Acts chapter 20, we will finish this chapter when we get through with this sermon. And again, we are going through the church's mission through the book of Acts, making sure that we stay on mission as a church and looking now in the second part of this book at really the Apostle Paul's ministry. And one thing that constantly comes to our minds as we look at the Apostle Paul and study his ministry is that our life affects people. Our life has an impact on people. And I want you to think tonight about your realm of influence and the people that you impact, your family and the people that you work with. I mentioned this morning that the title is kind of a morbid title, the Christian's epitaph, but I wonder, have you ever sat down and wrote an epitaph? Something that you want to be remembered for. Something that you would like to summarize your life. I think that it's good to do that. It's good to think now while we're living so that we make sure that we are having the right kind of impact on those around us. Our testimony for Christ is one of the most valuable things that we have in this life. What people see when they see our life, and the thing about our testimony, I always remember my dad telling us this growing up, is that it takes a long time sometimes to build a testimony, but it only takes just a second to tear it down. It is something that if we're not careful and guarded in that we can lose. The psalmist says this in Psalm 90 verse 12. He says, teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. Or you might paraphrase it like Martin Luther did when he said, Lord, teach us to think about death so that we might learn how to properly live. And we do need to think about death. We do need to realize that our life here on earth is short. And as we look at the text tonight, I can't help but think of the Apostle Paul as he shares his heart with the spiritual leaders in Ephesus. He wants them to remember him for certain things that they have seen in his life over the last three years specifically of ministry where he has been ministering in Ephesus. And as we look at these things, I think that you and I, as believers, as Christians, as servants of Christ, would want the same things said about us when the end of our life is over. I've mentioned this several times, but one day, and one day soon, all of us will be, our bodies will be lying in front of people, and they will be talking about our life, and I often wonder When I do that at services, what are people gonna say about me? What are gonna be the things that they remember about my life? And so as we read this lengthy text tonight, I want you to think about Paul's testimony as he is ending this ministry in Ephesus. As far as he knows, he will never see these people again. You'll see that in the text. And so this is Paul pouring out his heart. to these dear brothers and sisters in Christ. Verse 17, and from Miletus, he sent to Ephesus and called the elders of the church. And when they were come to him, he said unto them, you know from the first day that I came into Asia, after what manner I have been with you at all seasons, serving the Lord with all humility of mind and with many tears and temptations, which befell me by the lying and weight of the Jews. and how I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you, but have showed you and have taught you publicly and from house to house, testifying both to the Jews and also to the Greeks, repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. And now, behold, I go bound in the Spirit unto Jerusalem, not knowing the things that shall befall me there, save that the Holy Ghost witnesseth in every city, saying that bonds and afflictions abide me. I love verse 24, and it's certainly the heart of this text. As Paul says, but none of these things move me. What a great statement. Neither count I my life dear unto myself so that I might finish my course with joy and the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus to testify the gospel of the grace of God. And now behold, I know that ye all among whom I have gone preaching the kingdom of God shall see my face no more. We see there that Paul felt like this would be the last time that he ever saw these Christians at Ephesus, verse 26, wherefore I take you to record this day that I am pure from the blood of all men. For I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God. Take heed therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood. For I know this. That after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things to draw away disciples after them. In other words, to get followers of themselves instead of pointing them to Christ. Therefore watch, verse 31, and remember that by the space of three years, I cease not to warn everyone night and day with tears. And now, brethren, I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified. I have coveted no man's silver or gold or apparel. Yea, ye yourselves know that these hands have ministered unto my necessities and to them that were with me. I have showed you all things, how that so laboring ye ought to support the weak, to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, it is more blessed to give than to receive. And when he had thus spoken, he kneeled down and he prayed with them all. And they all wept sore and fell, on Paul's neck and kissed him, sorrowing most of all for the words which he spake, that they should see his face no more. And they accompanied him unto the ship." You can feel the emotion in the text, can't you? This is a farewell address. that Paul is giving to the Christian leaders at Ephesus. He is saying goodbye to them. And as far as he knows, the next time that he will see these servants of God is in eternity. And he opens up his heart to them. His plans from here are to go to Jerusalem and there to Rome where Paul believes that he will be martyred. And this is how he wants these believers at Ephesus to remember him. This is the only sermon in the book of Acts that is recorded, that was given to other Christians, other believers. All the rest of the sermons were directed to unbelievers. So it is an important message. And I think that it is recorded for us, inspired by the Holy Spirit to us, this generation, for a specific reason. And that is that we understand that decisions that we make in this life will determine what we are remembered for. What you give your life for. what you spend your time and my time doing and we see the values that the Apostle Paul lived by and hopefully these are your desires and they're my desires that we want to be remembered when we leave this earth for these things. Six of them, we'll get through one or two or three of them tonight. Number one is this, he made sure that his generation knew the truth. The Apostle Paul was focused and made sure that his generation knew the truth. Look at verse number 20. He says, I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you, but have showed you and have taught you publicly. Verse 26, wherefore I take you to record this day. I'm pure from the blood of all men. And then mark this, verse 27, for I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God. What a powerful statement about Paul's declaration of the truth. And I have said this before, but if there was anything that you can see in the life of the apostle Paul that he was consumed with, he was consumed with his generation knowing the truth, knowing the gospel. He was also consumed with passing that to the next generation and pouring into Timothy and other young men who would carry the gospel beyond him. He did not back away from proclaiming the truth of the gospel. He saw himself primarily as a bearer of the message. He was not most concerned if people liked his message. He was most concerned that they heard the truth and they understood the truth. Remember in Galatians, he challenges the Christians there in Galatians chapter one in verse 10. He says, for do I now persuade men or God, or do I seek to please men? For if I yet please men, I should not be the servant of Christ. And listen, I understand that we want people to like us and we want people to accept us. But when we are gone, there is one thing that will mean more to us than that they liked us. And that is that because of our life, they knew the truth. That they knew the truth about eternity. I'm talking about your neighbors. I'm talking about the people you work with. The most important thing that they will remember about you and I is that we told them the truth. And Paul sees this, look, as the most serious thing that he could do. And that's why he says in verse 26, I am pure or I am innocent from the blood of all men. He saw this as a life or death message. Paul is no doubt thinking back into the Old Testament, into Ezekiel here. When he says this, Ezekiel 33 verse eight, it says, I say unto the wicked, O wicked man, thou shalt surely die if thou does not speak to warn the wicked from his way. That wicked man shall die in his iniquity, but his blood will I require at thy hand. It's not in my notes, but I couldn't just help but think as I was reading that verse of Brother Noel, who I know for a fact, not from him, but from at least a half a dozen of his neighbors, that this is a man who is known in his community as a Christ follower, as a bearer of the truth. In fact, I've been under conviction from time to time when I think about the people in my realm of influence. And I ask you to ask the same question. It doesn't matter if they like you most. What matters the most is that you have told them the truth. That you are a bearer of the truth. Can I really say that I care about you or anyone if I know an eternal truth that could save them from being damned eternally to hell and hold that back? Can I truly say that I care for them? Or do I care more about me, that you like me, that you accept me? The first point of the gospel is a proclamation that the human race stands underneath the judgment of God. You've heard the phrase, the truth hurts sometimes. We stand under the judgment of God because of our rebellion, because of our sin. And listen, a lot of us don't like to start there when we share the gospel, right? We think it's good news. We wanna share that Jesus died on the cross. We wanna share that he paid our penalty. But listen, before we can ever get to the good news, we have to be honest about the bad news. And the bad news is that the wages of our sin is death. That's the whole truth. The whole truth is that we stand underneath the judgment of God. The whole truth is that there are not enough good works that we can do to work our way to heaven. And we have to be committed to giving people the truth. The good news of the gospel is that God offers the gift of forgiveness. And listen, we're not responsible with what people do with the message of the gospel, but we are responsible that they hear it and they understand it. What a shame it's going to be when we stand before God and we have had 10 or 20 or 40 or 50 or 100 conversations with people and never once shared with them the truth of the gospel. Do those in our realm of influence know the truth? Look at verse 31 in our text, Acts 20. Look at verse 31, Paul says, by the space of three years, notice this, I ceased not to, what's the next word? Worn. Every one night and day with tears. The truth is that hell is a real place. The truth is is that Jesus talked about hell more than he talked about heaven. And listen, I'm simply stating tonight that we have to be honest about the truth and we have to be committed to the truth of God's word. If we believe Revelation 21 verse eight, we will be committed to proclaiming the truth. Revelation 21 verse eight says, but the fearful and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and whoremongers and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone which is the second death. Do you believe that? We do believe it. It is the word of God. It is the truth. And right now we're living in critical times. We're living in intense spiritual warfare. And I understand it's always spiritual warfare. It's always been spiritual warfare, but there are times when it is a little bit more intense than at other times. And I would say right now we are under some pretty intense warfare. In Long Beach, California, you can go and visit a ship that has been turned into a museum. Maybe some of you have been there. It was originally built as a luxury cruise ship called the Queen Mary, but during World War II, it was commandeered to carry troops back and forth in battle. As a cruise ship, it carried 3,000 people. As a ship in battle, it carried 15,000 soldiers. Rooms that once carried a couple now were stacked with eight soldiers. You know why? Because wartime and peacetime demand different things. And listen, right now, we are in a intense warfare, and what you and I have to be committed to is the truth of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. And this church, Faith Baptist Tabernacle, isn't here to be a cruise ship of luxury. It is here to be a rescue boat for the drowning. It is here to be a boat that can rescue people in the midst of warfare. And that doesn't mean that things are not done with excellence, and that doesn't mean that we don't take care of things, but we are here on a mission. Keith Green said this, this generation of believers is responsible for this generation of souls all over the world, and I can't help I cannot get the Afghan people off of my heart and off of my mind. These are people, by and large, who are blinded to the gospel, and my heart is hurting for them, and I'll just ask you a question that the Holy Spirit asked me this week personally, am I more concerned, and Jackson and I had a conversation about this as we were talking about our safety and those concerns, but as the Holy Spirit asked me this, it was convicting to me, am I more concerned about my own temporary personal safety than the eternal danger of the lost souls in Afghanistan? Am I more concerned about my temporary safety on this earth than I am eternal souls over there who will spend an eternity in hell? And the fact is, yes, sometimes I am. in my human carnal state. I'm more worried about my safety and the safety of my family. But I remind you that God has not called us to come and live 80, 90 years comfortably and safe. He has called us on a mission to engage in a warfare, to share the gospel, to proclaim the truth of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's why this church is committed to truth. to proclaiming truth in love. It was Jim Elliott that lived and died with this passion. And he said this great quote, I seek not a long life, but a full one like you, dear Lord. I remind you that our Lord Jesus only lived how many years on this earth? 33 years. And yet his impact was enormous. He made sure Paul made sure that his generation know the truth because time is running out and time is short. The second thing, and we'll close with this, he made much of Jesus, not himself. Paul says in verse number 19, serving the Lord with all humility of mind, and with many tears and temptations, trials is the word there, which befell me by the lying in wait of the Jews. The word humility in verse number 19, it's often translated weakness. And it is almost always considered in this time, not in the Bible, but in this time, it was almost always considered as an insult. It means low, it means weak. but it is used over 200 times in the Bible, and in the Bible, it is always almost presented not as a weakness, but as a virtue. Why does Paul use this word, normally intended as an insult, and turn it into a virtue? He's basically saying here, serving the Lord with all weakness, with all lowliness. And I think that it is certainly true as you look at the life of the Apostle Paul, that the reason that he does that is because Christian ministry at its core is not about extraordinary people who are strong with great power. It is about a savior. who can save and change and use the weakest, most broken, most guilty of sinners. And Paul is acknowledging here, he is acknowledging at the same time, his personal weakness and the strength, the limitless power of God. That's what he's saying. Serving the Lord, pointing people to the Lord in my weakness. Tim Keller said this, a humble and weak person will show a crucified Savior better to a listener than a polished, pulled together expert. Because that is how it happened for us. We weren't saved by pulling ourselves together, but by admitting that we were sinners and calling on the one who was pulled apart for us. Exactly what Miss Amanda was talking about tonight, that when people come here, that they do not look at polished people looking down their noses at them, but they see recovering sinners just like they are. You may have a suit on, you may be dressed nicer, you may not have all the tattoos, but I wanna tell you something. I know by experience that we are recovering sinners just as much as they are. And Paul says, I'm one of you. My dad, as you know, has had an incredible impact upon my life. He was a great model in ministry for me. And I can remember from just a small boy, and Brother Larry West and Brother David Masseux, who went to church there, will confirm this, that as long as I can remember in ministries and churches that my dad has pastored, the motto has been, what, Brother Larry, do you remember? Making much of Jesus. Making much of Jesus. Is that what our life is about? Listen, I don't want my children's hope to be in me. I don't want this church's hope to be in me. I wanna point you to a sinless savior. That's who I wanna point you to. I will fail you. I will fail you, I will fail you, but Jesus will never fail you. And that is why we constantly make much of Jesus. Jesus said, without me, you can do some things. No, you can do nothing. May we remember that tonight. May we be honest about our struggles. This mentality leads to a life of sacrifice, deliberately depriving ourselves of resources that we could use to strengthen ourselves and strengthen our position and using those resources to redirect people's attention to Jesus Christ. And the truth is that when we sacrifice our time and when we sacrifice our treasure and our talents to Christ and to his church, We are saying this, my life is not about me. My life, as Paul says, for me to live is Christ. He has my time, he has my treasures. He hasn't given me my talents for me, he hasn't given me my treasures for me to build my kingdom. He has given me those things to use to make much of Jesus, to lift him up so that the world will know that there is a God who loves them. He made sure his generation knew the truth. He made sure that he made much of Jesus, not himself. Our need for the power of God, listen, it is not partial, it is total. We need God completely. And really what you see in verse number 19 is that Paul had the right perspective. His life wasn't about him. Serving the Lord with all humility of mind and with many tears and temptations or trials which befell me by the lying in wait of the Jews. And then next week we'll look at Several more, I'll just mention the third one. He invested his life in the church. He says in verse 28, take heed therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers to feed the church of God, say it with me, which he hath purchased with his own blood. And I know that I'm a preacher and a pastor, but it's not just preachers and pastors that should love the church. If you are a child of God, Jesus purchased you with his blood. He loved the church and he gave himself for it. Father, we love you. God, it is the desire of our heart that when we finish this life, that we are remembered for the right things. God, the temptation of this world is to pull us into consuming our life with power and prestige and things that do not matter, things that do not value eternally. So God, I pray that even in this moment, you would direct our hearts back to you Lord, that we can certainly learn from the apostle Paul that we are a people who are committed to the truth. We are a church who's committed to the truth. God, we desperately need your courage and boldness that comes from you every single day. You know me better than anybody does. You know the tendencies of my flesh that draw me away sometimes from speaking to people. God, I pray that you would help me as the leader of this church to be more committed to this, not just from the pulpit, but one-on-one, people's lives that you bring us into contact with. And God, I pray that our life will be summarized and that we point people to Jesus. That we're not ashamed of our weakness because we realize that in our weakness, you are made strong and people are directed to your strength when they see our weakness. So God, I pray that you would help us to be real, transparent. that we will not be ashamed to share as the Apostle Paul did. My life has been filled with tears. My life has been filled with trials. My life has been filled with brokenness. It is God that is strong. It is Jesus that is the strength of my life. God, I pray that as sinners come through these doors, that yes, they will feel the love, but that will come from a heart of humility, that we will not be a people who are puffed up with pride, wearing our nice clothes, outwardly looking like we have it all together, yet our struggles are real. Help us to be real people. And God, I pray that as the Apostle Paul did, that we will be a people who love what you loved. We will invest our lives in what you gave your life for. And thank you, God, for this church that we're able to be a part of. Thank you for the wonderful opportunity it is to serve you with these people. Some of the dearest servants that I know, some of the greatest Christians I know I've met in the last three years. And I'm so thankful that you've brought us together to be able to serve you together. So God, I pray that as we leave here tonight, that you will burn these things in our hearts and in our lives. May these be the things that we're focused on, that we will seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and that we will literally be consumed with eternal things. Lord, as we close tonight, we lift up our missionary, Brother John LaBelle, to you. God, you created that body. You know everything that's going on, and we don't need to inform you of anything. We simply do as you've asked us to do, and we intercede on his behalf tonight. Lord, we pray as you showed us in the garden, the example, Lord, not our will, but thine be done, and that is our prayer. And God, we pray, be your will, that you would raise this man up for your glory. Raise this man up where he can again proclaim in a loud voice, the doctors counted me out, but God has something else for me to share the gospel with you. Pray for Kelly tonight that you will strengthen her, that you will help her. The children who left this week to go off to Bible college and had to leave their dad in a hospital, an ICU, basically unconscious and paralyzed. Lord, I pray that you'll be with them. We don't understand your ways. We don't know all that you're doing, but we trust you. You are faithful. You are right in all that you do. God, we pray that you administer your grace and your strength and your wisdom to this family tonight. And we ask all this in Christ's precious name. Amen.