Christian Reason Defined | Acts 17:1-15
Luke's account of Paul's ministry in Thessalonica and Berea demonstrates three components of a Christian approach to reason: (1) explaining biblical proof; (2) avoiding emotional agitation; and (3) encouraging biblical examination. This sermon is part 11 of “Spreading the Faith,” Bryan Craddock’s verse-by-verse sermon series on Acts 8-20.
Wherever you travel, you’ll encounter differences in how people dress, what they eat, or how they talk. Head south from Michigan and before long you’ll find grits, sweet tea, and a southern twang. Go north and there’ll be hockey and poutine, eh? The farther you go, the bigger those cultural differences can be. There might even be differences in how people think and make decisions.
The Apostle Paul undoubtedly encountered cultural differences like these on his missionary journeys, and he was willing to sacrifice his freedom to adapt to them whenever he could. In 1 Corinthians 9:22, he said, “I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some.” But there were also lines that he would not cross, and in Acts 17, you could argue that he walks the line between faith and reason.
At the end of chapter 16, he departs from Philippi and sets out on a road trip to Thessalonica. Greeks call it Thessaloniki, and the archaeological museum there has a stone relief from sometime around the 1st century of people traveling by wagon. We don’t know if Paul and his team were able to catch a ride like that, but they followed the Via Egnatia that the Romans built for about a hundred miles.
The journey took them past the place where Aristotle was born over 400 years earlier. As they made their way west across Macedonia and then south towards Athens, they were entering a culture that had been significantly influenced by philosophy. Even today, there is a huge square by the Thessaloniki waterfront with a bronze statue of Aristotle.
So, perhaps it is no coincidence that Luke introduces a new term to describe Paul’s approach to spreading the faith there. It’s the Greek word from which we get our English word “dialogue”. Most Bible translations say that Paul “reasoned” with people. He had probably always done so, but Luke begins to highlight it in chapter 17, using that term nine more times in the next seven chapters.
Now Paul did not adopt the reasoning of the Greek philosophers. But neither did he use the methods that he learned from Jewish rabbis. In Acts 17:1-15, Luke's account of Paul’s ministry in Thessalonica and Berea demonstrates three essential components of a distinctly Christian approach to reason.
Understanding reason might seem important for church leaders, but why does it matter for other Christians? Whether you realize it or not, you have an approach to reasoning that you use every day. It guides your choices about what to accept as true. Every assertion that you hear or read is filtered through that grid. Your reasoning also shapes how you interact with and seek to influence people in society, your workplace, your neighborhood, and your own home. So, if you reason in a way that is not Christian, it will distort your beliefs and damage your witness for Christ. We need to get this right!
Explaining Biblical Proof
If you want to know where you’re at or how to get somewhere, you need a point of reference. For centuries, navigators used the national observatory in their own country to determine their longitude east or west around the globe. So, everyone was starting from a different place. It wasn’t until 1884 that the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, England came to be widely accepted as the location of the prime meridian. The satellite mapping systems that we use today still rely upon the same basic point of reference.
Christian reason takes the Scriptures as its point of reference. So, explaining biblical proof is essential to our approach. Paul demonstrates this practice in Acts 17:1-4. Luke tells us,
Now when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews. And Paul went in, as was his custom, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead, and saying, "This Jesus, whom I proclaim to you, is the Christ." And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, as did a great many of the devout Greeks and not a few of the leading women.
Paul started with the Old Testament, a point of reference that Jews accepted. They probably knew and treasured the promises of the Messiah’s reign. But they might not have ever considered the implications of passages like Psalm 22 or Isaiah 53 that foretell his death. For those promises to be fulfilled, the Messiah would have to rise from the dead. So, Paul used biblical proof to explain these ideas to them.
He also told them about the teaching, miracles, death and resurrection of Jesus. When you consider that news alongside those Old Testament prophecies, it’s reasonable to conclude that Jesus is the Messiah, or in Greek, the Christ. Some of the Jews in Thessalonica were persuaded. They chose to join Paul and Silas as fellow believers in Jesus. Devout Gentiles who already believed in the God of Israel began to follow Jesus as well.
But where do you start if people do not accept the Old Testament? God’s Word is still the point of reference, but you must explain why. We’ll see how Paul does that later in Acts 17 as he preaches in Athens. For now, however, it is worth considering where other approaches to reasoning start.
In one way or another, most people rely upon their own perception, and that tendency extends all the way back to the garden of Eden. According to Genesis 2:17, when God created Adam, he said that he should not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But in Genesis 3 the serpent comes to Eve. He questions God’s command (3:2), rejects the consequences for disobeying it (3:4), and accuses God of harshly withholding something good from them (3:5).
Now Eve does not simply accept the serpent’s claims. She chooses to make her own independent determination. She trusts her perception and intuition rather than God’s word. Genesis 3:6 says,
So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.
In effect, Eve assumed authority to act as judge over God himself. She examines the tree and concludes that God is wrong about it. The consequences of that choice are the guilt, hardship, conflict, death, and separation from God that we continue to experience as sinful human beings in a fallen world.
Nevertheless, people continue to follow Adam and Eve’s independent approach to reason. They trust their perception and intuition over God’s revelation. Some deny the existence of any deity, but many make their own judgment about the kind of god they want to believe in. When you consider the limitations that we have as human beings, this kind of thinking seems both arrogant and ridiculous.
Christian reason, on the other hand, starts from a place of faith. We believe that the Creator of all things has given us revelation to guide us and that his word has transformative power. Psalm 19:7-8 says,
The law of the LORD is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple; the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes.
So, we should look to the Scriptures as the guide for our lives and should rely upon them to influence others. We hear this idea from Jesus as he prays for his followers on the night before his crucifixion. John 17:17 tells us that he asked the Father, “Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.”
Only the truth of God’s word can change people’s lives and make them holy. It’s the only reliable point of reference. It’s where our reasoning must begin. Yet some people seek to bypass reason altogether, so we must consider a second component in a Christian approach to reason.
Avoiding Emotional Agitation
Some people know how to push your buttons. They can say or do something that will trigger you and set you off. They play upon your fear, your anger, or even your sympathy. There may not be any logic or substance to it at all. Instead, they provoke a response through a raw appeal to emotion.
We seem to encounter this kind of emotional agitation everywhere today, even from Christian leaders. Some might say that it is the only way to get through to people. But it’s not what we see in Jesus or the apostles. In fact, it is often used against them.
Paul faces it in Thessalonica. Acts 17:5-7 tells us,
But the Jews were jealous, and taking some wicked men of the rabble, they formed a mob, set the city in an uproar, and attacked the house of Jason, seeking to bring them out to the crowd. And when they could not find them, they dragged Jason and some of the brothers before the city authorities, shouting, "These men who have turned the world upside down have come here also, and Jason has received them, and they are all acting against the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, Jesus."
This whole crisis starts with a feeling. Some Jews are jealous that people who used to be in their synagogue have turned to Jesus. But rather than engaging with Paul’s message, they stir up a mob to attack Jason’s home, which is probably the place where the new Christians were meeting.
Since Paul and Silas aren’t there, they drag Jason out and accuse him of receiving “these men who have turned the world upside down.” But this claim is a ridiculous exaggeration. Paul had only visited a handful of cities. Yet the charge was still sufficient to provoke fear among local people who were unaware.
These accusers are correct that Christians consider Jesus to be king, but they were not revolutionaries. Jesus taught them to render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s while they pray and wait for his kingdom to come in accord with Messianic prophecy. These Jews understand those ideas, but they knowingly misrepresent the beliefs of Christians to provoke the authorities to act against them.
This strategy is the same one that the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem used against Jesus, but in this case it fizzles out. Verses 8-9 say,
And the people and the city authorities were disturbed when they heard these things. And when they had taken money as security from Jason and the rest, they let them go.
They were disturbed, but it did not take much to satisfy the authorities. The word used here is somewhat ambiguous. It could simply be a pledge, but most translations interpret it as security, bond, or bail. Elsewhere the term even refers to a bribe. Though the distinction between those things is apparent in our society, it is not so clear cut in other places and times.
How would you respond to a situation like this? Many Christians today would insist that you should boldly take a defiant stand against attacks like this. But that is not what Paul and the Christians in Thessalonica do. Verse 10 tells us,
The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived they went into the Jewish synagogue.
Why do they decide to leave Thessalonica? Are they afraid? I don’t think so. The problem is that Paul’s continued presence there would only feed the emotional agitation, and that is not conducive to spreading the faith. Rather than trying to turn the world upside down, he says in Romans 12:18 that Christians should seek to live peaceably with all people.
We considered another passage along these lines at the beginning of this series, but it’s worth reading again. In 1 Timothy 2:1-4, Paul writes,
First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
The ideal atmosphere for reasoning through the gospel with someone is peace and quiet. We should pray that our authorities would pursue that atmosphere in our society, and we should seek to maintain it in our relationships with those outside the church. It should even shape how we teach and preach.
Some Christians seem to be consistently confrontational, contentious, and condemning, and that kind of emotional agitation may seem effective. But the guilt and shame it produces often leads to short-lived, superficial responses. So, in 2 Timothy 2:24-26, Paul writes,
And the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will.
Repentance can be a very emotional experience. But those sorts of emotions in and of themselves are not the goal. People must come to the life-transforming knowledge of the truth. God brings that about through the gentle and patient explanation of biblical proof not through emotional agitation. That leads us to one more component in our definition of Christian reason.
Encouraging Biblical Examination
Parrots have a remarkable ability to imitate human speech. But that does not mean that they truly understand it. They just mimic the sound, probably because people enjoy it so much and give them crackers in response.
When you share biblical truth with people, it's also enjoyable to hear them parrot it back to you. It makes you feel as if your efforts have been successful. But parroting ideas does not mean that people truly understand or accept them. So, Christian reason must encourage listeners to personally engage in biblical examination.
The people in the synagogue of Berea follow this practice as Paul preaches to them, and Luke commends them for it. In Acts 17:11-12, he says,
Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so. Many of them therefore believed, with not a few Greek women of high standing as well as men.
You might assume that Paul’s apostolic authority would be sufficient validation. What right do the Bereans have to question him? They have not only the right but the responsibility to do so. God's word is the supreme authority, so they must examine his teaching to see whether it aligns with the Scriptures. In fact, this discernment process was their constant daily filter in determining what to believe.
Though Luke does not describe it in Acts, the Thessalonians who believed went through a similar process as they heard Paul’s teaching. They chose to accept his preaching as the authoritative word of God. Later he writes to them in 1 Thessalonians 2:13 and says,
And we also thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.
So, on a practical level, the question is whether we communicate God’s truth to people in a way that encourages them to examine the Scriptures themselves. Do we direct them to the Bible? Do we give them time to think and ponder? Do we welcome questions and offer reasonable answers, even if we ourselves need to take time to think and ponder before responding?
We might be tempted to pressure people into an immediate response, but we need to trust God to work through his word. In Isaiah 55:10-11, he says,
For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.
From a broader perspective, we see that people need to start the Christian life with biblical examination, so that it becomes a habit moving forward. Discernment is essential for spiritual maturity. We should evaluate everything we hear by the Scriptures. Hebrews 5:12-14 makes this point by saying,
For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.
Are we examining the Scriptures and practicing biblical discernment? Or do we just parrot things we heard before without any real understanding? There will always be people who apply pressure to disrupt and undermine the discernment process. In Berea, it was the same agitators from Thessalonica.
Even though Berea is over 50 miles away from Thessalonica, Acts 17:13-15 says,
But when the Jews from Thessalonica learned that the word of God was proclaimed by Paul at Berea also, they came there too, agitating and stirring up the crowds. Then the brothers immediately sent Paul off on his way to the sea, but Silas and Timothy remained there. Those who conducted Paul brought him as far as Athens, and after receiving a command for Silas and Timothy to come to him as soon as possible, they departed.
Athens is the historic heart of Greek society, culture, religion and philosophy. It is an ideal setting for a demonstration of Christian reason in action. That will be our focus next time when we consider the rest of Acts 17.
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For now, we must understand these vital components of Christian reason. It starts from a place of faith in God and his word, focusing on patiently explaining biblical proof. It avoids the emotional agitation that bypasses the mind to stir up guilt, fear, or anger. Instead, it patiently encourages biblical examination, trusting the Lord to bring about true heart change.
Perhaps your exposure to Christianity has been more agitation than explanation. You may have heard the word but felt pressure to simply parrot it back. That can be a hard habit to break. It often seems to harden people’s hearts. I encourage you to examine the biblical truth of the gospel for yourself. Reason through it. Don’t be afraid to ask hard questions. God can handle it! We’re also here to help. I encourage you to receive the word and come to the knowledge of the truth. If you would like to learn more about how that decision changes someone, take some time to read Paul's first letter to the Thessalonians.
If you’re a believer, are you practicing discernment? I encourage you to examine everything you hear by the Scriptures, even the things that I tell you. If you don’t learn to think that way, you won’t be able to help anyone else do it. We need to work hard at reasoning well with people. Jesus and his gospel deserve it!
May the word of Christ dwell in us richly!
Reflect
What are the problems with persuasion through agitation?
What could you do to improve your practice of biblical discernment?
What changes do you need to make to be more reasonable as you interact with people?