Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Acts 19:23-41
Sermons from Commons Church. Intellectually honest. Spiritually passionate. Jesus at the centre. Since 2014.
Welcome to the commons cast. We're glad to have you here. We hope you find something meaningful in our teaching this week. Head to commons.church for more information. Welcome today.
Speaker 1:If you and I haven't met yet, my name is Jeremy. I get the privilege of helping to lead our team here at Commons, but I've been away for a few weeks this summer taking some vacation with my family and then also spending some time getting ready and prepping for the fall season that's ahead of us. But it's great to be back, so thanks for that. Now the fall is always a big deal around here. And so this September, we will be starting our fifth year together as Commons.
Speaker 1:It's hard to believe it's already been four years since we launched. But next Sunday is Labor Day weekend. Bobby's gonna be here teaching in Kensington, and then September 9 is our big fall launch. And this is gonna be a huge birthday party. The new journals will be here, and we will be off and running into the new season together.
Speaker 1:So mark your calendar, invite a friend, but make sure you're here for the fall because it really is gonna be a blast. However, as part of our fall launch every year, we also have this big team night every September where we gather together 200 plus of our favorite volunteers, and we put on a dinner from the staff to say thank you. Now this is only for volunteers, so it's special invite only, but here's the trick. You can still get an invite to dinner by joining any of the volunteer teams at commons.life. And so if you pull out your phone right now and head to commons.life or if you're on our main website, commons.church, just hit next steps.
Speaker 1:You can browse through all of the different volunteer teams and find an opportunity that fits for you so you can do that. Now one last thing before we jump in today. With the arrival of the fall, we are also saying goodbye to Maddie's time on staff here at Commons. Maddie was with us last year as a practicum student from Ambrose University, but we just liked her so much that we hired her for the summer to help us with some staff transitions. But Yelena is here now, and Maddie is heading back to school in the fall, And we are really thankful for her contribution this summer.
Speaker 1:It was amazing to get to hear her preach this summer and see as she continues to grow. She's gonna be around commons this year, so stay high. She just won't be on staff, but just make sure you don't ask her to get any cream for the coffee bar because she's just here like the rest of us. So say thanks to Maddie for all her work this year. Now today, we have reached the penultimate message in our series on the book of acts.
Speaker 1:And what's been really interesting this summer has been all of the different voices that have come and shared with us as we have worked our way through this book. And that's a little unusual for us. Usually, I do a lot of the talking, but one of the really neat things about acts as a text is that this book is structured in such a way that it's kinda set up as a series of snapshots. And so it's actually kind of fitting then and kind of fun to take a book like Acts and to tell that story chapter by chapter by inviting different voices to come in and link those stories together. Because it really is often voices from unexpected places in our lives that end up having the biggest impact on us.
Speaker 1:And so I hope you've enjoyed that chance this summer. Today, however, we find ourselves in Acts chapter 19. And over the last couple weeks, we have seen Paul in Philippi and then in Athens. Today, we are gonna follow him to Ephesus. And these are really three of the major cities in the ancient world, each of them with their own flavor and culture, each with their own challenges that they presented to Paul and to the early Jesus community.
Speaker 1:Now I've been living in Calgary now for fifteen years, but I am originally from Toronto, and so some of you still hold that against me no matter how long I've been here. But come on, fifteen years counts. But this summer, I was back in Ontario doing some visiting, and we were in Toronto, and we were in Ottawa. We made it to Barrie and Halliburton, and we spent some time in a little town where my parents live called Peterborough. We visited everyone.
Speaker 1:But one of the things that I do in every city when I travel is I try to find the best coffee in town. Right? And that ranges depending on the city. Shout out to Little Victories in Ottawa, probably the best coffee I had on tour while I was there. But this is actually one of my favorite things to do in a new city is to look for good coffee.
Speaker 1:So I was in Portland this spring, and I drank lots of coffee when I was there. But in my experience, you can actually tell a lot about the culture of a town by the coffee it drinks. Is this just utilitarian caffeine dispensation? Is this pretentious espresso nonsense? That's my favorite, by the way.
Speaker 1:Or is this just a really good carefully crafted coffee experience? Well, I actually love searching this stuff out, but one of the ways that you could tell a lot about the culture of an ancient city was to search out the temples. Because even though there was this larger Greco Roman religious culture that blanketed the Roman Empire. Each city would often have a particular temple dedicated to a particular god within the Greco Roman pantheon. And so Athens was famous for the temple of Athena, a goddess of wisdom, courage, inspiration, civilization, law and justice, strategic warfare, mathematics, strength, strategy, arts, crafts, and skills.
Speaker 1:She's a very busy woman. In Philippi, there was a temple to Pan, sort of this half goat, half man fellow. But maybe more interestingly, in Philippi, there was also a temple that was dedicated directly to Caesar Augustus. Ephesus, however, where we find ourselves today was built around the temple of Artemis. And Artemis and her brother Apollo were two of the most important Greek gods.
Speaker 1:In fact, Artemis is one of the few gods who keeps her Greek name during the Roman period. So when Zeus is becoming Jupiter and Ares is becoming Mars, Artemis and Apollo, they just stay Artemis and Apollo. And she was, among other things, the goddess of the hunt. But because Artemis and Apollo were so popular, having a temple dedicated to Artemis in town meant really big business for the city. I mean, who wants to visit the goat boy when you can go take your vacation and see Artemis?
Speaker 1:And so today really is a story about temples and tourism. It's a story about money and fear, and it's a story about what happens when what we really love actually gets pinched. So let's pray, and then we're gonna take a look at Ephesus today. Lord God of grace and peace, God who is present in our business and in our vacations, in our rest and in our work, God who delights in our play and creativity. Would you remind us of what it means to celebrate your nearness in every moment?
Speaker 1:That we might put our trust in you, to welcome those who love you, to extend our hearts, to encompass those we may once have seen on the outside as outsiders. God, might we find the courage to really examine our idols today and all the things that we work so hard to protect. Might we see your kingdom as an ongoing challenge to the status quo that surrounds us. And may we slowly come to see your grace in all things, that force that continually pushes back against the walls that we create for ourselves. And may your kingdom come near us today.
Speaker 1:In the strong name of the risen Christ, we pray. Amen. K. We're in Acts chapter 19, and let's take a look. We're gonna start in verse 23, if you're following along, where we read that there arose a great disturbance about the way.
Speaker 1:Now let's pause here quickly so that we can talk about this way. Do you remember the spring during Lent? We walked through a section in the gospel of John. And at one point, Jesus says, I am the way and the truth and the life. One of his most iconic phrases, one that probably most of us have heard at some point.
Speaker 1:Well, in that series, we talked about how Greek grammar functions a little differently than English, and in particular, how that definite article the functions differently in Greek. And I'm not gonna rehash all of that right now. You can find that series online. I believe it was part two in the one last thing series. But the conclusion we made there is that when Jesus says, I am the way and the truth and the life, what he's doing is actually taking these large Hebrew titles for the divine, and he's applying them to himself.
Speaker 1:Jesus is saying, I am way, and I am truth. I am life. And all of these big ancient concepts for God that you have floating around in your mind, in your memory, are now embodied right here in front of you. And one of the ways we have a sense that this is what Jesus was doing is that the early Christians then adopted those names for themselves. They don't actually call themselves Christians because they don't see themselves as part of a new religion.
Speaker 1:They call themselves the way because they see Jesus as the full and complete embodiment of their religious path. So all of their rituals, all of their traditions, all of their wisdom and learning has been leading them to a way of moving through the world. And this is really important because, obviously, you have to believe something about Jesus in order to want to live his way. That's why we talk about faith. Right?
Speaker 1:But you can't simply believe your way into Christianity. That's not all that faith is. Faith isn't just about what you think. Faith is about who you trust yourself to. And the reason that the early followers of Jesus called themselves the way is because they had come to believe that Jesus had saved the world and that they were now trusting themselves to the way of grace and peace in the world.
Speaker 1:And I'll tell you, one of the really compelling things about the book of acts is all of these incredible stories of people who are turning to Jesus and leaving old stories and wounds behind, and they give their hearts to him in order to move forward. But over and over again, it is the way that the message is carried by Jesus followers that makes it compelling. It was actually a Canadian, Marshall McLuhan, who once said the medium is the message. And honestly, as far as the book of acts is concerned, Marshall could have been a theologian. Because if our way doesn't look like Jesus, then he'd probably rather not we use his name.
Speaker 1:Now, we've only talked about two words here so far, so we need to keep going. But there arose a great disturbance. And a silver spith named Demetrius, who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought in a lot of business for the craftsman there. Called them together along with the workers in the related trades, and he said, you know my friends, we receive a good income from this business. And you see and hear how this fellow Paul has convinced and led astray large numbers of people here in Ephesus and practically the whole province of Asia.
Speaker 1:He says gods made by human hands are no gods at all. And there's a danger not only that our trade will lose its good name, but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis will be discredited. And the goddess herself who is worshiped throughout the province of Asia and the world, she will be robbed of her divine majesty. Now this is interesting because Demetrius has a choice to make here. And I mean, I think at least from the writer's perspective, he wants us to know that Demetrius has his money on his mind and his mind on his money, he doesn't wanna look too greedy here.
Speaker 1:Right? And so he wants to play the part of a good citizen. He wants to defend the honor of Artemis, but you gotta know your audience. And so Demetrius starts with the economics here. And this is a really interesting part of the story.
Speaker 1:Because in ancient Rome, religion was big business. Now I'm not gonna pretend that it's not in our world today. Of course, it can be. And there are abuses of that all the time. But in ancient Rome, these temples really were all about tourism.
Speaker 1:You see, people would travel to these temples, and when they got to the city, they would need somewhere to stay, and they would need something to eat, and they would often want to bring home some kind of knickknack to remember things by, maybe a little Artemis swag to throw up on the mantle when you arrive back home. And this is absolutely literally no different than all of the vendors who were selling Canada merch when I was at parliament in Ottawa this summer. It's the same thing. In fact, when Caesar Augustus died and it became clear that the imperial cult that worshiped the emperors was gaining a lot of popularity in Rome, there was a mad rush by cities all across the empire to start building shrines and temples to Augustus in order to see if they could get a little bit of that tourist cheddar. So if Paul is coming to town, and remember, he's already been in Philippi and in Athens and caused the disturbance in both.
Speaker 1:So people have probably heard of him. But if he's coming around and he's converting people to Jesus and he's telling people that idols statues and knickknacks are a waste of their time, he's probably not someone you want in your town messing up your buy one get one free Artemis sale. In fact, Demetrius very specifically points out that Paul is saying gods made by human hands are no gods at all, and that is exactly what Paul just said last week when he was in Athens. So the case against Paul is legit here in the sense that he is some potential danger to their business model. So the question is, what are they gonna do about it?
Speaker 1:Notice here that not only does Demetrius start with the economic case, but he starts by pulling together all of the technetase. Now that's the word that's translated craftsman in the NIV. But artisans would work equally as well here. And these would have been silversmiths, woodworkers, sculptors, anyone really who worked on creating items either for the temple and worship itself or, probably more lucratively, they would make items to be purchased by these religious tourists. Now interestingly, Jesus' father is referred to as a tecton in the gospel of Matthew, and that's a related career.
Speaker 1:Maybe a little lower down the economic food chain, but where a technetace might work with wood or metal to create a finished product, a piece of art, a tekton would usually work with stone or wood to build something functional, like a house frame or a table or a bed maybe. And so these technetace like Demetrius, they are sort of specialized workers in the same basic field as Jesus' father. This is probably very similar to some of skills that Jesus may have learned when he was growing up. In other words, this is good honest work. But notice here, Demetrius doesn't start with the priests or the priestesses that work at the temple.
Speaker 1:He doesn't talk to the most devoted followers of Artemis in town. He goes to those who make their money off this religious system. And he appeals to what scares them the most, their real idol, their wallet. And this is really the center of the contrast that the writer is wanting to draw out in this story. We've got Paul, who we already know is willing to give up anything for his god.
Speaker 1:And now we've got Demetrius who ostensibly worships Artemis, but pretty plainly serves what serves him the best. And what's interesting here is that Paul is not even really going to get to speak in the story today. The author is simply going to let the story play out and that let you and I make up our mind about what it means based on the contrast that we see. So verse 28, we read that when they heard this, they were furious. They began shouting, great is Artemis of the Ephesians.
Speaker 1:Soon, the whole city was in an uproar, and the people seized Gaius and Aristarchus, Paul's traveling companions from Macedonia, and all of them rushed into the theater together. Now the theater here is the Theater Of Ephesus, and this was cut into the western slope of a hill that butted up against the city. But this amphitheater could hold 25,000 people. So remember, Ephesus is a big important city. These are big important civic leaders.
Speaker 1:And three times a month, what happened was that there was a gathering in this theater to deal with city matters. And so what they're trying to do here is they're trying to invoke an impromptu civic assembly and sort of put these guys on trial. But make no mistake here, this is a mob. And so they drag them to the theater. They wanna act like this is a legitimate court, but this is nothing but an angry rabble trying to pretend that respectability.
Speaker 1:So they drag them in. Paul wants to get in, but he's told to stay away. And then we read that the assembly was in confusion, and some were shutting one thing, some another thing. Most of the people didn't even know why they were there in the first place. And the writer really wants to drive this home, that this is just a mess.
Speaker 1:There's no meaningful argument here. There's no legitimate debate. There is just anger and resentment in the crowd that anger and resentment draws. And all of it is derived from economic anxiety. Now what's interesting here is that when Luke describes this mob, he calls them an assembly in English.
Speaker 1:But the Greek word he uses here is ekklesia. And you may have heard that word before because it is the Greek word for a church. Now it has secular use as well. So it could mean an assembly or a gathering, and really that's essentially all that a church is at the end of the day. That's actually important theologically that the church is not an institution or a hierarchy or a bureaucracy.
Speaker 1:A church is simply a local gathering of people who trust the story of Jesus. But here, this mess and this mob, this ecclesia, this is the worst of religious protectionism taken form. This is economic anxiety turned into fear of the outsider and legitimized by an appeal to religion. And I think that maybe this writer uses this term as a very subtle warning to us and our churches as well. And it's very easy for money and fear and religion to get mixed together into something with a veneer of respectability to it, but something that is ultimately set against the work of God.
Speaker 1:And just in case we actually miss what's happening here, Luke continues. He says this, that the Jews in the crowd, they pushed Alexander to the front, and they shouted instructions to him. He motioned for silence in order to make a defense before the people. But when they realized he was a Jew, they all shouted in unison for hours, great is Artemis of the Ephesians. Now we don't really know who this Alexander is, but what's happening here is that the Jews in the city have been swept up into this frenzy of the mob here.
Speaker 1:And they've now ended up in the assembly with the Christians who are being accused, and they're feeling like they need to defend themselves. And there's a few reasons for that. First, as we mentioned earlier, the Christians or the people of the way as they call themselves, they didn't see themselves as a separate religion. They still saw themselves as Jews. And if they're gonna be public enemy number one in town, well, then the Jews are gonna wanna distance themselves from them.
Speaker 1:Hey. They're not us. Second, the Jews are already on the outside of this community because they don't acknowledge Artemis either. Now they'd never been seen as a threat before, and they lived in the city for generations. But now there's Paul who himself is a Jew, and he's getting everyone riled up.
Speaker 1:And the Jews are kinda worried that the mob's gonna turn on them next. So they're like, hey. It's not us. Probably the most important to the story here though is that the Jews here want to defend themselves against these charges because they realize that what's going on here isn't rational. This is just anger.
Speaker 1:So, yes, it is possible that Christianity poses some small threat to the economic status quo in Ephesus. And, yes, it really does seem that the idol that is worshipped in Ephesus is more financial than fictional. But what's happening here in this mob has long since forked off from any reasonable economic anxiety into pure xenophobia and racism. This is a mob that doesn't want the other here in their town. And Luke spells it out for us.
Speaker 1:Some were shouting one thing. Some were shouting another thing. Most of the people didn't even know what they were there for. And yet when they found out that Alexander was a Jew, they shouted him down without listening to him. You see, this is a story about the idols we think that we worship and the idols that actually drive our perception of the world that surrounds us.
Speaker 1:What happens when our financial interests are impacted? And what happens when people who aren't like us move in beside us. And what happens when the status quo, when our city begins to shift beneath us. Because often what happens is that it brings out the worst in our scapegoating tendencies. It's their fault.
Speaker 1:Look. This mob had lived beside these Jews all of their lives. And yet all of a sudden, Alexander isn't their neighbor anymore. He's different. And Paul isn't a Roman citizen anymore.
Speaker 1:He's an agitator. And Gaius and Aristarchus, two guys with about as Roman names as you can possibly get, aren't even given the chance to tell their story. They are just drowned out by a mob of angry voices. Look, I know this is an ancient story. It's from long ago and far away, and it's a stretch to imagine that we could so easily blame our insecurities on those who look different from us today.
Speaker 1:But is it possible that this ecclesia here might have something to say to our ecclesia today? Anytime we scapegoat the other, in fact, anytime we think that the other is a category that exists in the kingdom of God, We have lost the plot and begun to serve idols of our own manufacture, whether we have carvings on our mantles or not. You see, at its core, this is not really a story about statues. This is a story about all the ways in which we replace the divine with what serves our interests. And if you have ever wondered about how to make sense of all this idol worship talk in the bible and how to make that make sense in the real world, then this is a good place to start.
Speaker 1:Because very few of us go to sleep with Artemis on our bedside table, but a lot of us fall asleep thinking about how to protect what we already have. That is no way to dream well. Now, I mentioned earlier that the writer leaves Paul largely out of this story. And so let's pull things to close together today and see how it wraps out. Verse 35, we read that the city clerk then quieted the crowd and said, fellow Ephesians, doesn't all the world know that the city of Ephesus is the guardian of the temple of the great Artemis and her image which fell from heaven?
Speaker 1:Therefore, since these facts are undeniable, you ought to calm down calm down and not do anything rash. Basically, this guy steps up and he's like, alright. Chill, everyone. Then he goes on and he says, you have brought these men here, though they have neither robbed temples nor blasphemed our goddess. If then Demetrius and his fellow craftsmen have a grievance against anybody, well, the courts are open and there are prominent consoles.
Speaker 1:They can press charges. But if there's anything further you want to bring up, it must be settled in a legal assembly. As it is already, we are in danger of being charged with rioting because of what has happened today. If that were to happen, we would not be able to account for this commotion since there is no reason for it. And after he said this, he dismissed the assembly.
Speaker 1:Now there's two important things here that are going on in this conclusion. First, the writer really wants to make the point that Christianity is not the boogeyman that the crowds are making it out to be. So, yeah, Christianity is gonna challenge the status quo. And, yes, it is going to change the world, but, no, Christianity is not this illegal, immoral movement predicated on sowing chaos throughout the empire. Now Luke wants to show that even the Roman system has to recognize that the way of Jesus is not illegal, is challenging, yes, and it's transformative, of course, but illegal, no.
Speaker 1:Second, I think the writer is also very subtly wanting to undermine the justice of rumpire as well. So, yeah, there are rules. Yes. They're gonna be followed. And, yes, the mob disperses and the Christians are set free.
Speaker 1:But this moment is just as much as the previous one about preserving the status quo. See the mob wants to riot because their economic interests are being challenged, but the clerk wants to quell the riot to make sure that Rome doesn't get involved in his business. Everybody here is really just looking out for themselves. And this is really one of the greatest challenges when it comes to following the way of Jesus in the real world. Very often, our idol is whatever serves us well.
Speaker 1:And sometimes that's the things we control. Sometimes it's the systems that surround us and support us. And until we are ready to lose something for the good of someone else, then we will always find ourselves standing at a distance from the one that we claim to worship. So may you know the difference today between the idols that serve you and the God that loves you. And may you be willing to lose the first in order to gain the second, particularly when it costs you something dear.
Speaker 1:Let's pray. God, for all the ways that we lose sight of you and we fix our attention on the idols that surround us, whether that looks religious or not, but the way that we focus our attention on what serves us best, what protects us the most, what keeps things comfortable and easy for us, we ask for your grace. And in those moments where we are then challenged to step out from the walls that we're used to and to embrace stories that are different from ours. For the ways that we are called to care for people who seem like they are set against us or different from us, we pray for your peace. That your spirit might guide and shape and help us to realize that the walls that we manufacture, our idols, were nothing to begin with, and that your kingdom calls us, invites us into something more true and beautiful than we imagine in this moment.
Speaker 1:God, one step at a time, might we be invited towards your kingdom. In the strong name of the risen Christ we pray. Amen.