; 16:1-5 Paul & Barmabas, Mark & Timothy
Acts 15:36-41 · Vern Peterman · Apr 8, 2018
Acts (2017-18), No. 57
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/492619934839

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Good morning We're going to take sort of a How do I say a sideways look at things here? We've been progressing for a number of months now through the book of Acts and wants to take a look at the lives of two young men and that will be looking at John Mark and looking at Timothy and And so we'll proceed using these passages as kind of a springboard for the rest of what we'll be looking at. Our focus today is going to be on these two young men, John Mark and Timothy. We'll talk about who we call John Mark.

You actually won't find those names together in scripture, at least directly, but we'll do that in order to make certain identification briefly. It's been more than 1900 years since these two young men came from the pages of the book of Acts, as Dr. Luke wrote it. And although all those 19 centuries plus have passed, the issues and answers that the Bible sets out here about these two young men are of monumental importance today. And they will be, these issues and the principles brought out, until this world is replaced. Very important things.

We're talking about the men as fathers, physical absence in the case of John Mark, and spiritual apathy in the case of Timothy. So here are a couple of instances where the fathers were either not present, or in another case with Timothy, didn't really seem to care about spiritual things. From every evidence that we have, John Mark did not have a physical father in his life. We see that first in Acts 12, 12, where we see that the house where everybody was gathered belonged to John Mark's mother, whose name was Mary.

As I mentioned last week, one in every five women in Israel was named Mary, right? So this was no surprise. You got another one. John Mark's mother. She owned a home large enough to hold a number of guests, but there didn't appear to be a husband, for her case, or a father in the picture. We don't know how long that had been the case, but it could have been for quite some time.

Timothy, on the other hand, was the product, the offspring, of a Greek father and a Jewish mother. Scripture makes that clear. Timothy's Greek father, from any evidence that we have, was spiritually apathetic. He did not care what Timothy's upbringing was, what his genetic background was. He didn't care to do anything. What would have been the proper thing to do would be to have Timothy circumcised on the eighth day since his mother was Jewish, but that Didn't seem to matter, and we'll find out even more clues that Timothy's father was spiritually apathetic, didn't care.

So there are lots of insights for us to gain from this, lessons to be learned in our examination of John Mark and Timothy, and how things worked out with these two, right? What key men in their lives did, and things that we can draw from today. So there are insights here for marriages, and for parents, for church leaders, even the health of society, and for law enforcement, legislators, and voters.

Can you imagine that? We almost never bring that up here at Holy Hills, but yes, even that. And we have along with that pictures of Hassan's and Juliet's children that we've happened to label. And if you've got everything started with the letter A, you're off to a good start. So these are therefore, now what I have to figure out is in the pictures that showed up on Facebook on Juliet's webpage, there's a couple of other kids and you might have noticed that there's a question mark or two as to who the others are. So I have to find out what that's all about since the picture just showed up this last week. So I'll be asking, I'll try to let you know as soon as I find out. Nonetheless, we have all these insights here with lots of application. God began providing these critical insights, we'll be taking a look at briefly here, way back in Genesis chapter 1.

So here are some examples of why some of the issues that we see here are exceedingly relevant. There's been a lot of hand-wringing, and understandably, about the mass shootings that have been taking place in the United States. Do you know they've tripled in the rate of mass shootings since 2011. So we have a whole bunch of that happening. What's interesting is people will try to, well, we need to do this, and we need to do that.

95% of the mass shooters are young males from 1982 up until February, the statistic runs. One of those was a male and female combination, but otherwise it's Male only shootings. Young males, all of them lacked a present and involved father in the home. No exceptions. Isn't that something? That's the common denominator. And scripture has an answer for this here. Scripture has some insights for us because scripture describes what's needed. And it starts at the very beginning of the Bible.

Dr. William Farrell, who I don't think he has a Christian message per se, but he's written a book entitled The Boy Crisis. You can see more brief presentations of that. He's got a number of videos on YouTube. But he brings to the front, the highlights, the crying need for a real father involvement in the families and our culture, and the huge problems from the fathers who are MIA, missing in action. It's a biggie. But here's a part of the problem. People want to say, well, we need to fix it. Well, guess what?

You can't fix it without the biblical insights. And the biblical insights go back to the root of the problem. God is the one who created the male and female from the beginning. If we have what appears to be prominently and predominantly a male action problem here, it goes back to what's the root. God is the one who created the male and female. Let's take a look at, here's an example, the angel released Peter from the prison that was under the authority of the Sanhedrin.

This is in Acts 12.12, and when he, Peter, realized this, he went to the house of Mary. That is, that the angel had let him out into freedom.

See, initially he just thought he was having a dream, right? Oh, I'm not having a dream, right? So when he realized this, he went to the house of Mary. There's another Mary, right? It's the mother of John, John Mark, where many were gathered together and were praying. So it was a large house. She was apparently well off, but no father in the picture. It was her house.

And that's the mother of John Mark, as we're calling John, who was also called Mark. This is the first mention of John Mark, although it's not the first place that he shows up in the Bible. So here from the passage that JD read for us, I'll look particularly at verses 37, 38, and 39. And Barnabas was desirous of taking John called Mark along with them also. So this is the beginning of the second missionary journey after Paul and Barnabas had been on their first journey.

Paul kept insisting they should not take him along. who had deserted them at Pamphylia and had not gone with them to the work. And there arose such a sharp disagreement that they never spoke to each other again. Is that what happened? No, it's not what happened. Such a sharp disagreement that they separated from one another, they went different paths. And Barnabas took Mark with him and sailed away to Cyprus.

So here's John who was called Mark. The book of Acts says John who was called Mark is identified three times by that, this passage being the second in which he was so identified. Except for Acts 15.37, he was either called John or Mark in the rest of the book of Acts and in all the rest of the New Testament books and letters. He does, in fact, show up in multiple places.

We're going to learn about a great deal of momentous things from what Scripture records about John, who is also called Mark, and about Barnabas and Saul, who will be Paul, and about ministry as we proceed through the book of Acts here. So Paul had proposed that he and Barnabas go back to the cities where they established the churches and appointed elders. And what's interesting is when Paul and Barnabas went through those cities initially, they went through the way and they established the churches through evangelism and they made a loop back and appointed elders at each one of those places and What's interesting is as you look at those and as we go through the book of Acts Paul again goes back to all those churches again on his second missionary journey and he does so again on his third missionary journey and So he doesn't just start them and leave, he comes back and continues to check on them, to help give them what they need. So we're going to see that pattern as we continue through the book of Acts. His summary purpose is to see how they are, how are they doing, what's going on. So more detail about what actually took place on that visit became evident as we went through Acts chapter 16 and as we'll see some more as he returns to those places.

So Barnabas wanted to take John Mark. A few things to know about him. John Mark had come along as a helper to Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey. And so this is recorded for us in Acts 12 and 13. John Mark and Barnabas are cousins. So that's the other thing that you don't see from the book of Acts. They're cousins. There's a family connection here.

Since Barnabas was a Levite, and this is Acts 4.36, and by the way, that passage tells us, one, that Barnabas was a nickname. His real name was Joseph, right? Joe. So, but Barnabas was a nickname, it meant son of encouragement.

He was a Levite, that is, of the tribe of Levi. Usually what that meant was of the tribe of Levi, so at least eligible for temple service, to do everything that the law spells out except for what is reserved for the priests who are the ones handling the sacrifices. So everything else the Levites would do. So John Mark could have been a Levite or in line to be a Levite as well since he was a cousin. So, by the way, of the Levites and the priests, they had to be age 30 before they actually took on the role. So Barnabas may well have been someone who did Levitical duty in the temple and was well aware of it. John Mark may have been someone younger and in line for that.

But John Mark had bailed on, as we see the New Testament puts it, Dr. Luke wrote it down, he bailed on Paul and Barnabas. And this was recorded for us in Acts 13. And it was that that caused Paul great hesitation. So there was sharp disagreement. Paul and Barnabas were both fine with going back to the churches they had established. So that part of the plan was fine, right? We're going to go back to the churches, we're going to see how they're doing. How they're doing as they carry on this bodybuilding ministry, right? The point at which they had sharp disagreement is bringing along Barnabas' cousin John Mark. Not him! Right?

The one who bailed on them, the one who deserted them on their first missionary journey. So here you have as a map on page two, this was the journey that they ultimately took starting off from Antioch, One end and I won't point to it here because you can't see where I'm pointing right so Antioch at the upper end there So they start on Antioch.

That's the beginning place for Paul's second missionary journey They would go through Tarsus and what's very interesting is Paul is from where? Paul is from Tarsus But there's very little described in the book of Acts about what goes on there. So they pass through Tarsus on the way to these cities of Galatia that we see written of and spoken about. And so that's the path that Paul takes. Then we have the rest of the information about Paul's second missionary journey, but it's looking ahead to this journey that is the point of Paul and Barnabas heading separate directions.

So as we look at this, at the very last part in verse 39, it says, and there occurred such a sharp disagreement that they separated from one another and Barnabas took Mark with him and sailed away to Cyprus. Now what do we know about Cyprus? One, it's an island as you see there on the map on the bottom part and the map in your handout. So it's an island and that happens to be where, why do they go back to Cyprus? That is where Barnabas is from, right? And so Barnabas takes them basically to be with him during that time.

So what, one of the things that we see happening is where Paul and Barnabas have a sharp disagreement. One of the things they didn't understand is God had a separate ministry for each of them in mind. And that showed itself up as a sharp disagreement, not to the point that they wouldn't talk to each other again, not to the point where they turned from friends to enemies, but certainly on this point, you know, how are we going to carry out this missionary effort? Paul went one way without Barnabas and without John Mark, taking Silas with him. And Barnabas, the son of encouragement, went to another place. So, since they had this disagreement, one of the things that we would consider there, did this cause a train wreck?

And the answer is no. These events do not, in fact, damage the relationship between Paul and Barnabas, and we're going to see evidence that they, in fact, remain friends. Paul wrote favorably of Barnabas, but what's amazing is later on he speaks even more favorably of John Mark and that's what's astounding and that's the point of our looking at things here Paul later wrote with respectful admiration about Barnabas 1st Corinthians 9 6 We see that, and then John Mark, there's actually three places. These are all later on and towards the end of Paul's ministry. He writes favorably, very favorably, about John Mark. Let's take a look at some of those. Colossians 4, 10 and 11.

Aristarchus, my fellow prisoner, sends you his greetings and also Barnabas Cousin Mark, about whom you received instructions, if he comes to you, tell him to go away. Right? No. If he comes to you, welcome him. What? Yeah, that exact same guy. Welcome him. What happened such that Paul would actually say, welcome him? And as we're going to see, write other favorable things.

Here's Philemon 23 and 24. He says, Epaphras, and this Philemon is one letter, it is one chapter long, which is why you don't see chapter numbers, but just the verses. Epaphras, my fellow prisoner in Christ Jesus, greets you, as do Mark, that's this Mark here, Aristarchus, Demas, who we find out later bails on Paul, right? And Luke, the one who wrote the book of Acts and the gospel of Luke, my fellow workers. So he has Mark as among his fellow workers here.

And now we have 2 Timothy 4, 9-12. It says, Make every effort to come to me soon. He's writing to Timothy directly. For Demas, having loved this present world, has deserted me. This is the same word for John Mark earlier. Demas has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica.

Thessalonica is a place we're going to read about. as we proceed through the book of Acts very shortly, and that's the believers there, the ones who received the letters, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians. And Crescens has gone to Galatia, Galatia being the place where the churches at Galatia were located. The letter to the churches at Galatia is written to that place. And Titus to Dalmatia, where he found Dalmatians?

No, probably not. Okay. By the way, Dalmatia is also called Illyricum. And Lindy, have you gone there yet? Or you're soon to go there? You've been there. So she actually went there. It's Dalmatia and Illyricum, which are just across the Adriatic from Italy. So anyway, same place, and I have no idea whether they have a lot of Dalmatians there or not. I haven't checked that out.

But we read in verse 11, only Luke is with me. Pick up Mark and bring him with you. So here's, by the way, so we ask the question, did Timothy and John Mark ever meet? The answer is yes, right? And here's one place where it's clear that they did. Pick up Mark and bring him with you, for he is useful to me for service. Only Dr. Luke is with me, and if you're coming, bring John Mark, too.

Isn't this amazing? Isn't this amazing? So Barnabas had a restorative ministry with his cousin John Mark, who later became a useful assistant, as it turns out, not just to Paul, but also to Peter. Faithful to the end Paul would soon take on Timothy and put him into useful service at least in the context that we had here So that began and as JD read for us in Acts chapter 16 at the beginning there So we have the outcome with John Mark so in the end we have the Apostle Paul who did not want John Mark along in a second missionary journey and who was not a direct part of John Mark's restoration to faithful service writing about John Mark.

Welcome him. He's a fellow worker. Pick up Mark and bring him with you for he is useful for me for service. John Mark became a valued man for the Apostle Peter. Peter calls John Mark his son. And he means that in a spiritual sense, not in a physical sense.

John Mark wrote the gospel of Mark with Peter as a Sponsor if you will so you actually have this John Mark who bailed Who bailed on Barnabas and Paul and Paul said I'm not going anywhere with him asking for John Mark and ultimately having John Mark alongside Peter writing the gospel of Mark and There is Acts 16, 1-5, which describes, as J.D. read for us, the selection of Timothy and how that began.

And it said very early on there, here is Timothy, he had a Greek father, a Jewish mother, but he had not been circumcised. So Paul then circumcised him, and I won't show you a picture of that. So, we said before Timothy was half Jewish, and so we illustrate that here with this. Timothy's mother and grandmother, also believers, taught Timothy out of the Old Testament.

So that's how he got it, not from his Greek father. His Greek father didn't care to have him circumcised. His Greek father didn't care to teach him. He was spiritually apathetic, so far as we could tell. But Timothy's mother and grandmother were not.

So one of the things I think is we see the importance of fathers and the role of fathers in the life of Timothy and in the life of John Mark. We see what happens when they either are not present or don't take their proper role. But it also says, aside from those opportunities, there are opportunities within the church body. to grow people in areas where they've not had background and exposure. I think that's one of the great things about the church. We have between the Holy Spirit and the Word of God and the body of Christ, there is a way to fill in either what was not present at all, as in the case of John Mark, apparently the father was not in the picture, or in the case of Timothy, where the father was present, but apathetic. There are opportunities for ministry within the church body in that regard.

One of the things that it says, it describes Timothy as a disciple. And one of the things we saw early on and will continue to see is from Acts chapter 6 on into chapter 21. The word disciple or disciples will continue to show up and there's actually one place, you know how Jesus said in Matthew 28, 19 and 20, go and make disciples. Paul is actually the one who actually fulfills it using that exact same word, make disciples.

There are two points for us to keep in mind along the way. Being a disciple as it is used in the Gospels has almost nothing to do with what it means here. Why is that? In the Gospels, there were rabbis and disciples, right? And the focal point was the law and it was based on traditions there in the land of Israel. And it was only among the Jews. Here, A disciple is used for males, females, Jew, Gentile, and so here is Timothy. It's got a different definition as it's used for the church and among those in the book of Acts. Here, including Timothy, this word disciple is used, and he's a young believer, right?

It has nothing to do with the law. It's entirely by grace, not by that. But he is circumcised. Why? Not to comply with the law, but so Timothy has an opportunity for ministry with the Jews. That's why Paul circumcised him. Not to comply with the law, but to make an opportunity for Timothy to have ministry with the Jews.

Being a disciple in the rest of the New Testament, Acts 2 on, is about learning and knowing Christ and depending upon Christ so as to bear fruit by dependence. It is not about our best efforts. One of the things you'll see in the Gospels is you'll hear statements, unless you do this you can't be my disciple. If you're going to be my disciple, you must do this and this and this, including carrying your cross daily and all those kinds of things.

You won't find that in the book of Acts. Not regarding church-age believers. They're not under law, it's not about Jews, and it's not in the land of Israel. And Jesus told them days before he went to the cross, and none of you is to be a rabbi. No more rabbis. because Christ is the teacher.

Let me present one more thing here. Peter called John Mark his son. Paul even called Timothy his son. Let me suggest to you that parents have an opportunity to make disciples. of their children. In the Book of Acts, New Testament sense. Parents have an opportunity to make disciples of their children. As a matter of fact, what we would say from this, fathers are some of the most important disciple makers.

Here's 1 Corinthians 9, 19-23, and we won't go through all of it. But Paul wrote this, he says, Though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all, so that I may win more. To the Jews I became as a Jew, so that I might win Jews. To those who are under the law, as under the law, though not being myself under the law, as Paul under the law. No, he is not. He is simply using it as a point of ministry with the Jews, that I might win those who are under the law. This is why Timothy was circumcised. Not to comply with the law, not because Paul was sliding towards legalism, but simply as a matter of saying, I will do this in order to maximize my ministry among the Jews.

So what we see here is this passage is just the beginning of the spiritual growth and training of Timothy. Because of God's Word, we know more about what happened to Timothy than most of the apostles. Timothy is mentioned in the book of Acts all the way into chapter 20. Timothy is mentioned in a number of Paul's letters. But it's just the beginning of showing us how God used Barnabas to disciple John Mark, and he used Paul to disciple Timothy. The sharp disagreement had a purpose. Here's the big picture of how Paul brought Timothy along in the faith.

And there are a number of things for us to learn from this. One is these are also parenting principles. And so the learning has three stages. One is learning and watching, and that learning and watching being by instruction and example. And then practice with guidance.

So here's what would happen. Initially, Paul would bring Timothy along, and Timothy would watch. Oh, here, this is how this is done. Next, Timothy, would be able to carry out the things that he'd been seeing an example of, things that he had had instruction on, and watch it, he would watch it, or be watched by and be guided by Silas, in some cases, and Paul. And so those two would give Timothy some instruction and guidance along the way. and then finally putting in to practice what's been learned unguided. And we see that sequence. So what we see, and we can summarize, there's a transition then from being mentored to being in a place of mentoring others.

Take, for example, in the instance of Timothy. Here is Timothy. He's being initially mentored, brought along by Paul. And then it turns around, Paul is in prison in Rome under house arrest. But what does he do? He sends Timothy to Ephesus. This takes boldness to correct the false teachers. Initially he's being taught and then he is teaching others.

In some cases, Timothy is being taught by watching Paul do various things, but you can imagine other times. Here's the Apostle Paul, and he's working on the tents, right? By the way, we're going to talk more about the tent making later, but that's chapter 18, I think. Anyway, so here you can imagine, here is Paul, and he's making tents, and he's showing Timothy.

Now look, you know, take that, yeah, cut along the pattern line there. Good. Give me the all, would you? You know? Okay, and then meanwhile, then he's instructing Timothy on various things. as they go along. So you can see that and then turns around Timothy then teaching others. But the interim stage was there initially practicing with guidance. The next thing, and we see this throughout Paul's letters and even beyond, first Timothy is imitating mature believers.

He's seeing the example and Paul himself lay himself out as an example. And then living as an example. and working towards that, okay, then as an example to others. Paul was in Thessalonica. He wrote the first and second Thessalonians, and one of the things that he did is he said as he wrote to them, he says, I am an example to you, but you're also an example to others. So there is an opportunity to turn around and be an example.

Spending time with the examples, those people who are examples, and that's one of the things that must happen initially. Spending time with those who are examples, and of course that fits parenting as well, but then inviting imitators. The Apostle Paul says, imitate me as I imitate Christ. That's not a superficial imitation as if it were an acting job.

Then growing towards faithfully passing on the faith. Paul writes to Timothy and he says, these truths that you have learned from me among many witnesses, you in turn teach those to faithful men who will in turn teach others. Right? So that's the sequence that he looks for. Growing in maturity all along the way. Certainly when Timothy was a young believer and first under Paul, he had a lot to learn. But let's ask this question. Was Paul done learning? No. Not at all. Growing in maturity, and you notice we take that arrow all the way across, right?

Growing together as a church body. There is an aspect of spiritual growth that's individual, and then there's another aspect I would say the central passage on that is Ephesians 4, 11-16, that talks about growing together as a church body. One of the reasons why we gather together, one of the reasons why we're going to go downstairs afterwards, many of us, in order to have a fellowship time, is that's a part of growing together as a church body.

So we're going to see more about Timothy as we proceed through this. We'll see even more about Timothy as we go through the rest of the book of Acts and especially up to chapter 20, although Timothy doesn't drop off at that point in time. Even in the book of Hebrews, the author of Hebrews says Timothy is getting out of prison, right? And so that's towards the end or even after the life of Paul. His name shows up in seven of Paul's letters. Two more are written directly to Timothy, 1 and 2 Timothy, directly to him. The author of Hebrews wrote of Timothy in Hebrews 13, 23 and 24, take notice that our brother Timothy has been released, that is from prison, with whom if he comes, soon I will see you. So here's Timothy, he is even going to prison at the end, which didn't happen initially, but did happen eventually.

Now, I have a story to tell that's like that. See this fellow whose picture I have up at the corner there? And this building that's in front of us here? That's where Nancy and I went to community college. So spring of 1971, this fellow by the name of Dick Ewing, who was working with the students up there at the campus, he said, Vern, you're afraid to teach, aren't you? I said, yeah. He said, you shouldn't be. You mustn't be. You need to be unafraid, and you need to get out there and teach.

Of course, that was only a few months that I invited Nancy to a Bible study, and as Courtney puts it, that was a Christian pickup line. But anyway, so it's a cool thing to look at it and say, okay, here is, in my instance, a hesitancy to move into ministry. And here's a man who came along and said, hey, you need to move into this area and grow in this area and not be timid. And so this is how it gets worked out. It gets worked out among us within the body of Christ.

It gets worked out as principles for parents. and all the rest of us, because you notice within the church body there are all sorts of opportunities to encourage other believers along the way and to be involved in ministry in their lives. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you as we look at this passage, as we ponder the different things in our lives. Where you are speaking to us where you're working in our hearts We thank you for these things that offer us guidance and offer us even hope where things have not gone along in some ideal way still nonetheless you have us put into service and You have us have ministry with one another we thank you for those opportunities we thank you for the insights we have into the lives of John Mark and Timothy and with some rough things in their earlier lives working out in such a way that you're glorified and we just give you thanks for these special and precious truths we pray in Jesus name amen