22 So Paul, standing in the midst of the Areopagus, said:
“Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious. 23 For as
I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar
with this inscription, ‘To the unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as
unknown, this I proclaim to you. 24 The God who made the world and everything
in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man,
[2] 25 nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he
himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. (Acts 17:22-25
(ESV)
We now come to a controversial speech that Paul gives before
the Areopagus. The odd thing about this speech that has many people scratching
their head is that Paul doesn’t seem to mention the cross, of which he tells
the Corinthians he knew nothing but amongst them. It’s a curious thing that has
been pointed out to me by both Moe and Bo Giertz concerning this speech, though
both of them believe that this is a faithful representation of Paul’s speech.
It could, I suppose be that Luke leaves this out of his story, and concentrates
on those things that he found more interesting and unique about this sermon of
Paul. I mean, one has to wonder how Paul gets to the resurrection at the end of
this speech if he doesn’t also talk about the cross, it is kind of hard to have
the one without the other. On the other hand, it is also possible that by “knowing
nothing but Christ and him crucified” than that he brought the cross to the forefront
of every sermon.
In this evangelical opportunity, Paul actually has to lay
down a lot of ground work to make the cross make sense. This starts with a
discussion of who God actually is. This would be a foreign concept to the
Greeks he is talking to who would as Stoics not really think of God as being
personal, or as polytheists, imagine God a the creator of the world.
It’s a very interesting proclamation also in that he doesn’t
start out berating the Athenians for their temples. He holds in check that
which originally upset him. In fact he uses this to praise them! “I see that
you are religious,” he says. Then starting from an altar to the unknown god,
Paul begins to tell them about God. He then explains that this God is the
creator of the world, and therefore can’t be pacified by anything we have to
give. He really appeals to the stoic concept of God here. Taking what they have
right and discarding what they have wrong, even showing to them why they are
wrong appealing to their logic.
And here Paul undermines all forms of works righteousness.
We just aren’t in any position to bargain with God. We have nothing to offer.
He has whatever it is he wants. We can’t earn our righteousness because even
the best we do falls short of his law, and even if it didn’t it is hardly more
than anything God has commanded in his law that could make up for those places
where we have failed. In other words, there is nothing we can do about our
guilt. There is only the forgiveness of sins on account of the Cross of Christ
who had no need of forgiveness himself and was able to go above and beyond the
law of God to show love for sinners like you and me, and with that give God the
one thing he wanted, you.
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