You're listening to the teaching ministry of Harvest Fellowship Church in Boyertown, Pennsylvania. You can find out more about us on the web at www.harvestfellowshipchurch.org. We pray that through our teaching, we may present everyone mature in Christ. Father in heaven, we bow before you on this Wednesday night. We rejoice, O Lord, for you are good. You are good to us. And Lord, we also rejoice at the goodness of your word to us. As we study your word tonight, O Lord, we pray for your wisdom to be heaped upon us. May it be overflowing in our hearts. May we be very careful to study ourselves, that you, O Lord, would reveal that which needs to be changed, that you would strengthen the foundation that is there of faith and the fundamentals of it. I pray all these things tonight, O Lord, submitting to you as Christ our King. And we ask this in the name of Jesus. Amen. All right. Welcome to Wednesday Night Bible Study. Let's give a quick recap. And I want to be pretty quick because there's a good amount of content for tonight. But last week we covered Acts chapter 12 verses 1 through 19. And we saw at the very beginning of the chapter we saw this ruler of Palestine Herod Agrippa I. He began to violently persecute the Christians in Jerusalem. And who did we first see mentioned facing persecution? the brother of? And so James was the first apostle martyred. And this emboldened Herod when he saw the response, the favorable response of the people of Jerusalem. And so he now then arrested Peter, takes this great spokesman of the church, he throws him in prison and he plans, he has this grand plan, he's going to bring him out after Passover for this public execution. But while all this planning is going on, the people of God were earnestly praying. All throughout the city they're praying to God, interceding on behalf of Peter. And so this very night then, before Peter is about to be executed, we see Peter sleeping soundly. chained to two men. I don't think that that would even allow me to sleep soundly being chained to other people. But he sleeps soundly and then this angel sent by Jesus appears in the cell. Light illuminates all around and nobody wakes up. So he punches Peter pretty hard and Peter gets woken up and his chains miraculously fall away from his hands. Angel says, get up, get dressed, come with me. They get to this outermost gate and we see in the text that it automatically opens for them. This is an act of God's might. And then it seemed as just as quickly as this angel had appeared, he disappeared. So whose house did Peter then go to? Mary's house. And he gets to Mary's house where the people are praying. And he knocks on the door. Rhoda, the gatekeeper, she recognizes his voice as she's about to open the door. And so instead of opening the door, she runs back into the house with great joy because she believes that Peter is there. Well, they did not believe it, but she believed it. And eventually they come and they open the door and they are astonished because there's Peter. So Peter tells him this amazing story. I didn't do anything. God did everything. What a wonderful act of God. And he says go tell James, this was Jesus's half brother, and the other elders everything because I'm not staying around. And Peter leaves. So in the morning the soldiers were quite alarmed to find out that Peter's not there. And then Herod interrogates them, they search the city, and Peter's nowhere to be found, and so the soldiers are put to death. The last thing that we end up with then is this, Herod, this great king, was rendered powerless by God. And so he leaves and he goes to Caesarea. So that brings us to verse 20, Acts chapter 12, and we're going to go tonight through chapter 13, So 1220 through 1312. Hear now the word of the Lord. Now Herod was angry with the people of Tyre and Sidon, and they came to him with one accord, and having persuaded Blastus, the king's chamberlain, they asked for peace, because their country depended on the king's country for food. On an appointed day, Herod put on his royal robes, took his seat upon the throne and delivered an oration to them. And the people were shouting the voice of a God and not of a man. Immediately an angel of the Lord struck him down because he did not give God the glory and he was eaten by worms and he breathed his last. The Word of God increased and multiplied, and Barnabas and Saul returned from Jerusalem when they had completed their service, bringing with them John, whose other name was Mark. Now there were in the church at Antioch prophets and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manan, a lifelong friend of Herod the Tetrarch, and Saul. While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them. Then after fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them and sent them off. So being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia, and from there they sailed to Cyprus. When they arrived at Salamis, they proclaimed the word of God in the synagogues of the Jews, and they had John to assist them. When they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos, they came upon a certain magician, a Jewish false prophet named Bar-Jesus. He was with the proconsul, Sergius Paulus, a man of intelligence, who summoned Barnabas and Saul, and sought to hear the word of God. But Elymas the magician, for that is the meaning of his name, opposed them, seeking to turn the proconsul away from the faith. Saul, who was also called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, looked intently at him and said, You son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, full of all deceit and villainy, will you not stop making crooked the straight paths of the Lord? And now behold, the hand of the Lord is upon you, and you will be blind and unable to see the sun for a time. Immediately, mist and darkness fell upon him, and he went about seeking people to lead him by the hand. Then the proconsul believed when he saw what had occurred, for he was astonished at the teaching of the Lord. May the Lord write the truths, the eternal truths of his word to our hearts on this Wednesday night. Tonight we're looking at this topic of spirit-filled strength for spiritual warfare. So the spirit-filled strength for spiritual warfare. First, though, we're going to look at this pernicious, destructive evil of pride. In the conclusion of chapter 12, But then as we get into chapter 13, as we start to see the missionary efforts of the Church really go forward in force, we are going to see that when the gospel mission takes the light of the world into the darkest places of the world, the evil forces of this world are going to wage war against those gospel proclaimers. But God's people should take heart because, as Paul says in 2 Thessalonians 3.3, He says, for the Lord is faithful. He will establish you and he will guard you against the evil one. So those thoughts sort of are the overarching thoughts of this passage. But now let's first consider sort of the conclusion to last week's. Remember we sort of cut off at verse 19 and that really wasn't the end of the story. So now we have to see what happened with Herod. Why did Luke find this important to include in his writings? So in verse 20 again it says, So we find this interesting description here of Herod being very angry, or we could say furious or enraged. He was quarreling with these people, and this would have been very par for the course. Remember the family he comes from? Herod's have problems. But if he has a problem with them, they have a much bigger problem with him because he's the king. And so he's very angry. And it doesn't say exactly what prompted his anger. It's not even really well recorded in history what caused this, but he's furious with them. And so this is with the principal cities in Phoenicia. This is Tyre and Sidon. So these are the main cities here in Phoenicia, but they are under the jurisdiction of the Roman governor of Syria. And right now that is Herod. And so in his anger, what does Herod do? He cuts off their food supply. You're going to make me angry? Try not eating again. And so very quickly, I would imagine, as they realized this broach in their relationship, it says they came or they presented themselves to him with one accord. You could say with one mind. They were all the same idea. And this was going to be to beg him for essentially forgiveness. So this delegation comes and what they first need to do is they need to seek audience with him. And who controls that audience? It's this man named Blastus, this King's Chamberlain. So this man was responsible for managing the household of Herod. He controlled the access. He was a very trusted person in the regime of Herod. And so it says that they convinced this man, or we could even say they won him over. How do you think they did that? Yeah, very likely bribery. So they convince him. And so he sets up this engagement, this audience with Herod. And so what do they do? They petition through Blastus. They're petitioning for a state of concord. They are prepared to perfectly submit to the power of Herod. Why, Luke says, because they depended upon him for their food. And so they needed to import grain from the king's country and especially the Galilean corn. And so they didn't want to starve to death. And so if this was primarily for their consumption, starvation was on their minds. If it was for their commerce to be able to also sell, then economic havoc is on their minds as well. But right away here, you know, at the beginning of this final narrative of Herod, we see something that's a contrast here. As we see Herod, he's not able to maintain peace and unity within his own kingdom. And while he's unable to do that, we see the church marching on. and they're spreading something, and that is the peace of the gospel, or the gospel of peace, whichever way you want to word it. So we've got these two different things going on, this seemingly powerful man and this inauspicious gospel. One is of peace and one is not. So verse 21, on an appointed day, Herod put on his royal robes. He took his seat upon the throne and delivered an oration to them. And the people were shouting, the voice of a God and not a man. Immediately an angel of the Lord struck him down because he did not give God the glory and he was eaten by worms and he breathed his last." Now we can't say for sure, but it seems like this day of audience here, this appointed day, probably is some sort of a celebration celebrating the fact that peace had been reached. And so on this grand day then, we find Herod, he comes and he clothes himself in kingly apparel. And the historians who record this event say that he was dressed in all silver, this shimmering all silver outfit, certainly a great display of ego and pomp. And so he takes his seat then on his throne. This is his tribunal platform in front of the people. And he is now, he gives this great speech to the people. And so as the sun hits, as the morning sun rises and it hits this glimmering silvery outfit that he has on, it just seems so wonderful to them. And so they cry out, and of course this is excessive flattery, but they cry out, this is the voice or the utterance of a God, not a man. So they're heaping on this adulation to Herod. We must keep him in our good graces. And in Josephus' writings, he said that they were saying to him, be thou merciful to us. For although we hitherto or before we reverenced you only as a man, now from henceforth we will own thee as superior to mortal nature. We're sorry that we thought you were only a man before but now we can see that you are a God. And there's a bit of, I mean, there's many instances that we could go back to throughout the Bible that speaks of pride and God's disposition toward pride. But one that I would like to highlight for you that is a little less known at times is Ezekiel 28. In Ezekiel 28, we see Ezekiel prophesying against the king of Tyre. I'm not trying to bring this up just because it's Tyre here, but it's more important is the word. So you can go back and read. There's a lot of good debate over who this king of Tyre was or even who he represented. But more importantly, what I want to draw out is God's disposition against this man, where it says, the word of the Lord came to me. This is to Ezekiel, son of man, say to the prince of Tyre, thus says the Lord God. Because your heart is proud." So there's this sense of pride. Because your heart is proud and you have said, I am a God. I sit in the seat of the gods in the heart of the seas. Yet, or this is God saying this is what you really are. Yet you are but a man and no God. Though you make your heart like the heart of a God. And you can continue reading on. through Ezekiel 28, but you'll see in verses 7 through 9, what is the pronounced end of this so-called God? It's death. Death is what God calls for upon this man, this prince of Tyre. You remember the words of the Lord through Isaiah, Isaiah 45.5, I am the Lord and there is no other beside me. There is no God. And so as these people are shouting this, Herod is receiving it. Perhaps maybe even thinking in his mind, oh, you finally recognize this, huh? You finally see it. But immediately, we find this angel of the Lord striking him down. In his pompous pride, just as Nebuchadnezzar was struck down to eat grass from the earth, in his pride, when he says, look at everything that I have done here, this king, King Herod, is struck down, but not to eat grass, but to die. Remember in 2 Kings 19.35, we see It says, that night the angel of the Lord went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians. And when the people got up in the morning, all they found was lots of dead bodies. But Luke says, why did the Lord strike him down? So that you're not confused. So that's very clear. It says, because he did not give God the glory. So here's Herod and he's trying to steal glory that is meant for God alone. He accepts these words of praise. He does not rebuke the people's flattery. Now the people were also sinning. But here God strikes down the king. And there is a bit of a contrast again. So here's Herod, he's welcoming of that praise and the adulation. And even in a sense, you could say worship as he shines on his throne. I remember back in chapter 10, Cornelius tries to worship Peter and Peter says, I will have none of that. I'm just a man. I'm not a God. Now as you consider this narrative and you think of this great concept of pride, now maybe you would look at it and say, well, that's not me because I would never claim to be God. Like this fool, that's not me. But every time that we exhibit pride, what are we doing? You are taking glory. You are saying, look at what I have done. Look at what I have said. And you are saying, essentially, this is what I have done in my own strength. I didn't need any help. And so pride, even if we could say it's a lesser overt form, at the root, it's the same thing. This is the same thing. And God's disposition about pride is hatred. And so how should we respond then when we are praised by others? So if you, you know, maybe you would say to Nate, for example, that grass looks amazing. Like I couldn't cut it like that. Or something like that, you know, some sort of praise. How would you, how should you respond? You should respond first of all, by not, not minimizing it. Does God enable us to do great things? Sure. So we don't self-deprecate everything because that's insulting to the God who helped us do something. But we should give then the glory to God. So you could say thank you to God be the glory. God strengthened me. God was my rock and my right hand and the ability to do this. So we have many opportunities to give God the glory. We often see this with athletes. We see one of two responses. Self-adulation. or sometimes the immediate praise of God. I want to thank my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ for giving glory to God which he rightly deserves. And so thinking about that then we shouldn't be afraid, shouldn't be afraid like I'm never going to encourage or praise that person because they might become prideful. No, the scriptures tell us that we are to encourage one another, to lift up one another. And it's okay for us to tell brothers and sisters, you're doing a good job. So we shouldn't be afraid of that, but we should certainly think about in every interaction, what is God's disposition here? How frail am I without God in my life? And so then we see here, it says that he was or he came to be eaten by worms and breathed his last. So this is a rapid occurrence because it was the Lord who struck him down in death. He's age 54 here. By many historical accounts, this appears to have been some sort of violent disease of his internal organs with these intestinal worms viciously feeding upon them. Very unpleasant way to die. And this took about five days, according to Josephus. But it is very similar, if you remember all the way back when we talked about Herod the Great's death. Very similar. King over all things, and that's not him, this is Jesus Christ. He had just as much power in Caesarea. Remember we talked about, well, maybe if I leave Jerusalem, I will escape the power of God. Well, he did not escape the power of God. God is everywhere. And so just as much power as he displayed in that rescue of Peter, he displays here in the judgment of Herod. And again, comparing Back to last week's discussion, remember Pharaoh exalts himself, the Lord strikes him down. Hey, today you're going to go swimming and you're going to drown. And here too, he strikes down Herod, just as he also struck down Lucifer from the heavens. There's a pattern here. Those who oppose themselves against God will be struck down. And so the church is not the one to retaliate with violence. That's the Lord's job. Vengeance is the Lord's. He will repay in his time. And even in Mary's Magnificat, she says in Luke 152, he has brought down the mighty from their thrones. So we see this truth here in the death of Herod, in the judgment death of Herod, that the Lord, Jesus' kingdom, it lasts forever. But the kingdoms of this earth will be consumed by dust." The final word on that comes from Proverbs 16, 18. Pride goes before destruction. Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall. And we often think about just this, hey, if you get a little bit too big for your britches, you're going to fall down. But that first part is serious. What does the word destruction mean? It doesn't mean just falling down and getting back up. No, pride goes before destruction. This is the same place where we read in Matthew about where people are cast out into who are not part of the kingdom. This is a very serious thing. Pride is not in the heart of God's people. It just isn't. But we see a great contrast here now in verse 24. We see this. This is a summary statement by Luke that looks backwards a little bit, but is also looking forward where he says, So despite all this awful persecution going on under King Herod, The result is this great spiritual fruit coming forth, this increasing and this multiplying, just like we saw back in Acts chapter 6 verse 7. And so when we look backwards, where are we looking? We're looking at Jerusalem. And as we look forward now through the eyes of Luke, we're looking outside of Jerusalem and specifically to Antioch. But we find that the Word of God just marches forward. It's a little bit of a reminiscent back to Exodus again. In the face of persecution, Moses records that the people multiplied and grew very strong, even when Pharaoh was trying to kill their babies. And so where Herod's words then, these great words of oration, where do they land? They just land on the ground. We don't have them recorded. They meant nothing. And so where his words are just falling onto the ground inconsequential, we find the word of God succeeding. Succeeding. And you'd have to think that this sudden death here of Herod probably caught the people quite off guard and they had a lot to think about. So this has a serious effect on their minds. And so we see this grand reversal just in one chapter. You know, the beginning of chapter 12 is very bad. Executions, Peter imprisoned, and now a great reversal of the church's condition. And so we find now we're back to these two men, Barnabas and Saul. Remember at the end of the last chapter, they came to Jerusalem. What did they have? They had that money. Here's this love gift from your brothers and sisters in Christ. And so it says, after they completed their service, that was their service to bring that. Now they go back to Antioch. But there's three of them now, and that man that Luke had just introduced several verses ago, John Mark, he joins them as a traveling companion. Chapter 13. Now there were in the church at Antioch prophets and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon, who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaan, a lifelong friend of Herod the Tetrarch, and Saul. So now the spotlight of Luke, it shines brightly on this thriving city again of Antioch. And Luke says, I want to tell you about five men who served in ministry there. And so he gives these five names of these men who were there. They were involved in ministry. They were foretelling, forth telling, teaching, preaching the good news, and teaching the people there the Christian fundamentals of the faith. And so we see then these five men listed here and he's got at the front, he's got Barnabas and Barnabas seems to be in this position of prominence. And at the end we've got Saul. So these two men that you already know about, they bookend this list. But within this list you have a Hellenized Jew, you have two men who are likely from Africa, you have a social elite here, and you have a Pharisaical Jew, that being Saul. Two Jews, three Gentiles, and so there's this great diversity. Just in these five men, Luke reveals a great diversity. It's symbolic of the ethnic and cultural diversity of the city. But as diverse as they are, what else are they? They are united by the Spirit of Christ. They're not divided, they're united by the Spirit of Christ to accomplish the purposes of God. So these three other men we know very little about. Simeon, who is called Niger, which is a Latin expression, who is called black, essentially. And some have speculated, oh, is this Simon of Cyrene? But I don't think so. It's very improbable. But this is all we know about this Simeon. Lucius of Cyrene. He's from northern Africa, probably a Hellenistic Jew who fled Jerusalem. We don't know much about him. But very interestingly, then, we've got this young, or he's not a young man now, but he was a childhood companion. He was brought up with Herod Antipas, and Herod Antipas was the one who had beheaded John the Baptist. What an amazing contrast. These two boys, they grew up together, and we've got a very, very evil leader, Herod Antipas, who's opposing the word of God. And then you see this other man, Manaan, and God transforms his life. And it seems that through his relationship with him, that this is how Luke has a lot more of inside information about what went on in the Herodian courts. But God saved this man, Manaan, and here he is in the town, in the city of Antioch, a transformed Christian proclaiming the word of God. And this is a wonderful thing. And so in verse two, while they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them. Then after fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them and sent them off. And so we've got here this expression of worshiping the Lord and fasting. Now, we have no way of knowing for sure here, but I have the sense that this is a reference to the entire church, not just these five men. because there's this expression of set apart. I don't think God's saying to just the five men, two of you go over here. I think this is a message for the whole church, for these two men to be separated out. But these people here, as we see, as they're worshiping the Lord, what are they doing? So they're in the public worship at the church, and they're also fasting. So they're depriving themselves or at least severely limiting their food because they are seeking the guidance of the Lord. And these activities here are very similar to the priestly activities that we see in the Old Testament. But there's not just a limited number now. So now it's not just one priest up there and the people are coming through that priest. No, this is the whole group of people. Remember what Peter says in 1 Peter 2.9, he says, but you are a chosen race. He says a royal priesthood, the priesthood of believers. And this is, again, not clear by Luke, but I think safe to assume that this is spoken through one of the prophets in their midst. Set apart, and this is a statement of urgency, set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them. Who called them? Does the church call them? No. The Holy Spirit. And it's a reminder to us that the Holy Spirit is God. He's sent by the exalted Christ, but he is God. So the words of the Holy Spirit carry the same weight as the words of Christ. And he says, set these men apart because I have called them. I have ordained something for them to do. Special work. And so this isn't some careful strategy session by the church. Who are the two men that we could send out? Let's do a strengths and weakness analysis here of our men. No, this is the guidance of God for something and He leads them, the Holy Spirit leads the church to send these two men out on an important mission. And so after they are told that, what do they do? They fast and they pray some more. It's good for us to remember that when we fast, I remember what Jesus said in Matthew chapter 6. He said, when you fast. But when we fast, we can look at fasting in a sense as a negative action because you're negatively doing something. But it's not just negative because it's for the sake of doing something else that is positive. So they negatively, they deprive themselves of food so that positively they can pray. After they do this, we don't know how long, now the church comes and they lay their hands upon these two men, Barnabas and Saul, a commissioning service that is accompanied by prayer. And so they send them off. These are the first, we could say, commissioned missionaries. that are being sent off and notice where they're going out from this Gentile church here in Antioch. But this does set a precedent for the church and that is that those who are called by the Holy Spirit into gospel ministry, that's what missionaries do. They don't do other things, they do gospel ministry. And when they're called by the Holy Spirit to do that, they are to be commissioned by whom? By the church. So they're commissioned by the church. Who did Christ give his authority to? To the church. And so this activity ought to flow through the church, through the local church. And so it's important then, within the local church, that the local church has stability and strong leadership, because they are the ones who are supporting missionary work. And so while Barnabas and Saul get sent off, we have three other very capable men to lead the church at Antioch, so the church of Antioch is not left floundering. No, they remain in good hands. Verse 4, so being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia. or for your benefit, Ben, Seleucia. And from there they sailed to Cyprus. When they arrived at Salamis, they proclaimed the word of God in the synagogues of the Jews, and they had John to assist them." So we find again here at the very beginning of 4 a very important phrase. Who dispatches them? Well, it's the church who dispatches them, but they're sent by the Holy Spirit. It's very important. So they're sent by the calling, by the guidance and the power of the Holy Spirit. Why is that important? Because the mission is going to be opposed. It's going to, they're going to find great opposition. So as these two men, or I should say as these three men, because John's going with them, as they go into their mission, what do they need? They need the whole armor of God. Remember at the beginning I mentioned that the spiritual power that's needed. Paul says in Ephesians 6, 12, For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness. And he's talking about a darkening of the eyes, spiritual blindness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. There's great cosmic spiritual battle that occurs when the gospel is proclaimed. So first we see them going down from Antioch. They're going to Seleucia. Here, this is a port city in Syrian Antioch that was at the mouth of what is called the Orontes River. So this is about 16 miles west of Antioch. It was at a lower elevation, so that's why they're going down. From there they go to Cyprus, who was born in Cyprus. Well, lots of people were, but specifically Barnabas. That was his birthplace. So Barnabas, or Cyprus here, this is an island that's in the bay. This is off of the south coast of Asia Minor and the Syrian coast. This is about 75 miles from Seleucia. And notice that they sail, so now they're not going on land, they're sailing to it. And then, verse 5, when they arrived at Salamis, what is Salamis? They're still at Cyprus. Salamis is a city in Cyprus on the eastern coast. It used to be the capital, but it was later replaced by Paphos, which we're going to see in just a little bit. And finally, when they get to Salamis, they now engage in gospel proclamation all throughout the synagogues. And you might ask, why the synagogues? I think probably Romans 1.16 probably comes to mind there. What did Paul say in Romans 1.16? That he would take the gospel first to the Jews and then the Gentiles. Very importantly, especially in what we'll see next week, we see John Mark. He's assisting them. So everything that they're doing in their gospel proclamation, they have this great assistant to help them with every aspect of their ministry. Whatever is needed, John is there to help. And so when they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos, they came upon a certain magician, a Jewish false prophet named Bar-Jesus. He was with the pro-consul Sergius Paulus, a man of intelligence who summoned Barnabas and Saul and sought to hear the word of God. So they're going to go across the whole island. They're going westward. They're going all the way across the island until they get to Paphos. But as they're going across, everything that they do is gospel ministry. This is what the church sent them out to do. This is what the Holy Spirit called them to do. Preach the gospel. So this is what they do. Paphos is about 90 miles southwest of Salamis. But here comes the spiritual opposition. They came upon a certain magician, or we could say they encountered a man of satanic power. No, this isn't our first magician. Remember we saw Simon, the magician in where? What city was that? Not too many chapters ago. Wasn't Jerusalem? Samaria? It was in Samaria. And so this man is engaged in just as wicked a behavior as Simon Magus was. He was not doing card tricks on the street. We talked about the things that he was doing are the same things that it says in Deuteronomy 18 are an abomination to the Lord. Hated just as much as he hates pride. And so who is this man, it says, a Jewish false prophet named Bar-Jesus, a deceiver of the people? Remember what Jesus said near the end of the Sermon on the Mount? He said, beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. But what a name. This is his Aramaic name, which I suppose has a great sense of irony because it means son of Joshua, or in the Greek we could say son of Jesus. So his name here is meaning son of Jesus. He's with this very intelligent man, this was a virtue in their culture, named Sergius Paulus, probably serving as some sort of spiritual advisor to him. But Sergius Paulus is an important, he governs the whole island of Cyprus. This is why he's here in Paphos, which is the capital. And so what did Sergius Paulus done? He actually called for Barnabas and Saul. Please come. I desire to hear the message that you are teaching and preaching. So he's got this spiritual advisor. You could say he's got this so-called wise man. But now he calls for two true wise men, Barnabas and Saul. And so he wants to hear firsthand. He doesn't want to hear it through anybody else. He wants to hear from their own mouths, what is this message that you proclaim? But Elymas the magician, for that is the meaning of his name, opposed them, seeking to turn the proconsul away from the faith. And so we see this phrase here, Elymas the magician. And Luke says that's the meaning of his name. There's this sense of his name means that he's the wise one or you could say the son of counsel. But what does this wise one do? He opposes the word of the Lord. He set himself against these two gospel proclaimers and I think there's a sense of two things here. I think he's physically opposing them, trying to physically stand in their way, but he's also trying to repudiate the words coming out of their mouth, repudiating the gospel. This is not the first time we've seen opposition in the Bible for sure. But as I keep going back to Exodus, remember, who are the two men who opposed Moses? Who are those advisors to Pharaoh? Yeah, Janus and Jambres. And think of another great prophet but all those unnamed false prophets at Mount Carmel opposing Elijah. Same type of thing. They are trying to keep the people from embracing the truth of God. And so this is a quite an evil attempt here. I don't want this man to hear the gospel. And of course there's a lot of probably even political reasons in his mind for doing that. But is this not the embodiment of what Jesus himself preached about? Luke 8, now the parable is this. The seed is the word of God. The ones along the path are those who have heard. Then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, through men like this, so that they may not believe and be saved. And Saul recognizes this. Saul, who was also called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, looked intently at him and said, You son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, full of all deceit and villainy, will you not stop making crooked the straight paths of the Lord? I feel like he shouted this. I don't know why, but a holy boldness just comes over him. But isn't it interesting how all of a sudden in the midst of such, not chaos, but drama, Luke says, oh, no, by the way, now here's his other name that I'm going to hereafter refer to him as Paul. And so this is his Roman or Greek name. There's a lot of debate among commentators. Is this a name that he always had or is this a name that is given to him later? I don't think it really matters. What matters now is that he's going to be referred to as Paul. There's this indicative transition that now the Jewish centered Jerusalem part of this whole first 12 chapters of Jerusalem that's over now because now we're transitioning to the Gentile centered ends of the earth and that's going to come primarily through this man Paul and so it's a fitting then to use his Roman or his Greek name. But Paul here is filled with the Holy Spirit, he's empowered by the Spirit, you can see a similar expression in Micah 3.8. He looks at, or we could say he stares at, Elymas with this penetrating gaze of holy abhorrence at these evil actions of Elymas. I wonder how long he stared at him. Who knows, maybe Elymas stared back. It was a stare-off. And so Paul says, you, or you could even put in there, oh, oh, son of the devil, you enemy of all of righteousness, full of deceit, or you could say full of treachery and villainy or wickedness. So Elemas is the false prophet. Paul is the true prophet. And so he throws his threefold accusation at Elemas. He exposes his true nature. Maybe other people were tricked by you, but you are an enemy of God. You are a false prophet. You are one who is working for the devil, perverting the right ways of the Lord. You are not a son of Jesus. You are a son of Satan. It'd be better for you to be called bar Satan. You are a man who is forming cunning schemes. commit sin to do mischief. He says, you're wise to do evil. You are just like your father, the old serpent, more subtle than any beast of the field. Remember what Jesus said in John 8 to the Pharisees, you are of your father, the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires. So what do we see here? This is a cosmic clash of spiritual warfare. Significant spiritual warfare, but it's coming through the human agents of Paul and Elemas. We could say, though, that in this battle, if we want to call it a battle, this is the Lord of heaven and he is arrayed against the lowercase lord of the earth. And Paul says, and this is a sense of rhetoric here, Will you not stop making crooked the straight paths of the Lord? Aren't you going to stop perverting that which is beautiful, that which is good, that which is straight? Remember the street that he had the scales fall from his eyes? Straight Street. Remember that? And so this is a very accusatory question here. Isaiah 43 talks about making straight the highway for our God, and that's what Paul's going to do. Everything that Elemas is trying to pervert and make crooked, Paul is called to make straight. Isaiah 520, woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter. Paul goes on. in his shouting, and now behold, the hand of the Lord is upon you and you will be blind and unable to see the sun for a time. Immediately mist and darkness fell upon him and he went about seeking people to lead him by the hand. And so he says, the hand of the Lord is upon you and that's not in power, that's in wrath, that's in judgment. Ezekiel 13 9, my hand will be against the false prophets who seek false visions and who give lying divinations. And so here. Paul the Apostle pronounces a divine curse upon him. This will prevent Elemas from making further crooked paths of the straight ways of the Lord. This is not a curse that he can escape through some type of dark magic. He cannot be protected from it by this powerful man, Sergius. But there is this sense of this for a time, there's this indication of Perhaps you will repent. Remember we talked about that with Simon Magus. Did he repent? Would he repent? We don't know. But there's this same sense of maybe he will repent. But right now he is judged. In 2 Peter 2.17, it's talking about the unrighteous, and this would certainly fit Elemis. It says, "...these are waterless springs, and misdriven by a storm. For them the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved." And so we see this divine darkening of his eyes. in blindness. This is physical blindness. He's already spiritually blind. So there's physical blindness that's brought upon him. And as Paul says that, and as it happens, it shows the truthfulness of Paul's words. It shows the power of God. And it shows this sense, which we'll see all throughout the New Testament, this handing over to Satan. Remember Paul talks about Hymenaeus and Alexander in 1 Timothy 1.20. But again, going back to Exodus, same type of affliction. The magicians could not stand before Moses just as Elemas could no longer stand before Paul because of the boils, for the boils came upon the magicians and upon all the Egyptians. So what's the result? It says he went, or we could say he felt his way, seeking people to lead him by the hand. Paul himself had experienced that, but it was for a much different purpose. There's a very significant truth that we should draw out of this, is that just as Jesus said false prophets will come, is that these wolves will seek to pervert, they will seek to hinder, they will seek to oppose the gospel. And so what's the shepherd's job? The shepherd's job, the true prophet must and he will expose them as wolves." How? Through the words of the shepherd, the good shepherd, his words. So this response then by Paul to Elemas is just as forceful as that response by Peter to Simon Magus. Final verse. Then the proconsul believed when he saw what had occurred for he was astonished. Amazed at the teaching of the Lord. The end result is that at the end of this great spiritual battle is that is that Sergius believes he sees the power of God triumphing over the power of Satan. He sees this is not just some sort of magic act here, but this is the manifest hand of God's power. And so the stumbling block is removed. And so it says here that the reason that he believes, though, is not just because he sees something happen, but because he was astonished. Or we could say that he was struck out of his senses at the teaching of the Lord. So it's the teaching of the Lord is what brings conviction to his heart and that causes him to believe. So where this evil magician was made blind, the proconsul is made to see. Hosea 14.9 says, Whoever is wise, let him understand these things. Whoever is discerning, let him know them. For the ways of the Lord are right. and the upright walk in them, but transgressors stumble in them, just as Elemas was now stumbling along the way. And it is from here on out that Paul, the unlikeliest apostle of all, is going to remain center stage throughout the whole rest of the book of Acts. He's no longer, it's no longer Barnabas and Saul, it's now Paul and Barnabas, and then Paul and Silas, and Paul and Luke. So there's this reversal of roles. So in summary, whether it be then a raging persecution from a mighty earthly king, as we saw with Herod Agrippa, or powerfully deceptive opposition to the ministry of the word, we must be reminded time and time again that the gospel of Jesus Christ will indeed triumph. It will. The kingdom of God cannot and it will not be defeated. Remember, Luke's writing this book, this letter to Theophilus. And here's this grand example for him to hold up to Theophilus, this man Sergius Paulus. He's the first totally pagan Gentile convert here in the writings. He's a representative of the upper echelons of Roman society. And so he stands then as this model inquirer. So remember, he calls for Barnabas and Saul. Remember, Luke says about Theophilus that he desired to look into these things. He had an inquiring mind as well. Well, here's someone else who inquired. Theophilus and believed on the Lord Jesus Christ. And how was he won over? He was won over through the power of spirit filled strength for spiritual warfare. We shouldn't forget that. We shouldn't forget that when we engage in gospel ministry, that there will be spiritual warfare. And so as we declare the gospel then to others, whether that be co-workers, friends, neighbors, all sorts of people that we come across, we can do one of two things. We can try to do it in our own strength or we can put on the armor of the Lord. So will you try to do it in your own strength or will you put on the armor of the Lord? Will you be filled with pride? Will you oppose God? in that way, by seeking to take glory that is meant for him alone? Or will you give all glory to God in everything in life? As we go our way tonight, O Father, we pray that every time that we are tempted to steal glory that is rightly yours, that we will crush such notions within our hearts, that we will cry out to you seeking to give you the glory alone. Father, we think even tonight of the missionaries that we send forth, that we might labor in prayer for them, that you would equip them for the fierce spiritual battles that they encounter, that you will give them spiritual victory, remove the stumbling blocks and grant to them spiritual fruit. Oh, Lord, we pray and to us. And we ask these things in the name of Jesus. Amen.