Cornerstone Mission Church, Sunday Sermon January 11, 2009
Throughout last year, we’ve journeyed through the book of Acts and have spent a lot of time learning about the life of apostle Paul. I am going to spend few more weeks and learn from his life about fighting for the faith.
Today, we are going to cover the period of time when Paul was first accused in Jerusalem by the Jews, and when he was on the trials before Sanhedrin in chapter 23, before Felix the governor of Caesarea in chapter 24, before Festus the successor to Felix and later before Agrippa in chapter 26. What I am most interested in exploring this morning with you is what Paul said before Sanhedrin and before Felix the governor of Caesarea. Acts 23:1, “My brothers, I have fulfilled my duty to God in all good conscience to this day.” And, Acts 24:16, “So, I strive always to keep my conscience clear before God and man.”
When I think about how I am going to live out the year 2009, I am moved by Paul’s unyielding commitment to live with good conscience. I am titling today’s sermon as “Fight for the good conscience” after meditating and studying Paul’s life. Because Paul fought for the good conscience, when he was arrested, accused falsely and put on trials before the Sanhedrin, the governors and the king and later before Caesar, he was able to stand straight without any regret or guilt; no conscience stricken heart for Paul.
Standing at the end of the year 2009 and looking back, it would be awesome if I can feel great about the way I have lived, living without any regret, guilt, or shame. Paul as a spiritual father to Timothy, he charged him to fight the good fight, holding on to faith and a good conscience (1 Timothy 1:18). And, Paul reminded Timothy how some have rejected these and so have shipwrecked their faith. I know that none of us want our faith journey to sink with utter and complete failure. I don’t want to look back and have all these regrets, unresolved guilt and shames, and deep sense of failure. I want to be able to stand straight with a good conscience like Paul did. If I were to defend myself about my life like Paul had to defend his life against those who wanted to tear his life apart, I want to be able to speak out of good conscience with no regret, nothing to hide, no shame, no guilt, but only clarity in my devotion to my King. And, this requires me to fight for the good conscience.
1. Fighting for the good conscience is not…
To talk about what fighting for the good conscience is as Paul fought, we need to begin it by defining what fighting for the good conscience is and what is not. We will first spend talking about what is not.
When you carefully study Paul’s life what you realize is that Paul was someone who lived passionately out of his conscience. Considering conscience is at its basic meaning a sense of knowing right from wrong, it is fitting to describe Paul as thoroughly a man of conscience, meaning he carried out diligently what he thought in his heart to be right. And, this was true of him both before and after he met Jesus Christ on the road to Damascus. So, in this sense, it is not enough to be a person of conscience if your sense of right and wrong is off.
Think about Paul’s life before meeting Jesus Christ. His conscience informed him that the teaching of Christianity was a complete deviation from the rightful Judaism and therefore Christianity deserved nothing but total obliteration. As a man of conscience, he saw himself as contending for God’s honor when he opposed Jesus Christ because he saw him not as the promised Messiah, but as an imposter. And, acting on his rock solid conscience he earned the fearsome reputation as someone who relentlessly persecuted Christians.
Paul reminds me of Richard Dawkins a evolutionary biologist and Christopher Hitchens a journalist and a literary critic. Unlike Paul, these are modern day atheist who based on their rational and scientific reasoning have developed utter detest and disbelief in the existence of God. I watched them debate last night making their rational reasoning for disbelieving existence of God. They are intelligent, articulate but also downright hostile and intolerant of people like you and me who esteems Jesus Christ as our Savior and our Lord. In this regard, Dawkins and Hitchens are men of deep conscience as Paul was before he met Jesus Christ.
What this tells us is that you can be a person of deep and sincere conscience, but it doesn't mean you are right about your conscience. A question must be asked about where you base your conscience. For Paul prior to submitting his life to Jesus as his Messiah, his King, his conscience was built on the misguided zeal for Judaism. Whole teachings of Judaism from the Old Testament bear witness to the Messiah, Jesus Christ, yet unable to see Jesus as the promised Messiah, Paul’s sincerely deep conscience was horribly misguided, resulting in his vicious attacks on Christians. Of course, this horribly misguided conscience was not what Paul strived always to keep clear before God and man as he stated in Acts 24:16.
2. Paul’s fight for the good conscience…
The good conscience Paul fought to keep clear before God and man was solidly based on his relationship with Jesus Christ. It always looked back to the forever life changing moment when Jesus Christ revealed himself to Paul on the road to Damascus and the life after with Jesus Christ. The sense of doing what was right for Paul came no longer from his misguided trust in Judaism, but in his trust in Jesus Christ. So, it was Jesus Christ who formed Paul’s conscience and all his actions out of it. Before the mistreatments, the life threatening attacks, the arrest and the false accusations before the Sanhedrin, before two governors of Caesarea, and Agrippa, all his actions were informed by his conscience in Jesus Christ. Let’s consider them.
Paul came to Jerusalem mostly to bridge the gap between the Gentile Christians and the Jewish Christians. According to Romans 15:25-26, he was on his way to Jerusalem in the service of the saints to bring with him a contribution for the poor among the saints in Jerusalem given by the Gentile believers throughout Macedonia and Achaia. In sharing the material blessings with the Jewish Christians, the Gentile Christians were expressing their deepest gratitude for the Jerusalem church for sharing their spiritual blessings received through Jesus Christ. For Paul, who was gripped by the heart of Jesus Christ who said, “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” (John 13:35), the right thing to do was to seek unity of believers in Jesus Christ.
Paul also had a personal reason to visit Jerusalem; it was to complete a Nazirite vow he took during his stay at Corinth. He took a Nazirite vow to ask God to intervene when things were depressingly difficult for him. When he saw God in answer to his prayer working in his life and in the lives of the Corinthian Christians, Paul made his way to Jerusalem to fulfill his vow by offering his hair as a burnt offering and offering sacrifices in the temple (Acts 21:26).[1] What we see here is Paul being motivated by his good conscience to express his heartfelt gratitude to Jesus Christ.
He also knew that there were false rumors against him that he taught the Jews to turn away from Moses… and not to circumcise their children (Acts 21:21); and, how this troubled Jewish Christians who still felt compelled to uphold their cultural tradition of Judaism without undermining the gospel message of grace.
To fight for the good conscience meant to help the Jews find out what he really stood for. By fulfilling his Nazirite vow, Paul sought to put to rest these false rumors about him. Paul didn’t teach against Moses, the Laws and the Old Testament scripture; he only pointed to Jesus Christ as the One who fulfilled them all.
So, Paul had no other alternative motives in coming to Jerusalem beyond wanting to encourage the Jerusalem church with the contribution from the Gentile Christians, to promote unity among Christians, to fulfill his own personal Nazirite vow to God, to put the false rumors against him to rest. Of course, Paul’s zeal to complete the task of testifying to the gospel of God’s grace (Acts 20:24) was the huge motivating factor that influenced Paul’s decision at every level. To sum up Paul’s motives, they all came from fighting for the good conscience, doing what was right in Jesus Christ. I think Peter explains what Paul was doing really well in 1 Peter 3:15-16 who said:
“But in your hearts set apart Christ as the Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, keeping clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander. It is better, if it is God’s will, to suffer for doing good than for doing evil.”
3. A testimony of a teenager
How are you and I are going to fight for the good conscience this year as Paul did with his life? I want to share a testimony to answer this question for us. It comes from the podcast by Francis Chen, a pastor from Cornerstone Community Church in Simi Valley, California, I listened this past week. In it, I heard a testimony from an 18 years old teenager who was told by his oncologist that he only had most three months to live; he has leukemia. Two months passed, he was standing in front of a crowd of junior and high schoolers to give his testimony. Here is the part of what he said that was so powerful to me when I thought about living my life in a good conscience before God and before man. He said:
I am dying of blessings given to me by God… I am scared for everyone else. I am scared for everyone who don’t know where they are going when they die. I am scared for those who think they know where they are going when they die, but they don’t. I am scared for all the people distracted by this world controlled by Satan. Especially you guys who are in America. I am scared for everyone who is distracted by friends, iPods, video games, movies, by having roof over your heads, by feeling secured, by feeling comfort...
I am dying so it’s not hard for me to live everyday like it is going to be my last day. Because tonight, I easily can go into coma and never wake up from it. It is not hard for me to thankful for life when I know tomorrow I might not have it. And it is not hard for me to be thankful for my friends because I know I might not be able to see them again very soon. Yes, I am dying but here is the kicker, so are you guys. We all have clock, timeline when we are going to kick the bucket. And, for me I have the luxury of knowing when I might go. I feel sorry for you guys because you don’t know when you are going to die. I do. So, everyone who is blinded by this world and is not living everyday as it could be their last which is very well could be, I feel sorry for you guys. So, these are people that I am afraid of.[2]
I see Paul who was not afraid of dying in this young teenager’s testimony. Paul said in Acts 20:24, “I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me- the task of testifying to the gospel of God’s grace.” To a person who is not afraid to die, there is this clarity about the way they see life. They are able to see what really matters in life. And, with this clarity about what’s really important in their lives comes this ability to think clearly about what’s right and wrong and act on what’s right. And, when a person sees with clarity about priority in life and fight for the good conscience, he or she can live life without regret, shame or guilt.
So, I ask myself these questions.
- Do I know what’s really important in life?
- Can I fight for what really matters?
- Can I live before God with this clarity about what my life is all about, what’s really important to God?
- Can I live with deep sense of “liberty and boldness”[3] to act on God-enriched conscience in most difficult circumstances like Paul faced?
- Will I look back at the end 2009 and have no regret, no shame, and no guilt over how I lived my life with good conscience?
How about you? Will you "fight the good fight, holding on to faith and a good conscience”? Or will you shipwreck your faith by rejecting these? (1 Timothy 1:18-19)
[1] Longenecker, Richard N. “1. Paul's return to Palestine-Syria (18:18-23)” In The Expositor's Bible Commentary: Volume 9. 488. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, © 1981.
[2] Francis Chen, Living a life that matters: Stop Talking (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EGWOh7-aHQ)
[3] Blum, Edwin A. “A. The Blessing of Suffering for Righteousness (3:13-17)” In The Expositor's Bible Commentary: Volume 12. 240. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, © 1981.
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