Order, Words, & Voices
09.01.24, Eutychus, Acts 20:1-12
Order
Pre Worship Music – Spotify – Open and Close
Introduction/Lighting of Christ Candle Rick
Songs Living Hope Bily/Linda
My Hope Is You
Passage/Prayer Acts 20:1-12 Renee
Song In Christ Alone Bily/Linda
Message Eutychus Rick
Music Goodness of God Billy/Linda
Community Rick
Closing Peace Rick
Closing Music Cornerstone Billy/Linda
Post Worship Music – Spotify – Open and Close
Lighting of Christ Candle (Slides) Rick (Billy softly playing)
[Slide] Introduction: Center of Room, center of us, reminder that Jesus is our center, our core, not our politics, not wars, not conspiracies, not our bank account, not our past, not our future, not anything except our deliverer.
[Slide] Prayer: May the the light of this Candle remind us of our calling to bring light into a world of darkness and hope into a world of despair. This morning and all days to come, may the light be our reminder of true hope.
We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Music (Slides) Bily/Linda
Living Hope CCLI Song # 7106807
Verse 1
How great the chasm that lay between us
How high the mountain I could not climb
In desperation I turned to heaven
And spoke Your name into the night
Then through the darkness Your loving-kindness
Tore through the shadows of my soul
The work is finished the end is written
Jesus Christ my living hope
Verse 2
Who could imagine so great a mercy
What heart could fathom such boundless grace
The God of ages stepped down from glory
To wear my sin and bear my shame
The cross has spoken I am forgiven
The King of kings calls me His own
Beautiful Savior I’m Yours forever
Jesus Christ my living hope
Chorus
Hallelujah praise the One who set me free
Hallelujah death has lost its grip on me
You have broken every chain
There’s salvation in Your name
Jesus Christ my living hope
Verse 3
Then came the morning that sealed the promise
Your buried body began to breathe
Out of the silence the Roaring Lion
Declared the grave has no claim on me (REPEAT)
Jesus Yours is the victory
Jesus Christ my living hope
Oh God You are my living hope
My Hope Is You CCLI Song # 2373672
Verse 1
To You oh Lord I lift my soul
In You oh God I place my trust
And do not let me be put to shame
Don’t let my enemies
Triumph over me
Chorus
My hope is You
Show me Your ways
Guide me in truth
In all my days
My hope is You
Verse 2
I am oh Lord filled with Your love
You are oh God my salvation
Well guard my life and rescue me
My broken spirit shouts
My mended heart cries out
Chorus
My hope is You
Show me Your ways
Guide me in truth
In all my days
My hope is You
Passage (Slides) Acts 20:7-12 Renee
On the first day of the week Paul, his companions, and a handful of other believers, gathered together to break bread, Paul began teaching and soon others joined and were listening.
They were leaving early the next morning so Paul did not intend to preach a long sermon, but he did.
As Paul spoke, darkness set in, thankfully there were many lamps in the third floor room where the crowd listened to Paul.
Among the listeners there was a young man named Eutychus who was sitting on the window sill. Paul spoke for a long time and around midnight Eutychus fell asleep.
While Paul was preaching, the sleeping Eutychus fell out the third floor window and died.
Paul ran down and embraced the young man and said to the others, “Do not be troubled, for there is still life in him.” Paul spread himself over Eutychus.
Eutychus opened his eyes and everyone went back up to the room where Paul had been preaching. They broke bread and ate as Paul continued to preach until daybreak.
Finally, as the crowd dispersed to go home, they took the boy to his house fully alive, and everyone was greatly comforted and encouraged.
Join me in the prayer of Jesus,
Our Father who art in Heaven hallowed be your name.
Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
Forgive us our trespasses, while we forgive those who trespass against us.
And, lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen
Music (Slides) Billy /Linda
In Christ Alone CCLI Song # 3350395
Verse 1
In Christ alone my hope is found
He is my light my strength my song
This Cornerstone this solid Ground
Firm through the fiercest drought and storm
What heights of love what depths of peace
When fears are stilled when strivings cease
My Comforter my All in All
Here in the love of Christ I stand
Verse 2
In Christ alone who took on flesh
Fullness of God in helpless babe
This gift of love and righteousness
Scorned by the ones He came to save
Till on that cross as Jesus died
The wrath of God was satisfied
For every sin on Him was laid
Here in the death of Christ I live
Verse 3
There in the ground His body lay
Light of the world by darkness slain
Then bursting forth in glorious Day
Up from the grave He rose again
And as He stands in victory
Sin’s curse has lost its grip on me
For I am His and He is mine
Bought with the precious blood of Christ
Verse 4
No guilt in life no fear in death
This is the power of Christ in me
From life’s first cry to final breath
Jesus commands my destiny
No power of hell no scheme of man
Can ever pluck me from His hand
Till He returns or calls me home
Here in the power of Christ I’ll stand
Message Rick (Slides)
Impact Celebration/Prayer {Slides}
[Slide] Gennady Podgaisky (back of picture), CBF Kraków, Poland Field Personnel, shares: “These young men and women came to Montreat College in Black Forest, NC, from several different countries last year to study while their parents searched for refuge after fleeing from the war in Ukraine. The youngest one was just 17 years old and has never lived apart from his family. These students are missing their homes, parents, siblings and familiar environment. On our first evening with them we ate Borscht, talked, ate more, talked more, sang more, worshipped more, and ate more. By living close to them in Black Mountain, and helping them to adjust to life in America and to life in college, we are fulfilling our God-given call to be His hands and His feet wherever we are. This works pretty well over a plate of borscht, or two, or for some students even three plates.”
[Slide] Prayer Requests
Pray…
Pray for the Podgiasky family as they transition to work among the Ukrainian refugees in eastern Poland.
Pray for an end to the war in Ukraine.
Pray for displaced Ukrainians around the world as they seek to study, work, and make a life for themselves and their families.
Messageh
An older teen, or young twenty-something, named Eutychus, which by the way means ‘fortunate’, climbs three flights of stairs to a room filled to the brim with kind of weathered, but mostly new, followers of Jesus. They are there to hear from a Jesus follower who had met, in the flesh, Jesus.
These new and old followers wanted to hear as much about Jesus as possible, and hearing it from a genuine and first person eyewitness. They were intrigued about Jesus’ life, but even more, they were amazed at the change Paul’s encounter with Jesus had transformed his own life.
Oddly, this was a risky gathering, Jesus’ followers were persecuted and hated. The act of gathering was an act of defiance, and for them it was a stance they were willing to make.
Eutychus arrived just in time for dinner, but not in time to claim a preferred seat. He ended up sitting in a window. During the dinner, Paul ate but he also reminded them to remember Jesus’ death and resurrection as they ate.
Then, Paul began to speak, he began to preach, his sermon would go on through the night until the sunrise, and he would only end then because he was set to travel.
The crowd of listeners were riveted by the words coming from Paul’s mouth and the first hand passion in his presence as he spoke. They were so transfixed on Paul’s personal testimony of his own transformation that no one noticed that Eutychus had fallen asleep and was about to fall from the windowsill.
By the time the crowd noticed, there was nothing they could do as his body fell to the ground except to run down the stairs to see the lifeless body. Eutychus was declared dead, but Paul pushed his way through the crowd to see the lifeless body.
“There is still life in him,” Paul proclaimed as he stretched his own body over the body of Eutychus. Soon, the young man’s eyes opened and it was obvious that he was now alive.
Then, everyone got up, went back up to the third floor, and Paul continued to preach. As the sun rose and Paul said ‘Amen’ the crowds exited the building and walked Eutychus home celebrating his miracle of life and life in general.
That’s it. Seven verses. Except for the speculations of some religious traditions, we hear nothing else of Eutychus. We do not know if he went on to great things or discarded the miracle as an outlandish dream.
This is a passage that has thrown me, not because Eutychus is raised from the dead. Nor is it because Luke, a physician, declares that the young man was dead, but Jesus declares he still has life in him. It doesn’t bother me that a large group would gather in such a public setting where they, a persecuted people, would be easily seen and identified.
What bothers me is that Luke, the author of the book of Acts, felt that this short story needed to be in his documentation of the early church?
We’ve already seen lives restored in the time since the cross, we’ve seen bravery prevail over risks and threats.
We’ve seen crowds clamoring to hear truth, to see a miracle, to be fed and encouraged, so why this small story filled with repeats of stories we already know?
Why is this story even told?
I think one of the greatest threats to truth is when we do disregard stories that don’t seem to be needed. Or, when we cannot understand why a story is in the bible, or when a story does not make sense or seem to have any purpose of salvation or encouragement. In those moments we let someone interpret the story or we allow someone else to turn the page to a ‘better’ story.
The threat is when we let someone else spoon feed truth to us through their own filters, traditions and history; when we speed through a passage refusing to consider the need to sink our roots in and search – not giving up until we understand and profit from the truth gifted, we miss truth.
I want to share three major theories of ‘why’ this story is included in scripture.
I think there are three primary theories about this passage as well as the reasoning for its inclusion in Luke’s writing.
First – A lesson of warning found in the first example of youth ministry and the first epic fail in the history of ministry to young people.
Reverend JD Walt uses this story to call out the unchanging nature of ministry to youth and young adults in churches. The strategy of ‘group’ mentality where all in this age group need to be isolated and protected from the outside world when the outside world has changed in recent decades.
- The refusal of churches to be willing to make sacrifices and changes of preferred practices and traditions.
- The judgment and condemnation of new societal norms, trends, and behaviors.
- The idea that we can squeeze an old way of teaching into brains that learn and respond in different ways.
- And…that preachers need to talk less and listen more.
- Walt goes on to site a Pinetops Foundation research that has concluded that by the year 2050 the church will have lost 40 million who were raised in the church. Walt refers to this as the ‘Euytchus Crisis’ while Treetops calls it the ‘Great Opportunity’.
A Second theory comes from the Meno Kalisher, pastor of the Jerusalem Assembly in Jerusalem, Israel. Reverend Meon feels that this passage is included by Luke into the story of the New testament church because it is a needed tie to Elijah and Elisha. Both were prophets proclaiming God’s truth and both were used to raise a young man from the dead by ‘spreading’ themself on the body of the deceased. By providing a thread between these two Old Testament prophets and the Apostle Paul, Kalisher says that the power and authority given by God to Elijah and Elisha has also been given to Paul.
The Third theory comes from Dr. H Steven Sims.
- Sims ties the Eutychus in with the plight of marginalized people.
- Eutychus was young and therefore dismissed.
- The ‘church’ wanted him there but they also wanted him to stay in the background and be silent.
- Sims, who is part of a marginalized group himself says, “The chosen leaders may talk incessantly and drive us to death, but they are likely to continue with organizational momentum and keep us (the marginalized) at the margins.
- Sims refers to Pastor Otis Moss’ sermon on Eutychus in which he said that, in our churches, even today, the marginalized are “relegated to the window on the third floor in a room with many candles and consequent heat.”
I have a fourth theory.
- I get this theory from the impact that came out of this moment from the history of the New Testament Church, therefore, our history.
- Acts 20:12 – “The people took the young man home alive and were greatly comforted.”
- Notice, they are not comforted by the meal, the remembrance, or even Paul’s enlightening message. They are comforted and moved by what took place, that a young man that they knew has been transformed from death to life. They were struck with life.
- Listen to how Eugene Petersen interprets this passage in the Message, “When Paul was finished talking, they all left—Paul went one way, the congregation went another way, they led the boy off alive, and they were also full of life themselves.”
This is our challenge, to watch for life, to celebrate life. To not get stuck in death, to not be defeated in death, to not give up when everything reeks of death. This is the purpose of being church.
Music (Slides) Billy /Linda/Pato
Goodness Of God CCLI Song # 7117726
Verse 1
I love You Lord
Oh Your mercy never fails me
All my days
I’ve been held in Your hands
From the moment that I wake up
Until I lay my head
I will sing of the goodness of God
Chorus
All my life You have been faithful
All my life You have been so so good
With every breath that I am able
I will sing of the goodness of God
Verse 2
I love Your voice
You have led me through the fire
In darkest night
You are close like no other
I’ve known You as a father
I’ve known You as a friend
I have lived in the goodness of God
Chorus
All my life You have been faithful
All my life You have been so so good
With every breath that I am able
I will sing of the goodness of God
Community (Slides) Rick
- Fall-Advent Sermon Series, ‘My Eyes Have Seen”, “For truly I say to you that many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.” – Our privilege of seeing and hearing, series will go through Advent, passages on web site, link-‘passages’, Next Sunday- 09.08.24, Present, Genesis 2:4 – 3:8
- CC Crop Walk, Sunday, October 20, 2:00pm, Ruby Grant Park (register for team Grace Fellowship on Web page)
- Instagram, GF link on website (follow @gracefellowshipnorman)
Closing Peace (Slides) Rick
Leader: May the peace of the Lord go with you.
Response: And also with you.
Closing Music Billy/Linda/Pato
Cornerstone CCLI Song # 6158927
Verse 1
My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness
I dare not trust the sweetest frame
But wholly trust in Jesus’ Name
(REPEAT)
Chorus
Christ alone cornerstone
Weak made strong in the Saviour’s love
Through the storm He is Lord
Lord of all
Verse 2
When darkness seems to hide His face
I rest on His unchanging grace
In every high and stormy gale
My anchor holds within the veil
My anchor holds within the veil
Interlude
He is Lord Lord of all
Verse 3
When He shall come with trumpet sound
Oh may I then in Him be found
Dressed in His righteousness alone
Faultless stand before the throne
Order, Words, & Voices 