The Courage of Conviction, Part 2
Acts 21:7-9
We're talking about the courage of conviction. That's the title of this little look at the 21st chapter of Acts. And to give you a broad perspective, we have been studying the Book of Acts, which is the story of the history of the church in its early years from its beginning in Jerusalem until the time that it became founded and formed in Rome. So it's the sweep of Christianity as it begins in Jerusalem and sweeps across the gentile world to Rome.
We found that the history of the church is not the history of events, but it's the history of people. We found that the church catalyst in the early years was Peter. And soon after Peter, we met people like Philip and Steven, who had great force and impetus in the growth of the church. And then there were others unnamed. And then we met the Apostle Paul. And starting in the 13th chapter of Acts, everything sort of issues from Paul. And we see him in combination with Barnabus and Silas and timothy and Luke. And we're watching Paul now, as he will fill out the rest of the Book of Acts in his ministry. As we come to chapter 21, he is concluding his third missionary tour. He is on his way back to Jerusalem.
And as we have studied the book of history...and it is a book of history...we have been reminded all the way through the Book of Acts that what we're reading is not just history, but that woven into the history and the narrative that we have been studying are principles that apply to life. And I suppose that the Book of Acts has become, for all of us, a very precious and practical instruction manual on the life of the church and the life of the believer in the church, as we have seen by example rather than by precept, for the most part, great principles that are applicable to our lives.
And as we have looked at chapter 21 verses 1-15, we have chosen out of that the principle of conviction or the courage of conviction for kind of a focal point. And as I've said to you many times, you could probably focus on a multiple of options in any given passage, and that's the genius of Scripture. But for this time, for this Lord's Day, for this series, and for my mind, it seems as though I read in these verses that Paul is a man of conviction, and that conviction needs to be translated to us.
Certainly there is no substitute for conviction. And by that, we maybe could substitute some old Baptist words that some of you probably grew up on, like dedication, consecration, yieldedness, surrender...those last two sound more like Methodist words. But somewhere along the line, those words have fit into all of the past of our various vocabularies and religious experiences if we've been in the church for any time. We've all been to conferences, camps, and Bible meetings, etc. And we've heard about being dedicated, consecrated, and committed. And this is really basic and, well, we should hear about it.
But as we come to 21 of Acts, we're not so much exposed to a sermon on commitment as we are to a life that is committed. And I've said this in my own mind over and over again, that I see more of what Paul is from what he does than what he says. But what makes it so powerful is that he winds up being what he talks about. And if I am to study the epistles of Paul, and I am to get all that exhortation that's good. But then I go back into the Book of Acts, and I say to myself, "This guy believed that. He made it operable. And here are the results of it." And that's exciting because that gives feet to exhortation. That gives application to information. That gives example, and I need an example. I need more than a lecture...I need a pattern. And so I see in the Book of Acts a man who is what he preached. And consequently, I learned from him.
Now Paul expressed something of his commitment...something of his dedication, if you will, or consecration, or the courage of conviction...whatever happens to say it to you. In chapter 20 verses 22-24, this kind of sets the pattern for what we're seeing in 21. He's on his way to Jerusalem, and he knows that that's going out of the proverbial frying pan into the fire. It was bad enough to be in Asia Minor and have the Jews against you, but it's worse to be in Jerusalem and have them against you. After all, that is where they're at. In great numbers and with great fury do they defend their Judaism at home base.
And so Paul moving toward Jerusalem, already despised and hated by the Jewish hierarchy for his preaching of the Gospel, which they simply determined is a heresy. And the closer he gets, the hotter it gets, and he continues that way. And verse 22 speaks with these words: "Now, behold, I go bound in the Spirit to Jerusalem." In other words, he was compelled to go. "Not knowing the things that shall befall me there." In other words, the particulars. "I know this though, that the Holy Spirit witnesses in every city that bonds and afflictions await me." Now he knew that because every town he went to, somebody told him that. Somebody used the Spirit and informed him he was going to get it when he got there. "But none of these things move me off my course. Neither count I my life dear unto myself so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus, which is to testify the Gospel of the grace of God." Now he says, "I have a ministry. The Lord gave me that ministry. I'm going to fulfill that ministry...I don't care what the price is." Now that's what I call commitment. Of all the words that are used, I prefer that word. But you might call it the courage of conviction, consecration, devotion, dedication, surrender, or yieldedness. Whatever other terms it comes under, it is basically the same thing. He says, "I have an objective. God has committed to me a ministry. I'm going to see that thing to its fulfillment. And the price that I have to pay is inconsequential to the fulfillment of the objective."
Now the issue is this: you take all those words that I've mentioned...all of them...and the basic definition of all of them in terms of practice...not in terms of dictionaries...but in terms of practice, the basic definition is the issue of the supreme and undivided lordship of Jesus Christ in the life of a believer. It is not a question of whether He is Lord...He is Lord, right? It is a question of my submission to His supremacy and my undivided obedience to that lordship...that's what we're getting at. We know the Lord Jesus Christ is a plan for my life...a plan to unfold for my ministry, and for yours as well, because you're a minister of Christ equally as I am. And that unfolding plan is done in terms of the mind of God. It is an accomplished fact, at least in terms of preparation...God knows what it is He wants us to do. And we have been given the opportunity to do that ministry...to fulfill that ministry. The question of consecration or devotion is simply whether we submit ourselves to that lordship undividedly accomplishing what He has called us to do.
Now we've called it the courage of conviction only to divide it into two parts. First of all, this whole idea of dedication begins with a conviction, and then secondly with the courage to see it through.
And there are different levels of conviction or commitment...let me just share them with you, just to help you to put everything in perspective. And I think most Christians fall under these categories. First of all, there's what I'll call incomplete commitment. In other words, you're committed up to a point if it doesn't get too hairy, or if it doesn't really intrude on my schedule a lot, or if it doesn't hassle me at the point of my own self-desires. I'm committed up to a point.
There was a man like this...there are a lot of men like this in the Bible...but one that came to mind was a man by the name of Demas. He was a nice fellow, I assume, or Paul wouldn't have chosen him as a companion. And Paul dearly loved him, which says something else about his character. And he accompanied the Apostle Paul on certain ministries with apparently some degree of involvement and success. But Paul gives a very pensive statement regarding Demas when he says, "Demas has forsaken me, having loved" what..."the present world."
Now there was a rival in the life of Demas for the lordship of Christ, and it was the system that he loved. Somehow Demas loved the world, the world that he knew in Thessalonica. And the time came when it got right down to the nitty-gritty of sacrifice that he opted out for the love of the Thessalonian system rather than the love of Jesus Christ. That's what you call incomplete commitment. His commitment was valid up to a point, but at a certain point in time and under certain stress, he cut out on his whole commitment and went the way of his own whims.
And you know, there are a lot of people like that. There are a lot of people who are very committed, except to the very crisis issues. When it gets right down to it, there's something missing. If you're struggling in your life with the conflict of the lordship of Christ and something else, you're incompletely committed.
The second kind of commitment that I'll just bring to your attention is what I call insincere commitment. This is the verbal commitment that doesn't have any feet on it. This is Peter..."Lord, whatever happens, I'll die for you." And immediately when given the opportunity, he denies Christ on three occasions. That's a lot of verbal balderdash, to use an old word, defined in Scripture under the term hypocrisy. This is all talk and no action. This is the person who is pias on the outside and supposedly very consecrated, very godly, and so forth, and so on. And when it comes right down to it, there's nothing there at all...it's all fluff...it's all show...it's all pretense...it's all superficial.
A classic illustration would be a couple in the early church by the names of Ananias and Saphira, who wanted to get in on being treated like they were holy people. So they tried to play the game, so they said, "We'll give all we have to the Lord." And then they gave the Lord part, and stuck the rest in their pocket. And Peter said, "You've lied to the Holy Spirit." And God took their life...they both died, executed by God on the spot.
You see, that's insincere commitment, and that is going all the time. And I think that there's nothing...and I guess maybe in the tradition of Jesus Christ, there's nothing as sickening as this...that façade of spirituality that has nothing behind it of genuine commitment. That's the person who...and I see this all the time...because there are people who, you know, they want to come on to me like they're very godly people...see, this is important...I mean it's the preacher, you know..."Here comes the pastor, cool it." And so I get that a lot, and then I find out what's really going on behind the scenes. And I wish that they were at least honest to begin with so you could at least begin to evaluate somehow to help them rather than to play games. There's a lot of insincere commitment...all talk and no action...Ananias and Saphira...dishonesty in the heart.
But there's a third kind. And I suppose all of us, at one time or another, get trapped into this deal, and this might define most Christians too, and that's what I call intermittent commitment. It all depends on which day you talk to them whether they're committed or not. It comes and goes. And the extreme form of it is in the church of Ephasis, as our Lord wrote and said, "I have this against you. You have left your first love." These are the bouncing balls of Christianity. And very often, the bounce goes out, and they just roll along at the low level.
Now God's choice for his people is not incomplete, insincere, or intermittent commitment. God's choice is total, constant, complete, and full commitment...that kind of dedication that goes along, and whatever happens happens, but that doesn't change the commitment.
Now Paul was this kind of a man. He had convictions, he was committed to them, and it didn't matter what the consequences were for him...he had the courage of conviction. And as I would stress to you, he did not have a different Holy Spirit. He had the same resources you have, right? So you can't say, "I'm no Apostle Paul." Well, he wasn't an Apostle Paul either. He was just a plain old Saul of Tarsus. It was the Holy Spirit that made him what he was. And you're nothing either...neither am I...but we do have the same Holy Spirit. So you're right in the sense that you're nothing, but you're not right in the sense that you can't do anything, because in His energy, you can.
All right, he had the courage of conviction, which means he was absolutely abandoned to the cause. And this is the kind of thing God desires. Those other kinds of commitment are worthless. I think Jesus established the norm when he said this: "If any man will come after Me"...Luke 9:23..."Let him" what..."Deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Me."
You know, it is basic to commitment that you've got to crucify self. You've just got to deny self...it's got to be put out of the way. It's over with. You say, "Yes, but that's for the great saints. That's for the spiritual giants." No, that's for the spiritual normals. All the rest of us are retarded, abnormal, subnormal. No, normalcy is that kind of attitude that Paul had.
Now in our passage, we're looking at Paul, the example, and we see in him the courage of conviction has four features. The last time we considered the first two...this time, we'll consider part of the third (Laughter). Anyway, after the sermon in the first hour, somebody came and said, "You didn't have any conclusion to that sermon." (Laughter) I said, "I know." We just ran out of time...that was it.
The courage of conviction involves, first of all, the knowledge of purpose. The courage of conviction knows its purpose. You cannot be convicted to fulfill something if you don't know what it is, right? You've got to have an objective. You're never going to win a race unless you know what race you're in. So the courage of conviction knows its purpose...that's the beginning. Secondly, it can't be diverted. Thirdly, it pays any price. And fourthly, it affects others.
Now first of all, by way of review, just to mention some thoughts, the courage of conviction knows its objective. A Christian knows his objective...Paul put it this way: "That I may know Him." That's a great objective. Or maybe the objective can be to walk in the Spirit, which we're going to talk about tonight. Or maybe your objective is simply to fulfill your life to the glory of God...that's general, that's good. Maybe your specific objective is to win your husband to Christ, or to win your neighbor, win your son, your daughter. Maybe your specific objective is to accomplish a ministry for Jesus Christ that you're beginning. I don't know...whatever it is...but there needs to be something there.
As I told you two weeks ago, when you say to a Christian, "What's your goal? What's your objective?" And I may start saying that to folks just to see how well you're doing on this. When I meet you, don't be surprised. If I should say to a Christian, "What is your objective? What's your goal? What are you shooting at?" You ought to be able to say, that fast, "This is my objective." You can't have the courage of conviction if the conviction isn't there.
Paul was a man of conviction, and his goal was Jerusalem. He was going to get there, and he was going to get there with that offering. And we see him in verses 1-3 on the way. And we went through verses 1-3...we'll not go through it again this morning. But he traversed across the Mediterranean Sea, stopping at all those little spots that it mentions...Coast, Roads, Patar, Fenicia, all the way past Cyprus, Syria, Tyre, and the whole thing...coming all the way to get to the land of Israel in order that he might deliver the money. You say, "What's so big about delivering the money?" Well, he felt it was important to unify the church, and to meet the needs of the poor saints in Jerusalem...we've been into that.
So the courage of conviction begins when you know your goal, you know your objective, and you know your purpose. And also it helps to know that, because then you can have a sense of fulfillment. If you don't have any particular direction you're going, you're not going to have any satisfaction when you arrive. So you've got to really know what you're doing.
Secondly, the courage of conviction can't be diverted. Now once the conviction is established, the courage comes at this point. The courage of conviction, in its truest sense, can't be diverted...once you get that conviction, then the courage to see it through. That's illustrated in verses 4-6.
And you see there...it says in verse 4, "Finding disciples"...they landed at Tyre, and that's on the coast north of Jerusalem and Israel...they found disciples and carried seven days. And these disciples, apparently using the gifts of the Spirit to communicate, warned Paul or told Paul about the suffering that was going to happen in Jerusalem, and their natural response was, "Paul, don't go to Jerusalem. Paul, you're going to get it." You say, "Well, did that scare him?" No, no, because you see, it said back in chapter 20 verse 23, "The Holy Spirit witnesses in every city saying this is going to come." No, he was expecting it. I mean it was just, you know, "Guys, let's find a Christian so I can get that message again." He got it everywhere else. And the fact that they told him does not mean that God was trying to prevent him from going to Jerusalem.
The fact that he heard this everywhere he went fulfilled prophecy. What prophesy? Acts 9:15. Remember that Paul was on the Damascus road, blinded...wound up in a house in Straight Street. It was kind of exciting a few weeks ago to be on Straight Street. It's kind of thrilling to think back to this time.
But Paul was in the house, and Ananias came...God used Ananias to communicate to him. Well, verse 15 says, "The Lord said unto Ananias, 'Go your way, Ananias, you can leave. He's a chosen vessel unto Me. Go your way, and get down there to Paul. You can trust me.'" You know, he told Ananias to go see Paul. And for all Ananias knew, he was a persecutor, so God had to get him on his way a little bit. "He's a chosen vessel unto Me to bear My name before the gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel." Now watch. "For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My namesake. Now God didn't say, "I'm going to make him suffer." God said, "I'm going to show him how much he's going to suffer." Which means God promised there to reveal to Paul his sufferings before they came...do you get this?
So all these testimonies to what's going to happen to Paul fulfill Acts 9:16. They were not to prevent Paul from going to Jerusalem. They were to prepare him. They were saying to him, "Paul, you're still on course, friend. You're still on target. I told you this, the first of your conversion. You're right on schedule. Now it's coming. Here's what it's going to be." God was really confirming to Paul that God was still on the throne of his life. God was still ruling. God was still directing. God was still running his course in spite of what he knew was going to happen. This is fulfilled prophecy.
Isn't it beautiful, how God prepared him for that? He knew it was going to happen, and God just fulfilled the prophecy all along. You know, it would have been easy for the human being to just sort of say, "Boy, things are falling apart. I mean this is cracking up. It's getting to be the end." But no, he'd just look back and say, "Yeah, but this is what God said He was going to show me, so I expect it right on schedule."