Thursday, October 16, 2014

The Scoffers

40 Beware, therefore, lest what is said in the Prophets should come about:  “‘Look, you scoffers, be astounded and perish; for I am doing a work in your days, a work that you will not believe, even if one tells it to you.’” (Acts 13:39-41 (ESV)
So Paul finishes, and he finishes with a warning, another prophecy, a prophecy fulfilled by  the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The scoffers won’t believe. They will be astounded and perish.
It’s all too true. They won’t believe even if one tells it to them. Their unbelief is their fault. It isn’t that God doesn’t want them to believe. He does. He wouldn’t give them this prophecy otherwise. But  the cross will be a stumbling block to the Jews, (the legalists of every culture who think they can earn salvation, that they should earn salvation) and it’s folly to the Greeks, the scoffers of every generation who think they know physics better than the creator of the world, the nature of biology better than he who molded us from clay. They see the death as the end. They refuse to believe. They scoff at the cross, they stand astounded that others would believe the resurrection. They can scoff all they want. And they will. But the tomb stands empty, defying all explanation but resurrection.


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