
Being involved in Christian activities and knowing Christian terminology doesn’t make a person a follower of Jesus! Hear about twelve “almost” Christians Paul encountered and the discerning questions he asked. Listen to Truth For Life with Alistair Begg.
From the Sermon
About Twelve “Almost” Christians
Acts 19:1–10 Sermon • Includes Transcript • 39:41 • ID: 2451
Turn to the Scriptures
For the first readers of the book of Hebrews, the metaphor in this verse would have drawn to mind the gladius, the Roman short sword. These swords had y-shaped tips that looked almost like steel tongues. It is to this that the writer to the Hebrews compares the word of God. In Revelation, too, Jesus refers to His authoritative word as the “sword of my mouth” (Revelation 2:16). Whether pricking the conscience, cutting away our camouflages, piercing through Satan’s lies, or offering us encouragement, the sword of God’s word is sharp enough for all our needs.
Jesus understood the sufficiency of Scripture in every situation and modeled for us a complete dependence upon it. In the face of temptation, He turned to the Bible to answer the Evil One, warding off his attacks (Matthew 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-12). After His resurrection, in order to revitalize the despondent duo on the road to Emmaus, He turned them to God’s word and “beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself” (24:27). Why did He not simply show them His nail-pierced hands? Because He knew that while the opportunity to see His wounds would be limited to a moment and a few observers, there would be many generations who followed them who could not walk along the road with Him—but they would still have the Scriptures and would be able to read them to see “the things concerning himself.” The unerring truth of God’s word would be sufficient for God’s people in all times and in all places.
We live in an environment in which long-held convictions have been shaken. Confidence in Scripture has significantly eroded. Few truly trust in its authority and its sufficiency to accomplish the purposes for which God has ordained it. It may not become fully apparent in one generation, but as time passes the declension, the rot, the misgivings, the disinterest, and the wrongful preoccupations will yield bitter fruit.
Beware anything that encourages you to waver on your convictions concerning the singular authority and absolute sufficiency of Scripture. Beware moments when your own heart seeks to blunt God’s word, either by not reading it or not applying it. Instead, open your Bible and ask the Spirit of God to go to work with His sword, piercing your thoughts and intentions, showing you Jesus, and reminding you time and time again of His love and of the power of His word.
How is God calling me to think differently?
How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?
What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?
The Temptation of Jesus
1sThen Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness tto be tempted by the devil. 2And after fasting uforty days and forty nights, he vwas hungry. 3And wthe tempter came and said to him, “If you are xthe Son of God, command ythese stones to become loaves of bread.” 4But he answered, z“It is written,
a“‘Man shall not live by bread alone,
but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”
5bThen the devil took him to cthe holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple 6and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written,
d“‘He will command his angels concerning you,’
and
“‘On their hands they will bear you up,
lest you strike your foot against a stone.’”
7Jesus said to him, “Again eit is written, f‘You shall not gput the Lord your God to the test.’” 8hAgain, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. 9And he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” 10Then Jesus said to him, “Be gone, iSatan! For jit is written,
k“‘You shall worship the Lord your God
and lhim only shall you serve.’”
11Then the devil left him, and behold, mangels came and were ministering to him.

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg, published by The Good Book Company, thegoodbook.com. Used by Truth For Life with permission. Copyright © 2021, 2022, The Good Book Company.

Exalted with Him
God exalted him.
Jesus, our Lord, who once was crucified, dead, and buried, now sits upon the throne of glory. The highest place that heaven affords is His by undisputed right. It is vital and helpful to remember that the exaltation of Christ in heaven is a representative exaltation. He is exalted at the Father’s right hand, and though as Jehovah He had eminent glories, in which finite creatures cannot share, yet as the Mediator, the honors that Jesus wears in heaven are the heritage of all the saints.
It is delightful to think of how close Christ’s union is with His people. We are actually one with Him; we are members of His body; and His exaltation is our exaltation. He will allow us to sit upon His throne, even as He has overcome and is seated with His Father on His throne. He has a crown, and He gives us crowns too. He has a throne, but He is not content with having a throne to Himself; on His right hand there must be His queen, dressed in fine gold. He cannot be glorified without His bride.
Look up, believer, to Jesus now. Let the eye of your faith see Him with many crowns upon His head; and remember that one day you will be like Him, when you will see Him as He is. You shall not be as great as He is, you will not be as divine; but you will, in some measure, share the same honors and enjoy the same happiness and the same dignity that He possesses. Be content to live unknown for a little while and to walk your weary way through the fields of poverty or up the hills of affliction; for soon enough you will reign with Christ, for He has “made [us] a kingdom and priests to our God,” and we shall reign forever and ever.1
What a wonderful thought for the children of God! We have Christ for our glorious representative in heaven’s courts right now, and soon He will come and receive us to Himself, to be with Him there, to see His glory and to share His joy.
1) Revelation 5:10

Devotional material is taken from Morning and Evening, written by C. H. Spurgeon, revised and updated by Alistair Begg. Copyright © 2003, Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers, Wheaton, IL 60187, www.crossway.org. Used by Truth For Life with written permission.
Daily Bible Reading for April 22
Blessings for Obedience
1“You shall not make sidols for yourselves or erect an timage or upillar, and you shall not set up a vfigured stone in your land to bow down to it, for I am the Lord your God. 2wYou shall keep my Sabbaths and reverence my sanctuary: I am the Lord.
3x“If you walk in my statutes and observe my commandments and do them, 4then yI will give you your rains in their season, and the land shall yield its increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit. 5zYour threshing shall last to the time of the grape harvest, and the grape harvest shall last to the time for sowing. And ayou shall eat your bread to the full and bdwell in your land securely. 6cI will give peace in the land, and dyou shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid. And eI will remove harmful beasts from the land, fand the sword shall not go through your land. 7You shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword. 8gFive of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall chase ten thousand, and your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. 9hI will turn to you and imake you fruitful and multiply you and will confirm my covenant with you. 10You shall eat jold store long kept, and you shall clear out the old to make way for the new. 11kI will make my dwelling1 among you, and my soul shall not abhor you. 12lAnd I mwill walk among you and will be your God, and you shall be my people. 13nI am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that you should not be their slaves. oAnd I have broken the bars of your yoke and made you walk erect.
Punishment for Disobedience
14p“But if you will not listen to me and will not do all these commandments, 15if you spurn my statutes, and if your soul abhors my rules, so that you will not do all my commandments, but qbreak my covenant, 16then I will do this to you: I will visit you with panic, with rwasting disease and fever that consume the eyes and make the heart ache. And syou shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it. 17I will tset my face against you, and uyou shall be struck down before your enemies. vThose who hate you shall rule over you, and wyou shall flee when none pursues you. 18And if in spite of this you will not listen to me, then I will discipline you again xsevenfold for your sins, 19and I will break ythe pride of your power, and I zwill make your heavens like iron and your earth like bronze. 20And ayour strength shall be spent in vain, for byour land shall not yield its increase, and the trees of the land shall not yield their fruit.
21c“Then if you walk contrary to me and will not listen to me, I will continue striking you, sevenfold for your sins. 22And dI will let loose the wild beasts against you, which shall bereave you of your children and destroy your livestock and make you few in number, so that eyour roads shall be deserted.
23“And fif by this discipline you are not turned to me cbut walk contrary to me, 24gthen I also will walk contrary to you, and I myself will strike you sevenfold for your sins. 25And hI will bring a sword upon you, that shall execute vengeance for the covenant. And if you gather within your cities, iI will send pestilence among you, and you shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy. 26jWhen I break your supply2 of bread, ten women shall bake your bread in a single oven and shall dole out your bread again by weight, and kyou shall eat and not be satisfied.
27“But lif in spite of this you will not listen to me, but walk contrary to me, 28then I will walk contrary to you min fury, and I myself will discipline you xsevenfold for your sins. 29nYou shall eat the flesh of your sons, and you shall eat the flesh of your daughters. 30And oI will destroy your high places and cut down your incense altars and pcast your dead bodies upon the dead bodies of your idols, and my soul will abhor you. 31And I will qlay your cities waste and will rmake your sanctuaries desolate, and sI will not smell your pleasing aromas. 32And tI myself will devastate the land, so that your enemies who settle in it shall be uappalled at it. 33And vI will scatter you among the nations, and I will unsheathe the sword after you, and your land shall be a desolation, and your cities shall be a waste.
34w“Then the land shall enjoy3 its Sabbaths as long as it lies desolate, while you are in your enemies' land; then the land shall rest, and enjoy its Sabbaths. 35As long as it lies desolate it shall have rest, the rest that it did not have on your Sabbaths when you were dwelling in it. 36And as for those of you who are left, xI will send faintness into their hearts in the lands of their enemies. The ysound of a zdriven leaf shall put them to flight, and they shall flee as one flees from the sword, and they shall fall when none pursues. 37They shall stumble over one another, as if to escape a sword, though none pursues. And ayou shall have no power to stand before your enemies. 38And you shall perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies shall eat you up. 39And those of you who are left shall brot away in your enemies' lands because of their iniquity, and also because of the iniquities of their fathers they shall rot away like them.
40“But if cthey confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their fathers in their treachery that they dcommitted against me, and also in walking contrary to me, 41so that I walked contrary to them and brought them into the land of their enemies—if then their euncircumcised heart is fhumbled and they make amends for their iniquity, 42then I will gremember my covenant with Jacob, and I will remember my covenant with Isaac and my covenant with Abraham, and I will hremember the land. 43But wthe land shall be abandoned by them and enjoy its Sabbaths while it lies desolate without them, and they shall make amends for their iniquity, because they spurned my rules and their soul abhorred my statutes. 44Yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, iI will not spurn them, neither will I abhor them so as to destroy them utterly and jbreak my covenant with them, for I am the Lord their God. 45But I will for their sake remember the covenant with their forefathers, kwhom I brought out of the land of Egypt lin the sight of the nations, that I might be their God: I am the Lord.”
46mThese are the statutes and rules and laws that the Lord made between himself and the people of Israel through Moses non Mount Sinai.
The Steadfast Love of the Lord
1hShout for joy in the Lord, O you righteous!
iPraise befits the upright.
2Give thanks to the Lord with the jlyre;
make melody to him with jthe harp of kten strings!
3Sing to him la new song;
play skillfully on the strings, with loud shouts.
4For the word of the Lord is upright,
and all his work is done in mfaithfulness.
5He nloves righteousness and justice;
othe earth is full of the steadfast love of the Lord.
6By pthe word of the Lord the heavens were made,
and by qthe breath of his mouth all rtheir host.
7He gathers the waters of the sea as sa heap;
he tputs the deeps in storehouses.
8Let all the earth fear the Lord;
let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him!
9For uhe spoke, and it came to be;
he commanded, and it stood firm.
10The Lord vbrings the counsel of the nations to nothing;
he frustrates the plans of the peoples.
11wThe counsel of the Lord stands forever,
the plans of his heart to all generations.
12xBlessed is the nation whose God is the Lord,
the people whom he has ychosen as his heritage!
13The Lord zlooks down from heaven;
he sees all the children of man;
14from awhere he sits enthroned he blooks out
on all the inhabitants of the earth,
15he who fashions the hearts of them all
and observes all their deeds.
16cThe king is not saved by his great army;
a warrior is not delivered by his great strength.
17dThe war horse is a false hope for salvation,
and by its great might it cannot rescue.
18Behold, ethe eye of the Lord is on those who fear him,
fon those who hope in his steadfast love,
19that he may gdeliver their soul from death
and keep them alive in hfamine.
20Our soul iwaits for the Lord;
he is our jhelp and kour shield.
21For our heart is lglad in him,
because we mtrust in his holy name.
22Let your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us,
even as we hope in you.
Death Comes to All
1But all this I laid to heart, examining it all, chow the righteous and the wise and their deeds are din the hand of God. Whether it is love or hate, man does not know; both are before him. 2eIt is the same for all, since fthe same event happens to the righteous and the wicked, to the good and the evil,1 to the clean and the unclean, to him who sacrifices and him who does not sacrifice. As the good one is, so is the sinner, and he who gswears is as he who shuns an oath. 3This is an evil in all that is done under the sun, that ethe same event happens to all. Also, the hearts of the children of man are full of evil, and hmadness is in their hearts while they live, and after that they go to the dead. 4But he who is joined with all the living has hope, for a living dog is better than a dead lion. 5For the living know that they will die, but ithe dead know nothing, and they have no more reward, for jthe memory of them is forgotten. 6Their love and their hate and their envy have already perished, and forever they have no more share in all that is done under the sun.
Enjoy Life with the One You Love
7Go, keat your bread with joy, and drink your wine with a merry heart, for God has already approved what you do.
8lLet your garments be always white. Let not moil be lacking on your head.
9Enjoy life with the wife whom you love, all the days of your nvain2 life that he has given you under the sun, because that is your oportion in life and in your toil at which you toil under the sun. 10Whatever your hand finds to do, pdo it with your might,3 qfor there is no work or thought or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, to which you are going.
Wisdom Better Than Folly
11rAgain I saw that under the sun sthe race is not to the swift, nor tthe battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the intelligent, nor favor to those with knowledge, but time and uchance vhappen to them all. 12For man wdoes not know his time. Like fish that are taken in an evil net, and xlike birds that are caught in a snare, so the children of man are ysnared at an evil time, when it suddenly falls upon them.
13I have also seen this example of wisdom under the sun, and it seemed great to me. 14There was a little city with few men in it, and a great king came against it and besieged it, building great siegeworks against it. 15But there was found in it za poor, wise man, and he by his awisdom delivered the city. Yet no one remembered that poor man. 16But I say that bwisdom is better than might, though cthe poor man's wisdom is despised and his words are not heard.
17The words of the wise heard in dquiet are better than the shouting of a ruler among fools. 18eWisdom is better than weapons of war, but fone sinner destroys much good.
Greeting
1Paul, a servant1 of God and aan apostle of Jesus Christ, for the sake of the faith of God's elect and btheir knowledge of the truth, cwhich accords with godliness, 2din hope of eternal life, which God, ewho never lies, fpromised gbefore the ages began2 3and hat the proper time manifested in his word3 ithrough the preaching jwith which I have been entrusted kby the command of God our Savior;
4To Titus, lmy true child in ma common faith:
nGrace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Savior.
Qualifications for Elders
5oThis is why I left you in Crete, so that you might put what remained into order, and pappoint elders in every town as I directed you— 6qif anyone is above reproach, the husband of one wife,4 and his children are believers5 and not open to the charge of rdebauchery or insubordination. 7For an overseer,6 sas God's steward, must be above reproach. He must not tbe arrogant or quick-tempered or a drunkard or violent uor greedy for gain, 8but hospitable, a lover of good, self-controlled, upright, holy, vand disciplined. 9He must whold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in xsound7 doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it.
10For there are many who are insubordinate, yempty talkers and deceivers, especially those of zthe circumcision party.8 11They must be silenced, since athey are upsetting whole families by teaching bfor shameful gain what they ought not to teach. 12cOne of the Cretans,9 a prophet of their own, said, “Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons.”10 13This testimony is true. Therefore drebuke them esharply, that they fmay be sound in the faith, 14gnot devoting themselves to Jewish myths and hthe commands of people iwho turn away from the truth. 15jTo the pure, all things are pure, but to the defiled and kunbelieving, nothing is pure; but both ltheir minds and their consciences are defiled. 16mThey profess to know God, but they ndeny him by their works. They are detestable, disobedient, ounfit for any good work.
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