Sharing Jesus in Hostile Times (Chantilly Sermon)
April 13, 2025
Acts 17:16 CSB – While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, he was deeply distressed when he saw that the city was full of idols.
Key to Effectiveness: A Missionary’s Heart
Luke 19:10 CSB – Jesus: I’ve come to seek and to save the lost.
Key to Effectiveness: See People Through Missionary’s Eyes
Acts 17:17-18 CSB – [Paul] saw that the city was full of idols. 17 So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and with those who worshiped God, as well as in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there. 18 Some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also debated with him. Some said, “What is this ignorant show-offtrying to say?”
Asking good questions is more important than having all the answers
“Occasionally someone will quip, “I don’t have any reasons; I just believe it,” to which I ask, “Why would you believe something when you have no reason to think it’s true?” This is a genuine—and very appropriate—question. And it’s simple.
You may not always have an answer, but you can always ask a question especially a well-placed one. That’s the value of the Columbo tactic. – Greg Koukl
Acts 17:19-21 CSB – They took him and brought him to the Areopagus, and said, “May we learn about this new teaching you are presenting? 20 Because what you say sounds strange to us, and we want to know what these things mean.” 21 Now all the Athenians and the foreigners residing there spent their time on nothing else but telling or hearing something new.
Key to Effectiveness: Keep it Simple (not simplistic)
Paul’s Simple Message
- A Positive Opening
Acts 17:22 CSB – Paul stood in the middle of the Areopagus and said, “People of Athens! I see that you are extremely religious in every respect.
- A Personal Connection
Acts 16:23 CSB – For as I was passing through and observing the objects of your worship, I even found an altar on which was inscribed, ‘To an Unknown God.’ Therefore, what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you.
- Paul Begins w/ Simple Question: Who is the Unknown God?
1. The Unknown God is the Creator
Acts 17:24-25 CSB – The God who made the world and everything in it—he is Lord of heaven and earth—does not live in shrines made by hands.25 Neither is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives everyone life and breath and all things.
2. The Unknown God is Sovereign Over All
Acts 17:26 CSB – From one man he has made every nationality to live over the whole earth and has determined their appointed times and the boundaries of where they live.
3. The Unknown God Created Us to Know Him
Acts 17:27 CSB – He did this so that they might seek God, and perhaps they might reach out and find him, though he is not far from each one of us.
Acts 17:28 CSB – For in him we live and move and have our being, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also his offspring.’
“What else does this craving, and this helplessness, proclaim but that there was once in man a true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace?
This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words, by God himself.” – Blaise Pascal, Pensées VII (425)
4. Instead of Worshiping the True God, We Have Followed False gods
Acts 17:29 CSB – Since, then, we are God’s offspring, we shouldn’t think that the divine nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image fashioned by human art and imagination.
Now, God Calls Us to Repent & Return to Him
Acts 17:30 CSB – “Therefore, having overlooked the times of ignorance, God now commands all people everywhere to repent, 31 because he has set a day when he is going to judge the world in righteousness by the man he has appointed. He has provided proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.”
Key to Effectiveness: Expect People to Respond
- Some Scoffed
Acts 17:32 CSB – When they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some began to ridicule him,
John 15:18 CSB – Jesus said, “If the world hates you, understand that it hated me before it hated you.
- Some Procrastinated
Acts 17:32 CSB – When they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some began to ridicule him, but others said, “We’d like to hear from you again about this.”
- A Few Believed!
Acts 17:33-34 CSB – So Paul left their presence. 34 However, some people joined him and believed, including Dionysius the Areopagite, a woman named Damaris, and others with them.
