August 25 – Acts 17:24-31

Main focus: Being near Jesus and practicing his way of life always happens in real space and time (i.e. place).

Welcome to week 2 of Humans Being. As a reminder, Humans Being is all about how following Jesus includes learning his way of life and practicing it. Last week we started with an initial take on following the way of Jesus, seeing how Christ’s call on our life is a dual call to repentance and new life in him. This week we begin looking at some of the categories of this new life we receive and learn from Jesus, starting with place.

As a heads up, we’ve got some conceptual ground to cover here, particularly because the sermon text isn’t directly about Jesus per se. Here’s an observation about Jesus’s way of life that undergirds the whole concept of how God uses place in our discipleship (feel free to bring this up somewhere naturally in discussion): Jesus’s entire earthly ministry happened within just three years on a specific piece of land. In fact, that piece of land was about the distance from Raleigh to Charlotte; if you’ve ever traveled out of state, you’ve gone farther than Jesus ever did in his ministry. Think about that! The omnipresent, infinite God of the universe chose to accomplish his plan of redemption on a specific patch of earth two millennia ago, and in his incarnation he took on a humble life of physical and geographic limitations.

Thus followers of Jesus can expect the same. Just as Jesus had a hometown, cousins, a language, family traditions, and a favorite meal, we will too. That’s just what it means to be human. And just as Jesus received his mission to a specific place and time, we will too; that’s what it means to receive his call to follow in his steps. And just as Jesus lived not just on mission to a people but in sincere love for them (ex. Matt 9:36; 23:37), we should learn how to imitate our Teacher.

Now, to Acts 17. Here we find Paul in Athens, which was a giant intellectual and cultural center in his day. Providentially, while there he got invited to the Areopagus, a prestigious open-air building where professional orators made presentations. This was like the 1st century version of TED Talks. There Paul made a remarkably cogent and contextualized appeal for the gospel, and in this appeal he made a comment about place that reflects what we observe in Jesus’s earthly ministry: as human creatures made by God, we receive from our Creator a specific place and time in which to live out our finite lives.

Immediately Paul ties this into God’s plan of redemption, but in discussion we’ll take a beat to consider what it means to live finite human lives in specific geographic limits, or in other words, a place. In every respect we humans tend to buck against our limitations, and placedness is no different. Through the internet we wander through other people’s lives, envying their travels, wishing ourselves elsewhere; many of us stake our happiness on vacations or other mental retreats (i.e. books, movies, porn, etc.); after a few years in one spot we might grow restless, in search of greener pastures elsewhere. But what we receive in Christ is the gift and goodness of our created state as finite creatures in space and time.

And furthermore, as Paul points out in verses 27-28 and 30, God uses this placedness in his plan of redemption. We all meet Jesus at a specific place and time, almost always through close, embodied relationships with friends or family members. God puts his people in the world to proclaim his goodness. To keep developing this thought we’ll turn to Jeremiah 29 to see how God used his people during their exile. You’ll see the little explanatory intro to the question below; here Israel is in exile awaiting their return, and this parallels the life of a Christian awaiting the coming Kingdom of God (ex. “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles…” 1 Peter 2:11). Thus we can see in God’s command to exiled Israel a similar intention for how God uses our placedness.

We’ll close by asking what it would look like for us to likewise put down roots. What would our lives look like if they were characterized by remarkable love for neighbors (literal next-door neighbors), by stalwart commitment to a specific neighborhood or town or city, or by careful avoidance of grass-is-greener urges? What if instead of chasing down our idea of the perfect house, neighborhood, or city, we instead wait on God’s call and stay or go at his pleasure? And how might God use all of this in his plan of bring more people to a knowledge of his goodness?

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