Acts 13:4-12 “True or False”
This morning I thought it might be nice to start with a little “true/false” quiz for everybody since the sermon topic has to do with true and false. I will have to admit that I have “borrowed” these questions from one of my daughter Kimberly’s magazines—that would be Ranger Rick illustrated. I will also admit that I felt a little foolish myself having to look at the back page of the children’s magazine to know myself if these things about various animals were true or false, so don’t be embarrassed if you don’t know!
True or False:
1)
All polar bears are left-handed? (True) My wife is
left-handed, but she is not a bear.
2)
Dragonflies can fly fifty-five miles per hour. (False)
They can only go thirty miles per hour. I think I followed one back from Lihue
the other day.
3)
Pigs don’t sweat. (True) Come to think of it, I have never seen a pig buying
antiperspirant.
4)
Pandas can eat
eighty-three pounds of bamboo a day. (True) That must be why we do not see
pandas doing Jenny Craig commercials on TV.
5)
A porcupine has
roughly 20,000 quills. (False) The average porcupine has 30,000 quills. And get
this: They are born with their quills. Ouch!
6)
2008 is the official “Year of the Frog.” (True)
Somebody forgot to tell those flattened bufa frogs on the road coming up to the
church.
7)
The people who have gotten every answer right so far
probably read this sermon ahead of time. (True) Or, they read Ranger Rick.
Now getting back to the Scripture for today, we see in Acts 13 that things are going very well for the new Christians in Antioch. Many believers have come to know Christ. Paul and Barnabas have been there about one year when they hear the call from the Holy Spirit to move on to a new mission field on the Island of Cypress. So they leave the church in Antioch in the hands of Simeon, Lucius, and Manaen, who first lay hands on Paul and Barnabas in an act of commissioning. They pray over them and set them in a ship. We see that John also went with them.
They arrive at the town of Salamis. Please know that even though the spelling is the same, this is not where salamis come from! The town was the former capital of the island but lost that distinction when the Romans moved the capital to Paphos. In this way, it has something in common with us Waimea folks who also once enjoyed being the political center of the island until Kauai lost its independence. We won’t talk about that!
Just as another pastoral, tangential, aside, Salamis is the town where Saint Barnabas will be martyred at the end of his ministry. Of course, he does not know this when he arrives for the first time with Paul on his mission to the people of Cypress.
They travel around the island and finally come to the capital of Paphos. The Proconsul Sergius Paulus ruled the island on behalf of Rome from his administrative seat in Paphos. Just so we are sure what a “proconsul” is, this position is assigned by the Senate in Rome to one of its senior senators. So, a proconsul is a senator, governor, and ambassador all rolled into one position of authority. Sergius Paulus was a very powerful man. The Bible also tells us that he had heard that Paul and Barnabas were on the Island of Cypress, and so he summoned them to himself in order to hear the Word of God being preached by them.
There was just one problem: among the proconsul’s staff was a fellow who called himself “Bar-Jesus.” The bible says that he was a magician whose real name was Elymas. The name “Bar-Jesus” means of course “Son of Jesus.” We all but have to assume that this is a name that he made up for himself since he is obviously a Greek and has an original Greek name that is “Elymas.” Why would a Greek man, serving a Roman proconsul, take on a Jewish name such as “Bar-Jesus”? I believe that he was trying to associate himself with Jesus because the story of the power of that name had already spread around Cypress.
Now we come back to another one of those “True/False” questions: Is Bar-Jesus a follower of Jesus? Is he a true prophet of the Lord? After all, Paul himself later writes in his letter to the Romans 8:16-17, “It is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God and joint heirs with Christ—if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.” Therefore, can it be wrong to call yourself “Son of Jesus”? I will let you decide on your own.
The real issue is not the name, it is that while Paul, Barnabas and John are telling of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, this Bar-Jesus fellow is telling the proconsul that it is all not true. And, the proconsul Sergius Paulus is trying to figure out for himself what is true or false in this matter. He has to decide who is the true apostle and who is not. He has already placed a lot of his trust in Bar-Jesus and perhaps he is leaning in thought towards Bar-Jesus when Paul starts railing against Bar-Jesus with very strong words.
Paul exclaims for all to hear that Bar-Jesus should not be called the “son of Jesus” but rather the “son of the Devil.” We read that in verse 10. And, Paul goes onto exclaim that “The hand of the Lord is against” Bar-Jesus. These are amazingly powerful words. I want to share with you that I believe that when Paul is saying these things that it is not really Paul but rather the Holy Spirit interceding and using Paul as an instrument to get the point across.
Let’s turn for a moment to what Peter says about this intercession of the Holy Spirit when we speak: 2 Peter 1:20-21, “First of all you must understand this, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by human will, but men and women moved by the Holy Spirit spoke by God.” So we must understand that the Holy Spirit is speaking through Paul and making this horrific statement that the hand of God is against Bar-Jesus. Know that you and I have no right to make such judgments as to whom God may be against, but the Holy Spirit may speak through us and make it plain before all! This is in fact the very essence of the Pentecost experience, isn’t it?! God blessed the people with the gift of the Holy Spirit and all people’s speech was made plain to all who were there!
Now, Paul just does not stop by telling Bar-Jesus that the “hand of the Lord is against [him].” He also, through the power of the Holy Spirit, makes a proclamation that seems amazingly familiar to us and must have been even more so to Paul himself. He tells Bar-Jesus that he will be made blind. Immediately the mist and darkness fell over him, and he went about groping for help from others. Wow! Doesn’t that sound exactly like Paul’s conversion experience on the Road to Damascus? Paul is walking on the road and is blinded by the glory of the risen Christ before him. He then goes to Damascus to have his normal sight healed by a believer named Ananias.
Will Bar-Jesus also be healed? We do not have that story in the Bible, but look carefully at the text in Acts 13:11 where it says that Bar-Jesus will be blind “for a while.” That means that he was to gain his sight back. Alleluia! He was made blind in order to show the absolute power of God. He is given his sight back to show the incredible mercy of God, too.
I will just put it out to you all that Bar-Jesus is very fortunate indeed. When we look at the stories of false prophets in the Bible, we usually see God totally eradicating them! Remember Jezebel and Elisha? Jezebel did not fare so well with those dogs licking her corpse! Hananiah and Jeremiah? Reading from Jeremiah 28:15-16, “The prophet Jeremiah said to Hananiah, ‘The Lord has not sent you and you made this people believe in a lie. . . .Within this year you will be dead because you have spoken against the Lord.’” That very year Hananiah died. You see, by only making Bar-Jesus blind, the Lord was actually showing a fare amount of mercy.
All this time, we have been focusing on this man Bar-Jesus. Perhaps we have missed a major point of the story in Acts 13! The last line of our Scripture says that Sergius Paulus saw all that had happened and believed! It does not say that Bar-Jesus believed but that the proconsul did!
We should follow the course thus far as to how the Holy Spirit is moving up the Roman hierarchy: Philip converted a Eunuch on the road to Gaza who brought the faith back to Candace, the Queen of Ethiopia. Peter converted Cornelius, the centurion of the Italian cohort who is presumed to bring the faith back Rome. Now Paul and Barnabas convert the proconsul to Cypress. One gets the idea that the movement of the Holy Spirit is becoming much bigger than the church! There are some major Roman players involved now. This is the beginning of not just the church but of Christendom itself. These are the beginnings of the Christian world, the Christian culture, we know today.
From that point on, Barnabas, Paul and John are given the freedom to travel anywhere in Cypress. The proconsul is on their side. The light of God’s love spreads unabated over the people.
Jesus
is what is true. He is the Truth. Carry that Truth with you on every
journey. Build the Kingdom for God. Do
miracles of faith so that the world may witness the strength and mercy of the
Lord. Amen.