Through The Ruach

0:01 Rabbi Ari is coming to the stage. I have the privilege of praying for him as he comes to bring forth the word Abba. I ask that you would strengthen your son, all the preparation, all the plans that you would use them mightily to proclaim your goodness and your mercy to us as sheep. Father, let us ears be open and attentive. And Father, as the word goes forth, let us respond as you would have us. Father, I pray that you would use him mightily in this hour. Yeshua. Amen. Amen. Thank you, Marcus Shabbat shalom.

0:51 Well, as I have done for 799 days, I will There remains one body in captivity, uh, in, as a hostage in Gaza. And in this, it's been almost 800 days. That's a, it's almost unfathomable to really think about about it. But during this time period, antisemitism has, well, spiked might be the, the least descriptive way to describe it. So let me give you some headlines from this week that I read in the news.

1:40 First one, the us, the United States of America Ways hitting the UN Palestinian Refugee Agency with terrorism related sanctions. This would be un a, uh, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency. They're considering sanctions on them, which would effectively complete, uh, a shutdown of its operations. No access to its $2 billion in assets. No website, no payroll, no ability to transact business, except in Qatar and Turkey, which are havens for sanctioned individuals and entities. Ironically, also our allies at the moment. Uh, it would also jeopardize other UN agencies which interact with it, including the secretariat at UN

2:27 headquarters in New York City. This week, uh, there was a, a, um, a headline for antisemitism in Toronto, a hate crime unit investigating. After Jewish Prayer Scrolls, scrolls were removed from doorways of New York, of North York Homes 15 to 20, miss, uh, Zas were removed from doorframes overnight. And in Toronto, there is a hate crime against Jewish people reported every 48 hours. Now, uh, another, another headline, hate in Plain Sight. Uh, this is, uh, cyber Well Alerts, social media

3:16 platforms on escalating emoji enc coated language based antisemitism, utilizing images such as a rat, uh, to depict Jewish people, uh, uh, in, in, in, in an emoji form. Also revealed this week, Hamas hid tons and, and I'm, I'm using the, the term, literally not figuratively, but tons, Hamas hid tons of baby formula to damage Israel with starvation claims. Palestinian activists says, reported by the New York Post. I, I can't remember the tonnage value, but it was tons, tons of tons.

4:04 I mentioned a tool, I think a week or two ago, and I, and I just quoted it now, but I, I was, uh, alerted to this tool, and it's called Cyber well.org. And you are welcome to go check it out. Um, if you do, you might get a preview of some of my headlines for the following Shabbat. Um, but Cyber Well is the first ever live database of online antisemitism. Uh, it tracks antisemitism via, uh, on social platforms, uh, across several social platforms. And it tracks the trends of what is going on currently. So that, by the way, that is cyber well.org,

4:53 if you're looking for it, if you're looking, if you're interested in those headlines, they're all in my YouVersion notes this week. Um, so you can get the articles there if you want 'em. There's also a link to cyber. Well, we are continuing Acts chapter, our acts series in Acts chapter 21. I did notice that, uh, if you are interested in not falling asleep, uh, I have a handout for you, uh, to help keep your mind busy while I, while I, while I drone, on and on, um, for the next couple hours. But anyways, if you're interested in a sheet and you don't have one yet, just raise your hand and, and someone will bring you, uh, a, a, a little packet.

5:43 We are continuing here in Acts 21 and today, and this is the reason I said drone, on and on for the next several hours, I'm covering 16 verses. So Chapter 21, I'll, I'll read through the 16 and then we'll come back and, and break it down. Chapter 21 of the Book of Acts, starting in verse one, after tearing ourselves away from them and setting sail, we set a straight course to coasts the next day to roads. And from there to Patara, finding a ship, crossing to Fania, we went aboard and set sail. When we came inside of Cyprus, passing it by on the left, we kept sailing to Syria and landed at tire. For there, the ship was to unload the cargo.

6:28 We looked up the disciples and stayed there seven days. They kept telling Paul through the Ruok not to step foot in Jerusalem. When our days there were over, we departed and we went on our journey. They all, with wives and children accompanied us until we were outside the city. After kneeling down on the shore and praying, we said farewell to one another, then we boarded the ship and they returned home. When we had finished the trip from Tire, we arrived in TOAs. We greeted the brothers and sisters and stayed with them for one day. On the next day, we departed and came to Caesarea. We entered the home of Philip, the Proclaimer of Good News, who was one of the seven, and we stayed with him. Now, this man had four virgin daughters who prophesied

7:17 while we stayed there for a number of days. A prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. He came to us, took Paul's belt, tied his own hands and feet, and said, the Ruak Hakodesh says this, in this way, shall the Jewish people in Jerusalem bind the man who owns this belt and deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles? When we heard these things, both we and the local people urged Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. Then Paul responded, what are you doing weeping and breaking my heart for I am ready, not only to be bound, but to die for the name of the Lord, Yeshua, since he would not be persuaded, we fell silent, saying Only May the Lord's will be done.

8:03 After these days, we packed and started going up to Jerusalem. Some of the disciples through Caesarea also, uh, from Caesarea also went up with us bringing with us Manson of Cyprus, one of the early disciples by whom we might be hosted. So I've broken this into three different sections based upon Paul's traveling. But before I get into the sections, I, I noticed a pattern, which you, when you're reading the scripture, I know I say things like this, every week when you're reading the scripture, you, you should read for detail, you should read slowly.

8:50 And I know it's really difficult when you get to generations number one, and when you get to cities that you don't know, but ironically, those are the two places you should actually slow down even more, because there's, there's elements there that have great meaning and are important for us. So let's, I I recognize this week is a, is a difficult one based upon all of the places where Paul stops. But here, one of the patterns I noticed is that there's a list of stops while traveling. Then the group stops to encourage the local body. Then they depart and set out for the next set of stops.

9:37 And, and actually this, the pattern emerges not this week, but it actually emerged last week, uh, when, or or before they arrived in Ephesus, because they had a list of stops. They stopped in or just outside of Ephesus encouraged the community and then departed. And now here we are re picking up or resuming the travel in, um, in Acts 21. And so what we're going to do is take a look at where, first of all, where the stops are, because partly the reason we don't, we don't take time in these verses is because we don't know where they are. I, i, if, if you are like me, I read through these verses and I'm like, I don't know where that place is. Let's just keep going. So here we are.

10:27 We, we start, we, we left off last week, um, encouraging the elders of, of Ephesus, and, and they were here in this place called Milus right here. And so here we can, we continue. And you see there's a stop here in coast as, as listed in 21, then in roads. And then here in, uh, let's see, what's the text say? The name is, it's like Patara or something like that, I think. Hold on. Oh, yeah, Patara. There it is. In verse one. We stop right here. You can't, it's, it's so close up in there. You can't even see. The name is interesting because, uh, just based upon the pattern here, it actually seems like Paul is taking local, uh,

11:14 what I would call the local Uber. Um, it, it, it, it's a, the local Swooper, you know, the, the, it's a boat. Um, or anyways, so he's taking the local one and, and, and stopping in the, they're about 10 mile intervals, 10 to 15 mile intervals. But then they get, he gets to Patara, uh, and, and it says that he catches a ship. Now here, what's fascinating is the ship is bound for foia. FOIA is, uh, what would be modern day Syria and Lebanon. By the way, if you want to, I, I, I, coming back just for a moment to, um, modern news, you know, everybody says

11:59 that Israel is the, the colonizer of the Middle East. It's fascinating because the Muslims colonized Fania Fania was not Muslim. In fact, I don't know, this might be a stretch for everyone. Nothing at this time was Muslim. In fact, Islam wasn't even invented yet. It wasn't even a dream. It was 600 years until Islam would, would come around. But here we have Fania with, with its indigenous population, which then gets, uh, colonized about six or 700 years later.

12:46 But, but here in Patara, Paul, in his, in, in and cadre, Paul in the group catch a boat from Patara to Fania. Now what's what's different here is they decide to go through the open sea. Open sea, by the way, is a much more dangerous voyage in the Middle East than to go 10 mile chunks, uh, at a time. So we know that the boat that goes from Patara to Fania is a much larger boat. Uh, in fact, we could make a couple deductions. Oh, I skipped a whole section of my message. Oh, well, it's not, not that important, obviously.

13:35 Okay, we'll come back to it just in case. It's just in case somebody is important for somebody here, even before the, before we start traveling, the text tells us that they tore themselves away and then set sail, The tearing themselves away tell tells us actually how emotional the departure, both for the, the elders in Ephesus and for Paul and his group, it tells us how emotional the departure was between the two. They had to tear themselves apart to continue the journey, because Paul is, is set to go to, to Jerusalem. By the way, it sounds to me, if you ever, you're like, oh,

14:22 I don't understand what, what was tearing apart. It's like when you have a family reunion and you have cousins and you don't see them very often, and you're all there together for like a week, and the cousins start doing everything together and, and you know, start pranking the parents and all sorts of things. And the cousins are having a whole lot of fine. And then all of a sudden what happens when you depart? You have to tear them apart sometimes. Literally, dad, I want to go with them. It's, their house is so much more fun than our house anyways. Yeah, they have to tear themselves apart. Okay, now we come back. So that's, that's the part I missed. Anyways, we come back here. What kind of ship are they on?

15:08 It's at a minimum. The text tells us that the ship carries cargo. So we can assume it's some sort of cargo ship, uh, that's going from p to, uh, ends up in tire. And it seems like it not, it seems it has to be a large ship because it decides to brave the open waters versus going along the shore. You see the, there would be boats that would continue on like this until they came down, but that is a much longer journey. This one, to go from Patara to tire is we, we have different records from different historians. One says it's a four day sale, and the other says it's a five day sale.

15:54 So, uh, one of the church fathers, oh, y'all, I can never pronounce the names right? I think his name is Christos. That guy Dio, he says it's a five day journey. And then there was another person, uh, maybe it's Josephus, I can't remember. The other person says it's a four day journey. So, okay, four or five days. It's like a may. It could be six or seven days. We're just not sure. Um, Anyways, we get to tire. We're tired here. No, we come to tire. And in tire they, the city, you don't know this, you have to presume this, but the city seems to be so large that they have

16:42 to look up the community. They have to go to the local Rolodex or Yellow Pages. And now I'm just dating myself. Rolodex. Rolodex, yeah, the local Rolodex to find the, the local disciples. And they stay here for seven days. Now, it's interesting because Paul has been in a hurry this entire time, but all of a sudden he comes to tire and he spends seven days in tire. And I'm, and I'm telling you, it's intentional. Why? Because the next place they go is to, uh, oh, it's not on it, it, it's got a different name on here to, to pet me, uh,

17:27 which is also known as aco, um, in, in, in modern geography. Uh, but the, from tire to aco, it's only a two day walk. So if Paul was in a hurry at this point, if he didn't wanna wait seven days and tire, he would've pushed onward. So whatever happens by the time they get to tire, Paul has gauged the rest of the distance and knows he's gonna make it to Jerusalem in time. And so now he takes a whole week, could be that it takes a, it takes a week to unload the cargo ship. By the way, these cargo ships, It's hard for me to imagine. And, and as such, I think it would be hard for anybody,

18:13 for all of us to imagine these cargo ships. They carry tons of cargo around 350 to 400 tons. I want you to think about that. That's a lot of tonnage. The grain ships, if this, if, if per chance this is a grain ship that carried grain as the cargo, the grain ships would carry 1200 tons of grain. And that would all have to be unloaded. But maybe these are just carrying stones, you know, like that you pave your driveway with, no, not those kind of stones, the stones that weigh 20 tons each. And then you have to figure out how to get 'em out of the boat and into the harbor.

18:59 And then, and so you have to go through, there's a process. So it could be that Paul's waiting for the same boat to then go on to the next location, and, and that may be why it's seven days. So here in tire, they look up the disciples, they stay with them seven days. And while there, and tire, let's see, it, it, the, this is what the disciple, this is what the text tells us. What Luke tells us, they, the disciples entire kept telling Paul through the Ruach not to set foot in Jerusalem. So here we have guidance by the Ruach to the disciples entire, that seemingly stands in contradiction to

19:45 what Paul is doing. I'm going to, I'm just gonna ask you to bear with me and take that and set it on the back burner, and we'll come back to it because there's a conflict here that, that I don't want to overlook, but also I want to get through the text and then we'll come back and address the conflict. So when their time in tire was complete, they departed and they continued on their journey. And all of the community, the, the wives, the children, the, the disciples, all of them, they came to see them off. They went to the shore and, and, and they knelt together. It, it's very interesting because it's now twice that we've seen that they, they knelt down and prayed together. It is fascinating to me to see how this early community interacts with one another.

20:32 So they knelt down and prayed for one another, and they boarded the ship, and, and the community returned home their entire, so we continue on in verse seven. When we had finished the trip from tire, we arrived in to Mayas, we greeted the brothers and sisters and stayed with them for one day. So here it's interesting. In tire, they stay for seven days. And in aco, modern day aco, they stay for one day. So again, we don't have the reasoning why they stayed for seven or for one, uh, but I, I would suspect it has to do with the ship schedule. That the ship is here only for one day and is in tire for a week. They stay for one day. They, they greet the brothers and sisters and stayed with them for one day. On the next day, they departed and they came to Caesarea,

21:21 and we entered into the home of Philip, the Proclaimer of Good news, who was one of the seven. And we stayed with him. Now, this man had Virgin four virgin daughters who prophesied while we stayed there for a number of days. A prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. He came to us, took Paul's belt, tied his own hands and feet, and said, the AK Hakodesh says this in this way, the, the Jewish people in Jerusalem shall bind the man who owns this belt and deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles. Now, so we've had the AK in one community says one thing, and we have the AK in this community saying one, something that's seemingly slightly different. Uh, and, and, and so this, again,

22:07 stick it on the back burner. We'll come back to it in a minute. Let's see. When we heard these things, both we and the local people urged Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. Then Paul responded, what are you doing weeping and breaking my heart for I am not only ready to be bound, but to die for the name of the Lord. Yeshua, since he would not be persuaded, we fell silent saying Only May the Lord's will be done. So this is the next little section that we're looking at. Again, we already talked about this. We, the boat goes from tire, oops, From tire down to aco. They spend one. So they're here seven days in tire.

22:56 They're one day in aco, and then they come to Caesarea. Caesarea is a, it's actually a manmade port in Israel, in nor along the coast, um, named after the Caesars. Um, and, and what they did is they, they put stones in the ocean and created a harbor for the sake of creating a port here. And, uh, because the natural port, let's see, it's not on here. The natural port is a little bit farther south in Joppa, uh, or Yao. Um, perhaps you remember, um, Peter goes up to Yfu and, and gets on top of a building, gets hungry and dreams of all kinds of creepy things to eat.

23:43 Uh, and, uh, and, and Acts 10, I think it's Acts 10. Yeah, that's Yao, that's a, that's the, the harbor that's primary. And then the Romans, they build Caesarea or ca. And so let's see, let's continue on here. We have in the text, they arrive here and they go to the home of Philip. Now, I want you to remember, it's some of you I'm asking to remember, and some of you, you haven't been here this long, but we have now been in the books of Luke and Acts for four years. Is that about right? I think it's four years now. And, um, when we started in, in the book of Luke,

24:31 we talked about, no, no, Luke and Acts total four years. Yeah, yeah. When we start, when we were talking in Luke, I think we might have mentioned it again in Acts, what Luke does as an author is he'll, he'll spin up some details and start a tale and move on, and he'll spin up some more. And, and, and, and this is the way Luke tells stories. So you may, something may have gotten spun up, and he hasn't mentioned it now for 15 chapters. So why do I say that? Because Philip, we have to go back about 13 chapters. He, Luke spun up a story and Philip landed in Caesarea and stayed there. And now here we are, we don't know how many years later,

25:17 but I would presume, um, let's, let's say this, I would presume that from the time that we left Philip in Acts, I think it's in Acts eight, I presume at that moment that Philip's single, and now Philip is married and has four daughters. So whatever amount of time it takes to achieve that is about the amount of time that we have. So here, so we're so Phil, Philip, now, now here's super fascinating, y'all. Luke has started up this story with Caesarea, but also if you go back a chapter or two to Acts, uh, six, Philip was introduced

26:03 to us along with Steven. And, and at that point in the text, we presume that Steven is, is the most important of them because he is listed first and then he has a whole chapter. Uh, but here's what's fascinating in that process, Paul was the one who oversaw the execution of Steven and Philip fled from before Paul. And now Paul's coming to Caesarea, and, and the storyline is coming back. Do you see how Luke is weaving it back together? Luke is one of one of my favorite storytellers, just by the way, he weaves the story. It, I don't know, know how to, I'm not even sure what modern movies to connect, connect it to. There are some good movies today that the storytellers are excellent,

26:49 and they, they drop, they drop hints along the way. And, and, and, but if you're not paying attention, you don't realize when those hints reemerge and the story, uh, you know, an hour later or 10 episodes if you're watching series or 3, 4, 5 movies later, if you're watching series of movies, this is what Luke does. He identifies Philip here as the one from Acts eight, because he says he's the Proclaimer of the good news. And then if that's not enough for us, he says, oh yeah, one of the seven. Why? Because in Acts chapter six, verse five, there are seven Shaheem who are appointed to alleviate, to, to relieve the, the burden of, of, um,

27:40 cleaning the tabletops, uh, in the text so that the apostles can focus on teaching, uh, and, and, and praying. And Philip is one of those. Now, the text also tells us that he has four virgin daughters who live with him. I don't know about y'all, but if you're reading this text and you're just, you're just power reading through the Bible, and then you're like, and Philip had four virgin daughters living with him, and then you move on, you're like, I don't understand what that has to do with the story. Like, it's, it's not a pertinent detail. Why does it matter that, that he has four virgin daughters? Why doesn't, why do you even have to tell us he has daughters? You're just telling us that he's meeting, uh,

28:25 meeting Philip, and, and it's a kind of a re reconnection from, you know, a decade or two before. Lemme tell you something else that Luke spun up quite a while ago if you've been here through the series of Acts, and he spun up within the text of Peter's message, ironically, on ot. Peter quotes Joel chapter three, or, or if you're referencing, um, Christian text starts at the end of chapter two. He quotes Joel chapter three and what Peter said, or what Luke writes down in Acts chapter two, verse 17. It says, and it shall be in the last days, says, God,

29:13 that I'll pour out my ruah, my spirit on all flesh. Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. Your young men shall see visions in your old men shall dream dreams. It could be that what Luke did with the text that was utilized by Peter was open up a thread of your young women shall prophesy. It doesn't seem to bear any account here other than this is, this is, um, testimony that the is the latter days because these young women are prophesying, how do I know they're young because they're virgin girls. And in the Jewish context,

30:00 that is primarily when you're too young to be married off. I'm not saying it's prohibitive of, of someone being older, um, and, and not having been married off, but primarily in the Jewish context. It's, it's referencing younger girls who are pre prepubescent. And in the latter days, it's the Ruach who will be poured out on both men and women, young and old. And so here we have an example of both young women and what we presume to be an older man, because Agabus comes down and Agabus seems to bear some level of renowned

30:47 or recognition, which means he has to have been around a while and, and to have some, some level of, of authority and acceptance. And Agabus comes down from Judea, by the way, again, uh, it's been a while since I've addressed the authorship or, or Luke's, um, Luke's Peoplehood background. Um, but to me, Luke, if he's not Jewish, he's perhaps the most Jewish, non-Jewish person I've met, Uh, at least met in in their writing, because the coming down from Judea is a, is an explicitly Jewish thing

31:33 that Agabus comes down from Judea, and here we're gonna continue in the text, he comes down, he came to us in this group, he takes Paul's belt, ties his hands in his feet, and he says, the Kodesh says this, in this way, shall the Jewish people in Jerusalem bind the man who owns this belt and deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles? The reaction of the community? It, it seems at least some part of the community is gathered with Philip in this, in this group. The reaction of them, not just the disciples in Caesarea, but also those who are traveling with Paul. Why do I say this? It's at least Luke, because he says, we, he says, we, let me, let me, let me get to this point.

32:19 He says, uh, when we heard these things, both we and the local people urged Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. You see, they've taken what Agabus has, prophesied Agabus comes out. Uh, it's hard for me to think that Agabus doesn't know who Paul is, but perhaps he doesn't. Perhaps he just takes a belt off a random dude and takes the belt and ties himself up and says, this is what's gonna happen to this random guy that I don't know. It's hard for me to believe that he doesn't know who Paul is, whether he knows him or not. It doesn't matter because the interpretation of both the group with Paul and the local group, the,

33:08 their interpretation is Paul don't go, or maybe I should say their application of what? Of, of what, of what they receive is they, they say, Paul, don't go. This is now at least the third time, that a group has tried to urge Paul not to go. And Paul gets tired of it, and he responds. You can just imagine Paul, Paul's Paul, what, what should I say? Paul's not one to mince words very often. Paul responds and says, what are you doing weeping and breaking my heart? He's like, stop it. I'm not only ready

33:53 to be bound, but to die in the name of the Lord. Yeshua. Paul is very quick to address what others are feeling on his behalf. He says, I'm going to, I'm going to reframe Paul's response and, and say this, this is what he tells him. Why are you trying to discourage me? You see, because what they're trying to do is discourage Paul from going up to Jerusalem. Why? Because they see the consequences. And I'll tell you, I'm not gonna, if I were to be in their place,

34:38 I might also have discouraged Paul. Paul, you're doing some great things out there. Let's skip Jerusalem for the moment. Let's get back on the road. Like your road record is way better than your home record right now. Like, let's get back on the road and let's, let's finish the tour. But he says, why are you trying to discourage me? And then he couples it with, I'm ready to follow in my Lord's footsteps. You see, this is the exact same thing that Yeshua experiences the night of the Seder.

35:24 He's there praying and he says, Lord, if you can take this cup for me, please. And he says, but not my will, but your will be done. He knows, I, I suspect Yeshua knew a little bit earlier, but he knows certainly at that point what's about to happen as Paul at this point knows what's about to happen. And if he didn't know before Agabus, he certainly knows now, And Paul says, stop it. Stop discouraging me. I'm ready to follow in my Lord's footsteps. Again, it's a fascinating twist in the narrative

36:10 because he oversaw Steven's execution for the same thing. And here, Paul, however many decades later, is willing to walk in the footsteps of Yeshua and walk in the footsteps of Steven, the response of the group when they get rebuked by Paul, the response of the group is, may the Lord's will be done. This is the beginning step. This is the beginning step for someone who needs their will bent to match the lord's may,

36:59 the Lord's will be done. I recognize whatever it is that you're seeing that I'm not, that may be the Lord's will. I don't, I don't advise you to do this, but may the Lord's will be done. I I can't see that. You see, the group has stepped back and they said, may the Lord's will be done. So here I want to, to pause and take what I'm going to call an excursus, because when you read commentaries, you'll read commentaries and they'll go and then they'll, they'll come back and they'll address a topic at length That's in the text that they just can't figure out how to address at that moment. The excursus, is this the leading of the rah?

37:47 How do we interpret and apply what appears to be conflicting instructions from the kodesh? Why, why do I want to go down this road? Number one, if it's important, then it's important. Now, number two, it's an extremely difficult thing to push into. And, and at one point, rabbi Sean encouraged me, not not this week, but years ago, when you find something difficult in the text, don't run from it. Push into it. So this is something difficult in the text because we have what seems to be conflicting instructions or leadings from the rock. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna put 'em all together for you.

38:33 We're gonna start in Acts chapter nine. Acts chapter nine, verses 15 and 16 says this, but the Lord said to him, to Paul, uh, excuse me, not to Paul, he said, uh, this is, um, Ananias, while Paul's in Damascus, Paul's blind and, and has just had this encounter with Yeshua on the road. And Ananias is the leading, leading disciple there in, in Damascus. And Paul's out there, if you remember the, recall, the text, Paul's out there breathing fire and trying to arrest people and, and all these things. And, and Anani says, I, are you sure that's the guy that you want me to go to? Like Lord, just can you gimme his name again?

39:19 And, and, and this time say Philip, not you, not Paul. Um, like, are you sure? Are you, are you sure you're sure? Like, can you tell me like five times with no variation, like sheep skin up, sheeps skin down, like all the different things. And Ananias finally says, okay. And the Lord says to Ananias, go, for he is a choice instrument. Paul is a choice instrument to carry my name before nations and kings and the children of Israel, for I will show him how much he must suffer for my name's sake. This is the initial course that the Lord's set

40:08 Paul on the, the Ruach, the spirit of God set Paul on this course to be a choice instrument before nations, kings and the children of Israel. And it's a course that includes suffering for his namesake. So we fast forward in the narrative, uh, to Acts chapter 20, and Paul says, and look now, uh, and now look bound by the Ruach. It's quite interesting. He's using this terminology bound by the Ruach, and, and he hasn't met Agabus yet. This is before Agabus bound by the Ruach. I am going to Jerusalem not knowing what will happen to me there, except that the

40:57 Kodesh bears witness to me from city to city, saying that bondage and afflictions await me. However, I don't consider my life of any value, except that I might finish my course and the office I receive from the Lord Yeshua to declare the good news of the grace of God. By this point in Paul's life, he has experienced plenty of seru, plenty of troubles of problems, uh, uh, of trials. He's been beaten, he's been left for dead. He's been put in prison, he's been stoned with stones, not the, not the other kind, The kind that hurts.

41:44 He's experienced all of these trials and he says, I know bondage and afflictions await me. It's interesting. I I forgot to write it down. Somebody can shout out the verse when I when I quote it. Um, I think it's in Philippians four, um, somewhere in somewhere. But he says, Paul says, Um, No, it's in Corinthians, maybe. Alright, here we go. Paul says, Paul says, I'd rather not be with you, to be with you, is to be the Messiah 1 21. What is it? Philippians one 20. Philippians 1 21, to be with you is the Messiah. That's not a good thing, y'all,

42:31 because when the Messiah was with us, he was, he was pierced, he was crushed for our iniquities. He was bruised, he was beaten. Paul says, to be with you is to be with the Messiah, is to is for me to be the Messiah. Like sometimes we think that's a good thing, not a good thing, y'all. And, and then he says, it would be better for me if I were to die, because then I would be present with the Lord. But the Lord keeps me here for your sake, not for my sake, but for your sake. I'm here to build you up. And, and just so you know, my building you up, it hurts. Or as my grandpa used to say, it heights,

43:18 it hurts for me to be here, but I will continue being here until the Lord says I'm not gonna be here. This is Paul's mindset. So here again now where we're gonna include this week's reading in 21, 4 B, uh, they kept telling Paul through the Ruok not to step foot in Jerusalem. So this is now Where're beginning to encounter some, some, um, conflict. The Ruach was speaking to these disciples and they were speaking to Paul. Now, when that happens, the Ruach speaking to someone and then that someone speaking to someone else, what happens, like it or not, is a level of interpretation.

44:05 There's a level of interpret interpretation that inherently happens in the exchange, much like what happens when we play the game. Telephone, I don't know if you've ever played telephone, certainly with, uh, it's much more fun with people who like to change the, the verbiage along the way. Um, but the game of telephone, what it, what it does is one person says, starts off the the thing and says, um, What? X, Y, ZI, I was, can't think, I can't think that fast on my feet. Um, oh, this dinner's really good. We should thank mom for it, But they have to whisper this dinner's really good. We have to thank mom For it. And the next person goes,

44:50 What? The dinner, the dinner should thank mom. And then that goes on to the next. And by the end, you have something that's not even at all related. Why do I say this? Because it could be, there's just an element of telephone going on here. Also, let's keep going and, and I'll come back to this in a minute. Acts chapter 21, verses 11 and 12 is what we just read. The Kodesh says this, uh, this is to agabus. So with, with the disciples in, is it entire? Yeah, entire. They're telling Paul not to go to Jerusalem and, and, and the Ruach is speaking to them. But here, Agabus says, the spirit of God says this,

45:40 like, this is a direct like instruction. In this way, shall the Jewish people in Jerusalem bind the man who owns this belt and deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles? When we heard these things, both we and the local people urged Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. Here the ruck speaks directly to the group through the prophecy. By Agabus, the application is the same. They don't want to go up to Jerusalem. They don't want Paul to go up to Jerusalem because they see the consequences. They see the consequences.

46:26 Paul then replies and says, y'all the consequence, I'm not, I'm not here to consider the consequences in terms of what my actions are. I'm doing what the Lord has told me to do. I'm acting out of obedience. Paul is going to Jerusalem out of obedience. When he first received his commission by Yeshua to follow him, it was immediately verified by the Lord revealing that Paul's allegiance to Yeshua would come at a cost. In other words, great suffering. But his calling, his, the trajectory that Paul was set upon there in Damascus was confirmed by, if I can put it this way, the elder of the body

47:12 of Messiah in Damascus, Ananias. Then Paul's brought up to Jerusalem, and Barnabas takes Paul under his wings and brings him into the group. Paul's a Paul's a lot. Y'all, Barnabas takes Paul and says, just shut up for just a moment. Let me help you. Barnabas puts his reputation on the line, and the, and, and the community there accepts Paul, but then Paul starts speaking in Jerusalem and they're like, wait, wait, we gotta get Paul outta here. Like he's causing more problems than, than he's worth at the moment. So they send Paul and, and,

47:57 and then Paul, He finally begins to understand what his mission in life is. And ironically, Paul is trained to go to the Jewish people. Paul is trained to go to the, the Jewishness of the Jewish people, like the most Jewish Jews, of all the Jews. Paul's trained to go to them. And the Lord says, uh, I think I got something else for you. Let's go to these people who have never even heard of the Torah. Like you're trained to go explain the,

48:44 the most minute detail. Let's go to people who don't, don't even know what you're talking about. Let's have fun here. Like, I don't know if y'all can really think about that. Paul, Paul is, is a, is a fish outta water. He's in a, he's in a place that's not his regular spot, but he's in the place that God put him. And in that place, the relational, the relationship between Jews and Gentiles begins to emerge and become defined to the point that Paul brings it to Jerusalem and says, Hey, what about this? And we have all, it says, all the elders of Jerusalem, all of the apostles, they get together and they argue, they fight over what's going to happen.

49:31 What do we do with these people? What do we do with the non-Jews who are coming to faith? I mean, I don't know if you can imagine this, but Paul is there like, I got the answer y'all, but he's trying not to force his hand at this point. And, and it comes through and, and it all comes out the way the Lord planned, by the way. And Paul gets released back, if I can put it this way, back into the wild, back into the wild olive trees. Paul gets released, but not just released. Actually, Paul gets sent. And what you'll notice pre Acts 15 is there's groups, there's individuals, there's,

50:18 there's some people like this. After Acts 15, it's communities, it's cities, it's thousands. It's tens of thousands. When Paul was released to walk into what he had, Uh, The world is his oyster. Literally. He goes out there and, and brings the, the good news, and now he's coming back. Now, I want you to notice, this is one thing I, I haven't, I haven't, I haven't focused on really this time through acts, but every time the gospel goes out from Jerusalem, it returns to Jerusalem,

51:04 it goes out with Philip to Samaria, then it comes back to Jerusalem, it goes out with Paul to the nations, and now Paul's coming back to Jerusalem. And what we'll see, we're not quite there yet, but I I, I'm, I'm laying the groundwork. What we'll see is Paul will go to Rome, but there's no return. Most commentators take that to mean that Rome is the end game goal of Luke. I actually think that's wrong. Luke has already set the pattern for us. The out in the back, when Paul doesn't make it back to me, Luke is leaving it up to us to bring it back. So the end of Acts leaves you just kind of going, huh?

51:51 And, and we'll be there in in six months. Don't worry, maybe seven. That one was not on purpose. We'll be there soon, be there this summer. But here we go. Paul is choosing to obey the Lord's direction, And he's, he knows he's going to be bound. In fact, if you think about it this way, Jonah chose to disobey the Lord's direction and went through a whole bunch of things. Paul, he's skipping the step. He's like, oh, I'll just obey. But I'll still go through all the things, these different moments of the disciples trying to convince Paul to not go do not necessarily

52:38 represent a conflict in the spirit, but rather a conflict in the disciples interpreting and applying what the spirit is saying. You know, if the spirit told me somebody in the congregation is gonna go to Jerusalem and they're gonna get their hands tied up and, and be bound up and then be sent to, you know, all these different things, I'll be like, maybe you should go to Jerusalem. Like, are you sure that that's the Lord that you, you're hearing right now? Let me give a, a, a story. Lemme see if I have time to give a story. I've given several stories, but let me, lemme give a personal story.

53:25 Oh, wait, what year are we in? 20, 25, 14 Years ago. 14 years ago, almost 15, somewhere, right around 14, 15 years ago. I came back from a trip, I came to my parents' house and I said, I feel like the Lord is calling me into, um, full-time, uh, vocational ministry at em. And I said, will y'all pray with me? I, this is, I felt like it was the, the, the, the spirit of the Lord was leading me in this direction. I said, well, y'all pray with me and consider this. And my dad said, I don't need to pray with you.

54:11 He said, I don't think the Lord's calling you into this. Perhaps you've never heard this story, but you may think that my dad wanted to turn the congregation over to me. But it was the opposite. He said, he said, I don't think the Lord's calling you into this. And I was like, dad, can you just like pray with me for the 40 days before you tell me that? And and he goes, I don't, I don't need the 40 days. And like we're going back and forth and, and finally my mom steps in and says, look, we'll pray with you for 40 days. So we pray for 40 days seeking those, the leading.

54:56 If I, if, if I can use the terminology from this passage seeking the ruach and his guidance in this, in this text, what I didn't say, my dad's response was, there's too many sufferings in leading a congregation for you to do this. So we come 40 days later, I come back, I'm eating breakfast at my parents' house. And, uh, I'm like, well, I didn't hear anything different. And my dad said, neither did I. And he said, he said, if the Lord isn't the one leading you and you, and you do it, so there, there's an if,

55:44 then if the Lord is not the one leading you and you do it, the ministry will break you beyond repair occupational ministry. And, uh, I said, dad, I know that. Like I've grown up in the family. Like I, I, I, I, he, he looks at me and he goes, you've grown up in the family, but you've never been the one in charge. And I said, okay, dad, that's true. You know, I was a very respectful young man, A great job. I did, I did have a really good job At that point. I worked, I would work eight days the night, eight days off, and I would just be up here doing stuff on my eight days off.

56:29 It was fantastic. And, uh, my dad said, you got a good job. Don't, don't, like, you can keep doing what you're doing and, and, and you'll, it, it'll be better for you basically. And I said, dad, I, I really don't think that's what the Lord is calling me to do. So I left it at that. I went home that day, 40 days after this, I, uh, 40 days after I started, I went home and I went to the Lord. And I said, if you would've asked me that day, I doesn't, I don't know that I would've could've defined it this way, but in my own life, this is reflecting, this is what I did. I went home and I said, Lord, if my dad, who is also my elder

57:15 and my rabbi, if he didn't hear from you that the, the confirmation of what I feel I heard, if he didn't hear that, then either I recognize either A, I'm wrong and I didn't hear it, or B, it's the wrong time. And I said, it's up to you. I said, I like my job. It is up to you. And, and I released it that night. And again, the next morning I'm having breakfast at my parents. You may see a repeating pattern here. I like to eat breakfast at my parents' house. Um, I'm eating breakfast at my parents, and my dad comes out and he says, well, the Lord told me something different.

58:06 So, but, but what I want you to take away from this is my dad had interpreted the Lord's leading in, seeing the suffering at the end said, I don't think this is the Lord. I don't think this is, this is the right call for you. This is the same thing by the way, that the, the disciples, they, they, through the spirit, they see what's at the end and they say, Paul, we don't think this is for you. But the difference is, they were not Paul's overseers. They were not Paul's elders. See, I have a challenge, and, and there's no way to know it's correct until, you know, the world to come happens. There's no way to know this.

58:51 But I suspect that if Peter or James or Barnabas, if they would've come to Paul and said, no, you stay away from Jerusalem, I think he would've stayed away Because those were his oversight. But it doesn't happen. In fact, we're gonna get to James next week, and I'm so excited about next week, but here we are this week. I gotta finish this week, James. James not only doesn't tell Paul to stay away, it's almost as if James sends Paul into the fire. He recognizes what's going on,

59:36 and James releases him into it. It's a, it's a fascinating, uh, conundrum. But Paul, he said What Ronnie said, Oh, okay, you're right. I, i, I did leave that unsaid. My dad did say to me, he said, the, this is the end of the story. It wasn't necessarily pertinent. Um, or my mom says, it's pertinent. You know, Yeshua, when he says, mom is not my time. And she says, just do whatever he does, he tells you to do, you know, and, and he'll, he'll get the wine. Um, but anyways, the end of the story with my dad

1:00:22 was, my dad said, I, you know, the Lord told me last night that you're not just my son, but you're also his. And that if he's called you to do this, then I'm to prepare you for what will happen. So, yeah, okay, you're right. It's, it's, it's applicable. See, mothers, mothers know every mothers know best. So all of all of that to say, there's not a conflict in the ach, as best as I can tell, the conflict comes in the way we interpret and apply for one another.

1:01:08 So you gotta be careful when you're interpreting and implying the ACH with one another and understand what, and, and, and be able to see what else is going on. So the text goes on, we're gonna finish with this after these days in verse 15, after these days, we packed and started going up to Jerusalem. You see all of them now, they're on board. At first they said, Paul, we don't want to go, we don't want you to go. Like, that's the group that's with Paul. And then Paul gives his reply and they say, may the Lord's will be done. So they're, they're yielding to the Lord's will. After these days, we packed and started going up to Jerusalem. So now they're all on board. And some of the disciples from Caesarea also went with us,

1:01:54 bringing with us, uh, bringing us to Manen son of, uh, Manan of Cyprus, one of the early disciples by whom we might be hosted. It's always good to bring a host along with you, the disciples acquiesce to Paul and how the rah is leading him, and they all go up to Jerusalem for the sake of being obedient and following Paul. So let me leave you with a couple questions. Number one, when I am in a hurry, Paul's in a hurry. I'm, I'm taking these, all these questions based straight from the text. When I'm in a hurry, do I take time to check in on other believers or friends where I travel?

1:02:43 I don't know. I don't know about you guys, but, but I, I, I'll tend to travel through places. And if I'm there and I know somebody there, I'll, I'll try to reach out if I have time. Um, but this was actually a relatively convicting thing because we all travel. We live in the most immobile society in history. And when we travel, do we take time to encourage others while we're there? Secondly, how do I respond when the Ruach leads me towards suffering? We see how Paul responds. How do we respond? Third, how do I discern when the Ruach is giving different guidance to different people?

1:03:28 This is, this is one of the issues at hand in here is Paul is being led by the Rock and the other, the other disciples, they say, no, there's suffering. At the end, they see the end and they see Paul, but they don't want the two to meet. And Paul says, no, I'm being, I'm being led. This is, this is my obedient walk here. And finally, what does it look like for our faith community, for us here at Brook Hashem to support the Lord's will, even when it's painful or not fully understood? You see Luke in the, in, in the cohort of, of travelers with Paul, they don't understand why

1:04:14 Paul has to go, I want you to think about this. Paul has led tens of thousands, I don't remember, perhaps we could say hundreds of thousands of Jews and Gentiles to faith in the Messiah. Yeshua, Paul, at this point, well, maybe I should say even up to a hundred years ago, Paul was the most accomplished Sharer of the good news in the world. You make an argument even to the last 30, 40 years that Paul had led more Jewish people to faith in Yeshua than anybody in history.

1:05:04 I think that might be, if it's not different. Now, I, I, I would say I can make an argument otherwise, but for one person. But what does it look like for us to yield our will to the Lords and say the Lord's will be done? So it doesn't always have to lead to suffering, but it very well could. We here so often we want to walk in the footsteps of our Messiah, Yeshua. But most of, most of the time we mo those people mean up until a certain point because

1:05:50 they don't really wanna walk in the other, the foot, the footsteps that he led right up until his death. Those are difficult footsteps. In fact, let me, let me, let me drop something quite challenging. If Yeshua's life was the embodiment of Israel, then does the persecution of Israel, and I'm not saying this in in terms of it should be, does the persecution of Israel bring redemption to the nations? If Yeshua suffered and died on our behalf

1:06:36 and said, Jerusalem, I'm weeping for you because what, what happens to me is going to happen to you? And Jerusalem was crucified about 40 years later, and it was through that, that the Jewish people went into exile. And it was through that, that the good news of Yeshua came to the nations. But I'm telling you, the life, life in the nations for the Jewish people has not been easy. Maybe you can make an argument for in America, for the last 40 or 50 years, life has been relatively decent for Jewish people in America. I would make the same argument for the twenties

1:07:25 and thirties in, in Germany with Jewish people in Germany. But it doesn't stay that way forever. And we're seeing, we're witnessing the rise of persecution again. And it's quite fascinating because Yeshua continues to be persecuted as do the Jewish people. And yet that's where salvation comes from. So consider these these things in your life this week. You, you never know. The Lord may lead you into a conversation or a relationship this week

1:08:11 where you can share Yeshua and you can share his love for the Jewish people. The two are not exclusive. In fact, the two are tied together so tight that it's hard, it's hard to say you love one and not the other. Right? My father in heaven. Lord, we thank you for this text. Lord, I thank you for the, for the, um, life example of of Paul. Lord, I pray that you would continue to lead and to guide each and every one of us in our lives this week, Lord. And we just, we submit ourselves to you and,

1:08:59 and ask that your will would be done here on earth as it already is in the heavens. We bless you in Yeshua's name. Amen. May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace If

1:10:08 In the, the name of our Messiah, Yeshua Shalum.