Good morning to everyone. Good to see you all here this morning. We're gonna be looking at Acts 17, finishing up just a little bit in Acts, well in verse 10 and then down through the end of the chapter.

What we're going to talk about this morning is knowing God and the thing that strikes us in this passage with Paul in Athens and his speech here before the philosophers is that God is unknown in our world, and that's true for religious men and that's true for pagans alike. That's something that we see through the book of Acts. The main point is that they're going out to preach the gospel to tell people about Jesus so that men might come to know God.

I've often wondered and sometimes debated whether it's easier to witness to a devoutly religious man with some Christian affiliation or a totally irreligious pagan. Certainly, they both present their challenges and sometimes it seems that with a professing Christian, a religious man, at least you have some common ground, somewhere to start, some things that you do not have to establish to get to the gospel. Things like the deity of Christ, the sin of man, the need of a Savior, the resurrection of Christ. 

Usually with religious men, it's a matter of showing them the futility of works for their salvation, but with the atheist or the agnostic or the simply irreligious man, there's a whole different way of thinking. There's no basis, perhaps not even a belief in absolutes or morality or truth at all. It's a different conversation and a different starting point where we must establish the basic premises of Christianity. 

In our text today, we see that Paul dealt with these same things in his life and ministry. We've seen him in account after account, city after city, even today in our text in Berea going into the synagogues and reasoning from the scriptures with the Jews that the Messiah had to suffer and that this Jesus that Paul was preaching was the fulfillment of the promise; he was the Messiah, the Christ. He had a lot of common ground there, a lot of common beliefs concerning the Old Testament, who God is and what the promises were. It was an easy launching point.

What we see is that it was not an easy task to persuade them that Jesus was the fulfillment of the promises. Paul was persecuted, he was run out of town, beaten and stoned for this very proposition as he sought to preach Christ. Well, today we see that Paul finds himself alone in Athens, a purely heathen city, very religious no doubt, but with no concept of the God of Israel, of sin and judgment and grace and forgiveness through the cross of Christ and His resurrection. There is virtually no common ground here, no starting point within the context of the scriptures or of truth or the framework of Judaism or Christianity.

I wonder if we asked Paul what he would say about who it is that it's easier to witness to. I'm guessing he would tell us that it doesn't matter. We are here to witness to every creature in every place, in every opportunity, with the same message, the same gospel. But Paul does show us that there may be a different way to get to the message; different circumstances, different opportunities to preach Christ. And the key here is that we do preach Christ. 

Let's not get so hung up in the method or the process that we never get to the message. This is a great example given us by Paul, a most interesting event in his life and ministry, but the key to see here is that in the course of his preaching, Paul is preaching Jesus. Maybe in a little different way, but by a different route than he did in the synagogue. But this is not some huge method change or paradigm shift. It's just common sense, my friends, as he seeks to preach Christ in the natural course of his life and ministry as God gives him the opportunity.

I was thinking about years ago I was invited to the National Trappers Association and I was invited to do the Sunday morning service there and a bunch of greasy trappers in there, you know, all my brethren. And I thought about how I would preach the gospel to them, and I didn't do it the same as I might in a different circumstance with different people. I talked about setting traps and breaking the law. And if you set a hundred counterbears and you set them all legally, and you set one that isn't legal, and they catch you, then you don't get to say my good works outweigh my bad, and the trappers understood that. 

So it was a different circumstance, different people, but that's just common sense. It's not a whole different methodology as we see some people build out of this account in Acts 17. Let's look at our text in verse 10. It says, "...then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived they went into the synagogue of the Jews. These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica in that they received the word with all readiness and searched the scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so. Therefore many of them believed and also not a few of the Greeks, prominent women as well as men. 

But when the Jews from Thessalonica learned that the word of God was preached by Paul at Berea, they came there also and stirred up the crowds. Then immediately the brethren sent Paul away to go to the sea, but both Silas and Timothy remained there. So those who conducted Paul brought him to Athens and receiving a command for Silas and Timothy to come to him with all speed, they departed. 

Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him when he saw that the city was given over to idols. Therefore he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and with the Gentile worshipers and in the marketplace daily with those who happened to be there. Then certain Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him and some said, what does this babbler want to say? Others said, he seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods because he preached to them Jesus and the resurrection. And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus saying, may we know what this new doctrine is of which you speak. 

And I'm going to stop there at verse 19. I've given you five points on your outline for our text this morning. The first, the unknown God. The second, Creator. Third, Sustainer. Fourth, Seeker. And fifth, Judge. I'd like to begin by asking you to turn to John 17 with me, please. John 17 at verse 1. This is Jesus' high priestly prayer before His crucifixion. In John 17 1, Jesus prayed, Father the hour has come. Glorify your Son that your Son also may glorify you as you have given him authority over all flesh that you should give eternal life to as many as you have given him. 

Now look at verse 3 with me, please. And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. This is eternal life, to know the one and only true God and Jesus Christ whom He has sent. In John 14 6, Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known me, you would have known the Father also. And from now on you have known Him and have seen Him. 

Hebrews 11 6 says, But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. And Romans 10 17 says, So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God, or literally a message about Jesus. Eternal life is this, my friends, to know God. And we know God by knowing Jesus Christ, and we know Jesus Christ by the Word of God. By hearing a message about Jesus, the gospel, believing, placing our faith in Him, receiving the Holy Spirit, the resident truth teacher, and then by studying, hearing, consuming the Word of God. This is how we can know God. 

And this is the very desire of God, and the reason that He sent Jesus His Son. In 2 Peter 3 9 it says, The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is long-suffering toward us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. In 1 Timothy 2, Paul writes, Therefore I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men, for kings, and all who are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, listen to verse 4, who desires all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth. 

For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time. It is God's very desire and purpose that all men should come to know Him through faith in Jesus Christ, through the Word, that they should know Him, and knowing Him that they would have eternal life. We see that this is Paul's desire as well, as the love of God was poured out into his heart by the Holy Spirit who was given to him, and it was Paul's intent and method to have those who come to faith in Christ, who know God, to grow in knowledge through the Word. 

In contrast with those who deny Christ, who will not come to Him by faith, but rather are religious, seeking to establish their own righteousness by works, those who Paul says are always learning but never able to come to the knowledge of the truth, in contrast to them, those who believe Jesus grow by the truth, they grow by the Word of God. In Colossians 1 9, he says, for this reason we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God, strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and long-suffering with joy, giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light.

We increase in the knowledge of God through the study of His Word. Paul believed that the key to salvation, coming to faith in Christ, was the preaching of the Word of God, a message about Jesus, the gospel. And he believed as Jesus taught, that sanctification comes by the Word of God as well, that we grow in the grace and knowledge of God through the Word of God. And this is why he said of the Bereans that they were more noble than the Thessalonians, because they searched the scriptures daily to see if what Paul was telling them was true. This is so key to our understanding, my friends. 

We can only know God through the Word. Look at verse 10 in our text again, please. It says, "...then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea." So they're run out of Thessalonica, persecution comes again from the Jews. It says, "...when they arrived, what did they do? They went into the synagogue." We talked about this before, but Paul just kept going into the synagogue. Every time he was beaten, he was stoned, he was persecuted, he was run out of town, but yet he went back every time to preach to the Jews. His desire was for them to be saved.

In verse 11, it tells us that they were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, and that they received the Word with all readiness and searched the scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so. Now look at the interesting word at the beginning of verse 12, "...therefore," because they searched the scriptures, because they received the Word with readiness, because their desire was to know God, "...therefore many of them believed." And also, not a few of the Greeks, prominent women as well as men.

But when the Jews from Thessalonica learned that the Word of God was preached by Paul at Berea, they came there also and stirred up the crowds, and so they had to send Paul out again and they took him to Athens, Silas and Timothy staying behind in Berea. We see as usual, as was his custom, that Paul went into the synagogue first and he preached Jesus as the Christ, but here the Jews received the Word. The legalistic men followed from Thessalonica and ran him out of town again, but when he left the Bereans, he left Silas and Timothy there, and he went on to Athens, and there he finds himself alone in the pagan city, one of the greatest cities of all time.

Look at verse 16, "...now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him when he saw that the city was given over to idols." They were very learned, very cultured people in Athens and also very religious. They had all kinds of gods, every god, even an inscription, an altar to the unknown God. This reminds me of when I was in India; the people there were very, very religious. Augustine told me that they had over 350 million gods, one for every American, he joked. They are surely religious, they surely have a zeal, but it's not according to knowledge, not according to knowledge of the one true God. 

And so it says that all this pagan worship, this idol worship and religion vexed Paul; it provoked him in his spirit. I wonder if you've been in a place like this. Are there situations that you found yourself in where it was so palpably pagan that you were vexed in your spirit? Maybe you've been to a foreign country or even places in this country where there's a fervent false religion or maybe it's just where you work or in your social circumstances or, worse yet, at family gatherings. This is a pagan world, my friends, and even in the good old USA it's becoming more and more filled with idol worship all the time. 

And you can sense it, you can feel it at times, and it provokes your spirit and it grieves your soul. And this is the way Paul felt standing in Athens, the greatest of cities, filled with all kinds of art and culture and wisdom and knowledge, but no knowledge of God. Paul had a yearning, a desire to bring the truth to these people, to lead them to faith, to save them from this false religion and the wrath of God to come, and he so wanted to preach to them, but where could he start? 

Well, he did go into the synagogue, as always, but this city was a great city filled with Gentiles. What should he do? Where can he start? Well, he went to the marketplace, it says, out on the street, and he just began to preach. He reasoned daily with whoever happened to be there, it says. He had to preach. He had to rescue these men from idol worship and condemnation. That was his heart. That was what drove him. That was the love of Christ in him. 

And so he just went into the public square, and he opened his mouth, and he preached Christ. And as he preached, some philosophers heard him. And they were interested in what he was saying, this new thing that had not come to their ears before. 

Look at verse 18. It says, then certain Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him, and some said, what does this babbler want to say? Others said, he seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods because he preached to them Jesus and the resurrection. And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, may we know what this new doctrine is of which you speak? 

For you are bringing some strange things to our ears, therefore we want to know what these things mean. For all the Athenians and the foreigners who were there spent their time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing. I just brought to my mind a class I took at Northland College, a philosophy class. I hadn't thought about this in a while. A friend of mine, we’re in that class, he was a vegetable farmer from Maine, had 12 kids in his family, and he had a speech impediment, and he had a Maine accent, and he kind of sounded like Elmer Fudd. 

And we just died in this class every day. We had to read a book called When Broccoli Cries. It was about how the grass screamed when you mowed your yard, and all this different philosophy and all these hippies in the class at Northland College. And one day there was a young guy in a little goatee back before they were popular, and he said to the professor, I believe that hunting is evil. 

And he said, I also believe that the cattle industry is evil. The professor's going, hmm. And he says, what we could do is we could eliminate one evil if we had the hunters shoot the cows. And this is what we lived with every day. So my friend couldn't take it anymore, and I was sitting behind him, and he stood up and he turned around like he was pointing a gun at me, and he said, fleas, heffa. So we got kicked out of the class. They wanted to hear some new thing. Philosophers. 

These were worldly wise men if there ever were any. It's difficult to really explain the philosophies of these men, the Epicureans set in contrast to the Stoics, but we don't really have time to go into all their babble. What is interesting in relation to our passage is that they were both consumed with nature and the universe and how it was formed and where it was going and how that related to how a man should live a flourishing life that's not devoid of meaning. They definitely saw the universe from different perspectives, but how things are formed and worked in the natural world were the key in their minds to understanding the meaning of life and how to live it. 

And they thought and taught and discussed and philosophized endlessly on these things. I wonder who was working. So here Paul comes, he's eager to preach, he's vexed in his soul by the rampant idolatry and the lostness of these well-learned and thinking men, and he gets an opportunity to preach to them as they asked to hear this new wisdom that had intrigued them. And they brought him to the place where they loved to sit and discuss and judge such things, part of their job was to judge the philosophies of men, and this was called Mars Hill, you may be familiar with that term.

So get the scene, picture yourself surrounded by idol worshippers with no background in the Hebrew Scriptures, no concept of the promises of Jehovah God or His singular deity or sovereignty or plan for life in eternity. What do you say? Where do you start? They've set him in the center of this place to listen to what he has to say, given him an opportunity. 

So Paul observed something from their very own culture, from their worship, a sort of relational point from which to begin, the unknown God, verse 22. Then Paul stood in the midst of Areopagus and said, men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious, for as I was passing through and considering the objects of your worship, I even found an altar with this inscription, the unknown God; therefore the one whom you worship without knowing, Him I proclaim to you. Now he has their attention. 

What's he going to say about God to these pagans? Verse 24, God who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands. He starts right away, you guys have it all wrong. Nor is He worshipped with men's hands as though He needed anything since He gives to all life and breath and all things, and He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on the face of the earth and has determined their pre-appointed times and boundaries of their dwelling so that they should seek the Lord in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us, for in Him we live and move and have our being. 

As also some of your own poets have said, for we are also His offspring. Therefore, since we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the divine nature is like gold or silver or stone, something shaped by art and man's devising. Paul says, I've noticed that you're very religious. You have all kinds of gods. I even saw that you worship the unknown God. Let me tell you about Him. 

Immediately turning it to the truth, Paul's found a point of reference that allows him to gain their interest but to immediately turn to preaching the gospel, to lay down the foundation for the gospel and to show the need for a Savior because of sin and then to preach Jesus as that one and only Savior. You see, they had no clue. They had no knowledge of the true God. Their view of the gods, many gods, in fact, was based on man's created gods, man's corrupt gods, Greek mythology, gods designed after nature, after man's imperfection, with man's desire to justify himself. That's what their gods were about. 

This is the same thing Paul wrote about in Romans 1. Turn over to Romans 1 with me, please, at verse 18. Romans 1:18 explains religion. And for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth and unrighteousness. Because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse. 

Because although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, that's what we have in Athens, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things. My friends, this is the origin of all man's religions. 

And Paul is about to challenge their wisdom, their ideas concerning the gods, their entire worldview, and he does it in a most interesting way. By describing God as the creator and the sustainer of all things. You see, these learned men, these teachers, these philosophers believed that gods created gods, and they made other gods, and finally one god made some material things, and there was a labyrinth of deities and mythologies and pure craziness in their worship and their understanding of the gods and of man. 

But Paul wants them to know the true God is the creator God. He's the God who made everything. Think about the weight that that truth carries. He made everything that is. He sustains everything that is by His power. He is sovereign over all things. He's determined the pre-appointed times and purposes and boundaries of where men will live. He's sovereign. Verse 23, he says, therefore, the one who you worship without knowing Him, I proclaim to you. And then he goes on to talk about how He made the world, how we exist in Him, we depend on Him for our very life and breath and that He's sovereign over all things.

It amazes me that in our churches in the Christian world today, we have capitulated to so-called science on the origins of the universe. It is abundantly clear in Genesis 1 that God created everything that was made in six literal days. Listen to the comments in the New Testament concerning the Creator, Jesus Christ. 

John 1, in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. Colossians 1, He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation, for by Him all things were created that are in heaven, that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, all things were created through Him and for Him. 

Hebrews 1, God who at various times and various ways spoke in the time past by the fathers, by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds, who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person and upholding all things, He sustains, upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high. 

My friends, Jesus is the creator; Jesus is the sustainer of all things, make no mistake about it. And the incredible, absolutely unbelievable theory of evolution has taken hold for one reason and one reason only. Because men love their sin and they cannot stand the thought of an accountable God. To believe that nothing times time produced everything takes infinitely more faith to believe than the consistent, continual biblical account of creation of the world from Genesis to Revelation. Men hold down, they suppress the obvious truth because they love darkness and their deeds are evil. 

They accept evolution not based on any evidence, but on their own desire to rid themselves of an accountable God. Julian Huxley, the grandson of Darwin's bulldog, Adolph Huxley, said that men accepted evolution because the idea of an accountable God interfered with our sexual mores. Sometimes they're honest. 

Listen to what Jesus said in John 5:46. Do not think that I shall accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you, Moses, in whom you trust. For if you believe Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words? In Romans 5:12, Paul made this statement a dagger in the heart of the theory of evolution which is built on millions of years of death and disease and destruction. He said, therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world and death through sin and thus death spread to all men because all sinned. 

Before Adam, there was no death, there was no disease, there was no suffering, there was no natural selection because there was no sin. We can believe God in Genesis just as we can believe Him in John 3:16. In fact, Genesis 1 to 11 is the basis for John 3:16. And this is precisely where Paul starts, my friends, proclaiming who God is. He is the creator of all things. He is the sustainer of all things. In Him we live and move and have our being, and from one blood He has made every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and He is sovereign having determined their pre-appointed times and boundaries of their dwellings. 

You see, these are the foundations of the gospel, my friends, who God is, who man is. The different gods of Athens and they're so different from the gods of Athens and from our pagan gods that we have in our culture today. We are all sons of Adam. We are all sinners in Adam. We all need to be changed. We need to be born again, recreated through faith in Jesus Christ, and Paul is laying the foundation for this truth. 

We're all dependent on the Creator God for our life, for our breath. And Paul says he's done all of this, especially sending His Son Jesus for an express purpose in order that men might seek the Lord and hope that they might grope for Him and find Him. You see, it's not through some great philosophy, some seriously thought out system of intricate rites and rituals, meditations and academics. And it's not by sitting in a tent on top of a mountain contemplating our navels. Paul says God is omnipresent. He's everywhere. He sent Jesus so that man might turn to Him and believe, might seek God who's not far, who is seeking us with open arms.

Jesus came into the world to seek and to save the lost. Jesus gave all. He took on flesh, condescended and became a man to seek and save all men by His sacrifice on the cross, His death, His burial and His resurrection, and by this He draws all men unto Himself. This is who the true God is. This is the God that you must know. Paul is using the truth of who God is, the Genesis foundation of creation, of the fall, of the promise of God, of a Redeemer and a Savior for those who will seek Him and believe Him. 

And these are important lessons for us today in our pagan world as well. And in the face of all the confusion and the compromise that we see in the church, Paul tells them God is not like man. God is not like your systems and temples and sacrifices. None of this can contain God. He made everything. He sustains everything. We are wholly dependent on Him and need Him. And next we see Paul explain that the unknown God, the Creator God, the Sustainer God, the Seeking God, who desires that men seek after Him, is also the Judge of all men.

Now Paul hits them with the truth of God as judge and with Jesus as the Savior of that judgment. Look at verse 30. Truly these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising him from the dead. 

Paul spent a great deal of effort to show them who God is, that they might know Him. He laid the foundation that needed to be laid of creation, of condemnation, of sovereignty, and God's desire for men to seek Him and know Him. But now he gets to the heart of the matter, the fact, the truth of judgment to come, and of Jesus as the Savior. As we talked about last week, Paul offends at the point where he must offend, at the point of the gospel. He must, as we must, tell men of the judgment to come for sin, of God's wrath for those who are in Adam. 

And we must tell them the good news that God has made a way for men to be saved from this judgment, from the wrath of God, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Faith in His one-time sacrifice in our place for our sins. Romans 1-4 says that God showed Jesus to be the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead. It’s Jesus who will judge the world at God's appointed time. 

But the good news is that for those who believe Him, who trust Him, the judge is our advocate. He is our Savior. He's our friend. If we choose to believe Him and trust in Him alone, the one who condemns is the one who is for us. Turn over to Romans 8. Let's close with Romans 8 in this beautiful scripture, 831-34. This follows Romans 8:28-30. The truth that God is working all things together for our good, that He's promised to conform us to the likeness of His Son for those who love Him, who are the called according to His purpose. And in verse 31, He says, What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? 

Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is He who condemns? It is Christ who died and furthermore is also risen. Who's the judge? Jesus is the judge. But look what it says at the end of verse 34. Who is even at the right hand of God who also makes intercession for us. John tells us in 1 John that we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. Jesus is the judge. But for those who will believe Him, He is the one who died and furthermore is also risen. 

And He even sits at the right hand of God in power and authority making intercession for us. What security, what salvation we have in Him. The question is, will you believe Him? That was the question for these philosophers in Athens that day. Will you believe Him? And we see at the end of our text what is always the case. Verse 32. And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked, while others said, we will hear you again on this matter, we'll put it off for a while. 

So Paul departed from among them. Now look at verse 34. However, some men joined him and believed. Among them Dionysius, the Arapegite, and a woman named Demarius, and others with them. Some men will reject the good news of salvation by grace, through faith, in favor of their own wisdom, their own religion. Many men. And we depart from them. But my friends, for those who believe, for those who join us in knowing God, and experiencing having eternal life, we have fellowship forever in the gospel, in Jesus Christ. 

And this is our great desire. This is our privilege. This is our joy. This is what Paul was doing. This is why he suffered all of those hardships. This is why he went into the marketplace and just started preaching to anyone who would listen. Because he was so moved in his spirit for the souls of men that he had to speak. He said, we believe, therefore we speak. And that's why we're here. And that's the example that Paul is giving to us in the book of Acts. 

Let's close in prayer. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank You again for the opportunity to come to this place and to gather around Christ our fellowship in Him and our common faith in Him, and just to rejoice and to praise and worship and to grow and to learn through Your Word. Thank You for Your faithfulness. Thank You that You're our Father. Thank You that we can know You through Jesus Christ. It's in His name we pray. Amen.