More of the Same, Please
The strengthening of disciples does not come through new teachings or different teachings, but through a deeper understanding of the same Gospel that first brought them to faith. When Paul returned to strengthen the souls of new believers, he reinforced the original message of God’s grace and loving-kindness. This pattern continues today – the way to help Christians grow stronger and more obedient is not by moving beyond the Gospel, but by helping them understand it more deeply. The book of Romans serves as a prime example of how teaching the Gospel at depth produces spiritual stability and growth in the lives of believers.
Automatically Generated Transcript
[00:00:00] Something heavy I have here. Actually, it’s one of my King James versions of the Bible. This one has lots of room for notes that you can scribble on the side. It’s really very useful. And the relevance of my bringing you along in King James Bible is that it’s a hint to answer the question that I was going to ask. How many of you know where the idea that some Christian churches have today of just confirming people? And so you might be sprinkled as a baby or baptised, some call it. And then later in a number of years you’re confirmed. How many of you know where that idea comes from? Being confirmed. It’s actually not a bad practice for people to be confirmed in the faith, so this is not my trying to knock the practice, but do you know why people do get confirmed? I didn’t think to ask the question, put your hand up if you were confirmed, but I don’t want to make you do that. Just talk about
[00:01:09] confirmation. And well, the answer is actually a Bible verse. It’s on the screen right now, I think. And well, maybe go to verse 23 and see if that will catch it. I can’t see it there in verse 22. We had a Bible verse, 21, 22, 23. Well, perhaps it was meant to be there. Well, then it’s got the next one, appointing elders for them in every church, prayer and fasting, committed them to the Lord, in whom they have believed. No, not in verse 23. As a matter of fact, in our Bible verses 21-23, there’s no word confirmed, unless you read it in the King James. And in the King James version of the Bible, just to read you what’s said there in verse 22, it reads like so. Well, I’ll read verse 21. And when they had preached the gospel to that city and had taught many, they returned again to Lystra and to Iconium and Antioch, where they previously been, confirming the souls of the disciples. So in the King James Bible, there is
[00:02:32] a mention of confirming the souls of the disciples after they’ve been made disciples. It’s a later event when you get confirmed as a disciple. And you’ll find there’s several other verses that might be relevant. So the idea of there being confirmation is more biblical than we Baptists might have thought. We don’t have confirmation in our church. And part of the reason why I’m talking now, when we come to have sermons in the church, I’m advised and asked and helped my wife to provide a good topic that’s understandable. And I get a lot of help from my preaching from my family. Mentioned then, by the way, Brinley’s come back from overseas. She left Kieran over there in West Coast of America. But she came back. And I thought, good, I’ll have Brinley. And I’ll be able to drive down to church with her. But no, some university things on. And quite a lot of our church have gone to the three or four days there is up at Mount Tambourine,
[00:03:46] which is a training thing. And I’m rather glad that she went to that. She’s been before, and it was a good one. And so it’s on again. So that’s why she’s not here. But I always look to the family to see that they do come along as much as possible. But I was relieved by the fact that, and at least we had Joey bring his family, and they’re sitting up the back. And so welcome here to Joey’s dad and mum. They’re the ones, not the little boy, but they’re the ones who are sitting next to Joey. And having family along at church is a terrific thing. And that’s not at all relevant. But I was being encouraged at home that I should always have good topics. And so the one that I had for tonight was, first of all, well, that was introduction. Do any of you know about confirming? But the one I thought of tonight really suits is the saying, more of the same, please. I don’t know whether you remember when
[00:04:52] you were younger and you went off to a party or whatever, and when they gave you the dessert and whatever. Depending on what it was, I have to confess to being a person who’s very picky. And when they served up things, I often didn’t necessarily like it. It’s an unfortunate trait that’s been handed down to my family. I won’t tell you of the illustration moments, but there would come something very special. And having given it to us for the first course, when they wanted to give us a second course, I would say, more of the same, please. Because there’s something that I’ve already gotten that’s really working for me. Now, in your Christian experience, well, I’ve been laboring about, and some of you know this is one of my themes about discipleship, that there’s something that really works in helping you get your feet on the ground with God, in helping you to get based in the Christian life.
[00:05:55] Put your hand up if you think you know what it is. What is it that makes you really get based soundly? Let’s see, who knows? Sometimes I don’t ask my questions very well. But what is it that really gets you founded really wonderfully as a Christian? If you know, don’t split it out, but put your hand up. Andrew knows, and I think that’s another Andrew, isn’t it? No, Matthew, Matthew, OK. OK, so some of you know, well, that was the subject of this morning’s message about the way that we get discipled is actually by the Gospel.
[00:06:46] And it’s the Gospel that is the energetic part, it’s the powerful part, in what turns you into a disciple. But that’s not the whole story. In fact, as we look at this particular passage about what Paul did in order to get disciples to stand on their feet, it was not only that he had them turned into disciples, but he had four or five things he did, which is what tonight I’m talking about. But in talking about them, it’s not a case of, well, you hear the Gospel and that might make you sign the decision card, but you better be getting into this something different to make you really go as a Christian. That’s what I’m trying to tell you is not the truth.
[00:07:31] But rather, it’s a case of more of the same, please, meaning it’s when the Apostle Paul went back to the people that he had gospelised into being Christians, turned into disciples by the Gospel. We’re talking about that this morning. Then he went back to places previously he’d been, and why he went there was to strengthen them and how he strengthened them was to give them more of the same. Now, as we look up there, I was asking us to see if we could see the word confirmed, and it wasn’t there, but actually where the King James Bible does translate confirmed is verse 22.
[00:08:15] If you look on the screen, the beginning of the verse says, strengthening the souls of the disciples. And those denominations that do have a moment of confirmation, that’s exactly what they’re aiming to do, is to take people who’ve been introduced to the faith, in their case by being baptised as an infant or by being trained up in Sunday school. Whatever is their understanding of the beginning moment, the confirmation is because they did find it biblical in this example of the Apostle Paul going back to confirm the souls of the disciples.
[00:08:51] That’s just the language of the King James for how in the more recent translations his word strengthening the souls of the disciples. Confirming is the idea that something has already been established, you give extra information for, or you give extra reasoning about, or you give extra motivation for it to happen. But it’s making sure something already that’s being decided and entered into gets to stick, that’s what confirming is about. That’s the purpose. Some churches do have confirmations, because they see the need to strengthen the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith. Now with my headings, one about confirmation, whether you knew about what it meant, the other one, the idea of more of the same, please,
[00:09:50] is explanatory of the fact that the way you get strengthened is to do what Paul did to go back and to strengthen those disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith. He didn’t introduce them to a new faith or a different step or this isn’t an occasion where he somehow gave them something that was different from what they got at the start. But he was strengthening them in holding to the belief of the Gospel, by the way, that they’d already received and a part of the task that we have as Christians with people who come to the Lord is to be careful enough to help to strengthen them with that faith that they’ve started to hang on to it. That’s what the verse is talking about, encouraging them to continue in the faith. Now be aware of the fact that in the New Testament, particularly where the
[00:10:48] Bible talks about faith and where it talks about the faith, there is a a difference of meaning that’s intended by whether you use the article. If it just is faith, it’s talking about the very thing of trust. Faith is dependence on God. The way we have a way to depend on God is through his word. So faith is helping people to believe the word of God. But when the Bible uses the terminology, the faith, they’re actually referring more to the content of what was asked of the people first to believe, the faith. And so there have been creeds that have been given, designed by Christians down through the ages, and we know many of the creeds. And the creed of the Apostles’ Creed is one that rehearses the things that we believe. And a part of the reason why sometimes in church services we have people saying out loud the creeds is a part of the purpose in church services
[00:11:54] of helping people know more deeply the truths that make you a Christian that you stand on and go on believing. So that’s the first thing that the verse 22 is saying, strengthening the souls of the disciples. Now I have been over this passage many times in our church and every now and then when there’s new people who’ve come and probably haven’t heard it, I bring it out again, which I’m doing tonight. But how many of you know what the Greek word happens to be? I don’t expect many of you bother knowing all the Greek words, but the word strengthening. We haven’t a previous service highlighted this word, but what is the word to strengthen in the Greek? This man knows many things. That’s true. Say it again. Sterizo. Sterizo. It’s making you stable. Sterizo is a Greek word. And when it says making stable or strengthening the souls of the disciples so they won’t fall away, encouraging
[00:13:07] them to continue in the faith, you can get the picture of what Paul is trying to do. Now, what’s very interesting about the word Sterizo is that sometimes it’s used in military settings. And in the military settings it is that there’s opposing armies who are battling out as to who’s going to own the territory when the battle is done. And if one general is smart enough to realise that there’s going to be an advantage if he could take a top of a hill, it would give his fighters, if their marksmen were their rifles, to look down on the enemy or if it’s back in the days of swords and people came to retake the top of the mountain from them, the people coming to retake it have got to wield their swords uphill. It’s much easier in the olden days to be militarily successful if you’re operating downhill. But if a hill is taken, generally the leaders generally, the generals on the
[00:14:16] other side, they would say it’s important for us not to let that, they’re winning that high place, go untested. And he would try and get a lot bigger amount of soldiers to do the job than what was sitting up there on that higher perch. And he’d bring them back to retake the high grounds. And when you’re trained in military things you’re trained about the value of the higher ground. And so you would try to take back the higher ground have been taken by the enemy. If someone has got soldiers who’ve won this high ground, he would know jolly well that if he doesn’t strengthen them, and in the case of the military scene he’s providing more reinforcements, if he doesn’t strengthen where they’re sitting by sending more soldiers to help guard it, he’ll lose it again to the opposition.
[00:15:14] This word sterizo is a word that was used very much in the military setting to add to the strength of the taking that will stay taken. That’s the idea. And when you as a person become a Christian and you come to Christ, there’s been a big spiritual world of forces around you. God won, because the evil world didn’t want you to become a Christian. He didn’t want you to believe the gospel, he’d have you believe everything else but the gospel. And when you came to Christ and you got in the door of the kingdom of God by coming to Jesus, the enemy to our souls, the Bible says, walks around seeking whom he’s like a lion
[00:16:00] seeking whom he may devour, immediately would be thinking up, how can he take back the fact that these people have come to know Jesus? How can I talk them out of it? How can make them see it was a bit of a wrong move for them, they’re going to cop all sorts of problems? And so there is design, excuse me, by the evil world, forces to stop you doing what you’ve been doing for Jesus. And that’s because we’re in a spiritual struggle. Now if you think that being a Christian is easy, then you haven’t been one very long. Because the truth of the matter is the moment you came to Christ and became a part of the
[00:16:43] kingdom of God, you were launched into this spiritual struggle. And one of the features of it is that there is an enemy who’s trying to scheme up ways to talk you out of it. If something happens when you go into a ministry and you go down like Michelle and I did to Tasmania and think we’re in a highlight place, boy, they’re paying me money to drive my car around Tasmania who could get a better job than that, that’s how I’d think. But there were issues that came up and reasons what made it harder and suddenly you become aware that you’re going to get tested. And that’s why you have strengthening and one of the chief purposes that we have with our apologetics emphasis in the church is to give people sometimes an intellectual strengthening.
[00:17:35] When you get converted it’s usually a spiritual thing, a conviction of sin, a sense of a calling from God, a sense of saying yes to Jesus, sometimes even quite an emotional thing because it’s something very deep and it affects you. And that’s the nature of a person coming to Christ. But you also need not only to have a genuine spiritual happening so you’ve got some assurance that God has worked in you and this is his doing and you haven’t been properly converted, that’s one part of it. But also you’re going to face people who say all sorts of rationale, why don’t go on believing that fundamentalist stuff. Or look, you’re just thinking that way because it’s how you’ve been brought up and your family
[00:18:22] led you to have all the right requisites to believe it easy. And so the evil one knows how to come along and give you rationale and a part of what apologetics is is to come and strengthen people with reasonings about the faith so that when the enemy comes against them of all these other rationale you don’t listen because you’ve thought it through and it doesn’t hold the water for you. And that’s why we have an apologetics club in our church, it meets on Thursdays, I don’t know what will happen across Christmas, none of us have discussed that. But whenever we meet next Thursday would be the relevant Thursday, it really depends on whether there are people who are free, this time of year most of our church are all going off to other things and we’ll wait and see.
[00:19:16] But we meet every second Thursday for the purpose of strengthening the souls of believers. And that strengthening is giving them a rationale, the biggest part of it, for the truth of the Gospel. That’s the heart of apologetics, it’s not just giving a rationale for our particular beliefs or showing why Baptists are right and Anglicans are nearly right. It’s not trying to say that we’ve got everything correct or trying to grandstand how good it is in the church. It is to confirm the Gospel and confirmation is also confirming that a person has indeed responded appropriately to the Gospel. One of the things that the devil likes to do to people who’ve become Christians is to
[00:20:11] stir them up and introduce a question mark and if he can’t succeed with a question mark about the content of the Gospel, he’ll take another aim and introduce a question mark as to whether you’ve properly believed. It is absolutely amazing when you listen to young Christians, ones who are not young in age but I mean people who’ve recently become Christians, how many silly ideas gets put in their heads, a friend or just coming out of the blue, the evil one behind it I believe, and the thoughts that are put in their head is, well maybe you didn’t say the prayer right as though God was going to be picky about your grammar. He’s not. There’s many a person that’s come to Christ and what they said in prayer to come to Jesus
[00:20:59] wasn’t very theologically correct but God is not picky actually. I’m always amazed at how unpicky God is and you know there are people who are in other denominations who don’t really have very good doctrines in my opinion but I’ve noticed when they become missionaries and with their hearts full of joy they go to tell the Gospel somewhere, God’s with them and he didn’t seem to take as much care about whether their doctrine was exactly right as I do. Have you realised that God, how gracious he is and even when part of your motives, have you ever investigated your own motives for doing things? I’m sad to say the truth about me is I keep finding I’ve got little extra motivations that are not necessarily good.
[00:21:45] I rather like it when people clap me on the back. I always want to be proven correct. My wife will tell you that. She makes it easy for me to be correct, no I shouldn’t say that. But the truth of the matter is you can have lots of little motivations that are not perfect. You know the evil one comes along and says yeah, you really weren’t that sincere. You had another motive. You’ve got involved in this because you want them to like you. It’s your way to get into the group and that’s what sort of thing the devil does and he tries to chisel away at your assurance that you’ve actually been doing all things with Jesus.
[00:22:30] It’s so good to know about the Gospel that it talks about a God whose chief characteristic is his loving-kindness, and the words that are all translated for loving-kindness include his grace and it’s grace that he blesses you because he loves you. Grace because he blesses you because he’s promised to. Grace because he’s got a character to keep his word and you may not. You may mean to have done better. You may have meant to have been praying hard this week, but you didn’t get around to it. You may have been meaning not to fall into that old besitting sin, but sometimes you do. But thankfully God is the one who’s perfect in his love and in his intention to keep doing
[00:23:17] what he’s promised to look after you despite your failures. And one of the ways that you strengthen people is to tell them God’s character. You’re actually only rehearsing one of the deeper parts of the gospel. For God so loved the world that he gave his only son. How many times I can remember when someone has come to me usually in crusade settings where there’s a person who listens to the call of the message and makes a response, but when you talk to them they’ve actually come to Christ earlier, but something got them to come the second time and part of what you have to tell them is that he’s still keeping you from the first coming. He hasn’t stopped.
[00:24:03] You may have backslidden and you may have dropped your bundle, but God has no intention of ever dropping his. And he is a grace God and part of that grace is that it doesn’t depend on what you do. It depends on his character and the fact that when he makes promises he who comes to me I will in no wise cast out. And when God gives a call for you to be his in any particular sense, that call is one that the Bible says the callings, the gifts and the callings of God are without repentance on his side it means. The gifts and callings of God are without repentance. That’s the reason why there still are Jews today because many times they’ve sinned against
[00:24:57] their heritage, many times they’ve not lived as they should do. But as the truth God comes again and again to restore them and take them back, one of my favourite verses in the Old Testament is about a prophet who was very successful in his earlier years and in that success he had, I don’t know whether he got lazy or whatever but he eventually decided he didn’t want to do it anymore and when God told him to go to a big heathen city he went the opposite direction, do you know who that is? Hey? Jonah. Jonah, yeah. And why the verse, I think it’s chapter three verse one or chapter two verse one but I can’t
[00:25:39] remember which. But why that’s my favourite verse, one of them, is that it says that God dealt with Jonah after he’d run away and God had to have the issue with the big fish that swallowed him and he got regurgitated up onto an island but all of that happening. And then the Bible says the Word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time because God doesn’t quit on his callings and Jonah didn’t get off just because he ran the wrong way. Jonah got called a second time and that happens to us many times when you’re someone who’s in the ministry it’s not that you do everything perfectly and sometimes you feel you’ve mucked it up but God doesn’t give up on you because that’s what his grace is about. And a part of what I’m sure the Apostle Paul would be saying to these young Christians
[00:26:41] is that they were ones who were still on God’s heart and that he would let them know that they were loved and that’s how he reinforced them. It’s actually a repetition of the Gospel again, you see, it’s more of the same place, the Gospel of Grace is what makes people get put back on the track. And when they had preached the Gospel of that city and made many disciples to the previous occasions I’ve explained that there’s not two sets of actions happening here. It’s one set of action preaching the Gospel of the city until it made many disciples. They returned to Listerokernium and Antioch strengthening the souls of the disciples, So even though discipleship is done by gospelising people, there are different things that are done with the gospel and to the disciples. The first one is to get strengthened. Now
[00:27:40] how is that strengthening actually done? Let me see whether some of you who have been around – not you Peter Muller because he knows jolly well what I’m saying – but what did the Apostle Paul do in his ministry of strengthening people already converted? How do we know from what the Apostle Paul did? Anybody help me? Yeah? Oh well he affirmed that they were Christians, yeah. He affirmed where they were in God’s hands, okay. Did he do anything more? Tell me about his methodology. Did he, yeah, say? He chased them, I didn’t hear it. Oh he chased them, yes he also had times where he had to tell him off, yeah. Mostly for stopping believing, mostly not to go on trusting. Well how did he get that to people? Is there anything big that he did? I think he probably knows so I’m just not asking my question properly. What did he do to the people at Rome to follow them up?
[00:29:07] I’m rather amazed that I’m not succeeding in making this clear. What did he do? He did a very big thing. Well I’ll tell you he wrote the book of Romans. Do you know right at the beginning of the book of Romans it says how he had been wanting to visit them, which would be the usual way, he’s doing it here in the book of Acts, to visit them, and he couldn’t get there, so he wrote the letter instead. He knew that if he visited them he could put his hands on them and they’d get spiritual gifts, but he couldn’t get there and that wasn’t going to happen. so he wrote the book of Romans. What is the book of Romans? Give me an account of what the content of the book of Romans is largely about. Not the little details, there’s lots of… Yes, it’s the gospel according to Paul. Thank you, thank you. It’s the gospel according to Paul, because it traces the gospel through. In fact, you can pick out chief verses,
[00:30:09] not every verse will fit in, but you can pick out some chief verses, which really is just a highlight for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, Romans 3.23. Romans 6.23, the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 5.8 about the death of Christ, the forgiveness of God, the justification that comes by faith. You can go right through the book of Romans and you get what is called the Roman road, which is a set of verses. The other day I was telling our people that that’s something that we did with the young people a long time ago, where we made out a list of verses and we had them printed and put special covering over it, nice and sparkly, and gave it to the young people and told them to pin it to the back of their toilet door. Every time you went in there to have a sitting, you’d see the Roman road and you could rehearse those verses. It did
[00:31:10] a real powerful work of helping the young people at that stage. They’re probably all married by now, but to really get strengthened. That’s what Paul did. And do you know when he got to the end of the book of Romans, how does he sum up? He sums up by saying in Romans 16.25 to 26, Letitia. If you can find Romans 16.25 to 26. When he had a point, no no, Romans, the book of Romans, sorry. Okay, thought you got it. Now to him who is able to strengthen you. Tell us which, not Andrew, I always call him Andrew, Matthew, what is that word that says strengthen you? It’s the same one. Now to him who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages. That’s the mystery of how God would do the church, actually how he’d bring Christ into the world, the mystery of Christ. But has now been disclosed through the prophetic writings
[00:32:34] and has been made known to all nations according to the command of the eternal God to bring about the obedience of faith. And one of the things that happens when you gospelize people, when you go back and help them again and teach them, make sure they reinforce the truth of the gospel, is that they get stronger and they become more obedient. And the way to get Christian’s obedient is to give them more of the same please, the gospel. And if you disciple your Christians by teaching the gospel at depth, it makes them more and more obedient. Oh boy, the illustration of that that happened in Sydney when I got led to preach through the book of Romans because of exactly what I’m telling you as a discipleship thing for the church, and one of my keenest youth leaders, a young man, he’s now a pastor down in Sydney, he came forward.
[00:33:40] I didn’t know why he did. I wanted some of the more slippery ones to come forward, but he came forward and I took him to be counseled and I said, tell me now, and I said his name, tell me now, why did you come forward? And he said to me, Jim, the book of Romans has got me. This disclosure of the gospel at depth drew him to become what he now is. And that obedience that sometimes we find ourselves hard to put into practice, and sometimes young Christians, and you visit them or you seek to contact them again, and they confess with a sheepish look that they’ve not really been walking very well. And a confession that you’ve not really been walking very well is nearly always because
[00:34:32] you just need to be gospelised a bit deeper about the grace of God. You need to know his promises a bit more securely. need to be reinforced sometimes with an opposition to things that have been unsettling you. You’d be amazed at how the devil gets going to try and unsettle a church. Start silly rumours or start people in different camps. And these are all things that if you know the grace of God, it’ll settle down. And this message that I’m telling you about and this disclosure by Paul through the book of Romans is that the purpose of discipleship is to bring about an obedience to the faith. And it works. And so that’s how the Scriptures speak. We are those who, by the Gospel, not only get in the door in the first place, but by the Gospel being taken more deeply by having an Apostle Paul strengthen us with it, reinforce
[00:35:38] us with it, showing us how it is the secret of God from the long ages past that has now been disclosed, what he said through the prophetic writings, but we could say through the Scriptures, according to the command of eternal God to bring about the obedience of faith. So when we do talk about discipleship, and you might hear from me that it’s done by the Gospel, I think don’t take that to mean that I think, this morning I was talking to the people about Billy Sunday and how he’ll say the only thing that matters was that you get them to say the sinner’s prayer. I think all of us have dealt with people coming to Christ and some not lasting and some backsliding and some of slipping into sins. Just a saying of a prayer might get people in the door of good prayer to be said when you really mean it. However, But nonetheless, there’s more to what needs to happen.
[00:36:35] And what we’re looking at here in Acts, his Paul’s method of discipleship is based on the gospel, yes, but it’s based also on him strengthening them with it, reinforcing them, helping them understand answers to some difficult questions. And there’s other things he’ll do as well, which we can talk about on another night. Anyway, thank you for listening to this question of more of the same, please.
[00:37:07] Because what I’m describing there is how you strengthen people is by letting them know more deeply the truth of the Christian gospel that God has given us. The best way to do that is like the book of Romans, to have it taken to you more deeply in your understanding. And if you’re a person wanting to go on more strongly, I would suggest the book of Romans is one way to do it. Most evangelistic agencies, when people first come to Christ,
[00:37:37] will give them a gospel because it does the same thing, whether it’s Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John. That’s why those gospels are there, not just to get us to be a disciple, but also to strengthen us as disciples. And that’s why discipleship may rest upon the power of the gospel to work, but it’s not just a simple thing of tell them the old, old story once, and that’s it. It’s a matter of working that message deeper
[00:38:04] and deeper into people until it produces the fruit of the obedience of the faith. Let me pray. Heavenly Father, I thank you for this word, and here it is in the King James Bible. It was, Storizo was translated as, what’s the word again, going along to church and having a renewal or having an encouragement or having been allowed to be made deeper. But that’s actually helped them what the Bible’s talking about, and we thank you for that in Jesus’ name, amen.