Why Did Paul and Barnabas Speak to the Jews First?

Tom:

This is our Understanding the Scriptures segment, we are in Acts Chapter 13, going through the Book of Acts, and just a little recap, a brief one.Paul is on his missionary journey, and he’s really recounting for the Jews to whom he’s preaching, bringing information regarding Jesus being the Messiah, and he’s giving them a little recap of their history.

Dave:

All out of the Old Testament, from the mouth of their own prophets.

Tom:

Right.So, we are at Verse 41, Dave, I’ll pick up right there:“Behold, ye despisers, and wonder, and perish:for I work a work in your days, a work which ye shall in no wise believe, though a man declare it unto you.And when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought that these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath.”

The gospel, Dave, to the Jew first, and then the Greek, or the Gentile.

Dave:

Exactly.Verse 40 actually, he says:“Beware therefore, lest that come upon you which is spoken of in the prophets.”So he’s reminding them---actually it’s from Habakkuk Chapter 1:5, that’s talking about the punishment that was coming upon them from an invading army that was going to punish them for their disobedience to God.And he says, This is what the prophet said:Behold, ye despisers, wonder, and perish.I work a work in your day, though it’s declared unto you, you’re not going to believe it.Now this could be your problem too, I’m declaring it.I mean, incredible works, miracles, and so forth, and you’re going to turn away from this?And it was a rather accurate warning, because they did turn away.And they become jealous, as it tells us, when he goes to the Gentiles.The Gentiles are saying, Hey, how come, can’t we hear this too?Maybe there were some of them who were in the synagogue at the time, as there could be.So, Verse 43:Now when the congregation was broken up---obviously, there had been some Gentiles there---many of the Jews and religious proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas---religious proselytes would be the non-Jews—

Tom:

Converts to Jews.

Dave:

Right,They followed Paul and Barnabas who, speaking to them,persuaded them to continue in the grace of God.“.And the next Sabbath day, came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God.”Wow! That is just fantastic.

Tom:

So the word got out.

Dave:

Yeah.

Tom:

You know, it’s amazing to me, Dave.As I read through the scriptures, the Old Testament, you know, we think, Hey, with our medium, we have television, we have radio, we have all these forms of communication, it’s amazing how the word got out.You know, I’m reading about, in first Samuel, first or second Samuel, maybe it’s the first part of second Samuel, I’m not quite sure, but the Philistines, remember when the Ark is captured by the Philistines---

Dave:

That’s first Samuel.

Tom:

First Samuel, yeah, they knew exactly what the Jews had gone through, they knew about Moses, they knew about the parting of the Red Sea, they knew all that stuff.

Dave:

Exactly, Rahab the harlot knew.

Tom:

Yeah, communication was not a problem back then.

Dave:

You would think it would have been, You would think we are so far superior, but the problem is that we are being bombarded with so much news and information it just kind of rolls off of us.This was something that caught their attention---Wow!What these men are saying, that you can have your sins forgiven, you can become a child of God, that God Himself came to this earth as man, born of a virgin, and they nailed Him to a cross, and in spite of that He said, Father, forgive them.And He, under those circumstances, offered Himself a sacrifice to the Father for the sins of the very people who had mocked Him and crucified Him---Wow!Now that is some story, tell me a little more about it!So, the next Sabbath day almost the whole city comes together to hear---I love that phrase, Tom, “to hear the word of God.”You know we call our ministry from Acts:17:11These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
See All..., The Berean Call, but I think you came up with that title, Tom, I remember.

Tom:

But actually, Verse 10 identifies the place as Berea.

Dave:

Right, The Berean Call, and we often emphasize, and we call this radio program, Search the Scriptures Daily, so we emphasize---you see, the Bereans, they searched the scriptures.That’s not all what it says, it says the Bereans were more noble than those in Thessalonica in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures.So, when they searched the scriptures they searched it with the attitude whatever the Bible says that’s what we’re going to accept.If the Bible backs up what this guy Paul is telling us, then we will readily receive that.So, this is the word of God they wanted to hear.Tom, it’s really what we need today.So many pulpits is not the word of God, and we don’t want to get into that, that’s a long trip.But modern translations, The Message, by Eugene Peterson, that changes the very word of God, even makes it say what God didn’t say, contradicts God and calls it a version of the Bible.The videos and movies we’ve got about Jesus, you know, we’ve talked about The Passion of the Christ---wow!Not biblical, so much in there that isn’t biblical, and so forth.

Tom:

Dave, I just want to add to that.Something just came across my desk this morning, a movement to retell the Bible from an artistic and poetical standpoint.What is that?Except people are excited about it.Wow, now we can use drama, we can use all of these things, let’s retell the Bible.

Dave:

While we are recording this, Tom, if that’s okay to say not long after Easter, and of course you know at Easter time they’ve always got this nonsense, articles in the paper, specials on TV, TBS, or whatever.Well you know, there’s questions about the accuracy of the Bible, questions about who Jesus really was, you know, and what His claims really were, and He really didn’t come down to us.Probably ought to go to the DiVinci Code, that would really give us the truth---

Tom:

Dave, the movie is going to be out---this is April now---it’s going to be out, I think, the first week in May, so I think that’s going to create some issues.

Dave:

Tom, people will accept anything that is not the truth.And if I can just say a word about that in advance, personally, of course it’s my own personal taste, I didn’t think it was very well written, and I thought it was just---

Tom:

Well, it didn’t hang together like a tight---and we know it didn’t hang together because most of the information, a few little factual things, but most of it, conjecture, and most of it just contrary to what the Bible teaches.

Dave:

Right, so the guy obviously had an axe to grind.He trashed the Bible, he trashed Jesus Christ, but he’s looking for the holy grail, which again is nonsense, it’sa myth, it never existed, nobody ever put any hope in it except people who didn’t know the Bible, and who didn’t know God, who didn’t know Christ.

Tom:

Not just the holy grail, he’s following the genealogy of Christ having married Mary Magdalene, now where do you go with that?

Dave:

Right, he never got that from any factual documents, okay, and yet he passes this off as being very factual.O yeah, he’s done this research and these secret documents, and so forth, okay, but no archeologist, no scholar would accept any of this.But anyway, what I am trying to make, Tom, so after trashing Jesus, trashing the Bible, which we can prove is the word of God, we have eye witnesses, we can document it.It has prophecies that absolutely prove it, okay.How does it end?He is worship---what’s the holy grail?He’s worshipping at the shrine of Mary Magdalene---Come on, you’ve got to be kidding!What else does he have?He’s got nothing else to go for, so I guess that’s the way it’s got to end, and people like this?

Tom:

Well, Dave, you just said it, people will go for anything but the truth.We just talked about the gospel of Judas, so called, and there’s the gospel of Thomas.There are all these kind of books out there, and supposedly, well, it’s an ancient manuscript.So what?You know, there’s a lot of stuff in the trash today that was put in the trash way back then.

Dave:

Right.So Tom, I love that phrase:They came together to hear the word of God.The word of God?We can prove what the word of God is, and I don’t want to give heed to anything else.