Encouragement in Dark Times Part 1

Pastor Mike will be speaking on Encouragement in Dark Times Part 1. He will be reading out of Acts 23:1-11.

There are times in our life that the weight of the trial is so heavy, we don’t often sense the presence of God. But I want to remind you that God is always with us. No matter where we go, God is always with us. Hello. This is pastor Mike Sanders with Hopeworth Having, and I’m delighted to welcome you to the Hopeworth Having radio program, and we’re excited to share God’s word with you as a source of inspiration.

Today, we’re gonna be in Acts chapter 23, and we’re going to be covering verses one through 11. And I’ve entitled my message encouragement in dark times. So let’s get our bibles and our pens, and let’s begin to study together. I wanna talk to you about encouragement in dark times. There are many times in our life that we feel like we are in a place, or perhaps a space that is very dark.

And that’s what we find in the apostle Paul’s life is that he has been facing many trials, many difficult days. You remember that as we have been studying the book of acts, that he was pre warned that he would face much tribulation and trials, and yet, he continues to move forward for God. And when we come to Acts chapter 23, we are reminded in the greater context of what is going on. In Acts chapter 21, all the way through Acts 26, the apostle is giving five different defenses for the gospel of Jesus Christ. He is defending the faith.

He is making the case for Christianity. It’s a tremendous study for anyone to take on these few chapters here in acts 21 through 26, knowing that it will equip you in being a better witness for God. Now, when we come down to chapter 23, Paul is before the Sanhedrin court. He is facing a religious trial. And of course, the Sanhedrin court has been very difficult towards him.

The religious leaders have mistreated him. And the reason that the apostle was before this religious Sanhedrin council is because back in chapter 22, when he was before a political or judicial council, it was found that his rights had been violated. I want you to back up if you will, just so again, you can understand context in chapter 22 and verse 27. Just a few verses before the beginning of the new chapter. And you will note that in verse 27 in chapter 22 says, then the commander came and said to him, tell me, are you a Roman?

The apostle Paul said, yes. The commander answered with a large sum, I obtained this citizenship. Meaning, how did you get this citizenship? And Paul said, I was born a citizen. Then immediately those who were about to examine him withdrew from him, and the commander was also afraid after he had found out that he was a Roman, and because he had bound him.

What has taken place is the apostle is leaning on his rights as a Roman citizen. And he has been unjustly brought before this council, and he has been falsely accused before them. And once they find out that he is a Roman citizen, the whole thing collapses, and they realize they’ve made a big mistake, and so they walk away from that. But that does not stop their effort of trying to hinder the work of the apostle, the ministry of the apostle. So we come to verse 23.

He is before the Sanhedrin court. And you’ll notice with me at the beginning of the chapter in 23, then Paul looked, looking earnestly at the council. I wanna stop there for a second because it helps us understand a few verses later. The apostle is looking earnestly. You remember that he had a hard time seeing.

He told the Galatians that he wrote in large letters his signature. The apostle apparently was dealing with some kind of a disease or some kind of health problem with his eyes, and so he is looking earnestly at the council. If you could imagine yourself in the midst of a large room with all these councilmen sitting there, and they’re looking at you. And here, the apostle was standing before them getting ready to give a defense, and he is looking at them. Not because he is admiring, but he’s trying to figure out, who are these people that I’m looking at?

And this will be important, but the Bible says that as he was looking earnestly at the council, he said, men and brethren, I have lived in all good conscience before God until this day. And the high priest, Ananias, commanded those who stood by him to strike him on the mouth. Then Paul said to him, God will strike you, you whitewashed wall, for you sit to judge me according to the law, and do you command me to be struck contrary to the law? Verse four, and those who stood by said, do you revile god’s high priest? You were never to question the high priest.

The Sanhedrin council consisted of Sadducees and Pharisees. These are just different religious groups that had different philosophies and belief systems, and they had merged together to create this Sanhedrin council. And as the apostle was looking at them earnestly, he can’t clearly see who they are, and so he begins to make his defense. And because he declares his innocence, that he has lived innocently before God, that he has not lived a life that is contrary to the law of God, to the will of God, to the word of God, all of a sudden, the high priest, Ananias, commands for one of the soldiers to slap Paul across the face, to hit him. And this is not just a little slap, you know, watch your mouth kind of a slap.

It is more of a blow to his face, is the idea of the word. And so here he is, he’s just been smitten, very forcefully stricken by this soldier. And, of course, when somebody hits you, you’re gonna get a reaction. Amen? And that’s normal.

It’s okay. We understand these things. And what does Paul say? He says, God will strike you, you whitewashed wall. Now he cannot tell that he’s talking to the high priest because he cannot see clearly.

The apostle was a man who was raised a Pharisee. He told the Philippians that he was a Pharisee of the Pharisees. Meaning that, I mean, if anybody was a Pharisee, it was the apostle, and he excelled all their expectations. He was in the top of his class. He was trained and equipped.

He understood, and he knew that it was wrong for him to rebuke the high priest, to say anything publicly offensive to the high priest. But out of his reaction of being smitten so hard, he looked at that person who commanded, who was the high priest. He said to him, he was a whitewash wall, which is simply the word whitewash wall simply means something that is unbecoming in appearance, and it’s something that they might use to cover the dirt or something to cover on the wall or even a tombstone to cover it from reflecting the dirt. And so really what he’s saying to the high priest is that you’re a hypocrite. On the inside, you are dirty.

On the inside, you are sinful. But on the outside, you have all this religious garb to cover up your mess, to cover up your sin. That’s why they were so shocked when the apostle said this. And again in verse four, those who stood by said, do you revile god’s high priest? Note the apostle’s response.

The reason we believe he could not clearly tell who was speaking and who was all sitting before him is because of this. Verse five, then Paul said, I did not know, brethren, that he was the high priest. For it is written, and he quotes the book of Deuteronomy, you shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people. But when Paul perceived that one part were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, he cried out in the council, men and brethren, I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee. Concerning the hope and resurrection of the dead, I am being judged.

Now let’s stop there again. I’m just giving you context. You gotta know this introduction stuff, or you won’t be able to properly interpret the text. And that is in chapter 22, he uses his Roman citizenship to protect himself, to be able to defend himself. And here he comes, now he’s before a religious court, and he recognizes that in this Sanhedrin council that there are groups of and Sadducees.

The Sadducees did not believe in the resurrection. The Pharisees did. The Sadducees only believed in the law of Moses that was given. In Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers, and Deuteronomy. The Pharisees believed on all the scriptures, the Psalms, the prophets, major and minor.

They believed that all of the old testament was the authoritative word of God. So the apostle knows that there’s already an inherent division within this council, so he uses his religious training to be able to cause a division and protect himself. So let’s back up, And he says in verse six, I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee. Concerning the hope and resurrection of the dead, I am being judged. The reason they have me here in front of you is because I teach and preach in the hope of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, because I teach in the hope and the resurrection of God’s people, and that’s why I’m standing before you.

Verse seven. And when he had said this, a dissension arose between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the assembly was divided. It would be like having Dallas cowboy fans sitting in a council and the Philadelphia Eagles sitting in a council together, and we were gonna try to work together, and somebody would get up and say, I think that Roger Staubach is the greatest quarterback ever. Oh, that would upset the Eagles. That would make them frustrated.

And all of a sudden, we’re attacking each other. We’re upset with each other. We’re going back to those old principles that we are divided on, and so that’s what’s going on. Verse eight. For Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, no angel or spirit, but the Pharisees confess both.

Verse nine. Then there arose a loud outcry, and the scribes of the Pharisees’ party arose and protested, saying, we find no evil in this man, but if a spirit or an angel has spoken to him, let us not fight against God. Now, when there arose a great dissension, The commander, fearing lest Paul might be pulled to pieces by them, commanded the soldiers to go down and take him by force from among them and bring him into the barracks, or bring him back to the prison, bring him back to the jail. And that’s where we find the apostle Paul, is that this commander, this political commander has been trying to find a way to get Paul to be guilty of something so he can get rid of him, and that he can apply a punishment to him, and that he would stop preaching and teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. He’s not allowed to do it on a judicial level because he’s a Roman citizen.

He’s not able to do it before a religious court because the apostle was smart enough knowing how to get them to fight against each other. And so he says, bring him back. And so here we find the apostle. He is in jail, and it is nighttime. And you know the apostle is isolated.

He doesn’t have the accommodations of today’s jails and prisons. There’s no weight room. There’s no TV. There’s no three meals a day. There’s no recreation time.

He’s just sitting in there in this filthy jail. And notice what verse 11, and this is the crux of my message I wanna share with you today. But the following night, the Lord stood by him and said, be of good cheer, Paul. For as you have testified for me in Jerusalem, so you must also bear witness at Rome. The apostle was in a very discouraging situation.

He was in the custody of the Roman soldiers. He was falsely accused, and it looked like evil had won, and that his ministry for God was over. But he comes to this moment and this time that he has a revelation, a vision from God, from Jesus Christ himself. God comes to the apostle in a dark hour of his life and encourages him, And he reminds the apostle that even in the darkness, that his ministry is not over yet. And there are four things that Jesus shares that I wanna share with you to help you in those dark times of your life, and so that you can be encouraged.

The first thing we see is the presence of God. I want you to go back and notice at the beginning of verse 11, underscore this in your bible. If you like to mark your bible, it’s okay. It’s good to make notes in your bible. It’s good to highlight things in your bible.

Some people don’t like to do that, and that’s fine. I don’t wanna do anything that bothers your conscience. But if you’d like to do that, would you please underscore the lord stood by him? The lord stood by him. There’s nothing more encouraging in a person’s life, a Christian’s life, than the presence of God.

There wasn’t many people there to stand with the apostle. You remember that the apostle, who was very familiar with jail, always being thrown in jail, that he told Timothy, no one stood with me. But here, when others had forsaken him, the apostle found that God did not forsake him. Remember the words of the apostle in second Timothy chapter four verse 17, the bible says that the lord stood with me and strengthened me so that the message might be preached fully through me and that all the gentiles might hear. Also, I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion.

What I want you to see here is the presence of God was with the apostle even in his dark time in his life. There are times in our life that the darkness is so thick, and the weight of the trial is so heavy in our heart that we don’t often sense the presence of God in our life. But I want to remind you that God is always with us. No matter where we go, God is always with us. He is with us whether we are serving him or we are in a space that we are not able to serve Him.

God is with us when things are wonderful in our life, and God is with us when things are difficult in our life. Our Lord and savior will never leave us or forsake us. Can God’s people say amen? Now we see this illustrated in the life of Moses, when Moses was leading Israel, and they came to a point where they were wondering, would they have the presence of God with them? It was Moses who pleaded with God that his presence would be with him.

Moses so valued the presence of God that he would not go on without the presence of God. Exodus 33 verse 15. Then he said to him, if your presence does not go with us, do not bring us up from here. You see, church, when we’re out there serving God, and we’re trying to be that Christian, that person who is a disciple of Christ out there amongst our family and in the midst of our daily schedules and responsibilities that we have, we must always ask for the presence of God, not just that God is with us. Yes, we know he’s with us.

We know that he’s omnipresent, meaning that he is everywhere at the same time, but we want the manifested presence of God in our life. We wanna be able to sense that God is working. We want to know that God, his presence is with us, and that we will not go anywhere without his manifested presence in our life. The key to Joseph’s success in the Old Testament was the presence of God. Even though Joseph had been mistreated, he had been betrayed, he had been misunderstood, he desired the presence of God in his life.

Genesis 39 verse 21. But the Lord was with Joseph, showed him mercy, and gave him favor in the sight of the keeper of the promise. My friends, you and I need the presence of God, And we need the presence of God in those difficult days. And we need to seek his presence. And we need to desire his presence.

And we need to pray for his presence. And we need to claim his presence. We talk about claiming the promises of God, but we also need to claim the presence of God in our life. Because, you say, what’s the big deal, Mike? Your presence, and definitely God’s presence, makes a big difference.

Sometimes people say to me, I don’t know what to do or say to a person who is grieving. I don’t know how to help them, Pastor Mike. I don’t know what to say. And I always remind them, you don’t have to say anything. Because most of the time, 90% of what you’re gonna say is more hurtful than not saying anything.

Because in our good intentions, we might misspeak. We might say something that is really not aligning with God’s truth. But let me tell you what is most important, is your presence. Just be there. Just be available.

Just be a listener. Just be someone who is present in their life. What I want you to know that that’s the way God is in your life. God is not up there judging you. He’s not up there correcting you.

He’s not up there trying to say, well, you should’ve done it this way, or I told you so. But rather, his presence is with you. When you feel discouraged, when you feel like you’re going through a dark time in your life, you have the presence of God, and you need to encourage yourself in the Lord that his presence is with you. God is with you. And when God is with you, you can endure.

You can move forward. You can take the next step for him. It doesn’t matter whether others are with you or not, as long as the Lord stands with you. It’s difficult for us to deal with the absence of people in our life. Sometimes the Lord calls our loved ones to be promoted to heaven.

Sometimes our loved ones are walking through the journey of life with us, and they decide they don’t wanna be a part of that journey anymore, and they abandon us, they betray us, or they break their vow to us. But listen to me, friends. No matter who forsakes you, no matter what relationship lets you down, there is one person who will never let you down, and his name is Jesus Christ. And his abiding presence is always with you, and you can be encouraged, and you can be comforted with that promise. And Jesus taught us that he will never leave us nor forsake us in the book of Hebrews.

I want you to stand on that promise, and I want you to claim his presence in those difficult times in your life. And that was so powerful in the life of the apostle is that the lord stood by him. The second thing I want you to see in how he encouraged the apostle was from the precepts from god. Now when I use that word precept, I’m just talking about the commands of God, that God gives us direction, that God gives us a directive. And here is what he tells the apostle after having been there.

His presence is with him, he stands with the apostle, he says, be of good cheer. That’s the command. Be of good cheer. Now when you think of that word, be of good cheer, it’s the idea of being courageous. It’s the idea of being bold.

And what he is saying to the apostle is, don’t quit. I want you to be courageous. I don’t want you to let this setback stop you. I want you to press on for the glory of God. I want you to get up.

You’ve been knocked down. Get back up. When our kids were growing up, we would often tell them, get up. They would fall in the living room, bump their head, and rather than everybody running to them and wanting to pick them up, we would just say, get up. Get up.

Why? Because we wanted them to learn when you fall, you get back up. You say, Mike, that’s not profound. We didn’t come this morning just for some little principle on when you fall, get back up, but let me tell you something. In today’s society, how many people need that?

There are many times we get overloaded with the circumstances of life. We fall, we flounder, and we struggle, and we just continue to have a pity party. And we dig deeper into our discouragement, our depression, I want to tell you that the height of your healing is never to close the blinds, shut the door, and grab a bag of potato chips and sit on the couch. That the only way that you will experience the full healing of God in your heart, in your emotions, in your spirit, and in your mind is to get up and take a step. I’ve told you this before, church.

You know how it is. I could say, how many of you have had a a knee replacement, or how many of you have had your shoulder replaced, or you’ve had your whatever hip replaced? You know? And next thing I know, they’re gonna be saying, pastor Mike, I’m getting my head replaced. Okay.

I mean, pretty soon, they’re gonna attach a AI head to you. Okay? It’s gonna be all automated, and you’re gonna be artificial intelligence, and you’re gonna be smarter than everybody. But you know what they tell you? Get up after surgery.

Get up. You’re not laying in this bed all day. Get up. You stay in this bed, you’ll get infected. You stay in this bed, you’ll get stiff.

You stay in this bed, you won’t be able to have the flexibility that you need. And that’s what I’m saying to you spiritually, is that you have to get up. You have to remember. Be of good cheer. We may be very surprised that encouragement comes from those directives and commands of God that we don’t always feel like obeying.

Sometimes you say, well, I don’t wanna go to church. Well, the Bible says, don’t forsake it. You say, I don’t wanna assemble with God’s people because and you got all your thousands of reasons, and I’m not saying any of them aren’t legit. But let me tell you something, friends. If you don’t re engage, you’re gonna spiral farther downward.

When you isolate your life from others, when you seclude yourself from the opportunity for God’s people to bear one another’s burdens, and to minister to you, and to encourage you, and to help you to keep moving forward for God, then I’m telling you, you are going to have a major setback in your spiritual life. That’s what we do. We build walls, and we try to keep people out, and we say, boy, I’m I was hurt, and I don’t want to be offended again. Listen. You can’t live your life like that.

You have got to say, I’m gonna be of good cheer. I’m gonna take courage in God. Listen to what Jesus said to the disciples. The bible says in Matthew 14, immediately Jesus spoke to them saying, take courage. It is I.

Do not be afraid. Take courage. God’s commands are given to us, not to be a burden to us, but to bless us. And you say, well, I don’t feel like it. I don’t want to.

That’s like the little kid who said, hey, I don’t wanna go to school. Yeah. You let the little kid sleep in all day in bed. He’ll never go to school. He’ll never be educated.

He’ll live with your mom until he’s 99. And I know some of you moms want that. Right? You want your little one to stay with you till they’re 99. But here’s the problem.

When they’re 99, mom ain’t gonna be there, and they’re not gonna be able to function without you. Take courage. God is with you. Take courage. His commands are to bless you.

His commandments are an avenue and a means of blessings and grace in your life. If God thought that it wasn’t important for you to follow His commands, He would have never given them to you. He gives them to you so you can continue to flourish in your faith. It’s not easy to obey God, is it? I’ll be the first to admit.

I know the rest of you are more spiritual than me, and I appreciate that. And I’m trying to catch up with you. I want you to know that. But let me tell you something. I know it’s hard to obey God, but even though it is hard to obey God, we cannot fall into the trap of pouting and complaining and having pity parties.

We must be courageous, church. We must press on. We must move forward for God. And sometimes it’s a step. And sometimes it’s just taking a small step.

But let’s keep moving forward for God in our discouraging times and not be quitters because it’s always too soon to quit and to keep moving forward. Remember what the apostle taught us, rejoice in the Lord always. When we come to Acts chapter 23, the apostle Paul is facing a religious trial, and he is making the case that he is a follower of Christ, but that it’s something that connects to the Old Testament. And as he is teaching, he is also receiving from God the promise that the Lord is gonna stand with him and how important that is for us to have that kind of encouragement. And when you find yourself in a dark time, just open your Bible and start reading his promises.

And I know that’ll be a great blessing to you and keep you encouraged and faithful to the calling God has on your life. I wanna remind you to make sure you check out our website. That’s hopeworthhaving.com, and there’s a lot of features on the website. Check it out, and you can learn more about Hope Worth Having ministry. This is pastor Mike Sanders reminding you, in Christ, there is hope worth having.