This is Living Waters of Grace, the teaching ministry of Clark
Waffer, senior pastor of Calvary Chapel of Westmoreland, County
of Greensburg, PA. Now here's Pastor Clark as he
continues teaching through God's Word.
And if we are salt and light, we will have an impact on the lives
of people that don't know Jesus. So you know, to become a
pro-life becomes a work of the spirit in someones heart.
Well, maybe they were pro-choice before, and all of a sudden
their worldview changes. I can't kill babies.
I can't kill creations of God anymore.
And I'm not going to be that way, right?
So all of a sudden the votes change and the commitment of the
people and you know, and the world doesn't seem like it's
going to hell and in handbasket. You might think you're just one
person and there's no way you could make a difference in your
school, but if you organize a time of prayer on campus, I bet
others will come alongside you. If you take a stand against some
agenda at work, you better believe some others likely will
too. Sometimes it just takes a person
who has a little courage to help others remember that they can be
brave in that situation, too. Pastor Clark teaches today about
Paul and others in Ephesus who took a stand.
Now here's Pastor Clark in the book of Acts Chapter 19 with
today's edition of Living Waters of Grace.
Well, as a result of this happening in the community in
the city of Ephesus, there was less people buying these things.
So if you made good living by making these things, maybe
you're selling, you know, 1000 a week or something.
And all of a sudden you look at your numbers and now they're 600
a week and then they're 400 a week and then they're three.
You know, you're, you're starting to get bothered, right?
Because you know that what's happening in the city now is
impacting your livelihood. So this is the purpose of why
Demetrius is beginning to get this crowd together, because he
made these silver shrines of Diana and it brought a lot of
money to the Craftsman who were involved in it.
It says in verse 24 he called them together with the workers
of similar occupations. So he's getting all the people
in the union together to tell them about what's going on and
why the numbers are down and why the revenue is a lot less than
what it once was, because they probably didn't really quite
grasp the impact that Christianity was having in the
city of Ephesus. So he calls them together and he
says, man, you know that we have our prosperity by this trade.
This is how we make our livelihood.
Moreover, you see in here that not only at Ephesus, but
throughout almost all Asia, this Paul has persuaded and turned
away many people saying that they are not gods which are made
with hands. Now, Paul never once picketed in
front of the temple of Diana. There's no indication that he
was there with signs and, and, and telling everybody, don't go
in there and don't do this. Don't do that.
He was just teaching the word. And whenever you teach the word,
it has an impact on lives. It, it changes your thought
process, it changes your worldview.
It changes what your priorities are and what you invest and
spend your money on you. If you're doing things that
aren't right, the Holy Spirit convicts you and speaks to your
heart inwardly and says, you know this isn't cool.
You know, you know, you really need to let this go.
You need to move away from this, this idol or whatever it might
be. And idolatry is fashioned in
many ways today. We don't have shrines and
temples of, of some ridiculous Pagan deity around our necks.
At least I hope we don't. But idolatry's in the form of a
lot of other things. It can be our material wealth.
It can be something we own that we love and that every time we
see it, we just smile and say that's mine, you know, and I'm
going to give ours a day to whatever I think is important.
That's mine. And so we begin to become
consumed and controlled by metal and, and, and leather and tires.
And those cars are the biggest idols for all of us.
When you first get it, you know, you're excited and there's
nothing wrong with having a nice car, but it can really overcome
you, can't it? Especially when someone wrecks
into it. You just bought it.
Like it happened to me. I'm in Philadelphia and someone
knocks my mirror on my Sienna and I'm like, you got to be
kidding me. You know, I was just like, I
just got this thing. Well, Lord, said Clark, it's
just a piece of metal and it's a means to an end.
It's how you make your livelihood.
It's how you stay safe and drive around.
But I, I had to, I had to sort of like repent a little bit.
John's an auto body guy. He likes it when we wreck.
That's good for your, your prosperity.
But you know, I had to think like, well, you know, it's just
a car, right? But things can control our
hearts at times, can't they? How about our houses?
Nothing wrong with having nice houses, but when they begin to
have problems, how can it begin to make us depressed or upset or
uptight? Or, you know, it's, it's
interesting. I love sports.
Many of you do too. But if my whole life was like,
well, you know, I'm not going to go to church today because I'll
miss the kickoff. And, and I actually did that
when I was younger. The Steelers were kicking off at
like 12, man, I was, I was the first one out the door at 11:30.
Cindy, come on, we got to go. Where are we going?
What's the game? It's starting at 9.
You know, that pastor's going to go on and on and on.
Let's get out of here. One pastor, he like tortured us.
He'd have an older call, especially in a a big stealer
day. And I knew, man, we were going
to miss like at least 1/2 an hour to have the game.
But anyway, you know, you don't where your treasure is, your
heart is, I'm not like, you know, no guilt trips here.
But if there's anything in your life that is above God, then get
it right and say, Lord, forgive me and put it in right position
so that I'm not worshiping whatever that is above you.
That's always the issue of whether something becomes an
idol or not an idol in your heart.
So these guys are really upset about this issue.
And he says their prosperity is being affected.
And this has happened throughout Asia.
So it's so exciting to know that this school that Paul was
teaching in over 2 years, people like you and me and hopefully
like we're going out into the world that a culture sharing our
faces, we have opportunity that maybe the city of Greensburg
would change a little bit, right?
Maybe there'd be a few less nightclubs or no casinos aren't
going to shut down because they generated a lot of money for it
upstate. And, you know, so everybody has
reasons why they do what they do.
But I mean, there's this element of a salt and light that impacts
and and pushes back darkness. So I talked a little bit last
week that we can't be apathetic, complacent or indifferent as
Christians because the power of God is in US.
And if we are salt and light, we will have an impact on the lives
of people that don't know Jesus. So you know, to become pro-life
becomes a work of the spirit in someone S heart.
Well, maybe they were pro-choice before and all of a sudden their
worldview changes. I can't kill babies.
I can't kill creations of God anymore and I'm not going to be
that way right. So all the sudden the votes
change and the commitment of the people and you know, and the
world doesn't seem like it's going to hell on in handbasket.
We begin to get excited because things can be changed, whether
it's through people who are running that have godly or the
votes change or whatever. The the most important thing to
understand is that you and I right now in 2023 are
responsible for what's happening in the world.
Whether we stand up for truth or we zip our mouths and not say
anything right, we're going to be held accountable by the Lord
one day in the judgement seat of Christ where we're judged for
our works, not for our sin, that we live our lives fully for the
purposes of why Christ saved us. Were we ashamed of the gospel or
we we're bold to preach the gospel?
Do we care enough about people and love them enough to want to
tell them about what the Lord's done for us?
Or we just didn't want to get involved in a conflict or an
argument. I mean, that's the challenge all
the time. Well, they won't listen.
Well, how do you know they won't listen?
And even if they act like they don't listen, maybe they are
listening and they're thinking about what you said and they're
giving it some thought and consideration and maybe believe
later on. And so now the, the, the crowds
are growing and this area that they went to, this arena held
about 25,000 people. This wasn't a small move or mob
issue. This was a big deal, and this
guy's saying that Paul is the one who's responsible for all
this. Well, he isn't.
It's God who's responsible for this.
They could kill Paul, but the work of the of the Kingdom of
God will go on and it has gone on without Paul, without you,
without me. God always raises up new people
to continue to, to proclaim the word.
So verse 27. So not only is this trade of
ours in danger of falling into disrepute, but also the temple
of the great goddess Diana may be despised and her magnificence
destroyed, whom all Asia and the world worship.
Now this guy could care less about her.
He wasn't a follower of this ridiculous deity, but he knew
she this concept and this worship, this false religion
made a lot of money for them. And so now he's trying to get
these people who are devoted to Diana to be upset, saying that
the testimony of the power of her influence in the nation's at
the time is going to be a greatly diminished.
So these people in verse 28 now when they heard this, they were
full of wrath and cried out saying great is Diana the
Ephesians. So the whole city was filled
with confusion and rushed into the theater with 1 accord,
having seized gay eyes and our Tarkas, Macedonians, Paul's
travel Companions. So it's a, it's a mob scene.
It's dangerous. No one's standing to reason.
If you've ever been in an environment where there's been a
riot, it's it takes on a life of its own.
And all the sudden people who are in the midst of the crowd
all the sudden become infected. And next thing you know, they're
on board with whatever the ridiculous thing is that
someone's upset about. That's what happened at the mob
rule. Whenever Jesus was Pilate and
they asked Pilate asked who should we release Jesus or
Barabbas? And they all yelled Barabbas.
And then they started yelling at crucify him, crucify him.
And all the people that were yelling crucify him probably
didn't even want him to be crucified, but they were caught
up in that atmosphere. It's demonic and it begins to
take people over. It's like what happened on
January 6th, right? There was people there that just
wanted to have a, a reason to stand up for thing they felt was
important. And next thing you know, people
are breaking barriers down, going into the buildings of
government and all of a sudden, you know, guns and all.
I mean, it was, it was anarchy, lawlessness.
This is what's happening in our nation right now.
Lawlessness. That's what happened with these
police officers, lawlessness, beating and brutalizing this
young man. This is going on right now.
And we need to pray by the power of the Holy Spirit that the Lord
would circumvent this and put a protective, protective hedge
around all of us, the churches, the people of God, and that the
law enforcement officials would be people who are standing for
justice and not injustice. The consequences of what people
do need to be dealt with it. You just can't be behave this
way. It's barbaric.
And this is what's happening here though they grab this,
these two guys that serve with Paul, thank God they weren't
martyred or killed. Paul's travel companions.
And when Paul found out about this in verse 30, he wanted to
go into the people and the disciples will not allow him.
Then some of the officials of Asia, these people weren't even
believers, but they respected Paul, who were.
His friends sent to him pleading that he would not venture into
the theater. Paul would have went in there.
He would have probably been martyred at that time wasn't his
time to be killed yet. So he didn't go in.
So therefore some therefore cried one thing and some another
for the assembly was confused. This mass confusion.
There's no no truth in this stuff going on and most of them
did not know why they had come together.
Isn't it amazing, amazing you're there and you're with all these
people and then you look to your spouse or your friend.
What are we doing here? Why are we here?
I'm sure that's probably the thought of some of the people on
the January 6th are probably like, this has turned into
something insane and ungodly and unjust and illegal, and they
drew Alexander out of the multitude.
Now, Alexander was a Jewish guy and the Jews were the ones that
really caused the persecution against the Christians at the
time. It wasn't so much the Roman
Empire. They tolerated different moves
of whatever religion. But in this instance here,
Alexander's motioning with his hand, he wanted to act like he
could control and get everybody calmed down.
He wanted to make his defense to the people, but when they found
out that he was a Jew, all with one voice cried out for about
two hours. Great as Diana of the Ephesians.
So again, nothing is making sense.
This is going on for two hours. This this mass mass confusion.
Now I don't know if you've ever been in a riot.
I hope you're not and never are in a riot, but it, it begins to
become very, very dangerous. And we, we see the aftermath of
some of these things in the streets of our country going on
right now up in the Oregon and San Francisco and, and some of
these other places. I mean, these cities have become
destroyed. They're not safe to walk in.
They're not safe to live in. They're not safe to be in
because we have allowed, for whatever crazy reason, the
extremism against the police. I'd hate to be a police officer
right now having to deal, you know, based upon what's just
happened because everybody's going to think cops are horrible
and and and dangerous to be around instead of realizing that
God raised him up to protect us from injustice.
And so things are really out of control.
Lewis has been teaching in Timothy about in the last days
there will be lawlessness. We see it, we're experiencing it
and what is it that we're going to do about it?
But pray and be a light and be salt in the midst of a crooked
and perverse generation who were supposed to shine his lights.
So then we see God in His mercy and His sovereignty in verse 35.
And when the city clerk, it quieted the crowd.
This guy is sort of like a mayor, but obviously an
anointing upon him to be able to bring some sanity.
And they begin to listen for some reason to him, men of
Ephesus, what man is there who does not know that the city of
the Ephesians is temple, guardian of the great goddess
Diana and of the image which fell down from Zeus?
So he, he goes to their mythology, calms them down
because the majority of the people, this is how they're
wired. This is what they think about
their city. This is the reputation.
Everything's still intact. He's saying, therefore, since
these things cannot be denied, you ought to be quiet and do
nothing rashly. So in other words, don't behave
this way. You're worked up about about
nothing. Nothing's changing right now in
in Ephesus in regard to our Pagan ways.
For you brought these men here who are neither robbers of
temples nor blasphemers, blasphemers of your goddess.
And what a testimony these guys, Paul and his associates and
those who serve with them had done nothing to diminish the
emphasis of these people in regard to what it was they
thought was important. Paul wasn't bad mouthing the
goddess. That wasn't.
We can learn something here, I think today from how we deal
with the culture. You're not going to win any
battles by, you know, hating and having signs defaming gay people
or pro-choice people and these kind of things.
That has no impact. All it does is inflamed people.
I mean, I've driven down Route 30 by Barnes Noble and I've seen
the most horrific signs of babies who are being aborted as
you almost want to wreck your car.
It's horrible. See it?
I don't want to think about that.
I know what's going on. But but but by doing that, what
what is that doing to people right by you think the people
that think it's OK to kill babies and good signs are going
to bother them, just going to make them mad and hate us more.
There's a way of reaching people in regard to these senseless
philosophies and ideologies and worldviews that people have, and
it's the preaching of the gospel.
It's not condemning the pro-choice people.
It's loving them enough to help them get free from the blindness
that the devil has allowed to be on their eyes, that they don't
understand who Jesus is. They're used to people fighting
them, they're used to the people picketing and arguing, but
they're not used to people caring about them and loving
them. And we can't love people like
that apart from Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit,
right? We can't, we can't give people
grace without God's grace in our hearts first.
We have a tendency to be angry as Christians, and it's very
unattractive to the lost. And they think they're getting
their way because the matter we get, and the more upset we get,
the more they invalidate our testimony and the more weak we
become because we're trying to win a battle on the energy and
the power of our human flesh and ability to try to legislate
righteousness. You can't legislate
righteousness as much as we would like to.
Only God can restore righteousness and it comes
through the cross and every one of us here today, for the most
part, I'm sure, had to come through the cross to become, we
all had to come through the cross to become righteous.
When we become righteous, not self-righteous, but righteous in
good position with God, the things that he's concerned about
or cares about, we should care about too.
For God so loved the world. That's everybody in it.
That's the murderers, extortioners, the rapists, the
immoral, the extortioners, the thieves.
God so loved the world, the people in this world, that he
gave of his only begotten Son, that whoever and that's all
those people along with us, whosoever would believe in him,
would not perish, but have everlasting life.
And I love what it says later. God did not send his Son into
the world to condemn the world. We've been doing, I'm not
talking about you, but the rank and foul.
I think of us many times as Christians, we've been doing too
much condemning. He didn't come to condemn the
world. He knew like this is what you
get when you're lost, when you're a Sinner and you don't
have a savior. This is this is your way you
live. You can't live any other way but
a godless way. God did not send his son into
the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him
might be saved. And so he's calming these people
down and he says. Therefore, since these things
cannot be denied, verse 36, you ought to be quiet and do nothing
rashly, for you have brought these men here, who are neither
robbers or of temples nor blasphemers, your goddess.
Therefore, if Demetrius and his fellow Craftsman have a case
against anyone, the courts are open and there are pro councils.
In other words, you guys are bothered you do this legally by
the form of government that we have in the Empire, and let them
bring charges against one another.
But if you have any other inquiry to make, it shall be
determined in a lawful assembly, for we are in danger of being
called in question of the day's uproar, there being no reason
which we may give to account for this disorderly gathering.
He was concerned if the leaders of the Roman Empire saw that he
was losing control as one of the responsible parties in this
city, then they would lose the freedom they have to conduct
their business and their ways according to what they were
allowed to do, according to the rules of the empire.
And when he had said these things, he dismissed the
assembly. There's never any excuse for any
disorderly gatherings. And the interesting point as we
conclude is that the city of Ephesus is no longer like it was
at that time. There is no temple of Diana
there. It was destroyed.
There's some excavation showing that the place was real.
And they got some pillars in a museum in in Britain, One of
these tall pillars, columns there was 125 columns, 60 feet
high that surrounded this, this edifice, this amazing edifice.
But it's no longer there. It's just a memory of history.
The idol makers of Diana are no longer making these things.
They're gone and Ephesus now is more like a tourist stop.
If you're on Bible journeys and that kind of stuff, they'll
they'll take you to Ephesus and show you around.
We know the Book of Revelation discussed the church in Ephesus
that left its first love and you know, these kind of historical
things. But Ephesus is no way an
influential center of commerce, let alone spirituality.
There's only one power that can overcome all this stuff that
we're all dealing with in the year that we're living, 2023 and
onward. And it's not by picketing, it's
not by hating, it's not by revolution.
It's by this as Paul proclaimed it in Romans 116.
For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, For it is the
power of God, the salvation for everyone who believes, for the
Jew 1st, and also for the Greek. For in it the righteousness of
God is revealed from faith to faith as it is written, the just
shall live by faith. So when you go out this week,
you live by faith in the truth of the Word of God.
You live by 100% confidence, faith in the gospel of Jesus
Christ. That this is the answer for
conflict. This is the answer for you to
speak to people who are lost or who counterintuitive, they think
differently than you do because they're lost.
And then we love them. We love them enough to share
with them and to pray for them and to care for them.
So May God give us grace as we lift up Christ in our life daily
the best we can with the ability He's given us in the home and
the marriage with the kids, the family, the workplace, the
community, the neighborhood. And that God, as He is faithful,
will turn hearts to himself when His word is proclaimed.
Amen. Thank you for listening to this
edition of Living Waters of Grace.
Pastor Clark is teaching us about the book of Acts in this
series. Acts is a powerful and unique
part of Scripture, not just because it records the spread of
the gospel geographically from Jerusalem to the ends of the
earth, but also culturally. Acts shows us how the message of
Jesus moved beyond its Jewish roots and began to reach the
Gentile world. What started with Peter leading
a small group in the Upper Room became a global movement with
Paul taking the gospel to cities, synagogues, and
marketplaces across the Roman Empire.
Acts captures this vital transition and reminds us that
the good news of Jesus is for all people in every place.
May we be inspired to carry that same gospel boldly into our
world today. Living Waters of Grace comes to
you from Calvary Chapel, Westmoreland.
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