Acts 19:11-20

Facebook later. Well, good morning. Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. It's so good to have you this morning. This is where every day you and I we get together. We get to God's Word and we grow in our love for the Lord together. And this year 2022 we'll go from Acts to Philemon. We're at Acts chapter 19 beginning at verse 11 and it's a really fun story for us this morning. Why don't we have some coffee? We'll pray and we'll get into the Lord's Word.
Let's pray. Oh, Father, we thank you so much for this day. What a blessing it is to hear from you, to read about the amazing things that you have done, the working of your spirit and spreading your gospel in Jesus's name. Amen. All right, here we go. We are at Acts chapter 19, beginning at verse 11.
Now God worked unusual miracles by the hand of Paul, so that even the handkerchiefs and aprons were brought from his body to the sick, and the deceased left them, and evil spirits went out of them. Then some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists took it upon themselves to call the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, we exorcise you by the Jesus whom Paul preaches. So there were seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest who did so. And the evil spirits answered and said, Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are you? Then the man in whom the Spirit was leaped upon them, overpowered them, and prevailed against them, so they fled out of the house naked and wounded.
This became known both to all Jews and Greeks dwelling in Ephesus, and fear fell on all, and the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified. and many who had believed came confessing and telling their deeds. Also many of those who had practiced magic brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all. they counted up the value of them, and it totaled 50,000 pieces of silver. So the word of the Lord grew mightily and prevailed." Well, what an amazing story we have to look at this morning. We need to ask ourselves, A, what's this about? B, what's the best verse to summarize this? And C, what are we called to do in response to these words? So what is this about?
Remember, Paul has now taken up residence in Ephesus. He's working with his hands. He's a tent maker and he's there for two years. And as he's there laboring, he's sweating, he's working, he's got a piece of cloth over his head and people would come and take that and they'd come and they'd take his apron and they'd take it to the sick and they'd take it to the demon-possessed. These are unordinary things, mighty works of God that are not the norm, and they would take it to these sick people, these demon-possessed people, and the spirits would leave them. And so, well, people are superstitious, and people try to do it themselves. Now, there's some background going on here that I want to explore with you.
Ephesus is the third largest city in the Roman Empire. We don't think of it like that today, you know, because we think of Rome and we think of Alexandria and stuff like that, and those are true, but Ephesus on the western coast of Turkey now, Asia Minor then, was the third largest city in the empire. And it is notorious at that time for magicians and sorcerers and warlocks and all this type of stuff. It even becomes known that the papyri of magic in Ephesus is just vast.
And Jewish people weren't, Jewish people weren't immune to this by any means. Actually, I have right here, this is a copy of Josephus' writings, and Josephus was writing about the same time as this is written, and he writes a book called The Antiquity of the Jews. And in his writing of the Antiquity of the Jews, he talks about how there's these made up stories about Solomon and how he was a great musician and stuff like that. And so he says things like Solomon composed such incantations also by which the distempers are alleviated.
And he left behind him the manner of using exorcisms. by which they drive away demons so that they never return. And this method of cure is of great force unto this day. For I have seen a certain man of my own country, whose name was Eleazar, releasing people that were demonically in the presence of Vespian and his sons and his captains and the whole multitude of soldiers. And the manner of the cure was this."
And he gives some crazy coccocted, just junk, right? Jewish magic was famous during this time. All sorts of incantations, all sorts of stuff like that. But there's a problem with that. What's the problem that Josephus just totally overlooks? One, it's a farce. Two, this whole story about Solomon is most likely a made-up, fanciful story.
Three, in the book of Moses, in Deuteronomy, it specifically outlaws magic. And then to go even further, in the book of Leviticus, let's see, I have it written down here, so Deuteronomy 18, 10 through 14, if you want to read about that prohibition, it's an absolute prohibition. No magic practices whatsoever.
But then it's even worse than that. Leviticus chapter 20, verse 27. What's the crime? Or what's the punishment for that crime? It's capital punishment. It's death. This is why the witch at Endor is so afraid when King Saul goes to try to summon up the Spirit. of Samuel. This is wicked stuff. This is dark stuff. This is horrible stuff.
And so these Jewish exorcists, itinerant exorcists, are going around and they're using the name of God. And here they think, oh, well here's this Jewish teacher, Jesus, and people are being exorcised. And look at what's being done with Paul's stuff. And so they go to the spirit and they say, you know, what are they, this is, it almost makes you want to laugh, you know, we exercise you by Jesus, whom Paul preaches. And what is it? The turn of events is, I just love it. And this evil spirit answered and said, Jesus, I know, and Paul, I know, but who are you?
The man who has this evil spirit leaps upon them, beats them, strips them naked, and they run out of the house! See, Jesus' name isn't just a trifle, a trinket. They have this view of religion as a superstitious type thing. But that's not what it's about. And the result of it is clear. What does it say in verse 17?
This became known both to all the Jews and Greeks dwelling in Ephesus and fear fell on them all and the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified. Don't mess with Jesus's name. I am so sick and tired of when I hear people talking about Jesus's name and they talk about it in a superstitious way. No, if you don't have a love for Jesus Christ, if you don't have faith in Jesus Christ, if you don't actually believe that He is the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, that He can slay the demons, and if you don't actually believe, believe in Him as your Lord and Savior, you have no right to think that there's somehow power in the name. There is power in Jesus' name. But it ain't some trinket. Jesus isn't some superstitious idea.
And so many believe they came confessing their deeds and then they do something incredible. They take their magic books. They take their papyri. They take their incantations. And they show that they're all in for Jesus. They show that they're no longer going to go back to the magic arts, they're no longer going to go back toward those things of paganism, the way of idolatry, and they burn the magic books.
50,000 silver pieces worth. This is most likely a drachma, which is one day's wages. 50,000 days worth of work. They say it's not worth it. We want to love God. We want to fear Him. We know that He's the one who's powerful. Not these stupid books. These are foolish. They're useless. We don't need these if we have Jesus Christ.
So the word of the Lord grew mightily and prevailed is how verse 20 gives us. What's the best verse to summarize this? Well, I have double underlined in my Bible verse 17. And fear fell on them all in the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified. I also have underlined verse 20. So the word of the Lord grew mightily and prevailed. Calling. What are we called to do in response to this?
Have you treated God like a trinket? Even in Christianity, there's like this folk religion that happens. Do you actually fear the Lord? Or do you treat him like he's a talisman? Do you actually come and worship the King of Kings? Or are you just kind of holding on to a superstitious belief, mixing your kind of pagan beliefs and backgrounds in with who Jesus Christ actually is and what the scriptures teach us He is? Do you actually fear the Lord? Or do you try to use the Lord?
Also, I must ask you, when we look at and we think of the Ephesians, They turn from their idolatry and turn wholeheartedly to God. And it was costly for them. Costly repentance. Turning away from the deeds of darkness, turning away from the deeds of Satan and turning towards Christ.
Do you need to repent in areas of your life that are costly? Are there areas in your life, areas of sin, that you need to get that out of here? What is it in your life, some superstitious belief or some cherished sin, some pet temptation that you just won't get rid of?
I don't know what it is in your life. Maybe you need to throw your smartphone into the bottom of the ocean because your soul is latched on to disgusting things that you know you shouldn't be looking at and you've been holding on to it because it's costly. Maybe it's a relationship with someone you know you shouldn't be in that relationship with but you know it's going to hurt. But you know that keeps dragging you down to the pits of hell. Maybe it's something in your life, some object.
Maybe even one of you, I don't know, there are people even in other countries who listen to this, and maybe one of you still keeps going to the witch doctor. Maybe you keep in the back of your closet that talisman from your past, that vestiges of paganism in your life. Will you repent? Will you throw it into the fire? Will you turn your heart fully away from idols and go and serve the living and the true God? Will you truly fear Him? Let's pray. Oh Father, we pray that Your Holy Spirit would indeed teach us to reverence You, to fear You, to walk before You wholeheartedly, totally exposed.
We pray that You would purge us from evil, that we would have only one hope, and that we might believe in the name of Jesus Christ. We thank you for these extraordinary miracles that happen. And Lord, we know that these types of things aren't the norm for today, but Father, we thank you for showing us how you used them in the past. Please, Lord, let us follow after you. In Jesus's name, amen. Well, may the Lord bless you. May you walk in full faith. May you repent of your sins and cling only to Jesus. And I'll see you tomorrow. Bye.
Thanks for listening to this week's message from God's Word for You, a ministry of Sharon R.P. Church in rural southeast Iowa. We pray that the message would be used by God to transform your faith in your life this week. If you'd like to get more information about us, feel free to go to the website, SharonRPC.org. We'd love to invite you to worship with us. Our worship time is 10 a.m. every Sunday at 25204 160th Avenue, Morning Sun, Iowa, 52640. May God richly bless you this week.