If you were here last Lord's Day, you remember that we began to look at the proclamation of the Christian God on the part of the Apostle Paul as he comes into Athens, as he is in Athens waiting for Timothy and Silas. His eyes land upon the various stoa and temples of Athens, and his spirit is provoked within him. His spirit is roused to a wholesome indignation against the madness and the darkness of the idolatry that plagued Athens at that particular time. And so he begins to preach to them Jesus and the resurrection, and these Epicurean and Stoic philosophers want to hear more.
Remember, we noted that they most likely are mistaking Jesus and the resurrection as two gods, possibly as a male and a female deity. Not that Paul was somehow cryptic in his proclamation of the Gospel, but rather in the hardness of their hearts and in unbelief and plagued by their own reigning paganism, they misunderstand what the Apostle Paul is saying. And so they want to hear more and they bring him to the Areopagus. And now we have then before us in verses 22 through 34, the sermon that Paul delivers at the Areopagus, setting forth the glory, the unrivaled majesty of the Christian God over and against all conceptions of pagan deities and all sorts of madness.
And we'll pick up reading in verse 22, of Acts 17, and we'll read to the end of the chapter. Then Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious. For as I was passing through and considering the objects of your worship, I even found an altar with this inscription to the unknown God. Therefore, the one whom you worship without knowing, Him I proclaim to you.
God, who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands, nor is He worshipped with men's hands as though He needed anything, since He gives to all life, breath, and all things. And He has made from one blood every nation, of men to dwell on the face of the earth, and has determined their pre-appointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings, so that they should seek the Lord in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him. Though He is not far from each one of us, for in Him we live and move and have our being. As also some of your own poets have said, for we are also His offspring.
Therefore, since we are the offspring of God,
Honor Due the Christian God
we ought not to think that the divine nature is like gold or silver or stone, something shaped by art and man's devising. Truly these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising him from the dead. And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked, while others said, We will hear you again on this matter.
So Paul departed from among them. However, some men joined him and believed. Among them Dionysius the Areopagite, a woman named Damaris, and others with them. Amen.
Let's ask God's blessing upon our time here in the preaching of the Word. Let's pray. God, we thank you that we can gather now as we have been already gathered, that we can observe now this act of worship, the preaching of the Word. Once again, we plead for your aid.
We ask for your help as the preacher opens up the Word. We pray that you would give him words to speak. We pray that, Lord God, I would not rest upon my own strength, whatever that may be, or my own intelligence, whatever that may be, but rather resting upon the aid that a triune God affords, we pray that this act of preaching would be unto your glory, unto the strengthening of saints, and, Lord God, unto the salvation of sinners. Might we know you and know you all the more by an examination, by a proclamation of this passage, and, Lord God, might you be honored, might you be praised, might you be gloried in.
We pray in the name of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
Introduction
Well, to frame our minds, consider these words of Francis Turrett, and he remarks that reflection upon such passages as these, Acts 17, 22-34, reflections on these passages are given so that, quote, when we approach unto God, we may elevate our thoughts above terrestrial and fleeting things and think nothing concerning God but what is great and lofty. I think that's something that the Apostle Paul is wanting to do here. Remember, his eyes are scandalized, if you will, and his spirit is roused to provocation because of the madness of the idolatry that he witnesses in Athens. Paul isn't like a tourist with a brochure and, you know, with a tropical button-up shirt and a camera around his neck marveling at the glory of architecture.
He casts his eyes and there is no marvel in a positive sense, but rather marveling that they have departed from the incorruptible God and had heaped to themselves all manner of corruption. They have heaped to themselves all manner of idolatry, all manner of pagan conceptions of deities. They had, in a sense, cast off the knowledge of God that comes by virtue of being created in His image. And they have heaped to themselves all manner of ungodly images, all manner of stoa with respect to Zeus and Hephaestus and all of these multitudinous deities of pagan madness.
So we are, and hopefully by a reflection of this passage, we are to frame our minds, we are to fill our heads with the knowledge of the true God, that one who is great and lofty, and to cast off any intruding thoughts. of any God that is lesser than Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Sermon Overview and Outline
We want to look at verses 22 to 34 under four headings and I'll give you those and hopefully we can proceed with God's aid and with allowable time limits through all of these. And those things are these. We want to look first at the prelude to the proclamation of the Christian God. We want to look at the proclamation of the Christian God proper and then the mercy extended by the Christian God, and lastly, the Athenian reception of the Christian God.
Now, when I say the Christian God, hopefully you all know that I'm not saying the Christian God as an offering of a deity that can be considered, along with other possible conceptions of God that are out there. We offer to you our Christian God, but if you're content with your own gods, then that's fine. We don't confess a God that is just the best God among other deities out there in the universe, or we don't confess the Christian God as one among many other competing equals, but when we say the Christian God, we say the proper and the true and the the one that has been properly conceived and revealed and set forth and opened up in the Scriptures. In other words, the only living and true God.
There is but one only living and true God, and He is Yahweh of our revelation. He is Father, Son, and Spirit. God in three Persons. Blessed Trinity.
So
Prelude to the Proclamation
notice the prelude to the proclamation of the Christian God, and we see this in Acts 17, 22. and 23. Notice first what we find there,
Location of the Sermon
the location of the sermon. Then Paul stood, verse 22, in the midst of the Areopagus and said, what is this Areopagus? The name itself is two words, and two words, one which is the god Ares, the Greek god Ares. Now you perhaps might have a translation there, Mars Hill.
It's commonly translated here as, the Areopagus is as Mars Hill, and we you know, we talk about Paul preaching at Mars Hill. Well, it was the god Ares who is the Roman god Mars and it is basically Areopagus means the rock of Ares or the hill of Ares. According to the madness of Greek paganism, the story goes that Ares was brought to this geological structure where juridical trials were sort of carried out and the twelve gods judged him for having murdered for having murdered the son of Neptune for raping his daughter. And so it's called the Rock of Ares because of that myth, because of that story.
It had been in classical antiquity, in the life and times of Athens, a place where there would be a gathering for juridical, for judgments being made against criminals and usually charges of proclaiming foreign gods and for the crime of murder. Now, some have supposed that Paul is actually seen here or taken to the actual geological structure, the rock and the place where those formal judicial trials were carried out. So he's actually at Mars Hill or the Rock of Aries. But more than likely, he's not at that geological structure but was taken to a royal portico in the marketplace where the council of the Areopagus met.
So if we have in our minds this picture of Paul standing on this rock, standing on Mars Hill, proclaiming the God, the Christian God, that's a fine image that you can have in your minds, but he probably wasn't there. He is proclaiming the Christian God with great vigor and apologetic strength, but it is in the midst of the council of the Areopagus, most likely, in this royal portico. Historians note that Areopagus had been a word that was sort of shortened and applied to the council that met for juridical procedure. So anyway, Paul is standing in the midst of this pagan council.
And as we'll get to, he is proclaiming the riches and the excellencies of the Triune God.
Occasion and Introduction
The occasion of the sermon, we note in verses 22 and 23, we see here men of Athens. I perceive that in all things you are very religious, for as I was passing through and considering the objects of your worship, I even found an altar with this inscription to the unknown God." What is the occasion of this sermon? Well, hopefully you remember from last time, the Epicureans and the Stoics bring Paul to the Areopagus and ask if they can hear more of this Jesus and the resurrection. And so Paul has this glorious occasion where he can open up Jesus and the resurrection, the true proclamation of the Christian God and Jesus Christ whom he has sent to these Athenian idolaters.
We have Paul addressing the men of Athens, and so no doubt what we have here wrapped up in men of Athens are those Epicureans, those Stoics and perhaps others, Pythagoreans and others who followed after the Homeric gods of ancient Greece. And they're all gathered before him, they're all present, they're all there waiting to hear as Paul opens up his God-inspired mouth to proclaim the riches of the triune God. What is the introduction to the sermon then? We're in the prelude to the proclamation of the Christian God, and we want to move quickly through this so that we can get to the proclamation proper, but notice Paul's introduction to his sermon.
First we see Paul's assessment of Athenian religious devotion. He speaks to them and he says, Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious. Now, we ought not let our minds to think that Paul is actually giving them a compliment here. That they actually are very religious, perhaps in the way that we might understand that in our modern mindset.
You know, we hear very religious today, and we think, you know, goes to church, prays a lot, reads his Bible, is at every service, is at the Lord's Supper, he's out there at Wednesday Bible study, he's there at Saturday morning theology study. He's very religious, never speaks an ill thing, never reviles when he has reviled, does not answer sufferings with threatenings, those sorts of things. Well, here Paul is not issuing a compliment to the Athenians, these men of Athens, when he says, I perceive that you are in all things very religious. It's not a compliment, but it's also not necessarily an insult.
This is not intended by Paul as a compliment, but rather we see if we know Paul, we know that he would not be complimenting the Athenians. And based on a historical witness, it's actually forbidden for one who is brought before the Areopagus, it's actually forbidden to engage in what's called complimentary exordia, according to Bruce. Introductory compliments to the council in order to garner their favor. It was actually forbidden by the Areopagus, and Paul no doubt would have known that, and so he's not issuing a compliment when he says, you are very religious.
Most likely, and what this language carries the weight of is perhaps rather superstitious or too superstitious. That might be too harsh because Paul is navigating a measure of respectability here. It could carry the weight of somewhat superstitious. Some have contended for a harsher fearful of demons.
The word translated very religious, if for those word nuts out there, it's actually the second largest Greek word in the New Testament. There is a larger word used in Acts chapter 10, I believe it is, but it's the second long, and it's a long one, 19 letters in the Greek language. And it contains the word, a root word that is included in it, for demons. And so some have contended for a harsher fearful of demons.
Perhaps it means carrying your religious reverence very far or fearers of the supernatural spirits. The thrust of the message here is not that Paul's giving them a compliment, not that he's doing some sort of underhanded insult, but rather that he is cutting at the heart of their irreligion, cutting at the heart of their ungodly pagan idolatry, and he is saying that it is rather superstitious, or somewhat superstitious, or carrying their religious reverence very far. He says, men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious. And notice the evidence of this religious devotion.
The evidence of it follows in verse 23, Therefore, the one whom you worship without knowing Him I proclaim to you." This is the evidence of, really, the evidence of their superstitiousness, is that they have an altar to the unknown God. Perhaps what that was, or what the back story is there, there's three approaches to what that might be, and perhaps there's a, well, there's probably not a little bit of everything, but perhaps a combination of two. But some have thought that this altar to the unknown God, this altar with the inscription to the unknown God is sort of a hat tip to the Jews that would have been there in Athens for quite some time. Remember, Paul preached in the synagogue. in Athens, there were some Jews in Athens, and so the idea is that these Jews have this unknown God, this one who is incomprehensible, this one who, yes we can know, yes we can apprehend, but we cannot fully enclose within the grasp of our comprehension because he is beyond comprehension, he is immense, eternal, infinite, and all of his glorious perfections.
The Athenian recognition of the God of the Jews. Henry notes that the heathens called the Jewish God an uncertain God, the uncertain deity of Moses. So perhaps that's in view. Another option with regards to why is there this altar with the inscription to the unknown God.
Another option is, one of the poets that the Apostle Paul quotes, Epimenides, later on in the passage, there was a time about 300 years prior to Paul's occasion here, where there was a plague in Athens. And so the people of Athens came to Epimenides and asked for his advice, and he said, release some black and white sheep into the city, and wherever they stop, there slay them and offer them up on an altar to the god of that spot. And so wherever they stopped, they were slain, and an altar was erected, and that sheep was sacrificed to an unknown god. Perhaps if they had stopped at the stoa of Zeus, they would have sacrificed it to Zeus.
If they would have stopped at the temple of Athena, they would have sacrificed it to Athena. But in this case, it stopped at the Areopagus on the hill of Ares, and so no god being there, they offered it up to the unknown God, having built an altar there. And another option is simply to suggest that they erected these altars to the unknown gods of foreign nations, but whatever it is. Whatever the case, when we read here an altar with this inscription to the unknown God, Paul uses this as an occasion to proclaim the true and living God who can be known, who is known by Paul, and whom he will now make known to these Athenian idolaters.
So that's the prelude to the proclamation of the Christian God.
Proclamation of the Christian God
We want to now move then to the proclamation of the Christian God. Paul opens up this beautiful sermon where he discloses to these Athenian idolaters the glory of the living and true God. Hopefully you see as you read this passage, and perhaps without the aid of the preacher as we navigate through this passage this morning, our minds are to be drawn to the greatness of our God, over and against any other God, which are no gods at all that are propagated out there in the world. This is a glorious occasion, a victory for the fame of Yahweh here on this day at the Areopagus in Athens.
Because Paul comes against. He's all by himself, remember. He's all by himself here at the Areopagus before this council. And before a multitude of idolaters of various flavors, he says, you're wrong.
And there is one and only living and true God. He is Yahweh of Israel. He is God in three persons, blessed Trinity. He is this one that I now open up to you.
We want to notice four things in the proclamation of the Christian God. And those four things are these. And this comes from the text. We're not just jumping now to a consideration of God on other matters or at other texts, but rather, this comes from the text.
The exclusive lordship of the Christian God, the unbounded glory of the Christian God, the all-sufficient independence of the Christian God, and then the honor that is due, the Christian God. I want you to listen to these words of a fellow named Marcianus Aristides. And for anybody who is interested, this is connected to Athens. Marcianus Aristides was living in around 126 A.D.
A.D. 126 is probably the proper way to say that. He was an Athenian philosopher. He's only two generations removed from the Apostle Paul. No doubt he would have heard stories of this Paul who came to the Areopagus and proclaimed Jesus and the resurrection.
He might have been the pupil of the son of Dionysius the Areopagite. We don't know. But what we do know is that he was an Athenian philosopher, only two generations removed from the Apostle Paul, converted unto Christianity by the grace of our God, And He proclaims this with regards to our subject matter. And as we read through Acts 17 and navigate the passage, listen how Aristides is rehashing, in a good way, he's reiterating the blessed words of the Apostle Paul.
The heavens do not limit Him, speaking of God, of course, but the heavens and all things, visible and invisible, receive their bounds from Him. Adversary He has none, for there exists not any stronger than He. Ignorance and forgetfulness are not in His nature, for He is altogether wisdom and understanding, and in Him stands fast all that exists. He requires not sacrifice and libation, nor even one of things visible.
He requires not anything from any, but all living creatures stand in need of Him. You see this Athenian philosopher converted unto Christianity, repeating the words of the Apostle Paul, repeating the words of the Apostle Paul who had proclaimed the glory of this God. So then
Exclusive Lordship of God
let's have a look, first off, at the exclusive lordship of the Christian God. Notice in the passage here, the Apostle Paul, from the outset, after saying, The exclusive lordship of Yahweh, the exclusive lordship of the Christian God. You know, this comes to the minds and the hearts of the modern people in our landscape, a time of religious plurality, a time of your truth is your truth, and my truth is my truth, and this is offensive to the modern ear, because we need to be tolerant, we need to be open-minded, we need to just let everybody do whatever, we just need to sing kumbaya, play a guitar in front of the fire, and let bygones be bygones. The Apostle Paul proclaims the exclusive lordship, and it's not out of some, of the Christian God, and it's not out of some, like we said last week, curmudgeonly rejection of everything else that I don't like, but it's unto the end of what the passage closes with, that they would close upon the mercy and the glory of this living and true God, this only God of heaven and earth, and that they would find in Him what is proper truth.
They would find in Him what is only true mercy, love, and grace, and all good things, that they would cast aside the madness of the hardness and the sinfulness of their hearts and own the living and true God. Exclusivity is a good thing with respect to truth, because there is only objective truth, one truth, God's truth. There are no rivals. There are no adversaries, as Aristides said.
And so he proclaims the exclusive lordship, and he does so by doing this, by noting that God is, the only living and true God, is the creator of all things. He is the creator of heaven and earth. If you've read your Old Testaments well, you'll know this, that very often when the prophets are coming up against the gods of the pagans all around them, or when Israel herself falls after idolatry because of the nation's influences upon them. The prophets often go to that point to exalt God over and above every other God who is no God at all.
And they do so by saying that He is Creator of all things. That He created the heavens and the earth. And so the Apostle Paul begins there because he knows that Old Testament reality. God who made the world and everything in it since He is Lord of heaven and earth.
You can turn with me in your Bibles to the book of Deuteronomy as we try to navigate the landscape of the glory of this Christian God. First, with respect to his exclusive lordship. Notice in Deuteronomy 32. If you'll turn there and try to turn there quickly, because we have much to work through.
I don't want to rush anyone, but Deuteronomy 32. And notice when you get there, you can turn to verse 36. The confession of Israel. And this comes in the context of the folly and the madness and the error of pagan deities, of following after idols.
And notice the language of God by the prophet Moses here in verse 36. For the Lord will judge his people. and have compassion on His servants when He sees that their power is gone and there is no one remaining, bond or free. He will say, where are their gods, the rock in which they sought refuge? Who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offering?
Let them rise up and help you and be your refuge. Now just pause for a moment. You see the indictment of pagan deities and those who follow after them. Where are their gods, the rock in which they sought refuge?
There is no refuge. There is no rock in anyone save Yahweh. And then notice the language in 38. Who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offering?
As often as anybody, any idolater places bananas before a golden Buddha, that offering will not be eaten. As long as they put any sort of beverage before an engraved or a graven image, there will be no libation drank. Who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offering? Let them rise up and help you and be your refuge.
Flee to them if you think you'll find mercy in these pagan gods. Run to them. The end will be misery. The end will be destruction.
The end will be colossal and everlasting disappointment. Notice then v. 39, Now see that I, even I, am He, and there is no God besides Me. I kill and I make alive, I wound and I heal, nor is there any who can deliver from My hand. You see, God proclaims the exclusive Lordship of Himself.
I, even I, am He, and there is no God besides Me. More pointedly, let's move to Isaiah 42 for a moment, because in Isaiah 42, We probably have what is in the background of the Apostle Paul when he's proclaiming the riches of the triune God at the Areopagus. Remember we said last time that Paul does take a little bit of a different tact here, a different track with the Gentiles. The Gentiles were not familiar with the Old Testament Scriptures.
They didn't traffic. in Moses, they didn't traffic in the Law, the Prophets and the Psalms, and so while he doesn't openly cite or quote the Old Testament and refer to it as such, the Lord says, or the Prophets spoke, or just as it is written, but nevertheless, the Old Testament is in the back of his mind, and revelation, the revelation of God informs his proclamation. Notice in Isaiah 42, verses 5 to 8, thus says God the Lord, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread forth the earth and that which comes from it, who gives breath to the people on it, and spirit to those who walk on it. I, the Lord, have called you in righteousness and will hold your hand. I will keep you and give you as a covenant to the people. as a light to the Gentiles, to open blind eyes, to bring out prisoners from the prison, those who sit in darkness from the prison house.
I am the Lord, that is my name, and my glory I will not give to another, nor my praise to carved images. Behold, the former things have come to pass, and new things I declare before they spring forth. I tell you of them." You see, this is the proclamation of the prophet Isaiah that is sort of a pre-Areopagus sermon by Isaiah. The folly of idols is brought in view by virtue of the fact that there is one God, God the Lord of verse 5, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread forth the earth. and that which comes from it.
You see, the pagans had all notions of a multiplicity of gods who were the gods of various things. You had the god of the sea, the god of the sky, the god of the sun, the god of blacksmiths, the god of wine, the god of war, the god of weapons, the god of potato chips. You had all manner of gods being ascribed to things that were no gods at all. And what the prophets of the Old Testament wanted to set forth and what the apostles, the proclaimers of Jesus and the resurrection in the New Testament want to set forth is that there is only one God and He is testified as the only God by virtue of the fact that He created all things and that He upholds all things.
You can turn as well, if you're still in Isaiah, to Isaiah 45. Isaiah 45, and notice in verse 18, for thus says the Lord, who created the heavens, who is God, who formed the earth and made it, who has established it, who did not create it in vain, who formed it to be inhabited, I am the Lord and there is no other. You see what the Apostle Paul is doing here when he says, As I observed the objects of your worship, I noticed an altar with this inscription, to the unknown God, and then when he follows that up by saying, him I proclaim to you, the one you worship in ignorance, him I proclaim to you, he's not tacking on an additional God to their pantheon of deities. I know you get that, but a wholesome reiteration.
He's not saying, okay, you've got your Zeus, you've got your Hephaestus, you've got your Athena, you've got your Hermes, you've got your Heracles, you've got your Hera, you've got all 30,000 of your deities. Consider a little Jesus and resurrection in your life. Perhaps might give a little boost to your step and supplement your idolatry well. No.
That's not what the Apostle Paul is doing. You see the biblical pedigree here is such that creation of the heavens and the earth and all that is in them testifies to the reality that the One who did that is the only living and true God and testifies to this reality that I am the Lord and there is no other. In other words, cast aside all of these on godly conceptions of deity and own the living and true God. Own the one that truly is the one and only God who created the heavens and the earth.
Glory is due the triune God alone. He alone is to be adored. The Athenians had exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for corruptible things. You know what is probably in the back of the Apostle Paul's mind as he was writing Romans 1?
What's probably in the back of the Apostle Paul's mind as he's writing Romans 1 is the Athenian episode, is the Areopagus episode. He's casting his eyes upon all of this madness of corruptible things, four-footed creatures and crawling things, the incorruptible God exchanged for corruptible things. That's what he is casting his eyes upon in this Athenian episode. And so it is God alone who is to be proclaimed, the incorruptible God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
One more text before we move on. You can turn to Jeremiah with me. If you were already in Isaiah and you hadn't yet moved back to Acts 17, you're not too far away. Jeremiah 10.
Notice the language in Jeremiah 10 beginning at verse 10. You see, the heart of the Apostle Paul here... Let's make no mistake, yes, Paul has a wholesome indignation against idolatry here. But he also has a heart that those wrapped up and bound in darkness would be let free and liberated from that darkness to own the living and true God.
You see, Paul will get to judgment. Paul will get to the reality that this God whom I proclaim to you will judge the world by the man whom He has ordained, and He's given testification, witness to this, by raising Him from the dead. And so he wants them to understand this God of Jeremiah 10.10. The Lord is the true God.
He is the living God and the everlasting King. At His wrath, the earth will tremble. and the nations will not be able to endure His indignation." Notice verse 11, "'Thus you shall say to them, the gods that have not made the heavens and the earth shall perish from the earth and from under these heavens.'" You see what is in the background of the Apostle Paul's preaching here? The gods, you Athenians, that have not made the heavens and the earth, shall perish from the earth, and you will perish with them, so do not follow them. Do not bow down before them, do not worship them, because this God, the God of verse 12, He has made the earth by His power, He has established the world by His wisdom, and has stretched out the heavens at His discretion.
The triune God. Yahweh. The Christian God. The only living and true God.
Unbounded Glory of God
Notice secondly as we get then back to Acts 17. Notice secondly, the Apostle Paul's next point is at this. The unbounded glory of the Christian God. Notice the language in v. 24.
God who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands. the unbounded glory of the Christian God. What does it mean when we say unbounded? Kids, you know, hopefully what a bound is, a boundary, it's a, you know, limitation set, a formal or informal limitation set, confine set for a thing. In sports, you can't go out of bounds.
You have to, you know, in soccer, you gotta keep the ball on this side of the touchline. If you kick it past or run past with it, you're out of bounds. So moving from low things to higher things, the unbounded glory of the Christian God means that He cannot be limited. He cannot be confined.
He cannot be circumscribed. This is the language of the Apostle Paul here. He does not dwell in temples made with hands. This is a direct attack, a direct blow against the Athenians who were listening because all of their gods dwelt in temples made with hands.
So the Apostle Paul wants to set forth the glory of the Christian God as the one who is unbounded, the one who is limitless, the one who does not dwell in temples made with hands. You can turn with me to 1 Kings 8. The reason we're navigating Bible is to understand that the Apostle Paul is not arguing from natural revelation, though in a sense he appeals to the reality that the Athenians, by virtue of being created in the image of God, and yet having that image marred, affected, vandalized, violated by virtue of sin, have suppressed the glory of the incorruptible God, and are following after many deities. Paul's preaching from his knowledge of the Scriptures, the Scriptures being that revelation of God himself, the one who is to be known, adored, loved, worshipped, and gloried in.
Notice in 1 Kings 8, in the context here, brethren, is that Solomon is giving the dedication of the temple. He's casting his eyes, perhaps, on the splendor of this temple that has been made with human hands. It's a beautiful structure, it's a glorious temple that he has made as a dwelling place of the Lord. We'll qualify that statement in a moment, but notice here in 1 Kings 8 at verse 27.
In the context, we have here the dedication of the temple, his prayer to Yahweh, the one for whom the temple was built. And notice in verse 27, but will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain you, how much less this temple which I have built. You see the language there.
First off, but will God indeed dwell on the earth? You know, some point to Solomon here with the knowledge of the coming Messiah that he is marveling and the one who would fulfill the reality of the temple. Will God indeed dwell on the earth? It's a marvel looking forward to the fact that yes, God will dwell upon the earth.
God, the second of the blessed triune, will come, assume man's nature, and dwell among men in order to bring redemption to the fallen sons and daughters of Adam. We have here a reality, though, a stress upon the greatness of God, the bigness of God. And that's even a language that we can't use, kids. Hopefully, in this church, you get at least the slightest impression that we seek to preach a big God.
God is big, and yet that language is not helpful to our conception of God, because God is not marked by size. He is sizeless. He is not constrained by space. He is immense, eternal, infinite.
But notice what the text says here. Behold heaven, and the heaven of heavens cannot contain you. What's he saying here? He's saying that if we cast our eyes out upon the galaxy, if we look up to the heavens and we see the stars in the expanse, and we consider for a moment, does God dwell there?
We have to say no, because the heavens cannot contain Him. Is God there? Yes, in the very immediacy of His being, His nature, and His essence, but He's not confined by the space, He's not confined by the expanse, and He goes beyond that to say even the heaven of heavens cannot contain you. Even heaven itself, though God does specially dwell there, the angels fly and they praise and they sing, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, and yet God does not properly dwell there because even the heaven of the heavens cannot contain Him.
You know, we need to divest ourselves of a Saturday morning or Sunday morning cartoon God who has round eyes, a gray beard, has a staff, and has this comical smile on his face and does whatever cartoon gods do. The universe and all that is in it, the expanse of the heaven, God doesn't dwell somewhere out there. God isn't beyond Pluto. in some size of his being, just pouring benevolence out upon an asking earth. God is big and that language even fails to express the God that we have.
He is immense. He is eternal. He fills the heavens and the earth. The Apostle Paul here in Acts 17 wants them to know that the greatness of God isn't to be shrunk down, distorted, disturbed, and violated so that He is represented on a six foot tall, a 20 foot tall, a 30 foot tall stoa of Zeus.
He does not dwell in temples made with hands. The glory of our God is being proclaimed by the Apostle Paul here, and it is at the point that he is immense. For anybody who's read Theology Immense, hopefully it doesn't scare anyone away, it speaks to an aspect of God's infinity. If the infinity of God is seen in the fact that He has no limitations, He is infinite.
Nothing can contain, constrain, limit our God. He is Lord of heaven and earth, the creator of all things. He constrains, He limits, He sets boundaries. He is not limited and He is not bounded.
Infinity. It's not a number. It's not the greatest number. It's without limits.
Well, immensity pertains to the fact that God is limitless with respect to space. You cannot confine Him. He does not dwell in temples made with hands. You know, in efforts to cast away our notions of God as a big-eyed Sunday morning cartoon, hopefully nobody sees him that way, but that's the way the world presents him to us, is this comical old man.
You think about the largeness, the bigness, again those words fail, but the immensity of our God. Anybody who lives in Abbotsford who has been there, if you drive down Whatcom Road from my side there, Sumas Mountain, you wind around Whatcom Road and there's a point where you wrap around the corner and you depart from the obstruction of houses and trees and all of a sudden you're presented with this majestic mountain, Mount Baker, on a clear day. It's absolutely amazing. You come around.
I've often times wanted to stop and take a photo. I'm not sure why the photo would stay on my phone and nobody would ever see it. But anyway, it's just so amazing. You're confronted as you wrap around with the immensity of this mountain.
That's improper predication of a mountain. A mountain isn't immense, but we can speak of it that way in our glowing poetry. But this massive mountain, Mount Baker. Now, if we then mount up, no pun intended, to a larger mountain, for those of you who don't know, Mount Baker, I think, is about 10,000 or almost 11,000 feet high.
You'd still have to travel 4,500 feet to get to base camp for Mount Everest. And then Mount Everest is another 14,000 feet on top of that. If we were to cast our eyes upon Mount Everest, we'd be casting our eyes upon a big thing. And yet to say that God is bigger than Mount Everest is to do Everest a favor and to cast dispersions upon the triune God.
Because He is immense. He fills the heavens and the earth. No place contains Him. He is located nowhere, and yet He is everywhere.
Because nothing bounds Him. Nothing confines Him. Glorious. Isaiah 66.
You can turn there with me. to rehearse something of this reality. Isaiah chapter 66. Again, the Apostle Paul is looking at these contained deities, these temples made with hands. He's looking at these things and he is grieved and provoked in his heart that these are casting aside the God of glorious immensity for creeping things and images made after human likeness.
Notice in Isaiah 66. Verse one, Isaiah 66, beginning in verse one. Thus says the Lord, heaven is my throne and earth is my footstool. Where is the house that you will build me?
And where is the place of my rest? For all those things my hand has made and all those things exist, says the Lord. But, excuse me, verse two, for all those things my hand has made, and all those things exist, says the Lord. But on this one will I look, on him who is poor, and of a contrite spirit, and who trembles at my word.
You see that language? Where is the house that you will build me, and where is the place of my rest? You see, there is an indictment by God himself against pagan deities that surround the nations of Israel in that time, the time of the apostle. Where is the house that you will build me in?
Where is the place that my rest? You know, it goes back to creation here. For all these things, my hand is made. And all those things exist.
The Lord does not dwell in temples made with hands. I want you to turn for a second to Acts 7. And I want to make a connection here at the point of Acts 7 with regards to the Apostle Paul. In Acts 7, we have near the closing, of Stephen's preaching of Jesus Christ, we have in Acts 7 at verse 48, notice this language.
However, the Most High does not dwell in temples made with hands. As the prophet says, heaven is my throne and earth is my footstool. What house will you build for me, says the Lord? Or what is the place of my rest?
Has my hand not made all these things? In Stephen's employ of the prophet there. He wants to press upon his Jewish audience that this temple is about to be destroyed and it only anyway was the shadow of the substance that is Christ Jesus himself. You put to death this righteous one, worship him, follow him, believe in him.
This temple is such that God no longer dwells there, having departed his glory from that place. by virtue of the reality that Christ, the promised tabernacle and temple, has come among men, redeemed men, and ascended to heaven. But notice the language in verse 48. Perhaps Paul here, in Acts 17, is reflecting upon his pre-conversion listening to Stephen. You think about that for a moment.
Remember, this is probably 20 years after he heard Stephen. There was a day on which he, as an unconverted Jew, was watching over the garments of those who were crushing Stephen's head. They had disrobed themselves, not entirely. They had disrobed themselves in order to be unconstrained, to pick up rocks and crush the head of Stephen.
Paul is watching that, hearing that. seeing that, and he would have listened to these words by Stephen, the Most High does not dwell in temples made with hands, as the prophet says. And so on that wonderful day in Athens, Paul repeats the same and the glorious truth. Men do not determine the boundaries of God's dwelling. He determines theirs.
In fact, that's the point in verse 27b and 28. Notice at this point, the unbounded glory of God. Verse 27, so that they should seek the Lord in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us, for in Him we live and move. Excuse me, back to verse 26. at this point, verse 26, and He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on the face of the earth, and notice, and has determined their pre-appointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings.
You know, we very often and rightly go to this verse and we see providence there. We see God's divine providence because God, and again, we rightly do this, God and He alone has determined the pre-appointed times and boundaries of everyone's dwellings. You see, there is force of the argument here that God is the one, as the text says, who determines the boundaries of us. We don't, as idolaters, determine the boundaries and the dwelling places of God.
He does not dwell in temples made with hands. You see, He's coming against all these Athenians who are determining the dwelling places and the boundaries of their gods. They shape them, they form them out of the earth, out of wood, out of stone. They build and erect temples wherein they place their gods, who are no gods at all, and yet it is Yahweh alone who is unbounded, who Himself determines the boundaries of our dwellings.
One other text, Psalm 139. Psalm 139, because brethren, God is immense. God is omnipresent. What that means, when we speak of his immensity, we ought not to scare anyone away from believing then that God is not imminent, that God is not present, that God is not near to every one of us.
You know that God's omnipresence Which means that He is everywhere. Hopefully, kids, as we study the doctrine of God in your classes, you come to know that God is omnipresent. He is everywhere. His omnipresence is not the omnipresence of His power that dispatched beyond Pluto.
He has the ability to affect, with His power, things on earth. But rather, that He is everywhere. He fills the heavens and the earth, is the language of Jeremiah 23, 23 and 24. He fills the heavens and the earth.
So while He is the transcendent God removed far from His creatures, nevertheless, He is the one who is immediately near by the everywhere presence of His glorious being. Notice in Psalm 139, He is a God who is present. Where can I go from your spirit? This is 139.7.
Or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend into heaven, you are there. If I make my bed in hell, behold, you are there. If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.
If I say, surely the darkness shall fall on me, even the night shall be light about me. Indeed, the darkness shall not hide from you, but the night shines as the day. The darkness and the light are both a light to you." See the language there? Now, this cuts with a two-edged sword.
This cuts with a two-edged sword. Where can I go from your spirit or where can I flee from your presence? For the believer, this is absolutely glorious. All this talk about immensity, the greatness of our God, the fact that He is unconstrained, unbounded, that He is located nowhere and yet is everywhere, it might go over our heads and you might think that it smacks of the high learning of theologians, but it doesn't.
It is ever so practical. God being immense and everywhere present comes to us and it brings glorious comfort and confidence. You see, kids, when you pray to God, and adults, when you pray to God, you're not praying to a God afar off. You know, our prayers don't go to God like a late 1980s, early 90s modem.
It takes a minute and a half to connect and it has to travel through space and air somewhere to get to God. He, you know, He demodulates it and processes the prayer and then dispenses it, but we have to wait a while. When we pray to God, we're not praying to a God afar off, we're praying to a God that is near, who fills the heavens and the earth. God is near.
Remember, when we read that God comes down from heaven, that's a special manifestation of his glory and his power and his condescension. God's not absent from earth. When God comes down from heaven, he's not coming to a place where he was absent. God is everywhere.
And so comfort and confidence comes with this blessed reality that our God is near. For the believer, this is to bring blessed comfort, blessed confidence, because God is immediately present in the perfection of His unbounded goodness. When you pray to God, you're praying to a God that is immediately present by His unbounded goodness. So when you pray, you pray with confidence.
Because of this truth that God does not dwell in temples made with hands, he is unconstrained, unbounded, and everywhere for his people. But you see, the other edge of that sword is the reality that God is everywhere. The language of the text, again, where can I go from your spirit or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend into heaven, you are there.
If I make my bed in hell, behold, you are there for the unbeliever. out there. You have to realize that God is near. You can't close a door and block out God. You can't hide in the darkness and block out God.
You can't call upon the rocks and the trees to hide you from the wrath of the Lamb, because God is everywhere. Where can I go from you is David's proclamation, David's prayer, David's declaration. If you're an unbeliever and you're seeking to hide your sin, you will be successful with respect to your parents, perhaps, with respect to those who are around you. You can wait till night and go under the covers.
You can wait for night and go wherever to commit all manner of iniquity, but you cannot hide from God who does not dwell in temples made with hands. The psalmist says, if I ascend into heaven, you are there. If I make my bed in hell, behold, you are there. Make no mistake, God is in hell.
His special manifestation of his unbounded goodness is not there, but rather the absolute and abiding presence of his holiness and his justice for all eternity. You know, the one who departs or the one who embraces or the one who seeks after death in order to somehow leave God is the one who is gravely mistaken. He's everywhere.
All-Sufficient Independence of God
Notice the all-sufficient independence of the Christian God as we move toward a close and as we move back to Acts 17. Notice the all-sufficient independence of God from Paul's proclamation here. V. 25, "...nor is he worshipped with men's hands as though he needed anything, since he gives to all life breath and all things." Now God is not saying that we are not to worship Him with our hands or that we are not to engage in a Christian and worshipful service to our God. What the Apostle Paul is saying over and against the Athenian deities is that unlike those gods, who are no gods at all, who are served by men's hands, men's hands make them, men's hands serve them, they gain their fame, they gain their notoriety, They have a lack that is filled up by the contribution of men.
God is not like that. He is not worshipped by men's hands as if He needed anything. He is all-sufficient. He is independent.
The converse here is that the pagans give life, breath, and all things to their gods. Their gods depend upon them for their very existence. And even if we grant the legitimacy of pagan religion for a moment, In their own scheme, their gods depend upon what they do towards them and for them in order to have fame and in order to have vindication. Isaiah 44, 8-17 brings out this reality.
It's a wonderful scene that you can read on your own time. Isaiah 44, 8-17. In that, the prophet is proclaiming the reality and the folly of idolatry, where someone can go and chop down a tree. You know, the idolaters go up to the forest, go up to a hill, they cut down a tree, and they manufacture their god from the tree.
Isaiah spends some time opening this up to see how mad it is. They cut down their gods with an axe and form them out of the felled tree. And then with some of that wood they put in the fire and they start to cook their meat. You know, the madness that our God is like unto that which is fuel for meat cooking is absolute madness.
But there's something at the end of that particular passage that Isaiah says, and not at the end, but very close to the end, in verse 21 of Isaiah 44, he says, Remember these, O Jacob, in Israel, for you are my servant. I have formed you, you are my servant. O Israel, you will not be forgotten by me. You see, God is all-sufficient in His glorious independence and has no need of anyone.
In Acts 17, at verse 28, this is brought out as well. In Acts 17, at verse 28, the Apostle Paul highlights this reality still, having not departed from his subject matter, but still proclaiming the Christian God, the one and only living and true God. The Apostle Paul speaks these words in verse 28. He says, For in Him we live and move and have our being.
As also some of your own poets have said, for we are also His offspring. God is glorious in his independence and in his all-sufficiency. And you see, this is one of the cruxes of the matter here. These idolaters are giving life, breath, and things to their gods and all the while forsaking the life, breath, and all things reality that the only living and true God provides.
You see, to follow after idols is to forsake the One who gives us life, breath, and all things. We see this close, this, therefore, in verse 29, Therefore, since we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the divine nature is like gold or silver or stone, something shaped by art and man's devising. That pertains to the honor that is due the Christian God. You see, it is of the utmost dishonor to think that the divine nature is like silver or gold or stone.
You see the folly then in the making of images. Perhaps you've thought in some of your own, in some of those moments of untaught Christianity, well, why was God so harsh against the nations for making, well, actually, more specifically, why was God so harsh to his own people when they just manufactured a god out of gold that represented Yahweh? What's the problem? It's the honor of God.
It's the glory of God. The idea here is that we, being made in the image of God, we aren't making statues or we aren't following after some sort of religion where we think that our nature, our soul, our immortality is that which is immaterial. Why would we manufacture out of material things an image of the One who gives us our immateriality. Why would we make images of the One who is pure Spirit?
Why would we make images of the One who is immense, eternal, and glorious in all of His perfections? It is to dishonor God. And the Apostle closes with the fact that this God is merciful. The implication of following after a God of idolatry is that you forsake the mercy of God, Jonah, spoke these words in his prayer, those who regard worthless idols forsake their own mercy.
So Paul says, therefore, since we are the offspring of, or excuse me, verse 30, truly these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent. You see, this comes as a mercy. This comes as a glorious mercy to these Athenians. The proclamation of this God wasn't to insult.
The proclamation of this God wasn't to engage in some sort of unwholesome boasting. But it was unto the end that they would know this God, and that in knowing this God, they would know the mercy that He brings through Jesus Christ the Lord. That's why he preaches Jesus and the resurrection. That's why he unfolds and opens up the glory of God in his unbounded glory, in his exclusive lordship, in his all sufficient independence.
And the honor that is not to be imaged is so that they might know him and that they might find mercy in this one in whom and in whom only there is mercy. And
Athenian Reception of the Proclamation
notice in closing the reception that this garnered the reception that this proclamation of the only living and true God received. Verse 32, and when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked while others said, we will hear you again on this matter. So Paul departed from among them. I know I've gone over and it's hot.
Bear with me for about two minutes and 17 seconds.
Application to Hearers
You hear this morning and you're found in verse 32. Some of you mock. You're not doing it openly, you're not doing it verbally, but in your heart, you're mocking this notion of this God. I don't know how you could.
Mocking the notions of the pagan deities, yes, in a wholesome way. The psalmist does it. They have eyes, but they don't see. They have ears, but they do not hear.
Elijah says your God perhaps is relieving himself in the outhouse. But mocking this God? The God who is unbounded? The God who can be confined nowhere and yet fills the heavens and the earth?
The one who does not need the works of human hands but depends solely and alone, in fact, doesn't depend on anything. He is independent. That doesn't mean that he's self-dependent. God doesn't have an attribute of self-dependence.
He's independent. Those aren't the same things. But why would you mock this glorious one? Why would you mock this splendid one?
And perhaps some of you are saying, we'll hear you again on this matter, or you hear this morning, and we'll hear you again. Come back next week, maybe, or I'll keep coming to church, but from Monday to Saturday, I'll keep engaging in those devised wickednesses that I plan when I awake from my pillow in the morning, and maybe one day in the future, I'll consider this Jesus and the resurrection. Know that the acceptable time is now, in fact, Paul, in essence, says that when he says, these times of ignorance God overlooked. The time is now.
He commands all men everywhere to repent. You know, he's given evidence of this. He's given testification of this. Verse 31, because he has appointed a day on which he will judge the world, In righteousness by the man whom he has ordained, he is given assurance of this by raising him from the dead.
Again, a two-edged sword comes. Glorious comfort to the believer. The certainty of the resurrection testifying that this God exists and will judge the world. Glorious comfort to the believer, the testification, the certainty that this Jesus Christ is raised from the dead, and so judgment will take place, and this mercy is real, this grace, this love.
But you see, the other side of that sword cuts to the heart of the unbeliever. God has given assurance of judgment by the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And know that if you're here this morning outside of Christ, he will come in glory. with all his holy angels rendering vengeance upon those who did not know God and who did not obey the gospel of Jesus Christ. Believe on him, and you will have everlasting life, and you'll be found among those, verse 34, some men joined him and believed, among them Dionysius the Areopagite, a woman named Damaris, and others with them.
We pray that you would be found in verse 34, and not in verse 32, that you would be found among those few who followed after Paul, who believed in this God of unbounded glory, and who believed in Jesus Christ and the resurrection. and who will have comfort of comforts and joy of joy in the knowledge of that God and His Christ. Let us pray.
Closing Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank you for the truth of your revelation. We thank you for the glory we see in Acts 17 as Paul combated the madness of pagan idolatry upheld the glory of the living and true God. We do pray that you'd help us to glory in you, and that we would rejoice in you alone, and that we would see in you the only living and true God of heaven and earth, who made the heavens and the earth, who is so glorious, who is so unbounded that he certainly does not dwell in temples made with hands, but rather is even above the heaven and the heaven of heavens and we thank you for who you are and for what you do in the midst of guilty sinners, that you have set forth your Christ, that you've given forgiveness of sins and everlasting life in Him. We thank you for the certainty of judgment by virtue of the resurrection of the dead.
We thank you for the certainty of judgment testified by the certainty of Christ's own resurrection and we do pray that you would help us as Christians to glory in the truth of your word to glory in You, our God, and in Jesus Christ, whom You have sent. And we pray, Lord God, that by Your grace and for Your glory, You would raise dead sinners to life, that by grace they would be saved, and that they would sing along with all Your saints. Hallelujah. What a Savior.
And it's in Christ's name that we pray. Amen.