The Sorcerer Bar-Jesus

Well, we would like to get back to the book of Acts. So let's turn in our Bibles back to Acts chapter number 13 as we work through the gospel or the book of Acts. Today, we're gonna do a little bit of reviewing, not so much review in the sense that the Lord covered this subject a little bit earlier and I think it was Acts chapter eight, which is probably gonna be six months ago, back in the spring.

And I spent about, oh, my five messages on the subject of sorcery. Some of you probably weren't here during some of that, but we have another sorcerer in the book of Acts. And so I believe God mentions these things because he wants us to mention them multiple times.

And repetition is one of the ways to learn, it's catechism. Catechism is to put a groove into the mind and you come back a week later and groove it a little bit more and groove a little bit more and you catechize and you teach by repetition. So the Bible, if you notice Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, many of the stories are repeated.

And so God is using repetition to teach and to give instruction. So we have this idea of a sorcerer. Well, we learned last time that the early church, especially the Gentile church, God is building his church and he's giving them the tools to do it.

Prophets and teachers were in the church at Antioch and they were also ascending church and they were sending out Paul and Barnabas and we mentioned some of that last week. And so I'm gonna pick up and start reading in Acts 13. We left off with verse number five.

So we'll pick up here in verse number six. Remember, Paul and Barnabas begins their journey as they're being sent out and they head to Cyprus. Why did they go to Cyprus? Who can remember? Do you think? That's Barnabas' home area.

Barnabas is from Cyprus. And oftentimes when we have a burden and we release that burden, it starts out with those who are nearest to us, our family and our friends and our relatives. And then of course, Barnabas and Paul didn't just stay in Cyprus.

They spread out and went into the known world. And so they're going forth. Let's start in verse number six.

I'm gonna read down through the whole passage. We'll just go down through verse 13 and we'll cover that here this morning. And when they had gone through the aisle unto Paphos, this is the aisle of Cyprus, they found a certain sorcerer, a false prophet, a Jew whose name was Bar-Jesus.

Interesting enough that Bar is son, actually means son of Jesus. It could mean son of Joshua, but there may be some implications there, false concepts. Verse seven, which was with the deputy of the country, Sergius Paulus, a prudent man who called for Barnabas and Saul and desired to hear the word of God.

Evidently he heard that they were in the area and wanted to hear. But Elamus, the sorcerer, for so is his name by interpretation, withstood them seeking to turn away the deputy from the faith. Then Saul, who also is called Paul, filled with the Holy Ghost, set his eyes on him and said, O fool of all subtlety and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord? Now, I believe the Holy Spirit at times can have some pretty strong words and that Jesus oftentimes use strong words.

And I don't think it's unusual for us to, if we're faced a situation like that, to speak. You know, Stephen, you uncircumcised in hearts and ears, rebels, and he spoke being filled with the Holy Spirit. Verse 11, and now behold, the hand of the Lord is upon thee and thou shalt be blind, not seeing the sun for a season.

And immediately there fell on him a midst and a darkness and he went about seeking some to lead him by the hand. Then the deputy, when he saw what was done, believed being astonished at the doctrine of the Lord. Now, when Paul and his company loosed from Paphos, they came to Perga in Pamphylia and John, departing from them, returned to Jerusalem.

So here's the situation where John evidently has, I don't know, maybe there's too much difficulty there with Paul and Barnabas, and John decides he's gonna jump ship. And of course, that's gonna cause problems later on between Barnabas and Paul. They're gonna split asunder over Mark and Mark's decision to leave them at this time.

And that's gonna be a little later on here in the Book of Acts. But we face another sorcerer. So what I'm gonna share with you, most of you have heard some of these things, a few things are added, but we'll look at sorcery again here this morning.

Heavenly Father, Lord, I pray that you would impress upon our hearts the importance of the message and the things that you have for us here today, Lord. May our hearts be quickened and our hearts encouraged. Wash us all in the blood of Jesus.

May we all be truly cleansed that we can hear and receive. That our conscience might not be guilty today and our hearts be closed. And Lord, we cannot learn.

May we learn and do what we receive here, Lord. And so we look to you for help this morning. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.

All right, sorcery. Now, Elamus is another sorcerer. If you remember, we talked about Simon and I spent probably five messages on Simon the sorcerer.

And so we really covered sorcery. Now, most of us think when we think of sorcery, we probably think of something down in Africa or something over in Haiti, some wild individual, some sorcerer. But I wanna caution you with regards to sorcery.

It's something that's actually can be very close to us. And it's something that is very much a part of our world today. And it's gonna become more and more a part of our world.

And so open your hearts here this morning to what sorcery really is. And I wanna read to you here in the book of Revelation, talking about Babylon. This great city is built and much is said about this great city.

And John writes in Revelation 18, verse 23, he says, "'And the light of the candle in this city "'shall shine no more at all in thee, "'and the voice of the bridegroom and the bride "'shall be heard no more at all in thee. "'For thy merchants were the great men of the earth, "'for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived.'" Now this Babylon, which I understand is to be, you know, the culmination of man's effort to build what man can do like the Tower of Babel, it goes clear back to the Tower of Babel. God is gonna give man an opportunity in the end to do his thing, to build technology, you know, all these great things that man is doing.

God is gonna give him the ability and let him build. And people are gonna look at what man can do, and they're gonna begin to worship man, look to man, and in the end, it's gonna be the Antichrist that they're gonna be looking to and honoring and even worshiping. But all this is being brought about, it says, by sorceries.

"'For by their sorceries were all the nations deceived.'" And so this idea of sorcery, it's gonna deceive all the nations. And it's a very simple concept, which if you remember six months ago or so, what sorcery is. Sorcery is looking for our needs from someone or someplace outside of Christ.

Looking for our needs from someone or someplace outside of Christ. Now, my Bible says, and I love this passage, and I preached on this up in Canada a few weeks ago, it talks about in Colossians 2 and verse 9, we are complete in him. And I'd just like to receive that here this morning.

You are complete in him. Everything you need is in him. You do not need anything else outside of him.

The songwriter said, Jesus Christ is all I need. He has made to me all I need. He is my wisdom.

He is my righteousness. He is my justification. He is my sanctification.

He is my redeemer. He is my physician. He is my supplier.

He is my safety. He is my healer. He is my everything.

He is everything that you need, he has. You need not that any man teach you, John says, but the anointing which you have received of him shall guide you into all truth. And so Christianity is designed for us to look to him for everything, looking unto Jesus.

He is the source of everything we need. But the devil, the devil is at work, and we talked about this a few weeks ago, he's at work, trying to direct your attention away from him, I mean the Lord Jesus, to some other source. And that word source is basically the root of sorceries.

You find another source outside of the Lord Jesus. And as Brother John said here this morning, it may appear to be a good source, it may mix with truth, maybe truth in there. And as we read here in Acts, that in Ilimus, or the sorcerer, he has some truth.

He's a Jew, he's a false prophet, but false prophets don't say everything that's false. They mix in a lot of truth into their false prophets, into their false prophecies. So I just wanna impress upon you, because all the nations of the world are in the end gonna be deceived by this very thing.

Look away from Christ, they won't say that, but look elsewhere, and that elsewhere is gonna end up being anti-Christ. And anti-Christ does not mean against Christ, it simply means in the place of Christ. The devil wants you to look to him for everything.

And in the end, that's where it's gonna be. And there's a spirit, the spirit of Babylon, this woman represented in Revelation, is leading the world into this place. You know, it's amazing, I listen to these politicians, and I'll talk about this in a minute, but politicians used to say we trust in God, it's on our money.

You know what they're saying today? We trust in the science. You don't hear anymore trusting in God, we're not looking to God for our safety, we're not looking to God for his blessing, we're looking to science, we're trusting in our heart. There's many of those, but looking for our needs.

And I, you know, this is the basis of what Christianity is, and if you don't see this, you're gonna be led astray. You need to be looking in the right direction, especially as we go further and further down the course here. You need wisdom, let's look at some of these examples.

You need some wisdom, what's the Bible say? Bible says, if any man lack wisdom, let him ask of who? And ask of God, who gives to all men liberally. He is the source of all wisdom. And one of the things that we suffer with, and I suffer with, and just to share this with you, we're living in a world where everything is instant.

We have instant coffee, instant hot chocolate, which is much better than coffee, instant hamburgers at the McDonald's, instant to everything, we get our needs met on a regular basis. So when we come to God, we oftentimes think he's gonna give it to us, you know, just like that, everything is instant, immediate gratification. Well, that's not how God works.

And one of our problems is we expect God to answer in a minute or answer in a day. But God expects us to seek him for answers, seek him for all these things, and not simply be an instant gratification individual, but we're being trained, you know, just like those rats that hear that little bell and they come out and get their food. We're being trained that you need, if you have a need, you need to have satisfied instantly.

And we can satisfy you instantly in the world. And God says, no, I want you to learn to come to me and to seek me and to find what you need. And I don't often give it to you instantly.

So you need wisdom? Let him ask of God. You need power? Well, you shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you. You need counsel? Well, you need not that any man teach you.

Now, I believe in counsel, and good counsel always pushes you to Jesus Christ. That's what the counsel that is good will say to you. Help you to find your look to Jesus.

That's counsel from the Bible. You need health? We have a great physician. There is a course of action coming to the Lord Jesus Christ.

I think of that story of Asa. You know, Asa went and sought the physicians before he sought the Lord, and God did not like that. Anytime we are sick, the first thing we ought to do is seek God.

Seek the Lord for our needs. And the Lord may send us to Brother Wolf, the physician. He may send us there, and that's okay.

But the heart doesn't just immediately go to the physician and say, I'm going to seek out the physician. But we ought to be seeking the Lord. Wealth, my God shall supply all your needs according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.

And so just to start off here, to understand what sorcery is, our needs, everything we have, needs to be found in the Lord Jesus. And God is honored when you have a need, you go to him first, and you seek him for that need. You have a need for finances, let's go to the Lord.

We have a need for health, let's go to the Lord. We have a need for wisdom, let's go to the Lord. And so that's a direction we ought to pursue.

We're connected to divine, and that connection hooks us into all the resources that we have need of. But sorcery is directing you to the Lord. To some other source.

And that's how you can remember what sorcery means. It's not the source, it's another source. And so you'll find these sorcerers are doing that very thing.

Instead of looking unto Jesus, look to me. I have some answers for you. And so in Africa, you know, in Haiti, you think of those sorcerers, and they probably wear costumes, you know, they paint their face and all kinds of things, and you say, oh, that's bad.

But in America, they appear differently, and they look very refined. Wolves in sheep's clothing, in churches, it's all covered up, so that it can be deceptive. Sorcery is much like, I'll use this comparison here.

Sorcery is much like the word, it's much like the word sports, or you can use any other example. Sports is a broad word, and there are many different types of sports. You have volleyball, you have baseball, you have basketball, you have football.

I mean, there's a list, it's a long list. Sorcery is the very same thing. Sorcery is a broad word.

You see it in the Bible, sorcery. Sorcery is referring to all the ways that the devil has devised, and man has devised to direct your attention away from your real source to another source. And there are many different types of sorcery, and I remember going over some of them with you all.

I'd like to go over some of them here by way of review again, so that we can be reminded, when we think about this man, Elamus the sorcerer, looking elsewhere. First of all, the idea of a necromancer. A necromancer is someone who looks to the dead for counsel, looks to the dead.

Do you remember Saul? Saul lost his connection with God, and he was in big trouble, and he went to the witch of Endor to try to find some counsel and some wisdom, and the witch of Endor called up, and I don't know all about how this works, called Samuel up, remember, from the dead, and Saul, saw Samuel there, and this idea of getting some direction and wisdom from the dead. A necromancer. Divination, and these are all Old Testament words.

You'll find them on many of the lists. I didn't, it's just a couple of them. Divination is looking to the demonic world for future or present knowledge.

There's a lot of this that goes on. There's places up in Mount Vernon, down in Newark. There's fortune tellers.

There's tarot cards. There's mediums. There's Ouija boards.

There's black boxes. There's, when I was a kid, that eight ball thing. You'd shake it around, and then have somebody come up on the little hole there and tell you what your future holds, and all these things tell you what's coming in the future, tell you who you're gonna marry, tell you how many children you're gonna have, give you wisdom and counsel for the future.

Don't look to God. Look over to me. And a lot of these things are demonic.

So you go in, you sit down, cross with a lady. She's got this crystal ball, or she's got these cards, and she's gonna tell you what your future is. Well, I know somebody who knows what my future is.

It's the Lord. And so I can go to the Lord, and if the Lord doesn't want me to know my future, you know, he says, just worry about today. Don't even think about tomorrow.

And so I need to let my heart rest. I don't need to know the future. But, you know, the sorcerer says, we got some information for you.

And so people know your future, so why don't you come and get it? Well, what happens is you start getting it, and maybe sometimes it works. And you say, whoa, this is good stuff. I'm getting my future.

I'm getting to know the future. And then your heart starts leaning toward that fortune teller, and pretty soon, you're trusting that fortune teller. Everything that happens, I need to go to the fortune teller to see what's gonna happen tomorrow.

I need to go to the fortune teller to see what's gonna happen in the next six months. And pretty soon, now you're attached to an individual, or even to a spirit, because you're looking in your heart outside of looking to the Lord. And so please, I encourage you to avoid all those things.

They're not good. Astrology, and these are just some of the common ones, looking to the stars for counsel. You know, there are people who look to the stars to get direction and counsel for their life.

And I think you can look to the stars if you're on a ship or you're out in the wilderness and you need to look for direction. God has given them for that purpose. But looking to the stars, what sign are you? Libro, what sign are you? Oh, I have a message from the stars for you.

I remember as a child, reading the astrologies in the newspaper, and every week or so, they had a different astrology. You know, your lucky week, or you're gonna meet the person of your life in the next week. It's just astrology.

And another source that is outside of the source that we're intended to seek. Now, this list of sorcery, just like sports, I could probably bring you 20 from the Bible. There's many of them.

Magi, we get the word magic, looking to the demonic world for power. You know, we're to look to the Lord for power. But some people look outside of that to the magi.

Those magi are the ones who withstood Moses. Now, there is power. Here's the caution for you.

You know, those who withstood Moses, they could turn that staff into a snake. And wow, these people have power too. And I believe the demonic world has power.

Just talk to the maniac of Gadara and those who tried to contain him. They couldn't even bind him with chains. He had a lot of power.

And so there is power on the dark side. And so some people, they start looking there. You know, Lord, I have to seek you for days and days and fast and pray and ask you for the power of the Holy Spirit of God.

And I have to ask you for boldness, Lord. And I can go over here and the devil has an opportunity for me to get some power real quick. I mean, we'll just drive through the drive-through and I can pick it up.

And that's looking to the wrong source. Then one that I think really affects a lot in America is this idea of witchcraft, looking to medicines for healing. You know, I don't think there's anything wrong with medicines, but here's what happens.

People start to get attached to them. And when they have some sort of a sickness, give me my meds, give me my meds. And they almost, their hearts become attached to it.

And people write it out and people get addicted. Witchcraft, by the way, witchcraft is the word pharmakeia. You all probably know that, where we get the word pharmacy from.

You know, I picture that witch, you know, stewing that big pot, making a potion so that you can come and drink some and get healed and all the things that are associated with that come to me for your medical needs. And here, just throw this out. I wanna make sure you understand this.

I'm not talking about, you know, taking an aspirin or taking a Tylenol, but what happens is the heart begins to get attached to these things. And you begin to live a life and you say, well, what should I do? Well, I'm gonna go to my astrologer. Well, I need some power and strength.

I'm gonna go over here to this magi. I need some counsel. I need to hear from the dead.

I'm gonna go to this person. And your heart is seeking all these places. A lot of people like that today.

Very superstitious. And of course, none of this gives any honor to God. The heart looking outside of the Lord Jesus.

Classic example of this is Brother Cleet and myself and Brother John Lonaker and Dennis, few years ago went down. We were just down spending our Saturdays in Columbus to the refugees there. And we were going to apartment complexes.

There's some complexes down there in Morse Road that are just entirely like Somalis and some Nepalis. Apartment complex is filled with these refugees. And so we went to this apartment complex and it had Nepalis in it.

And we'd go to these doors and there'd be these snakes, these pictures of snakes on the outside of the doors on these apartments. And you know, get to the door and knock. And here you got this picture of a snake.

Finally, I asked one of these Nepalis, I said, what's all these snakes doing on the outside of your doors? He says, oh, we're protected. Evil spirits, protected. So here's people, many people who when they need security and safety from harm and from the evil, they look to a snake, they look to a serpent that they've put on the outside of their door.

Happens all the time. A lot of people do that. And so, but safety is what? Safety is of the Lord.

And so when you're fearful, you run to the Lord. You put your trust in Him. You don't run to all these other sources.

So sorcery, it's when the heart is drawn away from the Lord to trust in another for wisdom, for counsel, for power, for health, for wealth, for safety, all those things. Science, same thing. You know, we're an educated people here in the West.

You know, we don't deal with that witchcraft and witches. We, we're smart. We have science.

And when we have questions, we run to science. We run to the scientists, the experts. We get our answers from them.

Well, it's a sorcery. It's sorcery. You don't trust in any of those things, but we trust in the Lord.

And so Babylon here in Revelation is deceiving the nations with sorcery because what she's doing, and she's doing it right now, is she is directing people's hearts slowly away from this and from seeking God for answers in every area of life to another source. Now we're going to get to this sorcerer here, Elamus. But one thing I want to bring out is this.

Once you start going that way, you go to the, you know, the diviner or the medium or the tarot card, or you go to the medication in your heart, or you go to these things and you're trusting in them, those things now begin to control you. And that's the bottom line to all this, control. Ultimately, the Antichrist wants control of the world.

And so the spirit of God, and it's the heart of God today for who is supposed to control us. We're to walk in the spirit. We're to walk under the authority and the control of the Lord Jesus Christ.

God gave us his spirit that we can walk in it. But ultimately what most people are doing is they're departing from the Lord and they're turning their heart toward all these other sources, which are sorcery. So that's the danger we face.

And once you do that, you're going to be controlled. Controlled by another. Simon, the sorcerer, he was one that was controlling the whole area of Samaria.

It says he, they would say this in Acts 8.9 that he is the great power of God. All this ought to be reviewed for all, most of you. In 8.10, they all gave heed unto him.

And in chapter eight, verse 11, to him they had regard from the least to the greatest. You know? Hey, that's Simon. You better listen to him.

We have health needs, we go to him. We have financial needs, we go to him. We need counsel, we go to him.

He's got control over everybody. We give heed to him. When he says something, we give heed because he's in control of us and he might take away our benefits.

So Simon. So let's look here now with all that in mind to Acts 13 and verse number six. And when they had gone through the isle unto Paphos, they found a certain sorcerer, a false prophet, a Jew.

There's a lot of things here whose name was Bar-Jesus. So there's a couple of things here that help us to see he's a religious man. Just like Simon.

Simon was also a half Jew. He was from Samaria and Simon believed in God. He was the great power of God and so these are religious individuals.

They're not some way out there and it's people that can be in the midst of us and leading people astray, but they're false prophets. He's a Jew and he's what the phrase here, Bar-Jesus, means a son, a son of Jesus. So sorcery.

Sorcery can be in religion and it oftentimes is. Mixing, as John said here this morning, the good and the bad. And when the devil used the Bible to try to tempt Jesus, he misquoted it.

He misused it. He wrested it out of its context and he used it then to destroy. And I thought of the cults and we talked about this previously when we talked about Simon, but all cults are into sorcery because all cults are very much control oriented.

You look at all the cults and you study some of those cults and you'll see that men like David Koresh and Jim Jones, they had such a control over the people that they would even drink Kool-Aid that they knew was poison. And all of them were committed suicide. So many people do crazy things because they're under the control of a cult leader who is into and promoting sorcery.

And I don't know, maybe there are people here this morning that are dabbling in sorcery. And maybe someone is controlling your life because you've let your heart out to another source and now your heart is attached to that source. And that source can sway you any way they want because your heart is heading in that direction.

So we need to be careful. It's all about control. People don't wanna live under the control of the Lord.

And so they're looking elsewhere. Look at verse six here. We're gonna try to learn a few things about this man.

And when they had gone through the island of Paphos, they found a certain sorcerer, a false prophet, a Jew whose name was Bar-Jesus, which was with the deputy of the country. Some sort of a governor there, Sergius Paulus, a prudent man who called for Barnabas and Saul and desired to hear the word of God. Now, this sorcerer attached himself, or may I say, desired to attach himself to a person of authority.

And if you're a sorcerer or you're involved in sorcery, you want to be in a position where you can influence those who control and who rule over others. And so you find oftentimes in the Bible, those individuals who are attached to leaders all through the Bible, the Pharaohs, the kings of Babylon, all of them had sorcerers attached to them. Now, maybe sometimes the kings wanted those sorcerers attached to them.

You know why? Because they wanted to hear and get some information. We're gonna see an example here in just a little bit. They want to get some information.

So the king says, I want you, necromancer, to be in my court. I want you, medium, you, tarot card lady, you, crystal ball leader, you, astrologer, give me all the information I can get because I'm a leader and I want to hear from anybody that can help me. Well, but the sorcerer says, if I'm gonna have an influence over a lot of people, I'm gonna connect with a governor, a president, a Pharaoh.

And in doing so, like Joseph found out on the good side, I can influence a lot of people. And so this sorcerer finds his way to a deputy of this country. And you'll find in Africa and you'll find in many parts of the world that the witch doctor attaches himself to the chief, the tribe chief.

And they're like that because through that connection, he can then influence a lot more people. And you see this in the book of Revelation because Babylon, who deceives the nation with sorceries, is sitting on the beast, which is the Antichrist. And so these two are attached together and the sorcery just feeds off of the governor or the ruler, Antichrist.

So they benefit from each other. I'd like you to turn with me back to the book of Daniel. There's a good example of this in Daniel chapter two.

Here's a black and white example. God bless Daniel and all of those who are like Daniel. But in Daniel chapter two, there was a situation happening here in Babylon and there was a dream and the secret was not able to be revealed.

And the king calls all the magicians and all the astrologers and they all come in and they don't have an answer to the interpretation of the dream. And so in verse 24 of Daniel two, let's read it. It says, therefore Daniel went in unto Ariok, whom the king had ordained to destroy the wise men of Babylon.

He went and said thus unto him, destroy not the wise men of Babylon, bring me in before the king and I will show unto the king the interpretation. Then Ariok brought in Daniel before the king in haste and said thus unto him, I have found a man of the captives of Judah that will make known unto the king the interpretation. So the king's been trying to find out the interpretation of this dream from all his wise men.

Verse 26, the king answered and said to Daniel, whose name was Belteshazzar, art thou able to make known unto me the dream which I have seen and the interpretation thereof? And Daniel answered in the presence of the king and said, I love this, the secret which the king hath demanded cannot the wise men, the astrologers, the magicians, the soothsayers show unto the king. He could put all those names on there, the necromancers, all these names. But verse 28, there is a God in heaven that reveals secrets and makes known to the king Nebuchadnezzar what shall be in the latter days.

And he goes on and he gives this interpretation of the dream. All these sorcerers, all these who are directing the attention away from the God of heaven. And yet God orchestrates a situation where he's a faithful man who is seeking him, who is not seeking all these other sources.

And God gives him an opportunity to say, Daniel, I'm gonna give you the interpretation of that dream. And I think the Lord still looks for that today. I think we ought to be a congregation of people that God can use to when people need wisdom, they come to you and I. When they need prayer for healing, they come to us.

When they need counsel, when they need power, when they need wisdom about finances, they come to us, to the word of God and they receive counsel that is biblical. So Daniel here is a great example of someone who exposes the sorcerer and lifts up the Lord as the source of all wisdom and understanding. Let's go back here to Acts again and continue Acts chapter 13.

Verse number seven, which was with the deputy of the country, Sergius Paulus, a prudent man who called for Barnabas and Saul and desired to hear the word of God. So here's a man on this island of Cyprus who wants to hear God's word, who wants to be converted, perhaps. Verse eight, but Elamus, the sorcerer, for so is named by interpretation, withstood them, seeking to turn away the deputy from the faith.

Now there's a fear here in Elamus' heart that, oh my, if these guys, Paul and Barnabas, give the gospel to this ruler, Sergius Paulus, he's gonna get converted. And if he gets converted, I lose my position. I lose my job and everything falls apart.

It's kind of like there in Ephesus when Paul and Barnabas are preaching about the great goddess Diana, you know, and the people there said, oh boy, we can't have this because if the people start believing that there's a true God in heaven and his son, Jesus Christ, they're not gonna buy our idols anymore. They're not gonna worship the idol and we're gonna be out of business. And so there was influence.

We gotta stop this. And so this Elamus said, I gotta stop. I gotta stop this preaching, preaching of the gospel.

This man may not turn to me anymore. This leader, he may turn to God and seek his answers from the Lord. So he's a fearful man.

He might lose his position of influence. Now Saul here, which is Paul, verse nine, and then Saul who also is called Paul, by the way, this is the first time that Saul is called Paul in the New Testament. I think from here on out, he's called Paul, filled with the Holy Ghost, set his eyes on him and said, oh, full of all subtlety and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord? Now I know I read that and maybe you read that and you say, wow, but you know, God tells us here that Paul is filled with the Holy Ghost.

There's no doubt about it. These are words that are coming directly from the Lord. You know, sometimes we hear people maybe rebuke in a very firm way and we say, oh, don't be so mean.

You know, but there is a time for rebuke. You know, Paul told Timothy, preach the word, be in sin and cease, and reprove and rebuke, rebuke. And here, Paul gives a firm rebuke and that rebuke is warranted because this individual is seeking to turn a soul that is seeking the gospel, seeking the truth, turn that one away from the truth.

And there's a couple of pretty strong statements that Paul makes about those who are trying to turn people away from the gospel. One of them is in Galatians 1. If any man preach any of the gospel, let him be accursed, let him be damned. I would if they were cut off, which trouble you, he said.

When people stand up in opposition and thwart the gospel message, that's a serious thing. The book of Romans says we ought to love righteousness and hate iniquity. I don't think we hate iniquity as much.

I know I don't. Hate iniquity, not only in my own life, but when I see it in the lives of others, to hate. And I know that the Lord hates it.

It says there that Jesus was given the Holy Spirit because he loved righteousness and he hated iniquity. And so if that hatred for iniquity is in us, yes, we can be long suffering, but that hatred ought to also produce a firm rebuke of sin. But you know, as I read that, I thought about Paul here.

I mean, just imagine, this is only about probably two or three years from his conversion, but can you imagine, here he is saying that to this man, yet he was the one doing the same thing. He was the one turning people away from Christ, encouraging them to blaspheme the name of the Lord. He was in the same position as this man.

That's probably why he knew he was a child of the devil and an enemy of righteousness, because I walked in your shoes and I was turning people away from the truth. Verse 11, and now behold, the hand of the Lord is upon thee and thou shalt be blind, not seeing the sun for a season. By the way, what happened to Paul on the road to Damascus, trying to turn people away from the faith? He lost his eyesight, too, so he knows a little bit about this, and maybe he's speaking out of experience.

This is what happened to me, because I was against the Lord and opposing the gospel, and now it's gonna happen to you. You go blind for a season. And immediately there fell on him a midst in a darkness and he went about seeking someone to lead him by the hand.

Wow, what an amazing thing. You know, we didn't have some courage like that when we're out ministering the word. We find opposition, boy.

Spirit of God can rise up in us. You child of the devil. Amen.

You know what's gonna happen here? Something really good's gonna happen. Look what it says. Verse 12, the devil, excuse me, the deputy.

Then the deputy, when he had saw what was done, believed, being astonished at the doctrine of the Lord. Now you notice it wasn't the preaching of the gospel, although I think he probably heard the gospel, because this sorcerer was resisting and trying to turn him away from the truth. But it's interesting that when he sees this man go blind, that pushes him over the edge.

And he says, I believe. And he's astonished at the doctrine. Now, here's something I think we ought to consider.

This is good for our day to day, and it's good for our lives. Doctrine in the Bible is more than words. You know that? It says he was astonished at the doctrine of the Lord, and yet, what he saw was action.

He saw something. When he saw what was done, it says he was astonished at the doctrine. Doctrine is words and actions.

Amen. Doctrine is both words and action. Acts 1.1 says all that Jesus began both to do and to teach.

Doctrine is the life of Christ. It's the doctrine of Christ. It's mentioned here, the doctrine of the Lord.

And that word became flesh. It wasn't just floating out there. God allowed the word to become human and to live out a life.

And so, when you think of I've got good doctrine, we ought to also, on top of saying it's good teaching, there ought to be a good life that follows it. Amen? And we as a church, if we say we have good doctrine, do we have good living? And does our lives match our doctrine? And so, the burden here is to flesh it out. And so, you know, this man, I don't know, he may have never been converted had he not seen the doctrine of the Lord.

He saw something. So, the word is being fleshed out. And I wonder in our lives, you know, as we preach and people look at our lives, and I hope down in Columbus, I hope these people say, those people are the real deal.

The real deal. I hope they say that. Because what we teach then is backed up by a life.

The real deal. And I wonder if our lives is the real deal to the people who see us and observe us, living it out. The word became flesh.

Let me ask you to turn to another place here. Let's look to Titus once, Titus chapter two. We're talking about doctrine.

Paul has the same burden in Titus chapter two. He mentions sound doctrine. But he doesn't talk about, you know, theology.

He doesn't talk about, well, what's your doctrine on the second coming of Christ? Or what's your doctrine on, you know, foreknowledge or your doctrine on the head covering? What's your doctrine? How do you live? How do you live? Titus chapter two, verse one says, but speak thou the things which become sound doctrine. That word sound means whole. Not just words, but deeds.

That's why James says, if a man says with words that he has faith, but he does not have works, can this kind of faith save? This faith is a hybrid faith. It doesn't have a completeness. It doesn't have a wholeness.

It doesn't have along with it words, excuse me, deeds. Speak thou the things which become sound doctrine. That the aged men be sober, grave, serious, temperate, meaning their bodies are under control.

Sound in faith, charity, patience. That's some of you older men. This is how you add some adornment to your doctrine.

He's gonna talk about that here in just a minute. Aged women, likewise, that they be in behaviors becometh holiness, not false accusers. Nothing more than to destroy the word of God in your testimony than to be a false accuser.

Not given to much wine, teaches you good things. That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children. By the way, this is how you adorn doctrine.

To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands. That the word of God be not blasphemed. Boy, isn't that interesting? That here you have the word of God.

This is the written word of God. And then you have a life that goes along with it that is totally contrary to sound doctrine. And it brings blasphemy.

Ah, you bunch of hypocrites. The word of God is not true. And they blaspheme the word of God because you may be out there preaching, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

They do this, do this. But the life is not a testimony to any of these things. And it's just... Verse seven, excuse me, verse six.

Young men likewise exhort to be sober-minded. Boy, we need that in this generation. Sober-minded, serious.

There's a heaven, there's a hell. You're gonna spend eternity one way or the other. You ought to get serious about life.

Someday you might drop over dead. Be serious about life. Be sober-minded.

In all things, showing thyself a pattern of good works. In doctrine, showing uncorruptness, gravity, sincerity. These are actions.

Sound speech that cannot be condemned. That he that is the contrary part may be ashamed having no evil thing. Not blaspheming, but they don't have anything evil to say about you.

It's not about how you preach the word or how much Bible you know and whether you carry a big King James Bible on your hand. It's the life that you live. Amen.

I don't have anything evil to say about that guy. I mean, he's just toppled a line. He had a good spirit, loves people, loves God, loves the word.

Young men. Verse nine, exhort servants to be obedient unto their own masters and to please them well in all things. Boy, that's a good one.

You're working for somebody. You're an employee. How about learning to be obedient to your boss and please them in all things? Not answering again.

Oh boy. You know what that is? Just keeping your mouth shut. The boss says, do something.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's this word here, purloining. Can you go over and do this? Why do I have to do that? Can't somebody else do it? Just having to say something negative.

Purloining. Not answering again. Not purloining.

Purloining, as far as I understand, is pilfering, taking from the boss, stealing. But showing all good fidelity. And here's what I'm trying to get to here in verse 10.

That they may adorn the doctrine of God, our Savior, in all things. So here's the doctrine of God in a sense. It's the Bible.

And then your life kind of is the adornment. Some people don't believe in adornment. I believe in adornment.

Take the Bible and you live it out in a beautiful way. And people look at that and say, that's adornment. That's adorning the doctrine of God.

That's beautiful there. Now, if you don't live it out, that's pretty ugly. And blasphemous.

Jump down to verse 15 and I'll finish this chapter here. These things speak and exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise thee.

I should have done more of that. Speak and rebuke with all authority. Don't let anybody ah you.

This is the way it is. Amen. And this is the way we ought to live.

To adorn the doctrine of God. And so there's more than just the pages of the Word. It's a life that, now I know we're not entirely there, but we ought to walk in such a way as the world has no evil thing to say.

And I've shared this illustration before. Maybe some of you haven't heard it, but we all know the importance of action to go along with our words. And you've heard me give this illustration.

I think it's a good one to demonstrate this. But if I were to come in to a crowded, I was in a hall preaching last week. We rented a hall in Vienna, Ontario, Canada.

There was probably three, 400 people every night and it was a big hall. And if I would come into that hall, someone would tell me on the way in that this hall is on fire. Everybody needs to get out.

And I would step up to the microphone. I would say, friends, this hall is on fire. Would you please get out and just slowly walk off.

You know what the people would do? They would be bewildered. They'd be bewildered. They'd look at each other and say, did you hear what he said? You know why they'd be bewildered? I told them the truth, right? But my actions didn't support it.

My actions didn't support it. And it left people confused. I mean, if I was sitting there and someone got up there and said, you know, there's a fire here.

You should get out. If I came running in, and I'm not gonna scream today, but I came running in, fire, everybody out. Immediately you go.

Now I say, I could say the same words, but it's the action that causes the affirmation of the word that people say, that's real. We better go. And so when people hear your words, you know, and they look at your life, and it's not adorning the doctrine, they look at that, hmm, that's perplexing, perplexing.

Calls himself a Christian, calls himself a Christian, but look at the way they live. Eh, it just doesn't fit for me. Something doesn't testify.

You know, we need more than one witness. We need two or three witnesses. And so action.

So I want to encourage all of us to adorn the doctrine that we say we believe. One more verse, and I'll finish. Verse 13, it says, now when Paul and his company loosed from Paphos, they came to Perga in Pamphylia.

They left that island there and came to Perga, and John, departing from them, returned to Jerusalem. Now, we're not told here, and later on, I don't believe we're told also what happens, but John Mark somehow is turned back. I don't know if the life is too difficult, there's too much persecution.

I don't know what it is that's causing him to turn back, but he turns back and goes back to Jerusalem, family and friends, and thus will cause problems later on. Paul is pretty firm about, hey, he departed once, he's not coming back with us. Barnabas is an exhorter, he's a mercy.

He's gonna say, he'll do better. Let's try, he'll do better. And the contention between the two will be so strong that Paul will not go with Barnabas.

He'll take Silas, and Barnabas will leave and go in another direction. So this John will be coming up here in a little bit. So Edomus, the sorcerer.

Let's remember, the world is heading toward sorcery, finding a source for everything. You need health insurance, you need health coverage, we got it for you. You need financial coverage, we got it for you.

You need wisdom and knowledge, we got it for you. We got everything, safety, we got it for you. We'll cover all your bases.

You look to us, then we'll control your life. But the Lord says, no, I've got it all under control. I'll cover every base.

So when we have needs, whatever it is, first give God opportunity, seek him. And don't just say, shoot up a little flare prayer and say, God, I need this, this, and this. Seek God.

And ask and it shall be given you. Seek and you shall find. Knock and it shall be opened unto you.

Okay, I'm gonna close. We'll have a word of prayer. Then if anyone would like to share, you can.

Heavenly Father, Lord, may we more and more seek your face in every area of life and not attach our hearts to other influences that cause our hearts to be drawn away and come under the control, Lord, of the evil. And Lord, may we also, I pray, for my own life and others, Lord, here, that we could adorn the doctrine of God with our actions and truly have a good testimony for those who observe our life, even our own family, our own children. Lord, have mercy upon us.

Give us grace. We pray your blessing on the congregation here in Jesus' name, amen.