Made to Know

What is actually the most important thing about me?

The sermon opens with the claim that what comes into your mind when you think about God shapes everything else about you. The Athenians had an altar for a god they couldn't name, and Paul says that gap is the most important thing about a person.

Paul stood in the middle of the Areopagus and said, “You men of Athens, I perceive that you are very religious in all things. For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription: ‘TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.’ What therefore you worship in ignorance, I announce to you.

Acts 17:22–23

When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have ordained, what is man, that you think of him? What is the son of man, that you care for him?

Psalms 8:3–4

Yahweh says, “Don’t let the wise man glory in his wisdom. Don’t let the mighty man glory in his might. Don’t let the rich man glory in his riches. But let him who glories glory in this, that he has understanding, and knows me, that I am Yahweh who exercises loving kindness, justice, and righteousness on the earth, for I delight in these things,” says Yahweh.

Jeremiah 9:23–24

How do I find the idols in my own heart when they don't look like statues?

Paul's spirit is provoked not by Athens' architecture but by what the city is trusting in. Ezekiel describes men who carried their idols into their hearts, which is where the sermon says ours still sit.

Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw the city full of idols.

Acts 17:16

“Son of man, these men have taken their idols into their heart, and put the stumbling block of their iniquity before their face. Should I be inquired of at all by them? Therefore speak to them and tell them, ‘The Lord Yahweh says: “Every man of the house of Israel who takes his idols into his heart and puts the stumbling block of his iniquity before his face then comes to the prophet, I Yahweh will answer him there according to the multitude of his idols,…

Ezekiel 14:3–4

“You shall have no other gods before me. “You shall not make for yourselves an idol, nor any image of anything that is in the heavens above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: you shall not bow yourself down to them, nor serve them, for I, Yahweh your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and on the fourth generation of those who hate me, and showing loving kindness to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

Exodus 20:3–6

Those who regard vain idols forsake their own mercy. But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving. I will pay that which I have vowed. Salvation belongs to Yahweh.”

Jonah 2:8–9

Why do the philosophies I use to cope never quite settle me?

The Epicureans chased pleasure and the Stoics chased self-mastery, and Paul preached to both in the same marketplace. The sermon says each one gets something partly right and still cannot supply the joy or the righteousness it is reaching for.

So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the marketplace every day with those who met him. Some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also were conversing with him. Some said, “What does this babbler want to say?” Others said, “He seems to be advocating foreign deities,” because he preached Jesus and the resurrection.

Acts 17:17–18

I said in my heart, “Come now, I will test you with mirth; therefore enjoy pleasure;” and behold, this also was vanity. I said of laughter, “It is foolishness;” and of mirth, “What does it accomplish?” I searched in my heart how to cheer my flesh with wine, my heart yet guiding me with wisdom, and how to lay hold of folly, until I might see what it was good for the sons of men that they should do under heaven all the days of their lives. I made myself great works. I built myself houses. I planted myself vineyards. I made myself gardens and parks, and I planted trees in them of all kinds of fruit. I made myself pools of water, to water the forest where trees were grown. I bought male servants and female servants, and had servants born in my house. I also had great possessions of herds and flocks, above all who were before me in Jerusalem. I also gathered silver and gold for myself, and the treasure of kings and of the provinces. I got myself male and female singers, and the delights of the sons of men: musical instruments of all sorts. So I was great, and increased more than all who were before me in Jerusalem. My wisdom also remained with me. Whatever my eyes desired, I didn’t keep from them. I didn’t withhold my heart from any joy, for my heart rejoiced because of all my labor, and this was my portion from all my labor. Then I looked at all the works that my hands had worked, and at the labor that I had labored to do; and behold, all was vanity and a chasing after wind, and there was no profit under the sun.

Ecclesiastes 2:1–11

But now apart from the law, a righteousness of God has been revealed, being testified by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all those who believe. For there is no distinction, for all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God; being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,…

Romans 3:21–24

I have spoken these things to you, that my joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be made full.

John 15:11

Is it arrogant to say God can be known, or is not knowing him the risk?

The altar was inscribed to an unknown god, the root of the word agnostic. The sermon treats that posture not as humble but as a wager with your own soul, and Paul answers it by saying this God is not far from any of us.

He made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the surface of the earth, having determined appointed seasons and the boundaries of their dwellings, that they should seek the Lord, if perhaps they might reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. ‘For in him we live, move, and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also his offspring.’

Acts 17:26–28

“Look to me, and be saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is no other.

Isaiah 45:22

Yahweh is near to those who have a broken heart, and saves those who have a crushed spirit.

Psalms 34:18

You shall seek me and find me, when you search for me with all your heart. I will be found by you,” says Yahweh, “and I will turn again your captivity, and I will gather you from all the nations, and from all the places where I have driven you,” says Yahweh. “I will bring you again to the place from where I caused you to be carried away captive.”

Jeremiah 29:13–14

What does it mean to repent if I can't fix my own sin?

Paul tells Athens that God has fixed a day of judgment and commands everyone everywhere to repent. The sermon says repentance is not cleanup or hiding but owning the sin and laying it on Christ, who was judged in the sinner's place.

The times of ignorance therefore God overlooked. But now he commands that all people everywhere should repent, because he has appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom he has ordained; of which he has given assurance to all men, in that he has raised him from the dead.”

Acts 17:30–31

For him who knew no sin he made to be sin on our behalf, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

2 Corinthians 5:21

Who is a God like you, who pardons iniquity, and passes over the disobedience of the remnant of his heritage? He doesn’t retain his anger forever, because he delights in loving kindness. He will again have compassion on us. He will tread our iniquities under foot. You will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.

Micah 7:18–19

When I kept silence, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy on me. My strength was sapped in the heat of summer. Selah. I acknowledged my sin to you. I didn’t hide my iniquity. I said, I will confess my transgressions to Yahweh, and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah.

Psalms 32:3–5