We live in a time in our current culture, where people no longer feel drawn to go to church, and more and more, are reluctant to claim they believe in Christ.  Have you ever wondered how we, as Christians, could walk with more understanding and love with those around us that are not Christian?  Or who have moved away from religion altogether?  

 I realized last Sunday when we talked around tables about the stoning of Stephen, the first martyr of the church, that many of us aren’t that familiar with the story of Acts and its important place in scripture.  If we didn’t possess the book of Acts, we would have no information about the formation of the early church other than what we could deduce from the letters of Paul.  Acts is the story of Paul, and three of Jesus’ disciples: James, John and Peter, doing their heroic work to spread the good news of Jesus Christ.  So this morning, I am going to focus on the book of Acts and Paul’s famous sermon to the Greek world at the Acropolis in Athens.  This strange sermon where Paul is speaking to them of the “unknown god.”    But first, a little background about the book of Acts:

Acts is written by Luke, who was not one of the disciples, but an early Gentile convert who was a physician in the Gentile world.  He not only wrote the gospel of Luke, telling the story of Jesus, but authored the book of Acts which is written to a specific person named Theophilus.  We don’t know who Theophilus is, but we can guess from various clues that he is someone high up in the service of the Roman government, perhaps someone who received Luke’s medical care during an illness. Physicians were considered slaves to the Roman government, so perhaps Theophilus was someone who had been gravely ill and out of gratitude for Luke’s healing care gave Luke his freedom.  This was also a very dangerous time to be a Christian, but  perhaps Luke had brought the love of God to Theophilus in such a way that now Luke was using his skill as a writer to try and persuade him, and other government officials not to persecute Christians.  Whatever the reason, the Holy Spirit inspired Luke to share that Christianity was for ALL people of every nation…something the Jews found hard to grasp and accept, and the Greek found very foreign to their intellectual way of thinking.

Acts begins this accounting at the first church at Jerusalem where the preaching of Peter and the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost unleashed a spiritual movement to follow the risen Jesus no matter what.  Followers were called people of the way.  Last week we read the story of the Martyrdom of Stephen, the first person murdered for following Jesus.  His story demonstrates that as the good news was spreading throughout Palestine, Judaea, Galilee and Samaria, there was an intensity to stop this movement, yet, the people of the way were increasing in numbers as the work of the Holy Spirit inspired love and faith that couldn’t be stopped.  And so, while Peter and James continue to preach the gospel to the Jews, Luke tells Theophilus about the dramatic conversion of Saul, who on the road to Damascus, fully encountered his living Lord and not only had a change of heart, but a clear calling to move out into the Gentile nations with all the fiery passion that had once made him a formidable persecutor, but now, is to become an unstoppable influencer and voice for the gospel of Christ.  

The book of Acts takes  the reader on many perilous yet exciting journeys throughout Asia Minor…places like Antioch, Galicia, Corinth, and Ephesus, where Paul’s dynamic preaching ignites the start up of one house church after another.  As he travels, and faces many dangers and persecutions, his presence as the first Pastor of the church evolves.   Paul’s many pastoral letters of encouragement and training paint a vision of what it looks like to be “the body of Christ” into the world where others don’t believe…….or won’t believe.  

Luke, obviously, was an eyewitness to these stories and events and was close to Paul.  So were other men like Silus and Timothy, as well as Peter, James and John.  The story of these first courageous men, and also several amazing women, whose acts were inspired and empowered by the unleashing of the Holy Spirit to lead them; comfort them; open their understanding, generated an unstoppable force of love and faith.  The book of Acts takes us through the story of Paul’s life until he is back in Rome, this time imprisoned, awaiting judgment and destined to be martyred for his faith.  Luke doesn’t finish the story of Paul, but stops there, with Paul in prison.  Why stop? Scholars think it’s because Luke had achieved his purpose.  He had shown how Christianity began in Jerusalem and swept across the known world of that time in history until it reached Rome.  Good news was brought from Jerusalem to the very seat of worldly power at that time…the Roman Empire.  

So…given all this historical background, what might we make of the text we are given today in which Paul delivers an astounding speech that breaks through all hardness of heart and starts this revolution?   

About 25 years back, Dale and I had the opportunity to co-lead a tour that  followed the footsteps of the Apostle Paul.  From Rome and Corinth, we took a cruise that led us through the Aegean Sea off the coasts of Greece and Turkey where we stopped at the many of the islands that Paul must have visited.  Places like Patmos, where the apostle John cared for Mary, the mother of Jesus, and wrote the book of Revelation.  And amazingly beautiful islands like Santorini.  But Ephesus was especially enlightening.  I was blown away by the sophistication and advancement of culture in the Hellenized Greek world that Paul encountered.  In the ruins of that city, we could see evidence of two story libraries where Greeks went to grow in their knowledge.  We saw complex bath and sewer systems that managed the movement of water through the city.  We saw signs carved into the stone pavements of streets that still exist today.  Signs that would point out which way to take to find the bordellos as well as the Christian fish sign that led early Christians to find where the people of the way would secretly gather to pray and support one another.   Perhaps most intriguing was evidence everywhere along the ruins and roadways of pagan statues to the various Greek gods that were worshipped at that time. We then went into a large amphitheater where we were told Greek scholars and philosophers would debate as they sought to understand the world.  It was similar to the Areopagus in Athens, where Paul had spoken.  This large, circular space was so acoustically attuned that if you sat in the top row of seats, you could discern a person’s speaking voice way down in the center of the space.   It was amazing.

 So, imagine what it must have been like for Paul to walk these streets, witnessing all these idols and the worldly lust for power and enlightenment that was so embedded within the Roman Empire.  Highly intelligent, educated, accomplished, and worldly scholars, heard about Paul’s preaching and out of curiosity,  invited him to come and defend his claims about Jesus Christ.  I’d be a bit intimidated, wouldn’t you?

But Paul was on fire with the Holy Spirit, and his personal encounter with Christ.  He was also a well educated scholar himself, and he knew that if he was to move from head to heart with these men of influence, he must honor their spiritual curiosity.  And so Paul begins:  “Men of Athens, I see how extremely religious and spiritual you are in every way.  For as I walk through your great city I looked carefully at your objects of worship and I found among them an altar with an inscription to an unknown god”

How interesting.  Paul is wise enough to meet the Greeks right where they are at…honoring their desire to worship SOMETHING THAT IS BEYOND THEIR UNDERSTANDING.  Honoring their SPIRITUAL CURIOUSITY…THEIR SEEKING DESIRE TO KNOW GOD…THE REAL GOD.  And so his sermon unfolds laying out arguments that caused them to pause…to think…to wonder.  God is not an idol made with human hands, Pau reasons, but the maker and giver of all life.  God has guided all of history, and all nations, not just tribes, and in each person, God has placed a deep desire and curiosity to search for God and true meaning in the darkness of life.  THEN… and only then, when his audience feels they have been acknowledged and heard as SEEKERS OF TRUTH, does Paul begin to introduce them to Christ.  In Jesus Christ, the knowledge of God has come…HE ALONE is THE UNKNOWN GOD they too worship.  And, his resurrection…of which no other god can claim, is PROOF THAT HE IS THE REAL THING.

Paul was quite the orator wasn’t he?  He spoke to his audience at that time just as we are asked to speak with our audience of our time.  The trouble is…the times keep changing, even though the human condition stays the same.  There are so many WORDS, and means of incessant communication in our world today that SPEECHES just get in the way.  People are tired of the doctrines, the dogma, and rituals, even the WORDs from a pulpit.  

So how are we to be the living church for today?  In this time and this culture, among nations where gods are still everywhere, they are just a bit more subtle.  Gods like war…gods like having the most money…the most entitlement… even ENOUGH money to survive.  Gods like being FIRST…putting ourselves FIRST, and keeping out those who may take that away from us.  Same gods as there have always been…yet with renewed power that is thrown in the face of a faith that calls for peace…and love…and giving over taking.

I don’t know how to answer these tough questions…How DO we make Christ known amid walls of WORDS?  Only one thing pops into my mind.  It’s a statement on a plaque that has always stayed with me.  It simply says this:  PREACH CHRIST ALWAYS, BUT ONLY IF YOU HAVE TO…USE WORDS.   What does that mean?  I think it meansLOVE…just LOVE and TRUST.  The Holy Spirit is STILL among us…working in THIS time and place too.  Our search for authenticity is the “unknown god” of our time and place.   Trust that Jesus IS in this with us…Amen.