In Daniel 4:34-35, we read a statement by Nebuchadnezzar that is full of insight for the church in our day. He says, “I, Nebuchadnezzar, raised my eyes toward heaven, and my sanity was restored. Then I praised the Most High; I honored and glorified him who lives forever. His dominion is an eternal dominion; his kingdom endures from generation to generation. All the peoples of the earth are regarded as nothing. He does as he pleases with the powers of heaven and the peoples of the earth. No one can hold back his hand or say to him: ‘What have you done?’”
Of this passage, A.W. Tozer writes, “This whole passage is apt to be overlooked, occurring as it does in one of the less popular books of the Bible, but is it not of great significance that humility and sanity returned together? ... While he saw himself large and God small he was insane; sanity returned only as he began to see God as all and himself as nothing” (see note 1).
The insight I think this passage has (especially) for us today is exactly what Tozer indicated: much of the church is living in a state of insanity, thinking it to be the norm. In fact, we have grown so accustomed to our insane state of thinking that we can read scripture that directly contradicts what we believe, and we still refuse to see it as it is. Our insanity is the same source of that of Nebuchadnezzar; we think of ourselves as large and God as small. Much of the church believes that the gospel starts with man, man is the center of all things, man is the end of all things, and God’s purposes for every action must be wrapped up in his desire to best serve man.
Such thinking is insanity. Yet we are so entrenched in it, that when we look at Paul’s preaching tonight and Luke’s narration in our passage in Acts, we might be tempted to be resistant to humbling ourselves and having our sanity restored. For this passage in Acts is one of the most God-entranced passages I have read in all of scripture. It demands that we see God in his greatness and not turn aside.
Therefore, my goal tonight is that we simply see a little more of how great God is, and what it means for God to be who he is—and who the scripture says he is.
What occurs in Acts 13:13-52 is that Paul and his companions travel from Paphos and go to Pisidian Antioch. There, they stop in the synagogue that they might first address the Jews with the gospel. And as Paul preaches, we are able to see this great vision of God which we need so desperately. He tells them truths of God that I want to us to know as well.
First of all, he assures them that God is the beginning and end of all things.
As the Israelites looked and saw their history unfold, Paul did not want them to be ignorant of the fact that God was behind it all, and God was the end of it all.
Listen to how many times he uses God as the subject.
He tells them that God chose their fathers (17). There was no merit in the Israelites. And they did not come to God and then God decide they were the best people. God chose them. And God was the one who made the people great (17). The Jews were not simply naturally fertile people. God was the one who made them great.
Going on, God led the people out of Egypt (17). Luke writes, “And with an uplifted arm He led them out from it.” What does that mean? It means that God is a show off. He made sport of the Egyptians. He was showing off before them his great power. Why did he do ten plagues when he could have done one? He wanted them to know he rules their river and their sun, their livestock and their insects, their weather and their lives. He wanted to show that he rules all. And he could have led them around another way, so why did he back them into the sea? He wanted to show them he could part the sea. The whole exodus is simply God putting himself on display before the Egyptians. He was showing them how great he was.
Going on, God destroyed the nations in Canaan (19). They might have been the ones with the weapons, but God was the one winning the battles. Paul is assuring them of the truth of Proverbs 21:31, “The horse is prepared for the day of battle, but victory belongs to the LORD.”
God was the one who gave them judges (20). God gave them Saul as their king (21). God removed Saul as their king (22). Paul was assuring them of the truth of Daniel 2:21, “It is [God] who changes the times and the seasons; He removes kings and establishes kings.”
God raised up David (23). No one can get credit for choosing David as king but God. God did it. It was his idea. He chose this little shepherd boy whom nobody else would ever have thought of in a million years.
And finally, God sent Jesus (23--see note 2). God raised Jesus from the dead (30). God fulfilled the promise of the covenant (33). And Paul points out in verse 27 that those who killed Jesus did it without realizing the prophecies.
Now why would Paul point that out? He did it because he wanted us to see that men did not simply read the prophecies and make them happen, God orchestrated his plans through them. God is responsible for our hope found in Jesus Christ.
Do you see how God is the one who works in all things? God is the center of all. All things are by him, and for him, and to him. He is the end of everything. Anything in life in which we are not able to look past it and catch a glimpse of God is superficial, for God is behind all things, the end of all things.
Do we realize that truth? Do we talk that way? Or are we seeing how insane we often are as we think we are the ones calling the shots here?
And because God is the end of all things, he is also the content of the gospel.
Jesus, God himself, is the content of the gospel. You cannot have the gospel without Jesus. In verses 27-33, Paul sums up the gospel in the events at the end of Jesus’ life. He tells them how Jesus was condemned, put to death, laid in a tomb, raised from the dead, and appeared to many. This is the same thing that he tells the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 15, saying, “Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel … that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He appeared to Peter and then to the twelve” (15:1-4).
Now isn’t this interesting when in our present day, we have developed a way of presenting the ‘gospel’ without even mentioning the cross? I saw a program recently where many were to have been presented with the gospel, and yet the whole night I never heard anything about the cross.
Man is not the content of the gospel. The gospel is not “Johnny, if you feel lonely and tired and scared, then ask Jesus into your heart and he will make it all better.” No! The gospel is that men are under the just wrath of God and that Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead to save those who fall helpless before him and rely solely on his great mercy. Jesus is the content of the gospel.
Paul says in Acts 13:38-39, “Therefore let it be known to you, brethren, that through [Jesus] forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you, and through Him everyone who believes is freed from all things, from which you could not be freed through the Law of Moses.” “Through Jesus” is there forgiveness of sins, and “through Him” we who believe are freed from the curse of the law. He is the only way.
And to show how insane many have become, we often think that God should save people who do not recognize his name because they believe what they believe with sincerity, even if it is that there is a supreme God that is greater than our Jesus. We think that God owes it to men if they believe even their falsehood with great sincerity. Well, sincerity, no matter how deep it runs, does not escape the fact that in their very nature they are despising God and that God will judge all who do not come to him through Jesus Christ.
And on that note, God is the one who saves men.
Luke writes in Acts 13:48, “And when the Gentiles heard this [that they were able to receive the gospel], they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord; and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed."
This is where it really strikes at our pride, doesn’t it? I struggled for years to embrace this truth that God must be the one to save men. I think I talked about grace more than anyone, while having no idea how much my salvation was of grace. We are saved because God saves us.
He grants repentance (Acts 11:18). Faith and salvation are gifts from him (Ephesians 2:8-9). We cannot be saved unless God saves us. And he does not depend on our ability to do anything to save ourselves. We repent and believe, and he gives us the repentance and faith. Salvation is utterly the work of God.
However, this does not negate responsibility of all men everywhere to repent and believe, and that is what we must preach. But, having been born again, we should fall on our faces and thank God for the mercy that he has shown us. There is no reason why you should not be in hell with every other individual who has rejected the gospel. You have only the grace of God to thank.
I know this is a difficult one to understand and there are many paradoxes. However, again, I want to point you to Tozer who speaks on this topic better than myself, as he writes, “However deep the mystery, however many the paradoxes involved, it is still true that men become saints not at their own whim but by sovereign calling … He is the Author of our faith as he must be its Finisher.” He then speaks of a push against this in the attitude of God’s greatness that thinks of God as small and man as great, writing, “The whole content of modern evangelistic preaching contributes to this attitude. Man is made large and God small: Christ is placed in a position to excite pity rather that respect as he stands meekly, lantern in hand, outside a vine-covered door. How deeply do men err who conceive of God as subject to our human will or as standing respectfully to wait upon our human pleasure … We need to have taken from our dying hand the shadow scepter with which we fancy we rule the world. We need to feel and know that we are but dust and ashes, and that God is the disposer of the destinies of men” (see note 3).
To that I simply add, “Amen.”
And because that is the case, let me end assuring us that God can and does save us for his own purposes.The reason I say that is because we get a glimpse of something in this thirteenth chapter of Acts that Paul will explain in more detail in Romans 11, and I want us to see clearly what is going on here.
The reason I say that is because we get a glimpse of something in this thirteenth chapter of Acts that Paul will explain in more detail in Romans 11, and I want us to see clearly what is going on here.
In verses 44-49, Luke records how the Jews gather and reject and argue against Paul and his gospel. Then Paul tells them that they have “judge[d] themselves unworthy of eternal life” (again, showing the responsibility of man to repent and believe). And finally, Paul turns to the Gentiles who have gathered in masses to hear him, which Luke said had caused the Jews to be filled with jealousy.
The reason I point this out is because we are seeing God’s plan unfold (even at this time) in his purpose for saving us Gentiles. For we know, according to Romans 11:25, that Israel has been hardened from accepting the gospel that we might be saved. And that excites the Gentiles, but why are the Gentiles saved?
Paul writes, “But I am speaking to you who are Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an apostle of Gentiles, I magnify my ministry, if somehow I might move to jealousy my fellow countrymen and save some of them” (Romans 11:13-14). One of the main reasons for our salvation is so that the Jews would be made jealous and long for the gospel themselves.
We are not the rulers of God, demanding that God give us eternal life where he must respond. We are but dust and ashes before a God who is the end of all things, the content of the gospel, saving whom he wills, and saving for whatever purpose he wills.
Therefore, feel how small and helpless you are. Realize that it is only by God’s grace that you are not in hell. And then you will sing Newton’s Amazing Grace in a whole different understanding. You will sing it to the glory of God. You will read Zephaniah 3:17, which tells us that God actually sings over us, in a whole different understanding. You will probably read it with tears because you will realize that this great God has chosen to delight in, sing over, and love a wretch who despised his great name. O how deep are the mercies of our great God!
To him be glory forever. Amen.