Finding Spiritual Sanity in an insane world
Acts 18: 18 So Paul still remained [e]a good while. Then he took leave of the brethren and sailed for Syria, and Priscilla and Aquila were with him. He had his hair cut off at Cenchrea, for he had taken a vow. 19 And he came to Ephesus, and left them there; but he himself entered the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews. 20 When they asked him to stay a longer time with them, he did not consent, 21 but took leave of them, saying, “I[f] must by all means keep this coming feast in Jerusalem; but I will return again to you, God willing.” And he sailed from Ephesus.
22 And when he had landed at Caesarea, and [g]gone up and greeted the church, he went down to Antioch. 23 After he had spent some time there, he departed and went over the region of Galatia and Phrygia [h]in order, strengthening all the disciples.
Finding Spiritual Sanity in an insane world
The sermon today is about being a Disciple of Jesus Christ. All disciple means is “follower.”
This morning we are returning to the book of Acts.
I want to begin looking at our passage for today; finding some principles for discipleship. But I noticed this week that these same principles relate to retaining our sanity. They sound like the kind of advice that you might hear from a secular counselor.
In fact, after I put this sermon together, I was looking at an article online with a very similar title, “How to stay sane in an increasingly insane world.” Paired with mine
These are the points I got from our Scripture passage;
Disciples should celebrate the small things, surround yourself with fellow travelers, distinguish between Scripture and tradition, keep working, remember that God is in control; not you, focus on present disciples
These are the tips from the article; celebrate the small things, have realistic expectations-- Fix your mental framework—distinguish between Scripture and tradition, take care of the fundamentals—focus on the present work, let go of the things you can’t control—remember that God is in control, not you, be productive—keep working, hang around people who inspire you—surround yourself with fellow travelers
I. Celebrate the small things
If you want to go insane in this world, just watch the news every day. Listen to political talk radio all day long. Stay abreast of all the news, all the time. It will drive you to insanity, or clinical depression either one. Because it’s all bad news. The old newspaper saying was that “if it bleeds, it leads.” What that means is that bad news is always going to be on the front page, bold headlines, above the crease.
We are admonished to “think on good things.”
18 So Paul still remained [e]a good while.
This principle, “Celebrate the small things,” doesn’t come from this passage. It is illustrated by this passage. If you want to find Bible passages that teach you to celebrate the small things, think of
Zechariah 4:10 For who has despised the day of small things?
Proverbs 4:18 The path of the righteous is like the morning sun, shining ever brighter till the full light of day.
Matthew 13: 31 He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. 32 Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.”
1 Corinthians 1:28 God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, 29 so that no one may boast before him.
So how is this principle illustrated by these 7 words?
18 So Paul still remained [e]a good while. (Then he left the brothers and sisters and sailed for Syria, )
Well, to understand that we need to remember the story of Paul’s missionary journeys before this.
Paul, in verse one of chapter 18, Paul proceeded on his missionary enterprise, and went to the city of Corinth. He went to the synagogue on Saturday, and took any opportunity they were given to present Jesus as the Promised, crucified, and risen Messiah.
They encountered opposition. Everywhere Paul went he met opposition. He’d was hassled all over the place from Philippi through Thessalonica, down to Berea, and finally to Athens and now to Corinth. Remember that everywhere he went, he met immediate opposition, and got driven out of town. So, now he comes to Corinth. There are those who believe, but he has some vehement Jewish opposition. They are so opposed to his being there, that they bring him up on charges in criminal court. He is charged with “persuading the people to worship God in ways contrary to the law.”
They were charging him with introducing new gods, which violated Roman law. But something happens that gives Paul a reason to celebrate. Gallio, the proconsul, or leading Roman administrator for the area, threw the charges out of court.
14 Just as Paul was about to speak, Gallio said to them, “If you Jews were making a complaint about some misdemeanor or serious crime, it would be reasonable for me to listen to you. 15 But since it involves questions about words and names and your own law—settle the matter yourselves. I will not be a judge of such things.” 16 So he drove them off. 17 Then the crowd there turned on Sosthenes the synagogue leader and beat him in front of the proconsul; and Gallio showed no concern whatever.
The long and short of it is, that what happened in the Corinthian court that day placed a “leave him alone” order on Paul and gospel preaching.
So, Paul was able to remain a good while. Paul was left free to preach the gospel, and teach new converts for a year and a half plus many days.
What’s the big deal? He was able to stay a while. Well, I think this statement is here as a little celebration. Why do I think that? Later we learn that Paul takes a vow. It is a Nazarite vow. We’ll get to that. But one of the prominent reasons that people took a Nazarite vow, was in thanks to God for some great blessing, like the birth of a child.
Paul celebrates the small blessing of being able to settle for a while in the area. And as we disciple people, we need to celebrate little victories. For most of Christian history, the kingdom advanced little by little, not by huge crowds or waves of people. And guess what, we imagine that if someone becomes a Christian, that magically all their problems are solved, and they become perfect angels, right?
No, frankly, if a low-down dirty rotten scoundrel becomes a Christian, now you often have a baptized low-down dirty rotten scoundrel. They have to learn from the Lord, and grow. And a lifetime of habits have to change by the guidance of the Spirit. And they live in families and come out of circumstances that don’t change when they come to Christ. So, we celebrate small things.
A second key to preserving Spiritual sanity is to surround yourself with fellow travelers.
II. Surround yourself with fellow travelers
Fellow travelers are those who are on the same Christian spiritual journey that you are. And just like it is always possible to find lots of bad news in our world, it is also always possible to find naysayers, cynics, complainers, defeatists, downers, killjoys, gloomy Guses, wet blankets, party poopers and prophets of doom. And that just in your typical church service.
As you seek to follow the Lord in ever deepening ways, there will always be those who tell you, “it’s a phase, you’ll get over it.” As you seek to be a better person, wife, husband, parent, friend, employee, there will be people around you who are ready to douse your fire. That’s why when you find people who pull you up, not drag you down, you need to latch on to them.
Then he took leave of the brethren and sailed for Syria, and Priscilla and Aquila were with him.
So, after a year and a half, Paul leaves Corinth to sail for Syria. Now, Syria is back home to the region of Israel, back to Jerusalem. He is going by boat from Greece back to Israel, in particular Jerusalem. And make note that he brings with him Priscilla and Aquila when he leaves. Why is this important? As we have learned, Priscilla and Aquila were already Christians when Paul met them. In fact, they are evangelistic believers. They go to the synagogue and actively talk about Christ. They did with Paul, and they will later with a man named Apollos. They host a church in their house later in Corinth.
1 Corinthians 16:19 The churches of Asia greet you. Aquila and Priscilla greet you heartily in the Lord, with the church that is in their house.
And Paul takes them with him when he leaves Corinth at this time. What’s the big deal? He must have valued them greatly as coworkers to take them from this new church. By the way, the fact that he took them would say to me that he had trained up leaders in Corinth in whose hands he could entrust that church.
But notice that Paul is not typically a lone wolf. He has people around him. Paul had many associates.
https://davidbcapes.com/articles/brief-articles/pauls-co-workers/
Some appear to relate to Paul as equals (e.g., Barnabas, Apollos, Aquila); others as subordinates (e.g., Timothy, Titus, Tychichus). Some work closely with Paul (e.g., Timothy, Luke, Silas); others independently (e.g., Apollos, Prisca, Barnabas). Some carry out their work primarily in a local setting (e.g., Philemon, Euodia); others travel with Paul or serve as his delegates when he cannot travel (Luke, Timothy, Titus). Still, all of his co-workers act cooperatively with him in a wide variety of mission activities.
Depending on the interpretation of terms, we find 80 to 90 names of people who are Paul’s co-laborers. He valued those who worked alongside him. He knew that he could accomplish far more with people beside him. So, he took Aquila and Priscilla with him.
And if you are going to be a follower of Jesus Christ, don’t try to go it alone. This is a principle reiterated throughout Scripture.
Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 Two are better than one, Because they have a good reward for their labor. 10 For if they fall, one will lift up his companion. But woe to him who is alone when he falls, For he has no one to help him up.
Genesis 2:18 18 And the LORD God said, “It is not good that man should be alone;
Moses came to God in Numbers 11 and said, I can’t bear these people alone. So God appointed 70 elders to bear the burden of leadership.
Jesus chose 12 disciples, He had three in an inner circle, He didn’t go to the garden of Gethsemane alone, He sent them out two by two. And when Jesus left the 12 disciples, even they had 120 other people called disciples alongside them when God gave the gift of the Spirit.
I think one of the greatest failures of this Christian generation is that we all try to go it alone. We have professing Christians who never even darken the doors of a church gathering, for years. And we have churches where the people barely know each other.
Christ instituted the church for a number of reasons, and one of the big ones is fellowship. The word fellowship means sharing, communion, mutual participation. In other words, Christ saved you and placed you in a place and among a people for your mutual nurturing and Spiritual growth. And if we are going to be successful as Christ’s disciples, it will only be when we surround ourselves with likeminded believers who are on the same journey as we are.
Celebrate, value coworkers…
III. Distinguish between Scripture and Traditions
One of the things that has helped me retain some Spiritual sanity is studying in order to develop a keen understanding of my salvation by grace, not legalism. You see, once some know you are a Christian, they will begin attaching traditional and legalistic expectations on you. Some of my most depressing times as a pastor have come from people who equate, “the way we’ve always done it” with “how it is supposed to be done.”
For example, do you know that the Bible doesn’t tell a preacher how to conduct the invitation at the end of the service? In fact, it doesn’t even say that you have to have an invitation at the end of every service. But I’ve been in churches where they believed you had to have it, 3 verses of Just As I Am, pastor pleading for people to come to the altar, “We’re gonna sing just one more verse.”
But that is a tradition, not a Scriptural mandate. There are also churches that embody Jesus’ characterization of the Pharisees, “They bind heavy burdens on men, grievous to be born.”
Paul knew the difference.
18 So Paul still remained [e]a good while. Then he took leave of the brethren and sailed for Syria, and Priscilla and Aquila were with him. He had his hair cut off at Cenchrea, for he had taken a vow.
Now this is an interesting little side note. Paul leaves Corinth on his way back to Jerusalem, and in Cenchrea he gets a haircut. Corinth was in Greece, and Cenchrea was the port city that he would sail from. By the way, a church ends up being established in Cenchrea. Paul refers to it in Romans 16:1. But, interestingly, we are not told of any activity that Paul did in Cenchrea, except getting his haircut. Why do we need to know that? It seems like such an odd detail. You might ask, “well, did he clip his toenails too?” Well, it tells us why we need to know that he got a haircut. It says, “because he had taken a vow.”
Hold it, what kind of vow are we talking about here?
Well, there was a vow that Jewish people took, originating in the Old Testament, that had to do with hair. It was a Nazarite vow. The Hebrew word Nazir has to do with taking a vow. So, a Nazarite was a consecrated one. It had to do with holiness or devotion. And when a Jewish person took a Nazarite vow, it’s like they were saying, “God, I am going to consecrate myself completely to you.” Everything else is set aside; pushed aside.
So, what did they do in this vow?
Numbers 6: Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: ‘When either a man or woman [a]consecrates an offering to take the vow of a Nazirite, to separate himself to the LORD, 3 he shall separate himself from wine and similar drink; he shall drink neither vinegar made from wine nor vinegar made from similar drink; neither shall he drink any grape juice, nor eat fresh grapes or raisins. 4 All the days of his [b]separation he shall eat nothing that is produced by the grapevine, from seed to skin.
5 ‘All the days of the vow of his separation no razor shall come upon his head; until the days are fulfilled for which he separated himself to the LORD, he shall be holy. Then he shall let the locks of the hair of his head grow. 6 All the days that he separates himself to the LORD he shall not go near a dead body. 7 He shall not [c]make himself unclean even for his father or his mother, for his brother or his sister, when they die, because his separation to God is on his head. 8 All the days of his separation he shall be holy to the LORD.
13 ‘Now this is the law of the Nazirite: When the days of his separation are fulfilled, he shall be brought to the door of the tabernacle of meeting. 14 And he shall present his offering to the LORD: one male lamb in its first year without blemish as a burnt offering, one ewe lamb in its first year without blemish as a sin offering, one ram without blemish as a peace offering, 15 a basket of unleavened bread, cakes of fine flour mixed with oil, unleavened wafers anointed with oil, and their grain offering with their drink offerings.
18 Then the Nazirite shall shave his consecrated head at the door of the tabernacle of meeting, and shall take the hair from his consecrated head and put it on the fire which is under the sacrifice of the peace offering.
19 ‘And the priest shall take the boiled shoulder of the ram, one unleavened cake from the basket, and one unleavened wafer, and put them upon the hands of the Nazirite after he has shaved his consecrated hair, 20 and the priest shall wave them as a wave offering before the LORD; they are holy for the priest, together with the breast of the wave offering and the thigh of the heave offering. After that the Nazirite may drink wine.’
They were totally dedicating themselves to God and separating from pleasure for a time. The wine and grapes symbolized the festive part of life that they were separating from. And not cutting the hair was an outward sign to others that you were consecrated to God. They see your long hair and are reminded not to tempt you by offering you wine or grapes.
So how long did they do this? The Mishna, Jewish rules, regulations, prescribed that a Nazirite vow could be 30 days, 60 days or 100 days. And after that, you cut your hair, took it to the temple and burned it along with a sacrifice.
So, Paul makes this vow, at some point leaves Corinth, arrives in Cenchrea, and by this time his 30 day vow time is over, so he cuts his hair. And now he has to take that hair on a 1500 mile trip to get to the temple.
So, Paul took a Nazarite vow. Why did he do that? Well, as I said before, this vow was usually taken when someone wanted to express gratitude to God for a special blessing or a special deliverance. Had Paul experienced a special blessing or deliverance? Well just before we are told of this vow, we read about how Paul was taken to court, accused, and then exonerated by Gallio. And out of that he was blessed with a prolonged time of ministry in Corinth.
But what is the point for us preacher? Your point was that a disciple needs to be able to distinguish between tradition and Scripture. And let me further say that a disciple has to distinguish between legalism and grace.
But why is Paul doing this? Isn’t this Old Testament law? Yes it is, and it was Jewish tradition. Are we supposed to take Nazarite vows? No. the Nazarite vow was a special time of separating yourself to God’s service. As believers, with the Holy Spirit, that is all the time. Paul wrote this later.
2 Corinthians 6:16-18
16 And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you[a] are the temple of the living God. As God has said: “I will dwell in them And walk among them. I will be their God, And they shall be My people.” 17 Therefore “Come out from among them And be separate, says the Lord. Do not touch what is unclean, And I will receive you.” 18 “I will be a Father to you, And you shall be My sons and daughters, Says the LORD Almighty.”
So, we don’t need vows of separation from external things.
Romans 6:14 For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.
Galatians 5:4 You have become estranged from Christ, you who attempt to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace.
But there is a second reason we don’t apply the Nazarite vow to ourselves.
No. Remember, as I said last week, we have to interpret the book of Acts differently, because it is historic narrative. I said then, just because something happens in the Bible, doesn’t mean that it is supposed to happen in our lives. We go to doctrinal books for that. And those doctrines and instructions are often illustrated in historic books like Acts.
Paul is taking this vow, because he feels a great deal of gratitude and thanks toward God because of the momentary improvement of his circumstance. And so he is expressing his thanks to God in the most extreme way that a Jew could; by taking a Nazarite vow.
But make no mistake, Paul knew the difference between the Old Testament law, and New Testament grace. He knew the difference between holding to traditions and following Scripture.
And if we are going to find Spiritual sanity in an insane world, we need to know what is Scripture and what is tradition.
We can’t get caught up with traditions, not Scripture.
I remember going to Bible studies where somebody taught that you needed to have a daily devotional time, and it needed to be in the morning. I used to feel so guilty, because I couldn’t do it. I’d get up early. I’d read my Bible half-asleep. I don’t wake up for a good hour after I get out of bed.
There have been many legalistic things in the past that have caused a lot of needless hand-wringing.
We are going to continue with this next week.
Sometimes we can give the impression in church that following Christ is stressful, and overwhelming. Every week we come to hear the preacher tell us one more thing that we are not doing that we should be doing.
But Jesus said, “Matthew 11:29-30 Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am [a]gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”
In the Philippines I heard a local pastor use the following parable to illustrate Christ's offer of rest (Matt. ll:28) and the response of people who won't trust Him completely: The driver of a carabao wagon was on his way to market when he overtook an old man carrying a heavy load. Taking compassion on him, the driver invited the old man to ride in the wagon. Gratefully the old man accepted. After a few minutes, the driver turned to see how the man was doing. To his surprise, he found him still straining under the heavy weight, for he had not taken the burden off his shoulders.
Larry Chell.
How to stay
IV. Keep working
19 And he came to Ephesus, and left them there; but he himself entered the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews.
2 Timothy 4:5 But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.
V. Remember that God is in control, not you.
20 When they asked him to stay a longer time with them, he did not consent, 21 but took leave of them, saying, “I[f] must by all means keep this coming feast in Jerusalem; but I will return again to you, God willing.” And he sailed from Ephesus.
James 4:14-16 whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. 15 Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.” 16 But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.
VI. Continue discipling your disciples
22 And when he had landed at Caesarea, and [g]gone up and greeted the church, he went down to Antioch. 23 After he had spent some time there, he departed and went over the region of Galatia and Phrygia [h]in order, strengthening all the disciples.
1 Thessalonians 5:14 Now we exhort you, brethren, warn those who are unruly, comfort the fainthearted, uphold the weak, be patient with all.
It is better to train ten people than to do the work of ten people. But it is harder.
Moody.
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