back to index2018-10-14 Good and Faithful Servants
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You know, some of the best insights or best treasures in the scriptures are in places 00:00:12.560 |
And I was just thinking, even last night, you know, this rarely happens now because 00:00:20.240 |
But before when we used to use more cash, you know, every once in a while I would put 00:00:24.920 |
on my suit, because I only wear the suit once a week and I would have money in here and 00:00:28.120 |
I would forget about that suit for a while and I would put that suit back on and I would 00:00:30.840 |
reach in and I would find a $20 bill or $10 bill and say, "Wow." 00:00:38.080 |
That never happens now because we don't use cash. 00:00:42.000 |
So I felt like chapter 16 is one of those chapters that you typically don't think that 00:00:49.800 |
You know, he said, "Greet this person, greet that person, greet this person," and then 00:00:53.120 |
he finishes up the letter and then that's it. 00:00:55.240 |
So typically, by the time we get to chapter 15 in the Book of Romans, he's kind of wrapping 00:01:01.120 |
Say hi to this person, I wish I can get there, when I get there, get some support, go to 00:01:05.720 |
And we've already seen in chapter 15 how much content is contained in that one chapter revealing 00:01:11.680 |
his ministry, his heart, the different people who are engaged in his ministry. 00:01:15.480 |
And then we get to chapter 16, it's just a bunch of lists of names. 00:01:20.280 |
We're going to take about three, possibly four weeks in this chapter. 00:01:24.200 |
And the reason why is because there's insights into what God is doing at that particular 00:01:30.840 |
time and we don't know a lot about, you know, a lot of the people on this list, but the 00:01:35.880 |
few people that we do know on this list, it reveals a great amount of what God is doing 00:01:42.520 |
And so I'm just going to pray for us and we'll jump right in, okay? 00:01:47.800 |
Heavenly Father, we thank you so much for today. 00:01:55.600 |
We thank you, Father God, for just a constant patience and perseverance with us, Lord God, 00:02:03.120 |
knowing all our failures, past, present, and future, that you've sent your only begotten 00:02:12.040 |
I pray that that sacrifice, Lord God, would never become old. 00:02:15.480 |
It would never simply be dead theology, but it would be the fuel that causes us, Lord 00:02:20.640 |
God, to run to you in every and all situation. 00:02:24.800 |
I pray that you would clear our minds, soften our hearts, help us, Lord God, to be eager 00:02:29.760 |
listeners, Lord God, that we may be hearers and doers of your word. 00:02:39.280 |
If you've been reading through the Old Testament or if you've done that in the past, you probably 00:02:42.840 |
already noticed that the Bible lists quite a few names, right? 00:02:49.920 |
In fact, when you get to the book of Numbers, you almost want to skip it because it's a 00:02:54.160 |
book of numbers because it's a book of numbers of people. 00:02:58.280 |
So there's genealogy after genealogy, genealogy. 00:03:00.720 |
You see it in Genesis, you see it in Numbers, you see it in various books, and then they 00:03:04.520 |
just have lists of names that go, you know, sometimes for pages. 00:03:09.480 |
So I don't know about you, but when I get to those passages, either I really slow down 00:03:14.960 |
and examine these words or I end up just skimming it, right? 00:03:19.320 |
But there's a reason why these names are listed there. 00:03:22.720 |
It's not, it isn't just there because, you know, these people are important to those 00:03:28.320 |
I mean, God could have easily written the Bible without having their names and then, 00:03:33.880 |
you know, to our knowledge, because we don't know who they are, it wouldn't have made any 00:03:37.800 |
difference, at least we think, to the overall gospel message. 00:03:42.680 |
But there's a reason why these people are mentioned. 00:03:46.960 |
God didn't just say, "You know what, let's just stick their names up there, you know, 00:03:49.760 |
and let them know that they're important to me," right? 00:03:57.040 |
In fact, if you read over in the Bible, especially in the book of Revelation, it's repeated over 00:04:02.680 |
again that every single soul's name is written in the book of life. 00:04:11.560 |
The Bible talks about how God cares for us to the extent that He counts every strand 00:04:18.800 |
He knows if you have, you know, 50,000 pieces or 30,000 pieces, He knows. 00:04:24.880 |
So if God cares for our souls to that degree, wouldn't He be counting the souls' names? 00:04:39.800 |
What do their names and their presence in Paul's ministry teach us about God, about 00:04:48.640 |
Just like the genealogy of Jesus, again, if you read the New Testament, you probably started 00:04:56.680 |
Yes, these are people that was in Jesus' genealogy, and then you start talking about the narrative, 00:05:01.760 |
or you go to the book of Luke, and then you see the genealogy, and then you skip that. 00:05:05.860 |
But those genealogies tell us a lot about God's redemptive history, what God's been 00:05:12.040 |
So every single one of those names connects Jesus to the promise in the book of Genesis, 00:05:18.360 |
that the son of the woman is going to come and crush the head of the serpent. 00:05:23.720 |
And so all the genealogies and the names, all from Genesis all the way to the book of 00:05:27.720 |
Matthew and the book of Luke, it connects God's faithfulness, despite the sinfulness 00:05:37.600 |
The greatest thing that it teaches us, that it wasn't because of the great people. 00:05:42.320 |
It was because there was a great God behind these people that he fulfills his promise. 00:05:46.240 |
So every one of those names highlights redemptive history. 00:05:51.520 |
And in the same way, what we see in chapter 16, it is a background information of what 00:05:59.160 |
has been happening and what God has been doing and how the gospel has been spreading. 00:06:06.280 |
In chapter 16, we have a list of 26 individuals. 00:06:14.960 |
There are two families and three house churches. 00:06:20.280 |
These are people that most people would never have known anything about. 00:06:25.680 |
My guess is you probably may have looked at this list, if you did, if you're an A+ student, 00:06:31.280 |
you already came and at least skimmed over it, and you may have recognized two, or maybe 00:06:40.680 |
But majority of these people you probably have never heard of before. 00:06:45.440 |
Hopefully you'll know some of them after today. 00:06:47.800 |
What I want to highlight this morning is, first of all, the different groups of people 00:06:52.720 |
So we're going to talk about the females that are mentioned, Paul's family members that 00:06:58.840 |
are mentioned in here, there are slaves, there are aristocrats, and then there's just one 00:07:05.080 |
or two people that really are highlighted and it gives us a background information of 00:07:09.640 |
So first thing that I want to mention about the different females that are mentioned here. 00:07:14.200 |
You have to understand, out of the 26 names, nine of them, nine of them are females. 00:07:20.880 |
More than a third of the list that are mentioned that Paul says to greet are females. 00:07:25.360 |
Now in our culture that means absolutely nothing. 00:07:31.360 |
That's the response that maybe our culture would say. 00:07:34.340 |
But at this particular time, to have nine females mentioned as prominent members of 00:07:39.880 |
the Roman church saying, "Hey, make sure you greet these ladies." 00:07:42.440 |
I'm not going to, I think the names are already up there, so I'm not going to mention all 00:07:49.320 |
But women at that time in history, in the Jewish culture and in the Roman culture and 00:07:54.300 |
in the Greek culture, did not have the same kind of status that women have today in our 00:08:02.240 |
Typically people say, without understanding the context, that if they read Apostle Paul's 00:08:07.880 |
letters superficially, they say, "Apostle Paul is a male chauvinist because he talks 00:08:13.160 |
about the order in the home, he talks about male leadership and the women to be learning 00:08:20.880 |
And so they read that superficially and say, "Apostle Paul is a male chauvinist, no wonder 00:08:29.560 |
It's because of the Judeo-Christian teaching that most of the countries today who have 00:08:35.000 |
the background of Judeo-Christian teaching in history tend to be more elevating of women's 00:08:41.680 |
status than the countries that don't have that background. 00:08:49.480 |
Only the countries who tend to have greater value for women have at some point in their 00:08:56.880 |
The reason why the women were elevated in society and were no longer treated like servants 00:09:02.700 |
or property, a large part of that was because of the teaching and the practice of the early 00:09:12.000 |
Women were not meant to be seen, at least in that culture. 00:09:15.920 |
They were told by the Jewish law to be veiled when they were in public. 00:09:21.160 |
In fact, this is the exact Jewish oral tradition. 00:09:23.640 |
The oral law stated, "Let no one talk with a woman in the street, no, not with his own 00:09:30.560 |
Some of us look at, think of that and say, "Well, that sounds a lot like the Muslim community." 00:09:35.240 |
And I have friends who are doing missions in some of these countries and they're not 00:09:41.080 |
And if they are in public, they have to be completely veiled. 00:09:44.680 |
And this is today, we're not talking about 100 years ago. 00:09:48.920 |
It said women typically were meant, again, by tradition, by their law, that they weren't 00:09:56.040 |
allowed to be out in public without some kind of chaperone. 00:09:59.160 |
The Eastern women of that time were discouraged to even go out in public at all. 00:10:04.220 |
And you can understand the reason why in John chapter 4, when Jesus is speaking to the Samaritan 00:10:08.560 |
woman, why she is surprised, even shocked, that a Jewish rabbi is speaking to her in 00:10:15.240 |
You know, I'm not going to go into all the different background information behind that, 00:10:20.480 |
but here's a woman who was rejected by her own Samaritan people and a Jewish male is 00:10:25.140 |
standing there in the middle of the day publicly talking to her. 00:10:31.800 |
Remember in chapter 3, Nicodemus is concerned about his reputation. 00:10:35.560 |
So he comes at night and then in chapter 4, the Samaritan woman is concerned about Jesus' 00:10:41.080 |
What are they going to say of you talking to me like this in public, a Samaritan woman? 00:10:45.680 |
See, that was the era in which the Bible was being written. 00:10:52.200 |
In a traditional Jewish village, a young girl was never allowed to have any kind of education 00:10:57.840 |
other than the education that mom would give her at home to cook and clean and take care 00:11:03.240 |
of their children, and outside of that, they never had any kind of formal education. 00:11:09.520 |
The first century Jewish male, if you haven't been offended up to this point, you're going 00:11:17.900 |
His daily prayer said, "Thank God I am not a Gentile slave or a woman." 00:11:26.600 |
You look at the prayer book of the Jews of that time, that's actually written in their 00:11:32.700 |
So you can see what the society looked like at that time. 00:11:38.720 |
Now if you take, again just logically from observation, if you take ethics and morality 00:11:49.920 |
and value that God has given every human being out of the culture and you just allow your 00:11:54.920 |
sinfulness to just reign free, what would happen? 00:12:00.000 |
Whoever is strongest is going to end up dominating. 00:12:03.100 |
If you have power, you suppress those who don't have power. 00:12:06.020 |
If you're physically stronger, you bully the ones who don't have power. 00:12:09.660 |
That's typically what happens if you let sin reign free. 00:12:12.900 |
And if you look at, again, societies where Judeo-Christian values are not at the foundation 00:12:20.980 |
upon which the South society was built, that's typically what happens. 00:12:25.520 |
We're not saying universally and to an equal amount, but that's typically what happens. 00:12:32.460 |
The point of all of this is to say that what the gospel taught about men and women were 00:12:41.560 |
It wasn't radical in suppressing women, it was radical in delivering them from the bondage 00:12:48.460 |
So when the scripture says that there is no difference between male or female, in our 00:12:53.900 |
culture we say, "Of course, why do you even have to say that?" 00:12:58.740 |
But a Jewish male of that time, when he heard there is no difference between male or female, 00:13:10.120 |
Our whole culture, our whole prayer that we pray before God, thank God you didn't make 00:13:19.780 |
What's interesting on this list, the very first name that Paul mentions is Phoebe. 00:13:25.620 |
He says she was a servant of Centria, which is near Corinth. 00:13:31.220 |
And the book of Romans was written in Corinth. 00:13:38.420 |
So it's a popular understanding of where Phoebe fits into all of this is Phoebe was most likely 00:13:43.320 |
the one who carried the Roman letter to Rome. 00:13:47.660 |
Paul probably gave it to her and she was acting as a messenger for Paul. 00:13:51.100 |
And that's why he says, "When you greet Phoebe, make sure you take good care of her because 00:14:00.220 |
It says that she was a servant of this church. 00:14:02.100 |
And the word servant is diakonos, where it can be literally translated a servant or deacon. 00:14:08.200 |
So the translators, the commentators are divided whether this was a formal title or whether 00:14:15.900 |
But either the case, she was a very prominent member. 00:14:18.740 |
And it says that she was a helper, or in some of your translations, it says she was a patron. 00:14:23.380 |
And so majority of the commentators believe that she was a very successful businesswoman. 00:14:29.460 |
And because of her wealth, she was able to provide and support, and possibly she might 00:14:37.500 |
And so Paul, knowing this, may have given the letter to her and say, "When you are headed 00:14:42.180 |
over there, can you take this letter for me?" 00:14:46.300 |
She was the carrier of the letter, and she was, again, the first name mentioned at the 00:14:52.020 |
end of this letter saying, "Make sure you take good care of her." 00:14:55.580 |
Again, in our culture, that means absolutely nothing. 00:14:59.660 |
Remember I told you that whenever you see a list of names in the New Testament, it means 00:15:04.340 |
that the first one that is mentioned is mentioned for a reason. 00:15:08.900 |
Peter is there because the first name mentioned in the 12, because he's the leader, and he's 00:15:14.700 |
So the fact that Apostle Paul, at the end of his letter, the first person that he mentions, 00:15:22.660 |
Because a Jewish male would have read that and think, "Phoebe." 00:15:26.260 |
Of all the people that you could have mentioned, you mentioned Phoebe, right? 00:15:34.900 |
It gives us a glimpse of what was happening, how the gospel was changing the culture at 00:15:40.940 |
Right off the bat, some of the most prominent members of the ones who were carrying and 00:15:49.740 |
Secondly, Priscilla and Akilah, their names you probably heard before because they're 00:15:54.260 |
mentioned about six different times in the New Testament. 00:15:57.180 |
But what's significant about that is among the six different times, four times Priscilla 00:16:06.580 |
Now why she was mentioned first, there's a debate. 00:16:10.340 |
Some believe that maybe she was mentioned first because she comes from a Roman background, 00:16:14.860 |
and she came from a prominent family, and as a result of status, before she became a 00:16:20.100 |
Christian that she was elevated first and people knew her first. 00:16:23.840 |
Some people think that maybe Priscilla was the more dominant one, right? 00:16:27.820 |
A lot of times we think of husband and wives, and in a traditional conservative church, 00:16:33.000 |
we have male role and a women's role, and men are to lead and the women are to support 00:16:39.380 |
And so a lot of the husbands struggle and wives struggle with what that looks like because 00:16:43.980 |
a lot of times they project leadership at church or strong male leadership needs to 00:16:53.300 |
And the husband needs to know the Bible better than the wife, and the husband needs to be 00:16:57.340 |
more articulate than the wife in order for her to lead, but that's not the case. 00:17:01.300 |
In fact, that's not the case in reality, no matter if you believe that or reject that. 00:17:08.540 |
The reality is there are many marriages where the wife is probably more gifted. 00:17:22.520 |
There's a lot of situations where the wife is more prominent, the wife is more outgoing, 00:17:26.700 |
the husband may be not necessarily a submissive role, but he's not as gifted, maybe he's an 00:17:35.660 |
So that may be a reason why Priscilla is more prominent. 00:17:40.100 |
I think another reason may be because these two people were tent makers, and they were 00:17:47.180 |
Again, the first two people that are mentioned here are business people. 00:17:52.620 |
And because they were very prominent business people, that there are times maybe when Priscilla 00:17:56.860 |
went to one state, one city, one to another city, and Priscilla may have been better known 00:18:02.620 |
in those four places that Paul mentions where her name is first. 00:18:07.420 |
And possibly the husband was mentioned first than the others because he was more prominent 00:18:13.360 |
We don't know for sure, but the fact that Priscilla is mentioned first to begin with, 00:18:19.860 |
it already tells us that the culture of that time was already changing because of the gospel. 00:18:29.100 |
Paul met these two people in the context of doing ministry, because he was selling tents, 00:18:35.480 |
and Paul had to learn to make and sell tents, and as a result of their business venture, 00:18:40.460 |
they were able to partner together in ministry. 00:18:43.740 |
Priscilla and Achilla, they were the ones who meet Apollos in Acts chapter 18, and they 00:18:52.260 |
He's teaching all these things about the Messiah, and they realize that he doesn't know the 00:18:58.460 |
So in Acts chapter 18, they pull him aside and instruct him, "This Jesus that you're 00:19:03.500 |
So they're the ones who bring Apollos to Christ. 00:19:07.660 |
And it's believed that the reason why Apollos was so prominent in Corinth, remember in the 00:19:14.320 |
Some people were loyal to Apollos, some people to Paul, some people to Jesus, right? 00:19:19.020 |
And the reason why Apollos had such a prominent ministry in Corinth was because Priscilla 00:19:27.620 |
So they believed that they were the ones who probably brought Apollos and introduced them, 00:19:31.220 |
and then that kind of caused some friction in the Corinthian church. 00:19:34.860 |
So these people were very prominent in the early church. 00:19:37.900 |
Paul, in fact, goes further and says, "These people risked their neck for me." 00:19:44.140 |
They literally risked their neck because Apostle Paul ended up having his neck chopped off. 00:19:50.140 |
Many of the early Christians of that time, because of their preaching of the gospel and 00:19:54.140 |
involvement with the ministry, they had their necks chopped off. 00:19:57.760 |
So Paul literally says that these people were not just partnering and giving me money, they 00:20:04.380 |
And as prominent, wealthy business people, that they risked their lives to do this. 00:20:17.100 |
All of these things are great, but you don't have to be a full-time pastor to be a passionate 00:20:24.100 |
The first two people that he mentions are business people in the context of using their 00:20:29.780 |
In fact, the first home that is mentioned in Corinth where they had the first church 00:20:37.300 |
So again, all of these things kind of point to the fact that the culture in the early 00:20:43.980 |
The gospel was not only having an effect on what's happening on Sunday, it was changing 00:20:49.100 |
Their paradigm of how they looked at the value of human beings. 00:20:54.580 |
We see Mary, Paul says, who said that she worked very hard. 00:20:58.620 |
We see these two ladies, Triphinae and Triphosa, and they believed that these were twins because 00:21:05.860 |
this is typically how they named twins at the time, similar names. 00:21:09.060 |
I have no idea why they did that because it's confusing as it is. 00:21:15.340 |
But it was their custom that if twins came out, they would have similar names. 00:21:18.340 |
So they believed that it was twin sisters who together served the gospel. 00:21:22.700 |
And what's interesting was their names literally means delicate and dainty. 00:21:26.540 |
So these delicate and dainty ladies were serving the Lord together. 00:21:34.900 |
What we know about the significance of women on this list was women were made a significant 00:21:44.220 |
We know that from a systematic study of the New Testament, not just this passage. 00:21:48.620 |
Women were given the same access to God that men enjoyed. 00:21:54.540 |
When Christ came, there was no outer court, inner court. 00:21:57.820 |
When the curtain to the Holy of Holies was ripped, all the Gentiles, everyone who had 00:22:02.500 |
to be stationed outside a certain distance from the holy place of God, all of a sudden, 00:22:09.500 |
Jews, Gentiles, male or female, all had the same access to God. 00:22:16.580 |
Thirdly, women engaged in significant ministry. 00:22:21.580 |
This doesn't mean that there's no role for men. 00:22:26.660 |
But we typically think that to be submissive, to learn in quietness means, or a lot of people 00:22:31.940 |
think that it means that you don't get involved with ministry, you just stay home and take 00:22:36.260 |
And that's not what we see in the New Testament. 00:22:39.220 |
It's talking about submissiveness in attitude, which we are all called to do. 00:22:45.060 |
We're all called to elevate Christ and be submissive in attitude. 00:22:50.980 |
It's just that the women were called to do so in the context of the home. 00:22:55.420 |
But we know that in application, that women were very active in the gospel ministry. 00:23:05.540 |
Again, these are all things that we typically don't think about. 00:23:09.460 |
But it gives us a huge understanding of the background. 00:23:12.620 |
Andronicus, Junia, Herodian, Jason, Sospater were all called kinsmen of Paul. 00:23:20.020 |
Now, the word kinsmen could refer to fellow Jews. 00:23:23.460 |
But the reason why the commentators believe that this is not talking about Jewish people 00:23:27.940 |
is because there are other lists of Jewish people on this list that he doesn't call kinsmen. 00:23:33.220 |
And there's good reasons to believe that Paul is talking about his personal relatives. 00:23:38.780 |
And it only makes sense because, think about it in practice, right? 00:23:42.700 |
Now, I'm not going to ask here, but how many of you got saved because a brother or sister, 00:23:48.740 |
mother, father, aunt, uncle shared the gospel with you? 00:23:53.540 |
How many of you in this church, which I know for a fact, were brought to Christ because 00:24:02.140 |
And many, like in our church, we have a lot of brothers and sisters or brother, brother 00:24:10.100 |
Sometimes you invite your aunt and uncle or your father and mother. 00:24:12.460 |
And we have a lot of people come to church because of the connection we have with family 00:24:20.140 |
When somebody came to Christ, the people who initially benefited the most were the people 00:24:27.420 |
And the people who were the closest to them were family members. 00:24:34.260 |
Andronicus Junius, it says they became Christians prior to Paul in verse 7, that they met the 00:24:45.420 |
He probably didn't know, or my guess is that he was actively pursuing Christians on the 00:24:50.340 |
way to Damascus, not realizing that he had a family member who were already a Christian, 00:24:55.460 |
that if he didn't convert, may have one day ran into maybe his aunt, uncle, or cousin 00:25:07.680 |
He may have been a freed slave from the King Herod. 00:25:13.200 |
So typically when a slave who was prominent in that home was freed, he would take on the 00:25:18.100 |
name of the one that he served, and he would be elevated because of the connection with 00:25:24.540 |
And so Herodian may have been a servant in the kingdom of Herod who was freed. 00:25:34.200 |
It's important because we know that Apostle Paul came from a very prominent home. 00:25:41.220 |
He's being whooped, and then he says, "Can you do this to a Roman?" 00:25:44.680 |
And the Roman guard freaks out because by law he can get into trouble. 00:25:55.120 |
We just think maybe his father was a very successful businessman and something happened, 00:26:04.540 |
If he had a relative who was a Herodian, there's a chance that all the people in his line all 00:26:10.160 |
of a sudden got elevated and had special favor from the Romans. 00:26:13.720 |
And that may be the reason why Paul had Roman citizenship. 00:26:18.580 |
We know that the first four disciples, they were brothers. 00:26:23.360 |
Jesus' brother James himself, after the resurrection, becomes one of the prominent leaders of Jerusalem. 00:26:31.600 |
Jesus' ministry, many of the ones who did the background work supporting the disciples 00:26:44.320 |
The people who first benefit most are the ones who are the nearest. 00:26:50.800 |
That's why in 1 Corinthians 7, 14, it says, "For the unbelieving husband is sanctified 00:26:57.000 |
It doesn't mean that an unbelieving husband becomes a Christian, but it says because of 00:27:00.560 |
her presence in the husband's life, he's the first to benefit because he's going to be 00:27:06.160 |
able to hear the gospel and see the gospel being practiced in their life. 00:27:13.240 |
So that's why he says, "Don't separate because they are sanctified because of you." 00:27:18.960 |
Acts chapter 16, 30, of the jailer, he said, "Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be 00:27:26.080 |
Now it doesn't mean that if one person becomes saved, the whole household becomes saved. 00:27:30.760 |
What he means is that the gospel comes into your home. 00:27:36.880 |
Now again, the significance of all of this is that you could see how the gospel is not 00:27:46.720 |
only working in Paul's life and establishing churches, you can see how it's penetrating 00:27:53.800 |
And as a result of that, it created tremendous chaos. 00:28:00.320 |
And it either forced the family members to either embrace Christ or divided homes. 00:28:08.760 |
I mean, I don't know about you, but as I was studying all this list, again, to me, I don't 00:28:17.440 |
know how it is for you, but to me it was like finding 20 bucks. 00:28:22.400 |
I've preached through Romans before, but I didn't take this kind of time in chapter 16. 00:28:30.080 |
But it's like, "Oh, maybe I'll stay a little bit longer." 00:28:32.880 |
I'm covering 16 verses today, but every single one of these names, we can go in depth and 00:28:40.000 |
And the reason why I want to do that is because outside of what we're doing today, you probably 00:28:52.140 |
God wants us to see something in these names. 00:28:56.640 |
There's another group of people that are mentioned here that you would have never heard in any 00:29:02.040 |
Amphiletus, Urbanus, Hermes, Philagus, Julia, they were all common slave names. 00:29:13.040 |
The reason that we know that they were slave names is because once a slave became free, 00:29:18.040 |
So the fact that they retained their slave names meant that they were probably still 00:29:24.040 |
Slaves in the first century, if women didn't have any rights, the slaves didn't have any 00:29:38.040 |
So if you happen to have a bad, evil master, he can do with that person physically and 00:29:48.560 |
He had the power to carry out capital punishment on his slave anytime he wanted. 00:29:56.580 |
So the fact that there are slaves that are mentioned, there's about five or six different 00:30:01.520 |
slaves that are mentioned in this list of people who are prominently helping Apostle 00:30:05.700 |
Paul do the gospel ministry would have been mind-blowing to the early church. 00:30:12.080 |
It would have been mind-blowing to anybody of that culture. 00:30:14.480 |
It's like slaves are prominent members and enough that Paul, an apostle of Christ, a 00:30:22.400 |
Roman citizen, possibly a member of the Sanhedrin, mentions them in this prominent letter. 00:30:27.960 |
Obviously, it wasn't Apostle Paul, it was the Holy Spirit. 00:30:32.920 |
These people are precious to Paul because they're precious to our God. 00:30:37.960 |
In fact, the whole letter is written in Philemon, where he's introducing his slave back to his 00:30:44.920 |
former master, which he ripped off before he became a Christian. 00:30:48.000 |
He stole things and he ran away and he meets Christ in prison and then he converts and 00:30:53.480 |
then Paul is trying to get him reconciled back to his master. 00:30:55.960 |
And the whole letter is written to reconcile him back to his master. 00:30:59.160 |
You have to understand that a runaway slave, if he was caught, it would have automatically 00:31:06.920 |
So for Onesimus to voluntarily go back to meet his master was literally to risk his 00:31:16.280 |
Receive him not as your slave, but as a brother now, because both of you have received the 00:31:21.920 |
Outside of the grace of God, it would have been ridiculous to even think of asking a 00:31:32.080 |
Not only by his master, but think of all the non-Christians around him that may have not 00:31:42.360 |
This is something that you would never even imagine. 00:31:48.480 |
How can that person who did that to you come back voluntarily to be restored? 00:31:57.120 |
And then the former master who lost not only his face, but money, maybe even status as 00:32:04.760 |
a result of that, just receive him as a brother. 00:32:10.760 |
I'm not going to force you, but do this for me because of what Christ has done for you." 00:32:16.360 |
I mean, that letter in and of itself, it cannot be written in any other context outside of 00:32:27.040 |
These are things that we don't normally think about or talk about, but that was the power 00:32:34.680 |
This is not because somebody determined, "I'm going to be a good person." 00:32:38.160 |
It wasn't because they were taught good ethics at some Jewish synagogue. 00:32:45.440 |
Only new creatures under the grace of God could possibly even think to do this. 00:32:51.720 |
In Galatians 3, 26 to 28, "For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. 00:32:56.720 |
For all of you who are baptized into Christ have clothed yourself with Christ. 00:33:10.240 |
Again, we recite this passage so often in the New Testament and we think about the oneness 00:33:19.080 |
Imagine the context in which this verse is written. 00:33:23.840 |
That's no different than us talking about how terrorists who came and bombed our house 00:33:29.000 |
and then all of a sudden you fall asleep for about a month and you wake up and then you 00:33:41.120 |
Only the power of the gospel has the ability to do that. 00:33:45.080 |
Only people who have been absolutely transformed from inside out could even think that this 00:33:53.200 |
We don't need to look to the scripture to see that. 00:33:57.200 |
There's people in this room, maybe some of you. 00:34:01.000 |
You have been forgiven some horrendous sin that you would never share to anybody else. 00:34:14.120 |
There are some people who have committed some horrendous sin in your life. 00:34:19.160 |
Humanly speaking, how can you possibly forgive these people? 00:34:25.800 |
But the only reason why we would even entertain reconciling with those people is because of 00:34:39.680 |
Just a mention of their names when you really think about what this means. 00:34:45.960 |
This is what the gospel is doing in the early church. 00:34:54.800 |
That's probably not how it's pronounced, but for now. 00:35:04.000 |
He was a grandson of Herod the Great, who was a friend of the emperor Claudius. 00:35:08.560 |
So it wasn't just the poor slaves and the disenfranchised, the misfits of culture who 00:35:14.360 |
became Christians, which a lot of people think, "Well, Christianity took off because everybody 00:35:18.380 |
was poor and Jesus promised wealth and health, and that's why everybody became Christian." 00:35:28.160 |
In fact, the last years of Apostle Paul's life, he stood before kings and governors 00:35:35.640 |
and wealthy, and he stood before them preaching the gospel until the day he died. 00:35:41.360 |
Narcissus was a rich, powerful freedman who many believe was the direct secretary of Emperor 00:35:57.680 |
In fact, Paul says in Philippians 4.22, he says, "All the saints greet you, especially 00:36:05.120 |
So the gospel did not only penetrate to the poor and the lowly, the gospel is also penetrating 00:36:11.880 |
So it wasn't just limited to people who are desperate. 00:36:17.080 |
The power of the gospel was penetrating into places that you would have never thought. 00:36:22.280 |
And that's the problem that we have sometimes in our culture, that we tend to target the 00:36:32.000 |
You go on campus and you want to share the gospel with somebody, and you target people 00:36:36.200 |
that you think you have some sort of advantage over. 00:36:39.400 |
So if they're older than you, don't talk to them. 00:36:44.580 |
If they're rich and you happen to be poorer, that's not your position. 00:36:49.960 |
So we have a tendency to target people that we think that we have some kind of advantage 00:36:55.680 |
We're older than them, more experienced than them, we have more money than them, we have 00:37:05.100 |
And then if we want to reach the aristocrats, we need to reach Caesar. 00:37:10.600 |
The gospel in and of itself is foolishness to those who are perishing, but it is a power 00:37:18.560 |
It is not the messenger where the authority comes from. 00:37:21.440 |
It is not because we are experienced, we're wealthy, and we're more educated or older 00:37:27.400 |
that I have something to say to you because I have all this experience. 00:37:34.080 |
The only authority I have is the authority that comes through me in Christ. 00:37:38.200 |
So the gospel came in and it penetrated even to the highest of places. 00:37:50.160 |
Eponatus, he's mentioned in verse 5 as a man who was committed, he was called the first 00:38:00.400 |
First fruit of Asia, meaning that he was probably the first convert of many converts. 00:38:04.200 |
You have to understand the persecution that was taking place in Asia was so tremendous 00:38:08.320 |
the Holy Spirit told him not to go there for a period. 00:38:12.040 |
But when he finally does arrive, he says Eponatus was the first convert. 00:38:16.840 |
And now he's residing in Rome, all for the purpose of doing mission work. 00:38:22.280 |
And these are common people, business people, right? 00:38:28.640 |
These are all just regular, normal people who are affected by the gospel, who have shifted 00:38:33.200 |
their lives around in order for the gospel ministry. 00:38:38.240 |
We don't know much about these people at all, but I'm going to mention them. 00:38:43.600 |
Asinicritus, Phlegon, Hermes, Patrobus, Hermes, Philagus, Julia, Nerus, and his sister Olympus, 00:38:57.840 |
The reason why I mentioned their name is because their names are important to God. 00:39:03.720 |
Maybe in the future, maybe there's some more archaeology will come out and we'll know more 00:39:06.560 |
about them, but these are important to God and they're mentioned in the scripture, so 00:39:12.080 |
I want to mention one other name before I wrap up this morning. 00:39:19.920 |
Rufus's name first comes to us in Mark chapter 15, 21. 00:39:29.200 |
And this is a text where Jesus is carrying his cross to Golgotha, and because he is stumbling, 00:39:34.800 |
the Roman guards make Simon, the Cyrene, to take up the cross and carry it for him because 00:39:47.440 |
They pressed into service a passerby coming from the country, Simon Cyrene, the father 00:39:59.920 |
Now the reason why we believe that this Rufus in Mark chapter 15 is the same Rufus in chapter 00:40:06.840 |
16 is because Rufus, the gospel of Mark, was written in Rome. 00:40:14.060 |
So Mark would have been very familiar with Rufus, Alexander, his mom, and his father. 00:40:21.740 |
So the church fathers believed, and most commentators believe, that this is the same Rufus. 00:40:27.620 |
And what it tells us is that random act of Simon, the Cyrene, that we never hear ever 00:40:35.460 |
again in Scripture, that ends up picking up the cross, ends up sharing the gospel with 00:40:40.620 |
his two children who are prominent enough where Apostle Paul would mention them by name. 00:40:45.000 |
And not only does he mention Rufus, he mentions the mother who was involved. 00:40:48.340 |
And he says, not only is she your mother, but she's also my mother because she was very 00:40:52.100 |
active in supporting Apostle Paul's ministry. 00:40:55.540 |
So that one act, it doesn't say Simon picked up the cross and took him, and then as a result 00:41:02.020 |
of seeing Jesus crucified, he gave his life to Christ and became a great missionary. 00:41:09.620 |
Simon, who just came to watch what's going on here, picks up the cross, and somehow, 00:41:15.200 |
we don't know how, we don't know who shared the gospel with him. 00:41:18.060 |
Somehow he becomes a Christian, goes back, shares the gospel with these two prominent 00:41:25.800 |
And then the mother becomes a Christian, and they join in the gospel ministry in the early 00:41:32.140 |
There is nothing that is in Scripture that is there for no reason. 00:41:45.780 |
Well, the power of the gospel reach all different walks of life. 00:41:52.340 |
Now why this is important is because we use marketing techniques to think that if we use 00:41:58.040 |
human wisdom and marketing, if we can, that person will submit if we do this, and that 00:42:02.500 |
person will be interested if we do that, and we use all kinds of techniques, human effort 00:42:09.740 |
But the power of the gospel is not human ingenuity. 00:42:14.020 |
The power of the gospel isn't because we found the right technique or the right person 00:42:19.780 |
The power of the gospel goes beyond who we are. 00:42:22.380 |
There is a reason why God deliberately chooses the foolish in the world to dumbfound the 00:42:26.780 |
wise, because the whole rebellion of mankind is to glorify himself. 00:42:32.580 |
So even the way that the gospel reaches people, he uses people that people normally think, 00:42:41.200 |
And when Apostle Paul, Apostle Peter and the disciples stood up and started preaching the 00:42:45.220 |
gospel in the book of Acts, they were amazed. 00:42:49.620 |
These lowly fishermen were able to preach with such boldness, and then they realized 00:42:57.780 |
They gave credit to Jesus, because that's where the power lied. 00:43:01.340 |
And so first and foremost, we see that the power of the gospel reached all walks of life. 00:43:09.740 |
Secondly, that the gospel brought unity among people where their lives would have never 00:43:14.980 |
crossed, and that's the beauty of the church. 00:43:18.540 |
Our unity isn't based upon our common background or our wealth or our culture or our language. 00:43:27.700 |
There's something far beyond that that unites us. 00:43:34.580 |
I can go to places in Europe and in the remotest parts of Asia, and I see somebody reading 00:43:46.380 |
And I remember early on when we used to go to China, and this is very early on in China 00:43:51.260 |
in I think maybe 1999 or year 2000, and this was in Harbin, China. 00:43:59.460 |
I was sitting in a McDonald's and just reading the scriptures, doing my devotions early in 00:44:06.260 |
And this lady was walking by the window with her daughter, and she was, you know, just 00:44:14.020 |
And she was walking, and then she saw my Bible, and I could see her lifting her head, just 00:44:22.100 |
And I was, "Oh, shoot, you know, maybe I'm going to get in trouble." 00:44:25.340 |
And then she literally just stared at me for about a minute. 00:44:37.220 |
But I was sitting there reading the scripture, and she was there, and she was looking at 00:44:42.820 |
me, and I was looking at her, and then she was looking at my Bible, and then she was 00:44:46.260 |
looking at her daughter, and then I was looking at her daughter. 00:44:52.460 |
I saw that little cross of a necklace that she had on, and I could tell she was telling 00:45:01.820 |
And that awkward moment, all of a sudden, just heart warmed another sister that walked 00:45:21.020 |
People who are disenfranchised, people who don't fit into this world, people who are 00:45:24.780 |
aristocrats, slaves, runaway slaves, former masters, Gentiles, Jews, Pharisees, tax collectors, 00:45:31.340 |
prostitutes, all saved by the grace of God, sitting together, calling each other brothers 00:45:37.380 |
and sisters in Christ, knowing that we live in a fallen world, but one day we will be 00:45:41.540 |
in heaven together for eternity because we have the same Father. 00:45:50.620 |
Third and finally, that the gospel ministry was carried out by many people without fanfare. 00:45:55.820 |
When we think about the gospel, we typically think about Apostle Paul, Apostle Peter, the 00:46:00.740 |
apostles, how they gave their life, but there were hundreds and thousands of people without 00:46:06.060 |
glory, without fame, without knowledge of anything else outside of that particular time. 00:46:13.060 |
In fact, even today, when we think about great men of God, we think of these great conference 00:46:18.780 |
speakers who wrote books, but 99% of all the gospel ministries are happening in the background 00:46:29.620 |
When they die, no one is going to venerate them, no one's going to remember them, but 00:46:36.140 |
they're going to be gone, but their names are written in the book of life. 00:46:44.700 |
Not only did Christ die for me, but I can die for him without name, without fanfare. 00:46:55.540 |
No one has to know me because my father knows me. 00:47:04.700 |
And that's the power that delivers us from ourselves. 00:47:07.900 |
Because the thing that kills us more than anything else is ourselves. 00:47:14.460 |
Our desire to be somebody, our desire to be recognized, our desire to be better than our 00:47:21.300 |
Even as Christians, we come to church and we compete with one another internally, not 00:47:25.820 |
externally, internally, because there's some of that world that's still sitting in us that 00:47:29.820 |
even as I preach the gospel, I want to be a great preacher. 00:47:35.540 |
We all want to be Apostle Paul, but nobody wants to be Jeremiah, the weeping prophet. 00:47:42.420 |
The gospel ministry happened with all of these people, and there are tons of people that 00:47:47.580 |
are not even mentioned in this letter, and God used every single one of them to spread 00:47:54.940 |
So my encouragement to you, again, chapter 16 is one of those, you know, like you just, 00:48:04.020 |
You turn on the fan and the page just rolls, and you can say you read it because your eyes 00:48:09.260 |
saw it, but you don't really know what's in there. 00:48:11.860 |
The chapter 16 is one of those chapters, but there's treasures in here because every single 00:48:19.700 |
So my encouragement, as I, again, let me ask our praise team to come up. 00:48:27.220 |
You know, whenever we think of Christianity or I'm going to do something great for God, 00:48:31.180 |
we automatically think of missions or, you know, be a pastor or do something, like I'm 00:48:35.860 |
going to go do this and that, but so much of God's work is just men and women, business 00:48:42.700 |
people, engineers, students, stay-at-home moms, just being faithful, and people who 00:48:50.380 |
have been affected by the cross just doing what God told them to do on a day-to-day basis. 00:48:56.220 |
So my prayer for our church is, yes, let's thank God for men like Apostle Paul. 00:49:03.440 |
Let's thank God for people who are being venerated, writing books, and challenging our generation, 00:49:08.460 |
but don't forget the 99.9% of the people who are faithfully serving God in the background, 00:49:16.720 |
Let's come to the Lord and be faithful as these men and women were faithful. 00:49:20.180 |
Let's take some time to pray as our worship team leaves.