Our society appears on the outside to be a very religious society. We see churches in every village, our history contains a clearly Christian foundation. Even studies asking people about their faith show that over 90% claim to believe in God. Certainly most people try to do good, to improve their lives and the lives of others. Yet few have actually accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Savior and truly live for him daily.
In Acts 17, Paul arrived in Athens and started proclaiming the message there. As more and more heard him talk, he was brought up before the Areopagus, which was sort of a clearing house of religious ideas. They were up on all the religions of the day, but weren’t familiar with Paul’s message of Christ crucified. They wanted to hear more.
As Paul is waiting to address them, he sees a statue, an idol, to the “unknown God.” That would be Paul’s argument. He said, “what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you” and he proceeded to share his faith in a very powerful way (Acts 17:22-23).
As I was thinking about this, if 90% of the people in America today claim to believe in God, yet very few have actually accepted Jesus Christ as their saviors, then perhaps we live in a time, like Paul found in Athens, where there seems to be an unknown god. Lots of people believe in this unknown god, but they don’t know him as the living God who created everything, who loves them deeply, and who waits patiently, eagerly awaiting the time when the people will return to Him.
Paul boldly and powerfully proclaimed this unknown God to the people. It’s time we do the same.
In Acts 17, Paul arrived in Athens and started proclaiming the message there. As more and more heard him talk, he was brought up before the Areopagus, which was sort of a clearing house of religious ideas. They were up on all the religions of the day, but weren’t familiar with Paul’s message of Christ crucified. They wanted to hear more.
As Paul is waiting to address them, he sees a statue, an idol, to the “unknown God.” That would be Paul’s argument. He said, “what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you” and he proceeded to share his faith in a very powerful way (Acts 17:22-23).
As I was thinking about this, if 90% of the people in America today claim to believe in God, yet very few have actually accepted Jesus Christ as their saviors, then perhaps we live in a time, like Paul found in Athens, where there seems to be an unknown god. Lots of people believe in this unknown god, but they don’t know him as the living God who created everything, who loves them deeply, and who waits patiently, eagerly awaiting the time when the people will return to Him.
Paul boldly and powerfully proclaimed this unknown God to the people. It’s time we do the same.
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