Making the unknown known. - Acts 17:22-31
Paul’s conversion to Christianity was a significant event that changed the course of his life. Before his conversion Paul was a well-known persecutor of the church. He hated the followers of The Way. With his every breath he made murderous threats against them. Paul just could not understand why they worshiped a dead guy. As far as he was concerned, the followers of Jesus of Nazareth were an embarrassment to the Jewish people and an abomination before the God of their fathers. Which is why Paul went to the high priest and asked for the authority to hunt them down and snuff them out.
Paul was on his way to Damascus to do just that when he had one of the most dramatic “come to Jesus moments” of all time. A light from heaven flashed around him, knocking him off his donkey. He heard a voice say to him, “why do you persecute me?” “Who are you, Lord?”, Paul asked. “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting”, was the reply[1]. That reply shook Paul to his core. The dead guy, whose followers Paul had dragged from their homes and executed, was dead no more. He was very much alive and was standing before him. The power and glory that radiated off Him was blinding.
In that moment Paul’s entire life changed. He could not unsee what he had seen. It was just as the followers of The Way had been saying, Jesus of Nazareth had risen from the dead just as He said He would. Which meant everything Jesus had been teaching and preaching was true. Jesus was the way and the truth and the life. No one could come to the Father except through Jesus. It was true what the followers of Jesus were saying, “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.”[2]
From that moment on, Paul made it his mission in life to tell people about Jesus, the one true God who allowed Himself to be pierced for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities, his punishment brough us peace, by His wounds we are healed[3] – ohhh it was all making sense to Paul now. All the prophecies of the Old Testament had found their fulfillment in Jesus of Nazareth. By His wounds Paul had been healed. By His death Paul had been forgiven. By His resurrection Paul now had peace with God. And Paul wanted the world to know what he now knew. Which is what brought Paul to Athens.
You would have been very comfortable in Athens. Much of ancient Greek culture still lives on in America today. There’s a reason the buildings in Washington, D.C., have Greek columns. Democracy traces many of its roots back to Athens itself. The very word democracy comes from two Greek words: δῆμος, “the people,” and κρατεῖν, “to rule.” Our obsession with sports can be traced back to the athletic competitions of ancient Greece. Indeed, many of our forms of entertainment come from the Greeks. Hollywood owes much of the art of storytelling to them. Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey became foundational works of Western literature and still echo through modern films like Star Wars, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, and Finding Nemo. The Greeks were also among the original intellectuals. Take Aristotle, for example, one of the defining figures in Western philosophy, who wrote about everything from physics to theater to biology. Educated, enlightened, and informed people such as yourselves would have felt very comfortable in a city like Athens.
Paul was an educated, enlightened, and informed individual, he should have felt very comfortable in the city of Athens, but when he entered the city, he was “greatly distressed”. You see, the city was “full of idols”.[4] The people of Athens worshiped a pantheon of deities. They had a god for everything. There was a god that protected your animals, a god that made your sports team victorious, a god that liked to party, a god that helped you sleep, a god that helped you find love. You name it, the Athenians had a god for it and if they didn’t, they would invent one. You see that is where their gods came from. The gods the Athenians worshiped were gods of their own making. They gave their gods their powers, assigned them personalities, and literally formed and fashioned their gods from gold or silver or stone.
Paul, who himself not that long ago had learned of the one true God, was greatly distressed when he discovered the city of Athens was full of gods such as these. But I can’t help but wonder whether you and I would still be very comfortable in Athens. Now, I am not suggesting that you have statues of deities in your living room to watch over your pets, help you sleep, or cause Georgia to win football games. (Right, Andy?!?) But I do wonder if we, like the Athenians, aren’t guilty of trying to form and fashion our own god, not out of gold or silver or stone, but perhaps out of wants, wishes and desires. We do not want a god who holds us accountable for our actions. We do not wish for a god who confronts us with His law. We do not desire a god who calls us to repentance and change. We want a god who is tolerant of our faults, failures, and flaws. We wish for a god who looks the other way when we gratify the desires of our sinful flesh. We desire a god who accepts us for who we are, blesses our choices, respects our decisions, and generally allows us to do what we want to do, say what we want to say, and think what we want to think. I fear you and I would feel very comfortable in a city full of formed and fashioned gods.
Athens was full of formed and fashioned gods, and it made Paul sick to see it. So “22 Paul stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: “Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. 23 For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you.” Paul begins, not by berating and belittling these idolatrous pagans, but rather Paul meets them where they are at. Paul recognizes they have a natural knowledge and clear curiosity of God. But that natural knowledge and clear curiosity was not sufficient for them to know who the one true God is. That’s why instinctively the Athenians built an altar TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Paul was distressed by their idolatry, but he was not shocked by it. Later Paul would say it this way, “How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?”[5]
Paul knew, unless someone told them who the one true God was, they would continue to form and fashion their own gods. From personal experience, Paul knew this to be true. Before his come-to-Jesus-moment Paul was worshiping a god he had formed and fashioned out of his preconceived notions and ideas. Thankfully, on the road to Damascus, Paul did have that come-to-Jesus-moment, and he was eager to share what he had learned with the people of Athens.
Paul told them, “we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by man’s design and skill.” The fundamental problem with formed and fashioned gods is they are limited to the imaginations of their creators. By its very nature a formed and fashioned God does not transcend all understanding, it can be neither all powerful nor all knowing, and it can be neither pure nor holy. A god that has been formed and fashioned by people might not hold you accountable, confront you with the law, or call you to change. Such a god may be tolerant, indulgent, and accepting of your behavior. But a formed and fashioned god cannot forgive, redeem, or save.
There is only one God who can do that. That God, Paul proclaimed, is the one “24 who made the world and everything in it”; who “25 gives all men life and breath and everything else”. That God is the one who “26 determines the times and places where we should live”; makes it possible for us to “28 live and move and have our being”. The one true God does not desire to be an UNKNOWN GOD. He desires to be THE KNOWN God. Which is why He left His fingerprints all over creation. It is why He knit an awareness of right and wrong into your soul. It is why He placed a natural knowledge and clear curiosity of God in your minds. And it is why He sent men like Paul to proclaim, “30 In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.” God wants all people to repent; to turn away from their formed and fashioned gods and by the power of the Holy Spirit turn toward Him.
The one true God is not formed or fashioned out of gold or silver or stone and He is not formed or fashioned out wants wishes and desires. The one true God became also flesh and blood, lived among us, as one of us, so that you would know Him. In Him you have a God who holds you accountable, confronts you with the law, and calls you to repentance and change because He loves you too much to leave you enslaved by sin and burdened by guilt. In Him you have a God who refuses to tolerate, indulge, or accept your sinful behavior. Instead, you have a God who suffered and died on the cross so that your sins would be forgiven, your guilt removed, and your eternity secured. The one true God’s name is Jesus and by the power of the Holy Spirit, you know Him.
Knowing Jesus changes your life. Now that you have been reminded of the foolishness of worshiping formed and fashioned gods, I imagine you will want the world to know what you know. Maybe that takes you to Athens, maybe it takes you to the grocery store, or PTA, or your living room. This world is full of formed and fashioned gods. Thankfully the one true God has left evidence of His existence in creation around us and the conscience within us. All we need to do is introduce people to Jesus and by the power of the Holy Spirit the unknown God will be made known. Amen
[1] Acts 9:1-6
[2] Acts 4:11
[3] Isaiah 53:5
[4] Acts 17:16
[5] Romans 10:14