Real Life Community Church Richmond, KY
Real Life Community Church, is a church located in Richmond, Kentucky. Our fellowship is comprised of authentic followers of Jesus Christ who aim to glorify God in all that we do. We have a desire to reach our community, meeting both the physical and spiritual needs of those who are hurting.What to Expect in a Service Our Sunday Morning services include a time of dynamic, blended worship. We have a full praise band, consisting of real Christ-followers who are committed to worshiping God, not just through song, but in every area of their lives. Each service will include a relevant, Bible-based message, that will inspire and challenge those who hear it. Come casually or formally dressed… however you are most comfortable. We hope to see you soon!
Real Life Community Church Richmond, KY
Acts | Part 21 | The Power of Influences
The people we surround ourselves with shape who we become. Pastor Ben takes us through Acts 13:4-12, exploring the powerful confrontation between Paul and Bar-Jesus, a false prophet who opposed the gospel message despite his impressive-sounding credentials.
Drawing from the timeless wisdom that "show me your friends and I'll show you your future," this message examines how the influences in our lives—whether people, media, or entertainment—can either draw us closer to Christ or pull us away. Through personal stories and biblical insights, Pastor Ben challenges us to evaluate whether what we allow into our lives is moving us toward spiritual growth or hindering our journey.
Are you surrounding yourself with people and influences that make you more like Christ? Join us as we explore how to build a life centered on godly influences and become life-giving influences for others.
Pastor Ben will be delivering the message today. So Acts 13, starting with verse 4 through 12. So, being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia and from there they sailed to Cyprus. When they arrived at Selemus, they proclaimed the word of God in the synagogues of the Jews, and they had John to assist them. When they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos, they came unto a certain magician, a Jewish false prophet, named Bar-Jesus. He was with the proconsul Sergius Paulus, a man of intelligence who summoned Barnabas and Saul and sought to hear the word of God. But Elimas, the magician for that is the meaning of his name opposed them, seeking to turn the proconsul away from the faith. But Saul, who was also called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, looked intently at him and said Immediately, mist and darkness fell upon him and he went about seeking people to lead him by the hand. Then the proconsul believed when he saw what had occurred, for he was astonished at the teaching of the Lord. Now, this is the word of the Lord.
Speaker 2:Good morning. If you would, would you indulge me in something for just a moment? Everybody, take your right hand. Now, obviously, mine's on a different side than yours. Everybody take your right hand and wave at me Hi everybody. Hi everybody. Everybody take your left hand. Everybody wave at me, hi everybody. All right, it looks like everybody still has their fingers. So I'm happy for you. Well, most of you, yeah, there's a few. No new injuries, let's say that. No new injuries. I'm proud of you because you know, fourth of July is a time of you know, great, let's say, peer pressure sometimes, right, we get all wrapped up in the 4th of July because we want to impress our friends, we want to set off the fireworks.
Speaker 2:My nephews were setting off fireworks at their house last night and so we went and, man, they had some good ones. They had the ones that you sit out and it has the little box and yet, like it actually has, like the mortars in the box, and so we were getting. We got a really good show. We got a better show, I think, than some of the professional firework shows I've been to Like it was really really good.
Speaker 2:But you know, sometimes you may have seen those posts on Facebook, for instance. You know that say like, let's hope this isn't your last 4th of July with all of your fingers. You know, sometimes we get wrapped up in trying to perform for other people. Right, there's this guy. His name was Dan Pena. He's called the trillion dollar man. The man lives in a castle in Scotland, just so you know. And he said these words. He said show me your friends and I'll show you your future. Sometimes we get all wrapped up in trying to perform for others, right?
Speaker 2:I remember when I was a kid I was probably five or six I told this story last week in our new believers class, which if you're not a part of and you'd like to be a part of, you're welcome to come at any point. Shameless plug. But I, when I was five or six years old somewhere in there, I remember that I was in a Dollar Tree. Now, five or six years old, dollar Tree's a big deal, right, I knew I was getting some kind of toy or something because we were at the Dollar Tree and so me and mom and some of our family friends, we were there and I remember there were two checkout lines. There was one over here and then, if you went kind of far over. There was one in kind of the middle of the store and it was in a shopping mall. Y'all remember those old things. You'd go in and there was a whole big bunch of stores and you know, you'd walk through all the places that was. It was in a shopping mall, so it was on the outside door to go back into the shopping mall.
Speaker 2:And so I remember I was walking through with a buddy of mine and we came upon the gum chewing gum, chewing gum, yeah, they're like what. And I remember I said boy, I'd like to have a pack of that. And he goes well, why don't you just take it? And I did. And then I felt instant conviction and so I had it in my pocket and I'm walking. And then I went you know what? I need to put this back. So I pulled it out of my pocket and I put it back on the shelf. I didn't tell this whole story the last time, but I took it out of my pocket and I put it back on the shelf and then I went no, I could take that, nobody would know. And then I grabbed it and I put it back.
Speaker 2:I had this moral quandary right, I do, I do this, do I not do this? At some point my mother found me. She said what are you doing? I think the excuse I made was I wanted to see what it feel like in my pocket. She knew exactly what I was doing. She made me go to the cashier and apologize. Right, and I'm not saying that it's all my friend's fault, but I blame him because this is America. No, I'm kidding.
Speaker 2:But how many of you know that a lot of times the company that you keep has a significant effect on how you may turn out later in life. We see this all the time. We've been doing campus ministry for like 20 years now, and you can always kind of tell the ones who aren't going to be back after the first semester. You know what I mean, because they sometimes get in with the wrong crowds and the longer they go, the harder they party until finally they flunk out. Right, we're pack animals and oftentimes those we hang around and let influence us have the greatest effect. You know it is the Fourth of July weekend. How many of you know? Famous last words can contain phrases like hey, watch this, or oh, I bet I could do that.
Speaker 2:And then the trip to the hospital ensues, and so this morning, if you're taking notes, and then the trip to the hospital ensues, and so this morning if you're taking notes, we are going to be looking at kind of two main groups, and our thesis is this you need to have godly influences in your life and you need to be a godly influence in the lives of others. Let me repeat that for you, you need godly influences in your life and you need to be godly influences in the lives of others. Let me repeat that for you, you need godly influences in your life and you need to be godly influences in the lives of others. Today we're looking at two character groups. As you heard, as Pastor Ron read for us earlier, we're looking at the character group of Paul and Barnabas and John Mark Paul and Barnabas, sent out by the church, and John Mark, who's kind of tagging along. Then we're looking at this other group, that is, sergius Paulus and Elimas Bar-Jesus, and I'm hoping that through looking at these two groups, that you'll see that the company you keep really matters.
Speaker 2:And so, as we dive back into the scriptures, let's pray and let's ask God to help us. Amen, heavenly Father, we come in the name of Jesus and we ask for your help, god, your word tells us that spiritual truths are interpreted by the Spirit, and, god, we know that we need every bit of your Spirit this morning to change us, to make us more into the image of your Son Jesus. So we pray that this word would do just that. Lord, help me to rightly divide it and give us ears to hear in Jesus' name, amen, Amen. So again, this story starts out Acts 13. I'm on the wrong page. There we go. Acts 13, verse 4. So, being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia and from there they sailed to Cyprus. When they arrived at Salamis, they proclaimed the word of God in the synagogues.
Speaker 2:What's happening is the group of people that we're looking at. You know Paul and Barnabas and John Mark. They were in the church in Antioch. Now, if you remember the church in Antioch, that's the first place where people are called Christians. The church in Antioch has got a lot going on and they're doing well, if you remember back to just the beginning of this passage. They have teachers and prophets and they're raising up missionaries to send out places, and you have Paul and Barnabas who are there. And if you know anything about Barnabas, if you remember, he's from the island of Cyprus that Paul and Barnabas are about to go to. So they're raising up missionaries out of local people that are there. They've got it going on.
Speaker 2:And so these guys, they get all together and they leave Antioch being sent out by the church and they travel 16 miles. Now if you're a nerd like me, maybe this geography will help you a little bit. They travel 16 miles to the seaport of Seleucia, so it's right next door. They're literally kind of attached. They go to Seleucia and then from there they sail across just this little channel of water over to the island of Cyprus.
Speaker 2:When they get to Cyprus, on the west side you have it's not in my notes, let's try the scripture On the west side you have Salamis. There we go that word. You have Salamis, and on the east side you have Paphos. So what happens is they leave the church. They really aren't looking to evangelize Seleucia so much. What they're going to do is they're going to catch a boat and they're going to go to their first missionary target. They're going to go to the island of Cyprus, where Barnabas grew up, and so when they get there they're going to land at the first city and they're going to evangelize that city and they're going to work their way all the way across the island, about 90 miles worth of island, and when they get to Paphos they know they have their work cut out for them.
Speaker 2:Now, why would they choose this island? Let me just give you a couple things. Number one if you remember, in our study of Acts, jesus says to go into Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria, into the uttermost parts of the earth, and this kind of fits, that model, if you think about Antioch as your Jerusalem, for instance, then they're reaching the next town over. They probably have already reached the town of Seleucia, which is probably why Paul and Barnabas are not going there, and so they've already kind of reached their immediate area of you know, the Judea, so to speak. Now they're going to send them to their next closest place, which is the island of Cyprus, their Samaria, so to speak.
Speaker 2:Now let me tell you a little bit about this island, by the way, and while I call it their Samaria, that island, if you look back in history, by the way, and while I call it there, samaria, that island, if you look back in history, had a massive, massive shrine in Paphos to the goddess Venus. If you wanted to experience sin and debauchery in your life, you would go to Paphos. You would go to the shrine of Venus, because Venus was worshipped for her beauty and for the fact that she was the goddess of fertility, and so you would engage in practices that go along with fertility. That's all I'm going to say. There are young ears in this place. You know what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2:They would engage in practices that would go along with the act of fertility, and it was a place that many commentators over the years have said was just full of sin and debauchery and all these things. Historically, though, it also held a large population of Jewish people. It was a place that the Jews just naturally resided from antiquity, and so it kind of fulfills all of the goals that the church was probably looking to fulfill. It was close, it was kind of the next place after their local region. They had a guy who's from there, so he already has kind of the inside scoop. It's a sinful place, so it needs the gospel, and it has a large population of Jews, and if you remember like, for instance and we're going to look at this passage a little bit more later but kind of the model was that they would send people to the synagogues. First they would try to reach the Jewish populations and then they would branch out. Now. They would kind of branch out now to the Gentile population, and so it fits, all the kind of things. So they're going to send Paul and Barnabas over to this place.
Speaker 2:And it says, verse 5, when they arrived at Salamis, they proclaimed the word of God in the synagogues of the Jews and they had John to assist them. Now we'll talk about John just a little bit more, just a little bit more later. So keep him kind of in the back of your mind. We're going to come back to John. But it says that when they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos remember, that's 90 miles they've worked their way all the way across they came upon a certain magician, a Jewish false prophet named Bar-Jesus. He was with the proconsul Sergius Paulus, a man of intelligence who summoned Barnabas and Saul and sought to hear the word of God. Now, let's talk about this guy, bar-jesus. You're like Word of God.
Speaker 2:Now let's talk about this guy, bar-jesus. You're like Bar-Jesus. What does that mean? I hear Jesus in his name. That's kind of cool. Bar-jesus is a man who has what sounds like all the right things.
Speaker 2:Bar-jesus was a guy. His name literally means son of Jesus. If you ever see Bar-something like Bar-nibus, it means that they are the son of something. Remember, barnabas was called Barnabas because he's the son of encouragement. So Barnabas, son of encouragement, bar-jesus, son of? Now you're like, so he was the son of Jesus, he's a believer? No, we'll find out about that more later. Now you're like so he was the son of Jesus, he's a believer? No, we'll find out about that more later. What the word Jesus meant. Remember, jesus was actually more of a common name in their day and age than we like to think. You know, but the name Jesus or Joshua, you could say it that way was a name that means salvation. So he was the son of salvation.
Speaker 2:If you look at his first name because remember in verse 8 it says but Elimas the magician for that's the meaning of his name, his kind of first name, elimas they don't really know if it comes from Aramaic or if it comes from Arabic. Either way, it doesn't really matter but his first name either means wise in Arabic or powerful in Aramaic. Either way, he is the wise son of salvation. Now let's tell you one more thing. So if you look, it says that they came upon a certain magician. What is the word magician? Does anybody know he's a magi? Anybody know where that word comes from? He's a magi. Anybody know where that word comes from?
Speaker 2:The Christmas story. So if you remember we three kings of Orient, you know that whole song. If you remember the wise men that came to see Jesus at his birth because they saw the sign and the stars, right, they make a great journey and we say three, right, we three kings, because they brought three gifts. But we really don't know how many there were. But he was one of those people. He was a magi and the reason why the magi were called the magi or wise men or whatever, they actually had their roots traced all the way back to Babylon. They were people who knew things and who did great magical works and looked at the stars and saw all of that stuff, right, and then they interpreted the signs and the stars and went from there.
Speaker 2:Daniel might have been a part of this group. It's funny that, as I was doing some research through this, some people would say that one of the reasons why the Magi may have been looking for a coming king and found their signs on the stars and all the stuff was because Daniel had written back in the day and he was considered one of the magi. Though not of the same religious practice, he was still considered a wise man. This guy was considered one of the wise men, so he was listened to, he was important, he was a guy that people looked at and they wanted to be like. And so, if you look, some commentators say that you know, they argue back and forth was Elimus? Was he like you know?
Speaker 2:an advisor to the Sergius Paulus guy, or was he just with?
Speaker 1:him.
Speaker 2:Was he just visiting that day? Was he just happened to be there? We don't know, but it seems like Sergius Paulus had. I'm sorry that Elimus had at least a little bit of change in Sergius Paulus' pocket, because it says that he opposes the Word of God to them, to him, that when Paul and Barnabas come they're going to share the Word of God and yet he's going to oppose it, which means if he's speaking up about this thing, he probably has something, you know, some kind of pull with this guy. I say all that to say. I say all that to say.
Speaker 2:On the surface he really sounds great, wise man, son of salvation. Wise son of salvation, powerful son of salvation. But here's the problem. The Bible tells us that he's not so great. After all. The Bible tells us that he's a false prophet, that he's opposed to the message of faith. Paul, being acted on by the Holy Spirit, calls him a son of the devil and an enemy of all righteousness. He may sound great, but he's not really great. Anyone have someone in your life like that. On the outside they look like they've got it all together, but on the inside they're like whitewashed tombs full of dead men's bones. Like they've got it all together, but on the inside they're like whitewashed tombs full of dead men's bones.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh yeah, we're going there today. Anybody have somebody in your life like that, like they look like they've got it all together but inwardly they just don't and they want to pull you down with them. Anybody ever have that family member, that just man? Everything's going wrong in their life and they want to grab a hold of you too Outwardly. You may know people like this.
Speaker 2:I knew a person like this and I won't say any names in here. We'll change their names to protect the innocent, right. But I knew a guy like this once. He was man, he was strong, right. He was good looking, he was charismatic and when I met him he was a really honestly, a pretty good leader. He was one of those guys that you just wanted to like, right. He even was a former pastor and man. He could tell you stuff about Scripture, but based on the way he lived and the way he spoke and everything else, I sure wouldn't listen to it.
Speaker 2:There's another person I knew. This was somebody we were in campus ministry with back in the day. I remember back in the day Chi Alpha was one of those things. We were 20, 30 members. I mean we were growing pretty well, had it going on. You know, we were kind of like the church that I just spoke about. You know, we had lots of things happening for us. We were seeing salvations, we were seeing people just loving the Lord.
Speaker 2:And then there was this guy who came in and he was one of those natural charismatic leaders. He was one of those guys that when he came in everybody just kind of listened to and he had one of those stories right, he was a drug addict and he got radically saved and now he sings in churches and all of this stuff. I remember him coming in and people were just enamored with him and everything that he said everybody wanted to listen to, until he started saying things that were anti-scriptural. I remember the first time I met him he was singing a hymn and it didn't seem like long after that he was espousing doctrines that just weren't what are consistent with biblical truth and it led some people astray and it caused I don't want to say the downfall of the ministry, because the ministry didn't pass away at that point there wasn't. But I saw friends who just got lost in it, who never came back to the faith, to this day live lives that are not in accordance with the Word of God, and I think about those people and I think about false prophets.
Speaker 2:And the Bible says some things about false prophets. In Matthew 7, verse 15, jesus says I could flip there, but I won't. It says that you'll recognize them by their fruit. And so what fruit could we be talking about? Well, you can find that fruit, I think, in 2 Timothy, chapter 3.
Speaker 2:2 Timothy, chapter 3 says in verse 1, but understand this that in the last days there will come times of difficulty, for people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. Now listen to this Having the appearance of godliness but denying its power. Avoid such people, for among them are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. When I think of my former acquaintance who used to be a pastor, he knew lots about the Bible and maybe I shouldn't judge. I just know that by his fruit. He was always learning, but I don't know that he ever came to a knowledge of the truth. And I would urge you, if you have people in your life like that, beware and be cautious, because a lot of times the people in our lives really matter as we go on.
Speaker 2:How many of you let me talk to my women here for just a minute have that friend who just loves to call you on the phone and when you start the day you're really happy and everything's good, and then they call you and then it seems like everything they talk about is negative. And let me tell you about so-and-so and let me you know it happens and we have two choices we can either cut those people out of our lives, which is what the Scripture says to do, or we can be the positive influence. Now, sometimes sometimes they may not always be what this talks about, they may not be false prophet level, but you just may have Christian friends that just need a positive influence sometimes. How many of you like me, sometimes you just need a Christian friend to come along beside you and help you live the Christian life the way it's supposed to be. There you go, amen. That's why I'm glad that we have a plurality of elders, because when I get down, jerry's up, when I get sad, jerry encourages me. When I want to debate a little bit, I call Hunter. When I need somebody to help me with the Scriptures, I call all of them, call PC, call Ron. I'm glad to have Christian brothers and sisters because they help me. Sometimes you need to be that positive influence in somebody's life because they helped me. Sometimes you need to be that positive influence in somebody's life. Sometimes we need the power of God to help us and sometimes we find that in our Christian brothers and sisters.
Speaker 2:Now we've looked at the negative guy, the Bar-Jesus guy. We know him by his fruit, right, he was the one who actively opposed the gospel, right? What happens? Well, let's see. It says that oh, I don't know. Oh, I'm in 2 Timothy. I'm like where is my passage? Let's go back to Acts for just a moment.
Speaker 2:We see in the book of Acts that something happens to this Bar-Jesus guy, something that is, I would say, a pronouncement of judgment. Acts, chapter 13, verse 6, says when they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos, they came upon a certain magician, a Jewish false prophet, named Bar-Jesus. He was with the proconsul Sergius Paulus, a man of intelligence, who summoned Barnabas and Saul and sought to hear the word of God. But Elimus the magician for that is the meaning of his name opposed them, seeking to turn the proconsul away from the faith. But Saul, who was also called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, looked intently at him and said you, son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, full of all deceit and villainy, will you not stop making crooked the straight paths of the Lord? And now, behold, the hand of the Lord is upon you and you will be blind and unable to see the sun for a time. Immediately, mist and darkness fell upon him and he went about seeking people to lead him by the hand. See, what happens is that the Lord pronounces judgment on this Bar-Jesus guy. He removes the negative influence from Sergius Paulus. And what happens, it says, then the proconsul believed when he saw what had occurred, for he was astonished at the teaching of the Lord. You see, sometimes it is necessary to remove the negative influence from your life, the influence that would take you away from Christ rather than toward Christ.
Speaker 2:Can I go just a little bit further than friends? In that particular example? Can I talk to you about and I'm not trying to be legalistic, but can I talk to you about the things that you read and the shows that you watch. Can I talk to you about the movies you go to see in the theaters? Now, back in the day, back in the day I was never a part of this, by the way, too young, but back in the day there were rules about going to movies, right, there were rules about going to dances, there were rules about going to lots of things. I'm not trying to be legalistic, but if you catch yourself where you have something in your life that draws you away from Christ rather than towards Christ, what should win? Can I tell one on myself, because it's real life, community church.
Speaker 2:I used to love this show called the Walking Dead. I know it's really bad, I agree it's really bad, but boy, I love that show. It was just, I don't know, it was like survival and like guns and cool people and I don't know they like. Anyway, it made you think, right, like, I don't know, it just had all the elements. I was like, oh, this is so fascinating. And I watched, man, I watched that show, I watched every bit of that show. I ate it all up.
Speaker 2:And then one day I realized does this bring me towards Christ or away from Christ? Can I talk about some books for just a minute? I got some friends and they read some books. Some of those books don't have the most wholesome things, and I'm not calling anybody out here, I'm not, although maybe I am. Some of those books don't have the most wholesome things in them. Did they bring you toward Christ or away from Christ? Some of those movies that we watch, braveheart Love, braveheart Freedom.
Speaker 2:But there's some things in there I probably shouldn't, anyway, so I'll just say I'm just going to leave it. I'm not telling you what to do and what not to do. I'm telling you to go to the Holy Spirit and ask Him Lord, is there something in my life that if I eliminate, it would draw me closer to you instead of further? And then do what he says. Okay, there you go. All right, sorry, soapbox gone, just throwing that out there. All right, let's finish this thing out. So, verse 13.
Speaker 2:Now Paul and his companions set sail from Paphos, so they've gone the whole island. They've worked that whole bad boy over. Set sail from Paphos, so they've gone the whole island, they've worked that whole bad boy over. And his companions, set sail from Paphos, came to Perga in Pamphylia and John left them and returned to Jerusalem. Now you're going, pastor Ben.
Speaker 2:Why did he leave? Well, if you look two chapters ahead in Acts, chapter 15, we'll get there eventually. But if you look a couple chapters ahead, what you're going to find is that we don't know why he left. But what we do know is that he left and it was a big deal. Paul kind of, I think, felt abandoned. And so later on in Acts, chapter 15, barnabas is going to go and get John Mark and he's going to be like, hey, let's take him with us as we go and revisit all the churches and see all the people that we'd seen. And that's not good with Paul. He gets mad about that. So apparently there was something wrong, right, like he did not leave just because, like they didn't like send him back to Jerusalem, he left.
Speaker 2:Now you're going, pastor Ben. That doesn't sound like that proves your point right. Because who could you have? That is a better example than Paul and Barnabas, right? A son of encouragement and a dude who apparently is like him and God are like this right Wrote a whole bunch of our New Testament. John Mark wouldn't know that, but that's beside the point. Like you couldn't get much better of two influences than that. And yet John Mark leaves the work and goes back to Jerusalem.
Speaker 2:You know what happens to John Mark though We've talked about this before, so it's not like I'm giving you anything new but what we see in Acts, chapter 15, the reason why Paul and Barnabas split up is because he wants to take John Mark with him to the work and Paul says no, we shouldn't take anybody who you know would turn back. And it becomes such an argument that two of them split and one of them goes one way and one of them goes the other. Barnabas takes John Mark, goes back to where Cyprus and you know what happens to John Mark after that. You ever heard of the gospel of Mark? He wrote that puppy.
Speaker 2:If you look in Scripture, paul has a couple things to say about John Mark, and here it comes. Listen to this Colossians 4.10,. Aristarchus, my fellow prisoner, sends you greetings, and Mark, the cousin of Barnabas, concerning whom you have received instructions, if he comes to you, welcome him. Cool, that doesn't sound so bad. What about 2 Timothy 4.11? Luke alone is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, for he's very useful to me for ministry. This is Paul talking twice. Here's Philemon. Paul wrote this one as well. He says Epaphras, my fellow prisoner in Christ Jesus sends greetings to you, and so do Mark, aristarchus Demas and Luke, my fellow workers. Aristarchus Demas and Luke, my fellow workers.
Speaker 2:Man John Mark was going down a path that probably would have led him out of the ministry, so to speak. John Mark abandoned the work, and I don't blame Paul, I will say Jesus even says in the Gospels and this helped me Jesus says in the Gospels that if you have your hand to the plow and you look back, you're not worthy to be my disciple. And it's like I've done that. There's been times I didn't want to do ministry. Well, neither did John Mark. And you know what I'm grateful for. I'm grateful for the grace of Jesus Christ and for good, strong Christian brothers and sisters who would bring you back. Because Mark, john Mark, this young kid at the time who did something stupid, barnabas grabbed him and discipled him and took him back along the missionary journeys. And what we find is that apparently him and Paul had a reconciliation. And not only did they reconcile, but man John Mark was valuable to the work of ministry.
Speaker 2:In one of the books of our New Testament that's longer than any of the books of our New Testament. That's longer than any of the epistles, except for, maybe, romans. I'll have to look at that. He wrote John Mark had value and Barnabas saw it and thanked God for our Christian brothers and sisters, who will pour into us and help us. And so what do we need to know? Number one if you have those negative influences in your life that draw you away from Christ whatever those are, instead of towards them, instead of towards Christ it may be time to eliminate that influence from your life. Number two that influence may need you, though. All of us need Christian brothers and sisters, and so maybe it is God calling you to say you know what I need to help this person. Maybe they're not quite to that false prophet status. Number three maybe you're sitting there and you're going. Man, I want to be like old John Mark and Barnabas and Paul. I want the things that they had. I want to be a Christian man, people that would give their lives for the gospel of Jesus Christ. I want to be like that. If you want that, come talk to us. We're going to have a time of prayer shortly. We absolutely will walk you through how to become a Christian. Last thing maybe you're sitting out there and life is good for you and you're going. I don't know what I should do about this whole message.
Speaker 2:I was looking through my wardrobe to get ready to preach this message and I saw this shirt and, if you look, I even wore a white shirt underneath, because this shirt has a bunch of holes in it and it's old. And the reason why I chose it was kind of to illustrate some of my point. I started wearing this shirt about the same time that I started doing ministry and there are people out there who become missionaries to places and they need your help and they need your support. I remember when I first became a missionary and I think about John Mark when I talk about this. I remember the hardest thing about being a missionary, which, if you don't know me, my name's Ben. I used to be a Chi Alpha missionary. I'm just now stepping out of that missionary track.
Speaker 2:But one of the hardest things about being a missionary to a college campus was apathy. People just didn't care. You know, if you think about college campuses, man, they're inundated with every influencer under the sun. We're just one voice in a whole host of voices, and I think about missionaries and how much they need support, how much they need the church not to be apathetic towards the calling that God has placed on their life, how they need people to support them financially and prayerfully. You know, as a missionary sometimes, or as a pastor, you can almost feel it when your people pray for you. They need that. And so, number four, if you're out there and you're like what could I do, kind of got it all together, I really don't have any negative influences in my life. Support a missionary, contribute to the work of sending somebody out, like Paul or Barnabas or John Mark, pray for them, support them financially, help them, whatever the case may be.
Speaker 2:Can I pray for you, heavenly Father? We come in the name of Jesus, god. We love your word, man. It reveals so much to us. It makes us wise unto salvation. It's useful for teaching and reproof and correction and training in righteousness. Lord, your word helps us to be more like you.
Speaker 2:And so, father, that's our prayer. Number one through the people that we keep around us and the influences that we have in our lives, that we would choose things that help us to be more like you and less like the world. And number two. My prayer is that you would help us for those Christian brothers and sisters who need us. Lord, would you help us to be the positive influence, the barnabas in their life, that keeps them from going off the rails, losing their way. Lord, for those who don't know you, that are sitting under the sound of my voice, would you bring them to you this day. In Jesus' name, and lastly, for all of us, would you help us to have a heart for the work of missions. Lord, would we support those who go? And it's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.