ACTS 17:10-12 COMMENDABLE BIBLE USE2020 Teaching by Jerry B Simmons

Teaching Transcript: Acts 17:10-12 Commendable Bible Use

You are listening to FerventWord, an online Bible study ministry with teachings and tools to help you grow deeper in your relationship with God. The following message was taught by Jerry Simmons in 2020.

You know, in this day, we live in a time where misinformation and disinformation is abundant. And everywhere you look and every, you know, source you turn to, whether it be online or on the radio or on the television, there's all kinds of mixed signals and different ideas, incorrect thinking, bad information,

Fake news, false news, some of it's intentional, some of it's just ignorance. There's a difference between misinformation and disinformation. Misinformation is just anything that's incorrect, but disinformation is sharing incorrect information intentionally or knowing that it's not true, but sharing it anyways. And there's all of these ideas about politics. There's all these ideas about politics.

the virus and those kinds of things happening. There's all these ideas about religion, about race. There's all of this information that's going back and forth continually. And we live in a world that can be very confusing because there is all of these different mixed signals that are happening. And I'm not here to resolve all of that for us this morning, to deal with all the bad information in all contexts. But I am

Wanting to remind us this morning that we do have a solid and clear source of truth when it comes to the things of God. And that is found, of course, in the Scriptures, in the Word of God. I've titled the message this morning, Commendable Bible Use. What we see here is a commendation given to a group of people for the way that they used the Scriptures. And that is, of course, in the Scriptures.

And it's a reminder and an encouragement to us to use the Bible in the way that God has designed it and to allow it to be the source of truth for us, a clear source of truth. No matter what misinformation or disinformation or what propaganda may be coming our way and may be thrown at us, we can go back to the Word of God and have a solid foundation of truth to rely upon.

Here, God takes a moment to pause, you know, the scriptures and commend these Jews for their usage of the scripture. It gives us some real insight about what God sees as important and honorable. It describes the Jews in Berea as fair-minded, or a lot of translations word it as noble. They were more noble than those who were in Thessalonica.

The idea of fair-minded or noble, it's the idea of a higher class, like nobility, you know, royalty, that kind of thing. And it's not talking about their bloodline. It's talking about their approach to the Word of God. They had a superior approach to the Word of God. It was honorable the way they approached the Word of God and allowed the Word of God to influence their lives and speak to them. And so we're going to learn from the Bereans here, four points.

to help us with some commendable Bible use. The first thing to consider this morning found in verse 10 and 11 is

to listen to different perspectives. We need to develop the skill, the ability, the patience to be able to listen to different perspectives. Looking again at verse 10, it says,

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. Here as Luke is recording for us these events on Paul's second missionary journey, he draws a contrast between the Jewish people in Thessalonica and the Jewish people in Berea.

And the difference between them was the way that they responded to and received the word of God. Now there was Jews who responded to and believed the scriptures as Paul was there in Thessalonica. He was able to have an effective ministry there and people believed and Jews were converted to Jesus in that time of ministry.

But then as he moved on to Berea, it was even better is the idea that there was a much greater reception to the things of God. And so again, they're more fair-minded. Paul's normal practice as he would reach out into new territories was he would go into a region and he would spend first some time with the Jews at the local synagogue.

And that's what he did in Thessalonica. And as he moved into Berea, that's what he did. He first goes into the synagogue and he begins to elaborate on the scriptures and point to Jesus as the Messiah. When the Jews inevitably refused to listen, then he would switch gears and focus on ministry to the Gentiles in that region. The Jews had the scriptures.

And so it was natural for him to go in, also because of his love for the Jews and the priority of the Jews in God's kingdom and God's plan. It was appropriate for him to have this approach.

But there was an advantage that the Jews had in that they had the scriptures. As Paul went to the Gentiles, he wasn't going to be quoting the Old Testament scriptures to them, right? He wasn't able to see, look, you know, here in the Old Testament that you already believe and know, you know, here's what it says about the Messiah. He wasn't able to do that with the Gentiles. But with the Jews, they had a good solid starting ground. They had the scriptures. They had the Old Testament scriptures.

And the Jewish people all throughout the world were religious and devout, and they believed the scriptures, but they also had developed traditions. And their traditions lived on top of the scriptures in many ways, and often were held in higher regard than the scriptures. And the Jewish people would often be offended, like to the core, when those traditions were challenged.

And so that's what we saw in the ministry of Jesus. That's what we see in the ministry of Paul. And in Thessalonica, the Jews, when their traditions are challenged about the Messiah, they get really upset and they attempt to take Paul out. And so verse 10 tells us that the brethren sent Paul and Silas away by night.

It's something we've seen repeatedly in Paul's ministry throughout the book of Acts. He's rushed out of the region because the Jews are stirred up. They're angered. They're offended by the challenge to their traditions, even though they hold on to the Old Testament scriptures.

Their traditions have been elevated to higher esteem in their mind. And so they often are trying to kill Paul and defeat his ministry just like they did with Jesus. And so Paul's rushed out of Thessalonica to save his life. In verse 5, it talks about the Jews becoming envious. And so they take some evil men. They start an uproar. They attack Jason. And they're stirring up all this trouble.

And then in a few verses after what we're looking at today in verse 13, you see the Jews go from Thessalonica to Berea once they hear where Paul ended up. And he's ministering now in Berea. So then the Jews from Thessalonica go down and they stir up trouble there because they're so offended. Again, they have the Old Testament scriptures, but their traditions are offended.

They don't like the ministry. They don't like the message that Paul is preaching. And we can see this also in the encounters that Jesus had with the religious leaders of the Jewish people, right? That there was always the conflict that went back and forth. In Matthew chapter 5, Jesus quotes from the prophet Isaiah in Isaiah chapter 29.

Speaking about the Jewish people, he says,

The problem, Jesus said, as he quotes from Isaiah, is that they believe the scriptures, but there's just an outward expression of their devotion and love to God. And what they really cling on to is the commandments of men. And they believe that as if it was doctored, as if it was the doctrine of God.

And so this is the situation that Paul is facing. He's ministering to people that have like hardened traditions, that things that are built into them, that they've known all their lives. And although they believe the scriptures, there is this conflict between who Jesus is and what they wanted to believe about the Messiah.

Now the whole point, reason why I'm going into all this background about the Jewish beliefs and such, is because now when he gets to Berea, he encounters something different. It's the same message that Paul's been preaching everywhere. And it's the same types of people, it's Jewish people in the synagogue that Paul has been preaching to. But here he finds a group of people that responds differently than others throughout the area did. Paul preached the same message,

In a sense, the Jewish people there in that region of Berea had the same opportunity to be offended as the other Jews in other places, like Thessalonica. Paul issued the same challenge to their traditions and beliefs. But in this case, amongst this group of people, it says in verse 11, they received the word with all readiness. Instead of being offended and getting all worked up like others like them had before it.

Instead of reacting violently and seeking to take Paul out, they heard what Paul was saying about the scriptures and they received it. They were open to listen. They were open to hear something that even would challenge the traditions that they held so dear. Even things that would challenge things that they had grown up understanding and things embedded into them as a result of their culture. They were willing to be challenged.

They were willing to rethink and to listen with fresh ears to this message that Paul would bring from the scriptures. And here I think we learn a great example from the Bereans. And again, the point is to listen to different perspectives. That as you think about it, maybe you're not going to be excited about this idea, but as you think about it, you might come to understand that we are the religious ones now.

Just as there were the Jews who were so devout and religious that Paul encountered and that Jesus encountered and they were all around the region and there was all this opposition to the gospel as a result. We need to be careful as believers because, well, as we go on in our Christian walk, as we go on in a life with Christ, there is a tendency for us to become a lot like the Jews.

Where we have the scriptures, we believe the scriptures, we refer to the scriptures, we love the scriptures, but then we also develop our traditions on top of the scriptures. And we can be closed off to new things that God wants to say, or old things that God wants to say that we've forgotten about, or things that the Lord has said that we would prefer not to listen to. There is so much that God wants to say through his word that

that sometimes we can be closed off to because we're so religious, because we've built up traditions in our minds and in our heads and in our hearts. I think the recent events that we've been experiencing kind of challenges this and exposes it a little bit. And in that sense, I kind of like that tradition.

Hey, this week we're doing church outside and next week we'll be back inside and then we'll be back outside after that and then we'll rearrange the chairs this way and then we'll only be online. And then, you know, like just like what's all this craziness going on? And I know it's frustrating in a lot of ways. I know there's, you know, a lot of things that go along with that. But in a lot of ways, oh, it's so good for us to be challenged. Yeah.

Can church be church if it's only live streaming? Boy, we had to wrestle with that, right? Like, what does that mean? And how do we deal with that? And our traditions are being challenged, right? What we believe, what we practice, and what we've done for so long is challenged. And how are we responding to that?

Can church be church if we don't sing in the service? You know, if we don't sing in the time as we're gathered together, then is it church? And can it be church? And how do we respond to that? How do we feel about that? Can it be church if there's not bells ringing in the background? Right? Like, we have our traditions. We have the things that we have built up. And

We need to be open and able to listen to different perspectives. Now, I'm not saying go chase down all the nonsense that you can find, because there's a lot of nonsense out there that doesn't do us any good to listen to. But when the scriptures are being brought forth, when the word of God is being shared and expounded upon,

There is a lot of different perspectives and ones that we would be very blessed and benefit from if we would be willing to listen. To let our traditions be challenged and to listen to what the Word of God says from a different perspective. You know, we've lived here in our society in relative comfort with our traditions for a long time.

And I would expect that there's going to be these kinds of challenges and more challenges ahead. And we need to bring our hearts to a place where we're willing to re-examine the scriptures and re-examine the word of God and allow it to be affecting us differently. Pastor David Guzik says, they received the word with all readiness when Paul preached. They had open hearts, but clear heads. Many people have clear heads, but closed hearts,

And never receive the word with all readiness. And I would encourage you to consider that. That we need to have open hearts and clear heads. Both are important. We need to be thinking, but we also need to be able to listen, to evaluate, to consider. We haven't, you know...

uncovered all the truth that is to be uncovered. There's much more for us to learn, much more for us to develop in our relationship with God and our understanding of God. And so let's be willing to listen to different perspectives. It's the first aspect to consider of them being fair-minded or God says honorable. They did a good job in that they were willing to allow the scriptures to be explained in a different way than they've always understood. And then they go on now to evaluate that.

And so that brings us to the second point to consider this morning. Point number one, listen to different perspectives. Point number two, search the Bible to verify truth. Now, it's not that we just hear another perspective and then, okay, now that's our new perspective, right? No, we're open to listen. We need to be willing to hear a different perspective. And then we need to dig into the scriptures to decide whether or not to receive that truth.

Again, in verse 11, these 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. They were searching diligently to find out, is this really true? Paul here is sharing the scriptures that we believe and know, but we've never seen them this way. We've never understood them this way. So, what do we do? Well, again, in some regions, the Jewish people said,

We don't even want to consider this. That's not even an option. We're just going to hate you. But here the Thessalonians said, hmm, I've not heard that scripture shared. I've never seen it in that light before. So let me stop and think about that and let me check out what the rest of the Bible says to evaluate, is this really true? We need to be open to different perspectives, but we must not blindly judge.

accept them. We must not be persuaded without verification. Imagine the Apostle Paul going into the synagogue and Paul is there saying, all these scriptures that you know, all these references, you know the verse before I quote it, once I tell you where I'm going. But these verses mean something different than what you've always thought. And he expounds to them the first coming of the Messiah and then the second coming of the Messiah and the difference and the suffering and the issue of sin and the crucifixion.

And he's bringing them an awareness that God has said this. It's been his plan throughout the whole time, but they never understood it that way. Now, as we spend time in the word of God, there are many benefits. This morning, as we're looking at this, we're really just focusing on this particular one. It's the truth. The truth is revealed in the scriptures. That is one of the many benefits, the establishing of doctrine that we can hold on to.

Spending time in the Word of God also does much in our heart to develop us, to comfort us, to give us hope, to show us the things that are to come, to give us examples by which we can learn to practice what they did or not practice what they practiced. There's so many values and benefits of the Word of God, but the one highlighted here is they verified the truth. God has revealed himself in the Word of God and said, this is who I am.

God has declared the truth and declared true doctrine in the Word of God and said, this is what is true. And so the Jews, believing that, were able to then look at the Word of God, even though it was different than they've ever seen or understood before, and to say, well, let's verify this. Let's find out if this is true by digging into the Scriptures. And so it says that they searched the Scriptures.

That word search, it means to sift or to examine closely. You ever sifted something, right? It's checking all the details, making sure all of the details are in line and are what they are supposed to be. One Greek scholar, Thayer, defined it this way. He says it's specifically used in a forensic sense of a judge. To hold an investigation, to interrogate, to examine the accused or the witness.

to search the scriptures is to do an investigation of the scriptures to to get all the insight all the data to to do all the interrogation of what does it say throughout the word of god and to come to some conclusions as a result of what the data is or what the facts are in the scriptures it describes a serious search the fact that it's daily it was a high priority and so this morning i would ask you to consider are you a bible student are you

a student of the word of God in this way, that you have a serious approach to the scriptures, that you're sifting through them, that you're forensically evaluating them, not to determine, you know, whether or not you want to believe them, but to understand what the truth of God is. Again, in verse 11, it says that they did this to find out whether these things were so. Is that really what the Bible says? Is that really what the Bible means? And I would encourage you in this.

Your Bible is in English, if you didn't know that, okay? Your Bible is in English, and that's perfect. We get intimidated sometimes when, okay, well, we hear something, and it's like, well, this is what it means in the Greek, or this is what the Hebrew says, right? Listen, the original languages are really helpful, but they don't change the meaning. Your English Bible is perfectly fine for you to be able to evaluate and understand and uncover the truth, right?

And yes, there's a lot of insights that God can bring through various means and through various teachers. But at the same time, God's word is so powerful in that it's so simple, you can translate it into a variety of languages and still communicate the truth without having to know all of the technical details, without having to know the original languages. Your Bible in English is what you need. It's what you need to be able to uncover the truth, to search the Bible, to verify the truth.

Pastor David Guzik says they believed they could understand and find out truth from the Bible. For them, the Bible was not just a pretty book of poetry or mystery or nice spiritual inspiration for thoughts for the day. It was a book of truth. And that truth was there to find out.

A book of truth that you could explore it. You could find out. You could learn the truth about God. You could learn the truth about God's heart and what he says and how he considers different perspectives or different situations. The truth is out there. It's not out there. It's in the scriptures. It's in the word of God. And so the Bereans here validated and verified Paul's message. And think about that. Paul's message was,

Right? Here's the Apostle Paul, author of half of the New Testament. And they took his message and said, hmm, I'm not sure. Let me double check what the Word of God says and verify that is the truth. And God says, you know what? That's an honorable thing.

The Bereans, they're to be commended. They did the right thing because they listened, they were open to allow their traditions to be challenged, but then they took it to the scriptures and said, okay, Lord, is this really true?

It's a great example for all of us. The prophet Isaiah tells us in Isaiah chapter eight, verse 20, to the law and to the testimony, if they do not speak according to this word, it is because there is no light in them. The word of God is to be the standard. It's to be the test. And yeah, we're encouraged to listen, to hear, to get different perspectives, but then go to the scriptures. And if it's not according to the scriptures, we disregard it. Test all things, hold fast to,

to that which is true. Well, thirdly, as we continue to consider this portion, the third point this morning is to search the Bible daily. The daily aspect of this is something to consider. Again, in verse 11, these 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. This was a very active activity

searching the scriptures that they were involved in. It was a very active thing that they were engaged in. And as we talk about knowing the scriptures and understanding the truth that it's there, we can verify it. I'm sure you understand the Bible is, it's not that big of a book, but it's still a big book, right? There's a lot there. Knowing and understanding the Bible is a huge project, but it's what we're called to.

It's a huge project. How big of a project is it to know and understand the Bible? It's bigger than what you can get in a two-year Bible college education. I would suggest that the Christian life is a lifelong journey of learning and growth in the Word of God. Learning and growth in the Scriptures. It's a responsibility that we have to continue on an ongoing, a consistent, a diligent, on a daily basis journey.

to be engaged with God in his word. Albert Barnes says, that man has very little reason to expect that he will grow in knowledge and grace who does not peruse with candor, that's with openness, that's the receptiveness, and with prayer a portion of the Bible every day. There needs to be, and their example provides for us a good reminder of the dailyness of

of the scriptures in our lives. The dailiness that God wants to meet with us and spend time with us. And you might look at this and start to challenge it a little bit, right? Like, well, hey, it doesn't say that they always for the rest of their life daily evaluated the scriptures, right? And so you can go investigate that, verify the truth, validate. Is this what the Lord wants, right? One example to consider is Psalm chapter one, talking about the blessed man.

The blessed man is the one whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law he meditates day and night. And it describes him being like a tree planted by the rivers of water that produces fruit that doesn't wither because he's planted in that day and night encounter with the word of God. But there's a lot of pushback, and there's a lot of challenge to this oftentimes for us. Does it really need to be daily, though? And I always like to consider the example, the illustration of food.

Hebrews talks about the word of God being like food, right? And some are only partaking of milk, but some by reason of use, because they're so experienced with the scriptures, they're able to cut up the meat, you know, to process the things themselves. And it's a good illustration for us to consider. But think about it this way. What if you were to eat all of your meals for the week on Sunday morning? That would be a good morning, right? Pastor Pule, what if you were to eat all the ice cream that you're going to eat that week, but you got to eat it all in one day, right?

So the average, you know, metric for considering calories is a 2,000 calorie a day diet, right? Seven days, that's 14,000 calories. What if you were to sit down and try to consume 14,000 calories in one day or in one morning?

If you went to Miguel's and tried to do that, hey, at Miguel's, bean, rice, and cheese burrito is 1,100 calories. You would have to eat 11 bean, rice, and cheese burritos in one sitting to consume all the calories that you need for the entire week. Or think about it the other way. What if you just ate one burrito and then expected that to last you for the rest of the week, right? The point is, look, we can't just rely upon our time gathering together for the word of God to nourish us spiritually and to carry us through, right?

Just like we have to eat every day. Just like we have to bring in and have a fresh source of food and nutrition every day. We need a fresh source of nutrition in the word of God every day. We need that milk of the word. We need the meat of the word. Maybe you would prefer to think about it with exercise. Hey, you could, you know, work out five times a week or you could just do really one good workout one day a week, right? It doesn't work that way.

We kind of wish it would, right? That you could just kind of work real hard, get it over with. No, but what it requires is the diligence of the ongoing, regularly, consistently, and the spiritual life is the same thing. Search the Bible daily. The Bible is a field of buried treasure.

And every day there's treasures, there's nuggets, there's things that the Lord wants to speak and reveal and move and work. And sometimes you don't perceive what it is that he's doing. Even as you're reading day by day that you're not aware that this was an amazing time. But it is an amazing time. The word of God is doing its work, whether you see it or realize it or not. And then every time you go over that field, you don't get to the end of the Bible and then go, all right, well, I read it all. I'm done.

No, every time you go back over that same field, there's new treasures to be uncovered. There's new things that the Lord wants to reveal. And it's why we always encourage you to be engaged in the scriptures on a daily basis. It's why I always refer back to the Bible in three years and encourage you to join with us because that dailiness changes our lives. The power of God to change a life is found in the daily reading of the word of God. And if you will make the word of God a priority, God will change your life.

Well, the final thought to consider this morning comes from verse 12, and that is believe the Bible. In verse 12, it says, therefore, many of them believed and also not a few of the Greeks, prominent women as well as men. When they took the scriptures seriously and searched out and verified and investigated, they walked away believing. Therefore, it says, many of them believed.

There's no need to fear. What if people try to investigate and find out these things for themselves? Listen, if you dig into the word of God and your heart is seeking the Lord, he's going to walk with you through the scriptures into the truth. And therefore, many will believe. Those who dig into the word of God, those who spend time with God and his word on this consistent basis and are serious about it, God's promise is, if you seek me with all your heart, you will find me.

Therefore, many of them believed. And sometimes we wonder why, you know, those who at one time believed or we thought they believed or we thought we believed and then why is there all this doubt and why is there all this struggle, you know, with the spiritual things? Sometimes it's due to our relationship with the word. There's not that ongoing consistent, but there is this connection. That daily investigation, that serious approach to the scriptures results in

Believe. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Believe the Bible. What's interesting about this is you can do the rest and not believe. You can listen to different perspectives and if that's where you stop, you can end up not believing the scriptures or believing what God says. You can search the Bible to verify truth and still not believe.

That doesn't automatically equal belief. You can search the Bible daily and still choose to not believe. You can do all these other things and feel great about yourself. Again, we become the religious ones. And there's been many examples throughout the years of those who knew the Word of God and quoted the Word of God and read the Word of God and taught the Word of God and walked in the things of God and were used by God and then they depart from God. Believe the Bible.

See, we need to not just learn and get information and have, you know, understanding of things in our heads, but we need to take that daily investigation, that daily time with God and his word, and then purposefully choose to believe it. It's one thing to understand how God says we're to relate to one another as husband and wife.

It's one thing to know and understand what God says about, you know, our relationship at work with our coworkers, employers, or employees, you know, whichever way. It's one thing to understand what God says about us in society or understand about what God says about this or about that. But to believe it is more than just knowing it. It's more than just having the information. It's then deliberately choosing to live according to that truth.

And so James tells us in James chapter one, be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. You can do all the other things and still just be a hearer. But here the Thessalonians, they didn't stop with that. They didn't just listen to Paul. They didn't just search the scriptures. They didn't just do that daily, but then they believed it. And they accepted Jesus Christ and they turned to him and followed him and became his disciples. They set the pattern for us, an example for us. We need discipleship.

to use the Bible in this way that God says is honorable, to allow God to change our lives, to change our hearts. Be open. Listen to different perspectives. Again, sometimes we're the religious ones and we have our traditions. We have the things that we've built up and the things that we do and the things that we practice and the things that we like, the things that we prefer. And those are not necessarily wrong. But at the same time, we need to be open and allow the Lord to speak to us from different perspectives in his word.

And as we hear those things, let's search the Bible to verify the truth. There's a lot of persuasion. There's a lot of pressure to comply, to buy into the doctrine that is being taught by various sources all around us. But don't just accept it. Search the Bible. Verify. Build your case. Is this found in the Word of God? Be a student of the Word of God on a daily basis. Let the Lord minister to you.

Dig in that field of hidden treasure and allow the Lord to reveal those things. But don't stop there. Then believe it. See and invite the Lord to show you how you can put it into practice, how it can make a difference in your life, how it can change your behavior. That's the use of a Bible that God commends and says that's a good commendable approach to the Word of God. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for your Word.

And the foundation that it provides, the stability that it provides in the midst of all kinds of chaos and crazy information and weird information and false information and things that the enemy wants to use to deceive and to lead astray. Lord, we are under attack in many ways in our spiritual lives. And I pray that you would help us to take your word seriously. Let it take root in our hearts. Help us, God, to recognize when we're believing things without understanding,

the verification that's found in your word, without checking it out and making sure and finding out where you say that, where you teach those things. Help us, Lord, to use your scriptures as the standard for truth. I pray, God, that you would develop in us the discipline, the diligence to spend time with you in prayer and in your word on a daily basis. Lord, that we might believe what you say, that we might live the lives that you've called us to live

Lord, that you might be glorified. I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.