All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name
January 24, 2021
Preached by Benjamin Vrbicek
Scripture Reading
Acts 18:18-19:20
18:18 After this, Paul stayed many days longer and then took leave of the brothers and set sail for Syria, and with him Priscilla and Aquila. At Cenchreae he had cut his hair, for he was under a vow. 19 And they came to Ephesus, and he left them there, but he himself went into the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews. 20 When they asked him to stay for a longer period, he declined. 21 But on taking leave of them he said, “I will return to you if God wills,” and he set sail from Ephesus.
22 When he had landed at Caesarea, he went up and greeted the church, and then went down to Antioch. 23 After spending some time there, he departed and went from one place to the next through the region of Galatia and Phrygia, strengthening all the disciples.
24 Now a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was an eloquent man, competent in the Scriptures. 25 He had been instructed in the way of the Lord. And being fervent in spirit, he spoke and taught accurately the things concerning Jesus, though he knew only the baptism of John. 26 He began to speak boldly in the synagogue, but when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately. 27 And when he wished to cross to Achaia, the brothers encouraged him and wrote to the disciples to welcome him. When he arrived, he greatly helped those who through grace had believed, 28 for he powerfully refuted the Jews in public, showing by the Scriptures that the Christ was Jesus.
19:1 And it happened that while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul passed through the inland country and came to Ephesus. There he found some disciples. 2 And he said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” And they said, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” 3 And he said, “Into what then were you baptized?” They said, “Into John's baptism.” 4 And Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, Jesus.” 5 On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. 6 And when Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking in tongues and prophesying.7 There were about twelve men in all.
8 And he entered the synagogue and for three months spoke boldly, reasoning and persuading them about the kingdom of God. 9 But when some became stubborn and continued in unbelief, speaking evil of the Way before the congregation, he withdrew from them and took the disciples with him, reasoning daily in the hall of Tyrannus. 10 This continued for two years, so that all the residents of Asia heard the word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks.
11 And God was doing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul, 12 so that even handkerchiefs or aprons that had touched his skin were carried away to the sick, and their diseases left them and the evil spirits came out of them. 13 Then some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists undertook to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, “I adjure you by the Jesus whom Paul proclaims.” 14 Seven sons of a Jewish high priest named Sceva were doing this. 15 But the evil spirit answered them, “Jesus I know, and Paul I recognize, but who are you?” 16 And the man in whom was the evil spirit leaped on them, mastered all of them and overpowered them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded. 17 And this became known to all the residents of Ephesus, both Jews and Greeks. And fear fell upon them all, and the name of the Lord Jesus was extolled. 18 Also many of those who were now believers came, confessing and divulging their practices. 19 And a number of those who had practiced magic arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all. And they counted the value of them and found it came to fifty thousand pieces of silver. 20 So the word of the Lord continued to increase and prevail mightily.
When you’re driving a car at speed on a highway, you can’t slow down to look at everything, or you’ll miss what matters most: the road that’s unfolding before you, the cars around you, and the key road signs that keep you traveling to your destination and not some other place. That’s what matters most. The road. The cars. The signs.
There’s overlap here with preaching long passages. We can’t pull over and look at the details on every billboard or roadside attraction. If we stop and get coffee at every diner and talk to all the locals, we’ll know a whole lot, but we might never cover the miles.
The scripture passage that was just read might be better considered four passages. But we’ve grouped them together because of commonalities among them, as well as because of the final, summary verse. The commonalities are that these passages cover the beginning of what we call Paul’s third missionary journey. Paul goes on three missionary journeys in the book, so this is the final one. He’ll journey some 1,500 miles. It would be like going from Harrisburg to the tip of Florida if you traveled along the coast. I’ll show you that in the verses. Look at vv. 22–23:
22 When he had landed at Caesarea, he went up and greeted the church, and then went down to Antioch. 23 After spending some time there, he departed and went from one place to the next through the region of Galatia and Phrygia, strengthening all the disciples.
The key city is Antioch. If you had a piece of paper and you drew a circle, you’d start in one place and end up back where you started. Now, if you drew three circles, you’d cross that starting point three times. That’s sort of the way the city of Antioch works in the last half of the book of Acts. Paul starts all three missionary journeys in Antioch. Now, they are not exactly circles, as each journey is a little different, and, in fact, his last missionary journey is curtailed by persecution and jail, so he never goes back to Antioch, but that’s what’s happening. All that starts here in Acts, so we grouped them together.
Beginning in v. 24 we meet a man named Apollos, who meets a husband and wife named Aquila and Priscilla. Apollos is a Jewish man from north Africa. Aquila and Priscilla are most recently from Italy. We don’t know how or why Apollos is in Ephesus. We know that Aquila and Priscilla were persecuted in Rome and went to Corinth where they met Paul (18:1–3), and now, for God’s own good purposes, God has brought Apollos and Aquila and Priscilla here. Look how Luke introduces Apollos:
24 Now a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was an eloquent man, competent in the Scriptures. 25 He had been instructed in the way of the Lord. And being fervent in spirit, he spoke and taught accurately the things concerning Jesus, though he knew only the baptism of John.
What he knew, he preached—but he didn’t know the whole gospel story. John was sent from God to get people ready for the Messiah. And Apollos only knew about the beginning of the gospel story, what John had preached about Jesus and perhaps some of the early teachings of Jesus.
So, this husband-and-wife couple quietly pulls him aside to, as we read in v. 26, explain to him “the way of God more accurately.” We don’t have to wait long for the answer to how that conversation went, but I’ll pause and just ask how you might expect it to go. Here’s a man who’s “eloquent,” learned, well-traveled, and he’s pulled aside and told he’s doing it wrong, or at least what he’s doing is incomplete; he only knows part of the gospel—the arrival of Jesus but not his full life and death and resurrection. How’s that rebuke going to go? How do you like being pulled aside and told you’re wrong? This shouldn’t go well… that is, unless King Jesus is at work, giving birth to humility and teachability and causing people to love God’s reputation more than their own.
And, it would seem, that Apollos does; he’s humble, teachable, and loves God’s honor more than his own. Luke says in v. 28 that after the conversation he “powerfully refuted the Jews in public, showing by the Scriptures that the Christ was Jesus.” Before he meets Pricilla and Aquila, Luke says in v. 24 that he is “competent in the Scriptures.” Then we read that after he is better instructed in the gospel, “he powerfully refuted the Jews in public, showing by the Scriptures that the Christ was Jesus” (v. 28).
I want to just linger here to make a passing comment. Many of you are teachers and many of you are parents and you are laboring to see others shaped into maturity in Christ. And you look around at all the effort and all the time and all the ministry and you look at your student or child and you love them so much, but you just know that they don’t get it—not yet anyway. I would just point out that this was Apollos. All that learning and study of the Scriptures that was poured into him, when God changed his heart, none of that work was lost. Some of you might feel like you’re parenting and your teaching is like teaching someone to ride a stationary bike: they’re not going anywhere. But be encouraged that if and when God moves, all that training and all that effort, might be like setting them on a real bike and they start to soar. If we teach the primacy of the Bible and model a humble posture toward the Bible, good things can happen. In fact, when people humbly bow before the King’s words, good things already are.
In the next passage, Paul goes to Ephesus. Ephesus has 500,000 people. It’s the religious capital of the region (see John Stott, Acts). Ephesus is the generically spiritual capital for all the religions in the area. Now what we saw happen with Apollos, in a similar way, happens with a whole group of believers. As Apollos knew about John the Baptist and the early ministry of Jesus, in the same way, these believers seem to only know about John and the early teachings of Jesus. They don’t seem to have the full gospel story, the story of Jesus’s life and death and resurrection, so Paul tells it to them. We read this in vv. 5–6. “On hearing this [i.e., the full story of Jesus], they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And when Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them . . .” In other words, when they learn of the life and death and resurrection of Jesus, they became believers.
Then we read that Paul stayed there for two more years, teaching people about Jesus (vv. 8–10). And his teaching was so contagious, look how Luke can summarize the effects of Paul’s teaching in v. 10: “all the residents of Asia heard the word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks.” Paul’s teaching about Jesus had reached a level where Christianity was no longer as obscure as it was just a few years before. This expansion and even saturation of gospel ministry creates potential hindrances for Paul and the early church. One hindrance is “copycat” ministry. I’ll go ahead and read vv. 11–16:
11 And God was doing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul, 12 so that even handkerchiefs or aprons that had touched his skin were carried away to the sick, and their diseases left them and the evil spirits came out of them. 13 Then some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists undertook to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, “I adjure you by the Jesus whom Paul proclaims.” 14 Seven sons of a Jewish high priest named Sceva were doing this. 15 But the evil spirit answered them, “Jesus I know, and Paul I recognize, but who are you?” 16 And the man in whom was the evil spirit leaped on them, mastered all of them and overpowered them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded.
This passage is, to be candid, wild. I think Luke even sees it that way. He writes in v. 11 that “God was doing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul.” Did you catch that? As though any miracles were not special enough, Luke labels these miracles “extraordinary.” And they were. In a city given over to evil spirits and witchcraft and all manner of darkness and idolatry, God shows in extraordinary ways that he is the only real King. As I mentioned, this leads to copycat ministry. Apparently, there were Jewish exorcists who try to copy Paul. But in this case, they don’t copy very well. They try to cast a demon out of a man. Did you notice the evil spirit talks back to them? What does he say? “Jesus I know, and Paul I recognize, but who are you?” (v. 15). I don’t think they were expecting that. Nor did they expect the beat down they got.
Let’s talk about this for a minute. Pastor David had a line in his sermon last week, which he got from another pastor, and the line was about wanting the kingdom but not the King. It’s possible to want parts of the kingdom of God but not actually want the King. You can want the power that comes with the kingdom or the peace that comes with the kingdom but not want to submit to the King of the kingdom. This is their problem. They want the power of the King without loving the person of the King. I’ll say it another way. It’s a bad practice to make Jesus your mascot or your talisman. A talisman is a word for a lucky object with magical powers. Jesus is not a mascot or a talisman.
There’s a story in the Old Testament where the Israelites are in a battle, and the battle is not going well, so they say, “Let’s fetch the ark” (1 Samuel 4–6, esp. 4:1–4). The ark was the decorative wooden box that held the ten commandments and a few other items. The ark was also the closest thing on earth at the time to the manifestation of their true King’s presence among his people. And they say, “Let’s fetch God, our mascot and our lucky rabbit’s foot.” They got pounded in the battle. Here in Acts, it’s the same lesson: God loves you too much to let you want the kingdom without the King. God loves you so much that he might let your world fall apart around you so that you would meet the King. That’s not to say every time your world falls apart, and you get sick or have struggles, it’s because you’re sinning. I’m not saying that. But I am saying that when we make Jesus our mere mascot, not our King, we shouldn’t expect to win a lot of games. So, when you see TV evangelists waving “blessed” handkerchiefs and asking you to send your money so they can send you something touched by them, don’t be surprised if their ministry, eventually, comes crashing down.
All week I’ve been wondering what happened with these seven sons. I’d like to think they found the King, but we don’t know. But we do know lots of other people did. Look how the passage ends.
17 And this became known to all the residents of Ephesus, both Jews and Greeks. And fear fell upon them all, and the name of the Lord Jesus was extolled. 18 Also many of those who were now believers came, confessing and divulging their practices. 19 And a number of those who had practiced magic arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all. And they counted the value of them and found it came to fifty thousand pieces of silver. 20 So the word of the Lord continued to increase and prevail mightily.
Some would say that in today’s dollars, this is about 6 million dollars paraphernalia (ESV Study Bible). God’s gospel ministry though Paul causes so many dramatic conversions that it shakes the cage of economic idolatry. This theme will become the focus of the entire passage next week. So many lost people get saved that the old, sinful businesses that they used to patron might go out of business, and a riot breaks out. But that’s next week.
Here’s what I want to point out as we end this sermon. Despite all the potential hindrances, the hope of the gospel is going forward. In this passage, we have the potential hindrance that believers and teachers who don’t know the full gospel; they only know part of the gospel, and their pride could have been a hindrance. In this passage we see some who are stubborn in heart who directly oppose the gospel. I didn’t talk much about that, but they are mentioned directly in 19:9: “some became stubborn and continued in unbelief, speaking evil of the Way before the congregation.” That’s a potential hindrance. We also have the potential hindrance of seven religious circus leaders who want to copycat the power and authority of the kingdom without love for the King. And there is the hindrance of the city of Ephesus itself, a community saturated with witchcraft and darkness. How will the gospel ever go forward in such a mixed up, broken culture? Won’t all these hindrances stop the advance of the good news of Jesus? No, they did not stop the advance of the good news of Jesus. And they still don’t stop the advance of the good news of Jesus.
At the start I mentioned preaching longer passage is like driving along the highway. I said that when you’re driving a car at speed, you can’t slow down to look at everything, or you’ll miss what matters most: the road that’s unfolding before you, the cars around you, and the key road signs that keep you traveling to your destination and not some other place. That’s what matters most. The road. The cars. The signs.
I’m sure you’ve felt this at one time or another—and I may have mentioned it before—but that moment you exit off the highway toward the turnpike and go through the toll station always stresses me out. You look up, and there are two signs: Philly and Pittsburgh. Of course, there are all sorts of things you could be looking at. You might notice what the person working at the toll booth was wearing. You might notice if some car in front of you has a Hawaii license plate, and your mind will start to wonder, How does a car getfrom Hawaii to Pennsylvania? All very interesting, but what matters most—besides not hitting other cars in that big free-for-all where multiple lanes merge together—is not missing whether you need to go left to Philly or right to Pittsburgh. There are lots of things happening in this passage that are interesting to talk about, but I don’t want us to miss what matters most.
Periodically as we preach, I find it helpful to remind us what the author most wants us to see. I feel this especially on weeks when there are “summary verses,” as 19:20 is. When we read the book of Acts, we’re reading an account of the early church recorded by Luke, the historian. Luke is the same author who wrote the gospel of Luke. He’s writing to a man named Theophilus, likely a wealthy patron who bankrolled the time and money for Luke to research his two volumes. Luke writes,
Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things that have been accomplished among us, just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word have delivered them to us, it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, that you may have certainty concerning the things you have been taught. (Luke 1:1–4)
Luke wants Theophilus—as he wants you and I—to have certainty about who Jesus is and what he did, and why what he did and who he is matters. When Luke opens the book of Acts, which we consider his second volume, Luke addresses this same Theophilus.
In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day when he was taken up, after he had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. (Acts 1:1–2)
I’m going back over old material to remind us of the main thing Luke wants us to get out of the book(s). I’ll say it another way. If you come away from the book of Acts saying, “Woah, that Peter is pretty awesome,” or “Woah that Stephen is pretty awesome,” or “Woah, that Paul is pretty awesome,” or “Woah, that Apollos or that Pricilla and Aquilla are pretty awesome,” then you’ve missed what Luke wants you to see. The real question is Why are they awesome?
How does Luke phrase the introduction to his second volume? He says that he had previously written about all that Jesus began to say and do. What is his implication? Luke is saying that the book of Acts is about all what Jesus continues to do. King Jesus is doing things in the book of Acts. He still is.
All the hindrances in the book—all the sin, all the suffering—are there to show us that no matter what happens, Jesus can build his church. Throughout the book, Peter will do things; Stephen will do things; Paul and a host of others will do things; but mainly what Luke wants us to feel when we read these stories is this: All hail the power of Jesus’s name. That’s what Luke wants us to see, and that’s what I want us to see.
I’ll invite the music team to lead us in a few songs. Let’s pray. . .
