Keep Watch

Pastor Koay Kheng Hin
26 February 2023

The sermon today continues with spiritual insights that can be drawn from a study of the speech of the apostle Paul to the Ephesian elders on his way to Jerusalem as he finishes his third missionary journey.

We began by painting a portrait of Paul by looking into the first part of his speech in Acts 20:18-27, his emphasis on gospel truth and the expression of that truth in his love as can be seen from how the Ephesian elders loved him (Acts 20:36-38). It was this experience of truth and love that gave him that strengthening grace of God as he went through the trials of life.

Today we will look into the second part of the sermon by covering Acts 20:27-35, altogether 7 verses and draw relevant insights from them to illumine us to the importance of the truth of God in Christ.

²⁷ For I have not hesitated to proclaim to you the whole will of God. ²⁸ Keep watch over yourselves and all the flock of which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers. Be shepherds of the church of God,^[a] which he bought with his own blood.^[b] 29 I know that after I leave, savage wolves will come in among you and will not spare the flock. ³⁰ Even from your own number men will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away disciples after them. ³¹ So be on your guard! Remember that for three years I never stopped warning each of you night and day with tears.
³² “Now I commit you to God and to the word of his grace, which can build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified. ³³ I have not coveted anyone’s silver or gold or clothing. ³⁴ You yourselves know that these hands of mine have supplied my own needs and the needs of my companions. ³⁵ In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ”

I begin with verse 27. The emphasis of Paul was the word “whole”. It is often said that “half-truths” can be as dangerous as lies.

The gospel of Jesus Christ needs to be proclaimed and taught in its totality. “The whole will of God” is a reference to all aspects of the Christian faith.

It is definitely not enough that we are acquainted only with the basics of the Christian faith for we are all called to keep on growing in both objective factual knowledge and subjective experiential knowing.

This is the final exhortation of the apostle Peter in 2 Peter 3:18, “But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ…..”

In verses 29 & 30, Paul gives the reason for his stress on the right comprehension of the whole will of God. He anticipates that in time after he is gone there will be people who will come into the church to “distort the truth”.

It did come to pass as can be seen later in the church in Ephesus where out of the seven churches of Revelation 2 & 3, Ephesus is the first to be rebuked. Revelation 2:4-5 bears this out.

Even though the Ephesians had been diligent in the ministry, showed perseverance, endured hardships and even endeavoured to main doctrinal purity, they had failed miserably in the cardinal gospel truth of having an intimate loving relationship with God in Christ.

They had separated doctrinal truth from love. They had forgotten the Great Commandment of Matthew 22:37-39, that of loving God with all their heart and with all their soul and with all their mind expressed in loving their neighbour as themselves.

They had failed to properly comprehend that theological truth is relational truth, to be read and understood in the context of a relationship.

Theology is not philosophy! They had emphasized the work of God and lost their love for the God of the work.

The distortion of gospel truth is seen presently in the “health and wealth” gospel. Outright heresy is seen in various cults that promote strange interpretations of Scripture.

Examples of such distortion abound these days. An overemphasis on spiritual manifestations, the glorification of men rather than of God, the reduction of gospel blessings to merely the temporal, the burden and yoke of legalism and the over-spiritualization of life is how gospel truth is distorted. These are false teachings.

That is why in verse 28, Paul exhorts the Ephesian elders to ‘KEEP WATCH”, first over themselves and then the flock.

Paul emphasizes the preciousness and importance of the church by referring to it as the church of God and by stating that it was bought with the blood of Christ.

It is my prayer that we are acutely aware of this significant spiritual truth and make every effort to keep the purity of the church in both its doctrine and its devotion, in both its truth and its love, in its theology and its practice, in its belief and its actions, in its character and its conduct.

1 Timothy 4:16, “Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.”

Verse 31 restates the exhortation to “keep watch” with the instruction to “be on your guard”. This warning of Paul reminds us of the reply that Jesus gave to his disciples when they asked him concerning the sign of the end of the age (Matthew 24:3) and begins the Olivet Discourse with verse 4 where Jesus tells them to watch out and not be deceived.

It is noteworthy that the first immediate concern that Jesus brought up in relation to the last days is about truth and deception. May we in these last days be aware that in these last days, the Devil encounters us primarily as a deceiver. So, “KEEP WATCH”!

In verse 32, Paul then commits them to God and his word which can build them up.

Today Indeed, I do commit you to God and the word of his grace. Paul ends his speech with verse 35, drawing them to the expression of a selfless sacrificial life in God, emphasizing the integration of truth and love, of the fact that biblical truth is ultimately relational truth.

To God be the glory. Amen!