Acts 17 – Thessalonica, Berea, and Athens
Soils: hardened, rocky, thorny, fruitful
Thessalonica
- Taught the Jews in synagogues from the scriptures (Old Testament)
- Christ must suffer, and rise from the dead
- Isaiah 52-53 ?
- Probably written 700 BCE
- Solid evidence of earlier than 300 BCE
- People all over the world immediately recognize this is about Jesus (AD 30)
- Isaiah 52-53 ?
- Jesus is Christ
- Some believe – lots of Greeks and some prominent women
- Paul stayed for some time, evidently, due to the teachings referenced in 1+2 Thessalonians (probably too many to cover in just 2 weeks)
- Christ must suffer, and rise from the dead
- Unbelieving Jews take action
- Motivated by Jealousy
- Using low means – is this a tactic of truth?
- Persecuted Jason
- Christians had “turned the world upside down!”
- Claimed a threat to Rome – another king
- Paul and Silas leave by night
Berea
- More noble minded
- What made them more noble minded?
- Received the word with readiness of mind
- Searched the scriptures daily
- THEREFORE – many believed
- What made them more noble minded?
- Thessalonian disbelieving Jews are persistent
- Followed and stirred up the people against
Athens
- Paul is moved by their idolatry
- Went to the Jews in the synagogue
- In the marketplace – with everyone!
- Philosophers met him
- Epicureans
- Happiness is Truth…descended to sensuality
- Stoicks
- Live at peace with nature, suppress desires
- Epicureans
- Spent their time telling or hearing something new – “news”
- Given a chance to speak to an assembly at the Areopagus
- What kind of soil are they?
- We can’t tell until some time passes
- Should we judge if a person will hear? No
- Paul sows indiscriminantly
- What will he teach?
- From the OT to people who knew it…
- Now he teaches from a philosophical perspective
- Unknown God
- Starts with an observation about where they are – ambiguous, but likely intended positively
- Unknown god – can we be “safe” by covering all the bases? No – there is only one
- Personal Creator…not like Stoics thought (pantheistic)
- One family – all mankind
- Not left to chance, but planned…not like the Epicureans thought
- Available – near to us all
- Poets
- Cretan Epimedes (c. 600 B.C.E.)
- Cilian Aratus (c. 315-240 B.C.E)
- Cleanthes (c. 331-233 B.C.E)
- Not physical…but beyond materials (fed in to belief in spirits)
- Overlooked ignorance…but that time is up!
- Jesus is the Christ – proved by the resurrection!
- This is as much as many can handle
- Some believers – eventually formed a strong church in Athens (soil?)