna happen. How's this person gonna respond? I know they're a Christian. I know they're a Christian, but how Christian are they?

Are they a Christian now when they got demoted? When they miss out on a project that they really wanted? Whenever their kid's flipping out and accusing them of really bad things? How are you acting then? Because the Holy Spirit is working, you can take that suffering. Because the Holy Spirit is working something out, even though, and I don't know this, the viper attaching himself to Paul's hand probably hurt. I'm just guessing here. Snake lights don't feel awesome. I don't know if you've ever been snake bit. I've never had the privilege of being bitten by a snake

or surviving it. So who knows what would happen if I got bit on the hand. But I'm sure it is not like a crowning achievement of a great day. So many good things happened. Got bit by a snake today. That's not how we understand that. Look, when you're gonna get snake bit at work, you're gonna get snake bit in your family, you're gonna get snake bit among your friends, you're gonna get snake bit when you least expect it in ways that you don't see coming and it's going to hurt. It's gonna hurt. And in that moment, man, in that moment, you need to understand that that is part of the Holy Spirit proving what is true through your life.

It doesn't mean that you've gotta be perfect. You know, Paul, when he got bit by a snake, he might've yelled the cuss word. I don't know, okay. It might've happened. But I'm saying in that moment when you get snake bit, it's not like, you don't need to pretend like it's nothing. You don't need to be like, oh, a snake biting my hand. How great is this? Praise God. Like, that's not the response, right? That's also not what we're going for. You get snake bit, it hurts. You acknowledge that. That's good to acknowledge that, right? It's good to lament that. It's okay to be upset at that. But then there's how you handle it after that, right? What is the Holy Spirit? Are you jumping to this moment of hope? Say, okay, I got bit by a snake. Not great, it's not a great day, but what does the Lord have for me? This isn't good, but I know the Lord is working all things for His glory and my good.

How is a snake bite for His glory and your good? I don't know, but I know it's true. I've seen it happen. I've experienced it. Many of you have also experienced it. Let's look at scripture, 1 Peter 3:15. I'm just gonna kind of riff on these. 1 Peter 3:15 and 16, it's not gonna be up here, but in 15 it says to honor Christ as holy and be prepared to gently defend your faith. And then in 16 it says having a good conscience, oh, we have it up here, sorry, having a good conscience so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. When you are slandered, when your good behavior is reviled, in those times the temptation is to defend yourself. And people are gonna say, in that moment, whenever you're snake bit, I bet you're glad you're a Christian now, right? Oh, it's really paying off. How blessed do you feel now?

Look where it got you. Why don't you go pray to your Sky Daddy and see if something can happen. Those are things I've actually been told in person. Here's my encouragement, man. Just let the Holy Spirit shut them up. It might not be then, it might not even be that year. It might not be that decade. But the Holy Spirit will shut them up. Your job is not to shut them up. Your job is not to have some smart comment. It's to be a you are here sign for God's plan. And here's God's plan. We've been talking about God's plan. God's plan is redemption. God's plan is what the Holy Spirit is directing us toward. God's plan is redemption. This is what the Bible is talking about whenever it says don't lose heart. Don't lose heart in what? That everything's gonna be okay? No, don't lose heart in God's plan that he's going to redeem everything. When it talks about, when the Bible talks about

how the Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise. His promise that what? His promise that he will redeem all things. When it says I've finished the race, I have kept the faith. Kept the faith in what? That God is gonna do what he said. That God is going to bring all things together. We can easily lose sight of our part in redemption. Being lost at sea is sometimes a really good metaphor for even how we feel. We have seasons where we feel like nothing is going according to plan and we feel so off course that we almost forget where we're going and we dive. We dive at that point into something, podcasts, books. We start listening to Jordan Peterson. We start picking up some different hobbies. We're trying to shake things up. We shake up our workout routine. But all of those things have their own you are here maps. Those things are fine on their own but they don't center you

because they aren't God's plan of redemption. They might be really beneficial to your dietary health or to your marriage, might be good marriage advice. Might be good career coaching, right? Like all those things are fine and well and good but it's not the same as being able to lay your head on your pillow at night knowing that you are cooperating with the God of the universe and his plan of redemption. Both in you and in others. Following Jesus is working out our part in that redemption. And so not only can we lose sight of our part, we can also lose sight of God working his plan.

Because when things go wrong, really wrong, not like I had a lot of traffic lights on the way to work wrong but I don't even know, I can't even see a solution to this wrong. I don't know how I'm ever going to be the same wrong. This is like bad diagnosis wrong. This is losing my job wrong. When things go wrong, it can be a serious discouragement and it can seem like God's asleep at the wheel.

We can lose sight of the fact that God is working his plan. Back to the story. Paul is finally coming to the end, okay? This is the thing that he's been planning for. There's another ship that comes to Malta, they board that ship and they're on to Rome and they finally land at Rome. What Paul was looking at, was praying for, what he had purpose in his heart, all the way in Acts chapter 20 verse 19, or 19 verse 20, I don't remember anymore, is now coming to fruition in the very last chapter of Acts. He's finally getting to where he wants to be. And in chapter 28 verses 17 through 20, Paul is kind of setting the perimeters with Jewish leaders. He's saying, okay, I need to talk to you guys. And maybe these are even things he's rehearsed, right? So he's kind of coming to this moment, this thing that he's been planning for. He didn't plan for the shipwreck, he didn't plan for Malta,

he didn't plan to be in jail in Caesarea for two plus years. He didn't plan for any of that, but he did plan for Rome. He did have in mind, okay, I'm gonna meet the Jewish leaders first, and then I'm gonna tell them kind of what's going on. And I'm gonna listen to them, and then we're gonna kind of talk a little bit, and then we're gonna set a day, and I'm gonna preach the gospel to these Jews in Rome. It's gonna be great. In verses 21 and 22, the leaders communicate that they are open to hearing what God, or what Paul is going to say about God, but they are wary, because they say that this sect that you are a part of, Paul, is spoken against everywhere. In other words, you got a bad reputation. We're open, but we're cautious.

Look at the second part of verse 23. It says, Acts 28, 23, they came to him, we're kind of picking up mid-verse, they came to him at his lodging in greater numbers. From morning till evening, he expounded to them, this is Paul to Jewish leaders, testifying to the kingdom of God and trying to convince them about Jesus, both from the law of Moses and from the prophets. This is exactly, we have every inclination, we know almost exactly what he's saying, because we've seen, we have it written down all through the book of Acts, what Paul has said to Jewish leaders in particular about Jesus being the fulfillment of the Old Testament, according to the law of Moses, according to the prophets, right, that Jesus has ushered in the kingdom of God in a new way. All of these things are touchstones for all these Jewish leaders. Paul is speaking their heritage back to them, right?

They should be able to connect with this in a significant capacity. He is expounding scripture to them. Paul is being a you are here sign to Jewish leaders in a way that they probably have never heard. Paul is making sense of their entire heritage. And I'm sure, I'm sure that it was a moment that many of them would never forget. Even if they ignored what he said, they probably went home and told a lot of people about it. Man, I just heard, I heard the craziest thing today.

However, look at the reaction, verse 24. We're getting to the end. There's not many verses left in Acts. Verse 24. And some were convinced by what he said, but others disbelieved. Kind of looking for a little more action there, right? I'm looking for either, if I'm Paul, I'm looking for either revival or stoning, okay? I want to move the needle somehow. I'm giving them good news of great joy. I am explaining to them that Jesus is the Messiah. And I'm using Old Testament to prove that. Some were convinced by what he said, others disbelieved. The next verse tells us that even the ones that believed left him.

That he was virtually ignored. That Paul, who has spent, excuse me, from our perspective, has spent the last eight chapters, okay? Nine chapters going to Rome, finally gets there, preaches the gospel to the Jews, the Jewish leaders, the guys who could influence other people, the guys who got all those other Jews to come that morning just to hear Paul. Some were convinced by what he said, but others disbelieved. Verse 25, you get the impression, everybody's gone. This is a shoulder shrug. This is nothing. This is kind of a meh. Oh, okay, interesting.

It's a really curious way to end the book of Acts, but it really helps us understand two things. First, sometimes ministry don't go like you thought it would. They just don't. You expected it to work one way. Maybe some of you were with a, you know, you've been part of another church in a, you know, a couple years ago or in a different life. It was so long ago, it feels like a different life. And maybe you were part of that church and things were just blowing and going, and you thought, man, this is so great, it's never gonna end, this is never gonna be wrong, this is never gonna go bad, and it went bad.

That's hard. Sometimes ministry does not go like you thought. With Paul, man, he had been giving overwhelming, overwhelming, miraculous favor. Paul had every indication that the Holy Spirit wanted him to go to Rome. He survived a shipwreck, he healed a guy, an angel visited him, all these things happened. And then when he gets there, this is it. He's come to the end, and this is more of the same thing, really, for Paul. I mean, this is, we shouldn't be surprised, right? Everywhere he's gone, there has been heavy resistance by Jewish leaders. Acts 13, Antioch and Iconium. Acts 14, and Lystra. Acts 17, Thessalonica. And then he's chased away from Berea by the same Jewish leaders. In Acts 18, it's Corinth. In Acts 20, it's Greece. On top of that, on top of all of the people, all the Jews in those places running him off, there are no governors and no kings that are professing faith in the Lord Jesus Christ,

despite the fact that they've had Paul in prison for two years sharing the gospel with them. And so here in Rome, it's more of the same. And I'm sure in that moment, Paul could be discouraged, but here's what he remembers. Look at verse 28. And he's quoting scripture at this point, but he's definitely understanding it for his moment. It says, therefore, let it be known to you that this salvation of God has been sent to the Gentiles. They will listen.

And so Acts does not end with Paul wallowing in self-pity because the Jews have rejected him yet again, because all these miracles had not added up maybe to what he had planned or how he thought it would go. I don't know how he thought it'd go in Rome, but maybe he thought it'd be different. What he does though, what Paul does is he remembers God's plan of redemption, and that redemption is going to come to outsiders and redemption is going to come to the world through outsiders, through people that don't belong. You and I are here, not because we are nice people. If you think that you're a Christian because you're a nice person, you are wrong. You are not as nice as you think you are.

You aren't. We aren't here because our parents raised us in church. And if you're here just because you're kind of religiously following what your parents told you to do, well, look, I mean, I'm glad to see your face. That's cool, but man, there's a lot more to a relationship with the Lord than just doing what your parents want you to do, than just paying the church tax, right, and just coming because they're dragging you, right? I've heard more than one camp speaker say that they had a drug problem, that their parents drug them to church every Sunday and Wednesday. Maybe that's you, maybe you have a drug problem this morning.

Look at how it ends. Look at Acts 28, 30 through 31. This is the very end of the book of Acts. Paul, he lived there two whole years at his own expense and welcomed all who came to him, proclaiming the kingdom of God and teaching about the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness and without hindrance. This is how the book of Acts ends. This is an encouragement to us. This is Paul being able to minister without hindrance.

Hebrews 12:1 says to let us run the race with endurance that is set before us. 2 Timothy 4,7 says, I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Look, for some of you, man, you resonate with what Paul's saying, what Paul's doing. Some of you, maybe you don't. But here's my help. If this is some kind of map for you, then where are you? Where's your you are here sign, right? Are you like Paul on the ship? Are you reminding other people of the promise? If that's happening, then man, pray for strength and stay the course. If you are Paul on the island and you are dealing with some opposition, leave your reputation in the Lord's hands. He'll take care of the rest. If you are Paul here at the end of Acts and things have not turned out like you thought, you need to remember the promise. You need to recite scripture. You need to understand that you are

in the middle of something, not at the end, that the Lord has a plan. Finish the race marked out for you. But maybe you're not like Paul at all. Maybe you're like the crew. You're unsure, but you're kind of doing what Paul says. You're kind of there and you're just smiling, like happy to be here. Here's my encouragement to you. Start asking why. Why is the Lord protecting me? Why is the Lord providing for me? Why have all these people who are all around me, why do they love me and why do they help me out? Why do they want good things for me? Start praying and asking questions. Start reading your Bible and asking questions. Start having conversations with Christians and asking questions. This is why we have our couch and our two chairs over there next to the lamps. This is why we have that, so that you can start asking those kinds of questions, so that we can start those conversations.

As we end our time, I just wanna encourage you, if you wanna start that conversation, if there's a way for you to kind of understand what the Lord's doing, I'm gonna call the worship band up. If there's a way to understand kind of what the Lord's doing for you in the middle of all that, man, it's going to start with you taking a step forward. And taking a step forward just looks like us hanging out back there and talking and praying. Who knows, we might even have coffee that week, okay? But I just wanna encourage you toward that end of saying, man, the Lord wants to do something. Don't let that opportunity pass you by, let's pray. Lord, thank you for this morning. Thank you for your word. Thank you for the book of Acts that ends so strangely, so in a way that's not always expected.

Thank you that you wanna do things with us. I pray that you would help us. Help us listen to you. Help us start that conversation. Help us be a welcome sign for others. In the name we pray.