Thought for the Week

In Acts Chapter 2, on the Day of Pentecost, Peter preached to a crowd of people. Many of them came under conviction, repented of their sinful lives and turned to God, through Jesus Christ for forgiveness. On that day some 3,000 people were saved and added to or actually began the Church.

We have been looking at Acts Chapter 17 this week and last and we find Paul preaching. One named man, one named woman, and a few others came under conviction, repented of their sinful lives and turned to God, through Jesus Christ for forgiveness. These few were added to the Church. What made the difference? Was Peter that much better as a preacher than Paul? I think I know the reason for the difference or at least one of the reasons.

Peter was preaching to Jews and God-fearers. These were people who had come to observe one of the special days on the Jewish calendar of events designed to worship God and remember God's involvement with Israel through the millennia of time. They knew the Law and the Prophets. They understood their lives as sinners under sentence from the holy God. They knew the events of the last few weeks, and how Jesus had been crucified because of the jealousy of the chief priests and leaders of the Jewish Nation. They had heard the story of Christ's Resurrection from the lips of Peter who was indeed an eye-witness of these events.

It was different for Paul's audience. Paul was not preaching to Jews and God-fearers. These were people who knew nothing of the special days on the Jewish calendar or of events designed to worship God and remember God's involvement through the millennia of time. They did not know the Law and the Prophets. They did not understand their lives as sinners under sentence from the holy God.

I've said all this to say we in America today are more like the Greeks to whom Paul preached than the Jews to whom Peter preached. We do not know the Scriptures. They are no longer read in school at the beginning of the day. We do not know the holy days dedicated to the worship of God. We had pushed Christmas, Easter, Ascension Day and Pentecost out of our civic calendar. We do not know God, we hear of a pantheon of gods suggesting "all religions lead to Heaven." We do not see ourselves as sinners in need of salvation because we do not hear about sin. Our consciences are not convicting us. We say, "Anything goes." "If it feels good, do it."

Everyone has his own code of ethics or has no code of ethics at all. If we want to reach out to a lost and dying world, we need to help them see that's what they are, Lost and dying. We know not much about The God Who Created all things. We have been convinced that we are all products of evolution and that when life ends, everything is over. We have a whole lot of teaching to do if we are going to have any sort of revival or evangelistic movement in our country. Let's begin by praying for such a thing.