How To Reason With The World(From Our 12-8-24 Worship)

Watch The Video Version Here:https://youtu.be/za-4V2aptXsTranscript:You know, if you're needing a Christmas idea for somebody,  this might make a good one.  Uh, that's a Ferrari 250 GT.  That's not exactly my style, but if you buy me one, I'll sell it. We'll all go spend Christmas at Maldives or somewhere like,  um, if you want to buy one, depend on the model. It'll cost you somewhere between a million and 15 million  to buy one. But in 1963, this gentleman here  would not have given you a plug nickel  for that car.  The reason why is he owned one,  and he kept having a problem  with his car. No matter what he did, the same problem appeared over and over again. He couldn't keep a clutch in it.  Now, who wants to own a Ferrari,  and you can't drive it like a Ferrari? He went through all the service channels. He waited on several factory parts, and every time they put one in, same thing.  Finally, he scheduled a meeting with this gentleman, Enzo Ferrari, like,  of the company Ferrari.  And he shared with him his struggle and all the time that his car had been down, and  Enzo, being Enzo, just didn't care. He kind of blew him off.  And in fact, right before he left the meeting, he says, he told him, he said,  What's a man who makes tractors for a living  know about sports cars?  And this man, whose name is Ferici Lamborghini,  decided to show him what a tractor man knew about making cars. He, he created  the car company that we know and date, know and love today.Probably some of the most recognizable automobiles to have ever been created.  All because he got tired. Of waiting for a clutch for a two 50 GT Ferrari.  Now you think about that. We all hate waiting.  We hate it.  But sometimes waiting is exactly what it takes  to be the motivation for somebody to go change the world. You've got your bibles with you this morning.  Let's go to X Chapter 17. That's where we're gonna spend our time at this morning. You could go to one opening and we're not gonna not gonna move.  But here we're going to see the Apostle Paul and bless his heart, everywhere Apostle Paul went, there were angry people trying to run him out of town. And as you read up to verse 16, that's what's happened with the Apostle Paul. They were about to kill him, stone him one more time, and a group of disciples get him out and they get him to Athens.  And he's in Athens just simply because he's waiting for Silas and Timothy to get there.  He's waiting around.He's got some time to kill.  But I want you to see this morning what happened while he was waiting there.  Now, Paul was waiting for them in Athens. His spirit was provoked within him when he saw that the city was full of idols.  So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the about persons in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there. So you look at Paul and you say, Paul, can't you just hang out somewhere and not not share the gospel with anybody? And the answer is that's no.  Right? He's, this is a foreign place to him.  It's, it's not somewhere he's from.  And obviously it's a place, being a New Testament Christian, that when he looks around and he sees all the idols in the idolatry,  right, it just provoked his spirit. I cannot do something.  So it says he began to reason with people.  And you think about that. You think about the first century world and all the religious ideas going on in that day and time. Those people,  those people who didn't know God needed to be reasoned with, didn't they?  Do you think our day and time is any different today? Do you think we don't have a world full of people who need to be reasoned with?  Well, it's obvious to say yes, but then the hard question is, well, how do you go about doing that?  How do you talk to somebody about God who may not believe in God or may have all kind of false ideas? So, Well, I believe this morning that the Apostle Paul shows us how to do that.  As we continue on in Acts chapter 17 this morning, we're going to notice several things that you're going to have to do  if you're going to reason with the world.  And when I say that, I hope you understand I mean worldly people. Now,  let's get started. And we're going to start in verse 17, what we've already read. But I want you to notice where he reasoned.  He reasoned in the synagogue with Jews and devout people, right? And that makes sense. That's where you expect to go talk about God is in the synagogue in the church building. It's a natural place to start.  But don't you notice he didn't just reason in the synagogue.  Where else did he reason?  In the marketplace.  Now that's different, isn't it?  You see, I feel like in our society today, we have this nasty habit. Sometimes we want to silo God to the church building.  We'll talk about God in the church building. You know, if you come to church, we'll talk to you about your salvation. We'll talk to you about the gospel.  Sometimes we want to silo God in one place.  And the problem with that is he's everywhere  and lost people who need them.  They're not just in synagogues.  They're not just in the church buildings.They're in the marketplace  every day.  Every day they're there.  And yes, we can't interact with everybody. And yes, we can't save everybody.  We can't even save all the people that we interact with. But if we never If we never even bring it up,  that word reason means to have a discussion  with, or even in some contexts is to have an argument.Of course, we don't have an argument, but if you're going to have an argument right, there's got to be some back and forth.  We got to bring it up  and we can't just bring it up in the church building. It  has to be brought up out in the marketplace, out in the world where everybody is.  So as you go, if you're going to reason with the world, you got to do it as you go. Also, if you're going to reason with the worldly people, you can't take it personal.  Verse 18.  Some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also conversed with him, and some said, what does this babbler wish to say?  Others said he seems to be a preacher of foreign divinities  because he was preaching Jesus  and the resurrection. Now this is a hard lesson for me,  but when you're trying to reason with worldly people about God,  you can't take it personally when they reject, when they reject it.  Because here's the thing, it's gonna feel like they're rejecting you.  I mean, you believe in God, and you, you have faith, and, and this is a core tenet of your life. And when somebody looks at you and says,  I don't care about that.  You're gonna take it personal. You're gonna feel it in your gut.  But I remind you of what God told Samuel.  God told him when the people wanted a king, what?  He was tearing his clothes in mourning and he said, they haven't rejected you.  They rejected me  in a very real sense.That's absolutely true.  If somebody goes out and you try to tell them about God, if you try to help them save their souls and they don't want to hear it,  they're not rejecting you. They're rejecting God.  And one of the things you got to understand when we're talking about this, when we're talking about interacting with people.We're talking about trying to save souls.  The other thing that ...