LIFE LESSONS
FRIENDS OF PAUL: PRISCILLA
MOTHER’S DAY
DR. JIM DIXON
ACTS 18:1-4; ACTS 18:24-26
MAY 14, 2006
“A woman of noble character, who can find?” “She’s worth far more than rubies.” “Her husband has full confidence in her and lacks nothing of value.” “She gets up while it’s still dark.” “She gives food to her family.” “Her arms are strong for her tasks.” “Her lamp does not go out at night.” “She opens her arms to the poor and extends her hands to the needy.” “She is clothed with strength and dignity.” “She can laugh at the days to come.” “She speaks with wisdom.” “She watches over the affairs of her household.” “Her children arise and call her blessed.” “Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all.”
We are approaching a very exciting time in the life of our church. The atrium should be completed sometime in June and the chapel should be completed sometime in July. We are looking forward of course to the completion of both of these facility spaces and we know they are going to enhance our service of Jesus Christ. We want you to know that if you have made a commitment financially to either the chapel or the atrium or both, we are running a little bit behind. We want to encourage you to be faithful in the commitments made and also to ask those of you who have not yet given to these important structures in our ministry to consider making a special gift. We want to be faithful in our stewardship and we appreciate your support.
This is Mother’s Day and of course we want to honor and express gratitude to all moms so I would like to ask that all moms would stand up. (Applause.) Our time is just a little bit tight, so I just want to honor one mom since we have had baptisms at the first service and dedications at this service. I want to honor the mom who has most recently had a child. The newest mom. I would like to ask that all moms who have had a child this past year to please rise. Quite a few of you have. Now stay standing if you have had a child in the last ten months. Eight months? Six months? Four months? Two months? We are getting down to it. Seven weeks? Six weeks? Five weeks? Four weeks? This morning? You gave birth this morning? Just kidding. Three weeks? Two weeks? One week? One is still standing. Four days! WOW! That is awesome! Mark has a special gift for you. If, by the way, you feel like you are the mom with the most kids here today or you’re the mom who has been a mom for the longest period of time today and you feel like you’re getting robbed this morning, you can come up and see what you can get out of Mark after the service.
We’re coming to the end of our series on Life Lessons from biblical people this morning and today we look at the last in that series and in the Friends of Paul series we come to the person of Priscilla. Priscilla is mentioned in six different passages in the New Testament, and they are all kind of scattered about and they’re all kind of relatively brief. For our scripture this morning, I want to take a look at two such passages in the Book of Acts.
The Skinopoio were people, a group of people who lived throughout the Roman world, throughout the Greco Roman world. These were people of a particular trade. They worked with leather products. They worked with goat hair, cilicium, a special type of goat’s hair that came from Silesia. They used leather and they used cilicium to make tents. They were members of the Skeino Poi Noi, the tentmakers. They were much valued in the Roman world because the Roman armies had need of tents and many members of the Skeino Poi Noi, it is believed, were given Roman citizenship thereby. It’s possible that the Apostle Paul and his family, being members of the Skeino Poi Noi, were thereby granted their Roman citizenship.
The Bible tells us that Paul had two friends who were also members of the Skeino Poi Noi, and their names were Priscilla and Aquila. Priscilla and Aquila were wife and husband. They were married and you never see one mentioned without the other.
This morning. We look at Priscilla and Aquila and particularly at Priscilla as it is Mother’s Day, and we have three life lessons. The first life lesson concerns the subject of hospitality. You see in the biblical world, the two people most known for their hospitality were Priscilla and Aquila. They were famous for their hospitality in all the churches. When Paul came to their home in Corinth, they invited Paul to stay at their house and Paul stayed for 18 months. They must have thought, “We never should have asked him,” but they had hospitality. When they came to Ephesus Paul stayed with them again and Apollos, the great orator, the great leader of the early church, the cultured Alexandrian, also stayed with them. In fact the Bible tells us in Romans 16 that the Church assembled in the house of Priscilla and Aquila and so their gift of hospitality was huge.
I think God would ask us this morning how we’re doing in this area, this area of hospitality. How are we doing with regard to our home? How are we doing with regard to this church and this church home? The word hospitality comes from the Latin, “hospice,” which means, “guest.” It also comes from “hospitalus” which means, “home for guests.” The early church gave friendly and free welcome to guests.
By the year 400, virtually every church throughout the Christian world, every Church throughout Christendom, every church throughout the Roman world, built a hospice. Can you imagine a world where every Christian Church built a hospice? Those hospices gave friendly and free welcome to visitors be they friends or strangers; anyone who was a guest. They were given free food by the Church and free lodging by the Church. They were given free clothing if needed by the Church. Many poor people came to these hospices which were administered by the Church.
By the time we come to the Crusades, virtually all the hospices throughout the Christian world were administered by religious orders. For instance in the region of the Holy Land, all the hospices were administered by the Knights of St. John who were called hospitalers. The hospices still gave free and friendly welcome to all guests. Anyone who came was given food, clothing, and lodging. After the Crusades, the picture began to change as sick people and infirmed people and people who had been injured came into the hospices and they began to be treated and cared for. Out of the hospices came modern-day hospitals. Initially all of that service, all of that treatment given to the sick and the infirm was free, given by the Christian Church.
Of course today the hospital picture is a little bit different. Many hospitals today are of course still fulfilled by Christians or Christian organizations but none of them are free. In fact medical care can be very costly. Barb and I had breakfast yesterday with my mom and she was laughing. She wanted us to see something. She showed us a bill that she had received from the doctor’s office where she had some tests run. They charged her $25 for a prostate exam. My mom thought that was kind of funny. I think that is funny for a woman of any age, certainly a woman of age 93. Obviously, we live in a world where everyone is trying to make a buck and maybe sometimes not in an entirely honest way although I am sure that was an innocent mistake. But, you see, hospitality means, “free.” Free welcome, free food, free lodging, free clothing, FREE. It has to do with the way you treat guests. And so we have to ask ourselves how we are doing as a church.
I read some time ago the story of St. Bartholomew’s Church in New York City. It is on 5th Avenue. Maybe some of you have gone there. St. Bartholomew’s is an Episcopalian Church. The story that I am about to tell you is a true story. The man who came into St. Bartholomew’s sat in the third row in a Sunday Service. He had a hat on. The usher came to him and said, “Sir, we’re about to start the worship service. We do not wear hats here at St. Bartholomew’s when we worship the Lord so would you please take your hat off?” This man stood up. He greeted the usher, and he was really friendly, shook his hand and was really nice but he left his hat on.
So they sent the Head Usher to talk to this guy. The Head Usher said, “Sir, I hate to remind you again but we’re very close to starting the worship service. You’ve got your hat on and you need to take it off.” The man got up and again he was very friendly. He shook the hand of the Head Usher, and he was very nice, but he left his hat on. The Episcopal Church thought, “Let’s try something else. Maybe he’ll listen to a woman, so they sent the Head of the Women’s Association up to him.” She said, “Sir, this is an Episcopal Church, and we don’t wear hats during worship. We just ask you please, respectively, to take your hat off.” He stood up and greeted her. He was very friendly and shook her hand but again left his hat on. Finally they sent the Senior Warden to him. The Senior Warden came to him and said, “Sir, I hate to be firm, but the service is just now going to start. Please, you must take your hat off.” Again this man stood up very friendly, shook the Senior Warden’s hand but left his hat on.” When the service did start, he took his hat off.
After the service, the Senior Warden came back up to him and-said, “Sir, I’m sorry we had to be so firm with you. I hope you are not offended. We just wanted to make sure you understood.” The man said, “Hey, no problem. I am a member here. I’ve been a member here for years and no one has ever even said hello to me but today I decided to wear my hat and I got to meet the Usher, the Head Usher, the Head of the Women’s Association and the Senior Warden.”
Kind of a strange story but I suppose it is true that sometimes churches are not very friendly. We want to be friendly, but I hope you understand if we are going to show hospitality it is in your hands. It is up to you. When people come in these doors, if they get a friendly welcome, if they feel loved, if they feel valued, if they find friends, it is up to you. I hope we are doing well. I hope you take this seriously every time you come to church that we would be like a 1st Century church, and we would give friendly welcome.
Of course we seek to show hospitality in all of its forms. We have Manna Ministries here in the church where we do give food and clothing and some medical care to the needy. We support relief organizations in the inner city, and we support relief organizations all over the world because we want to be hospitable. We want to give expressions of our love for free. We want to show hospitality.
I hope in your home that you are using your home for ministry and that you invite people, neighbors, friends and strangers to come into your house. That’s what the early church was like. In the Roman world, virtually every home had a triclinium. A triclinium consisted of three couches in a “U” shape. Each couch held three people so the triclinium could hold nine people. It was a common saying in the 1st Century that throughout the Roman world all the tricliniums in Christian homes were full, that Christian homes had full tricliniums. That is what everyone said because of all the hospitality. I know it is sometimes inconvenient in a busy world but oh, there’s power in friendship, power in hospitality, power in demonstrations of love and reaching out to others.
In 1963 Billy Graham came to Los Angeles. It was the great L.A. Crusade. The L.A. Coliseum is a huge sports stadium but in 1963 when Billy Graham came, that stadium was filled with more people than any time prior to since. One hundred and thirty-four thousand people jammed the inside of the
L.A. Memorial Coliseum and twenty thousand people stood outside – 154,000 people. I was there because I was a counselor at that 1963 Billy Graham Crusade in L.A. I was just in high school. It was a privilege for me. When Billy Graham came to Los Angeles in 1963 to do the Crusade, some member of the clergy who were very liberal asked for an audience with him. They met with him, and they said they were concerned that he had such an old-fashioned gospel. Their fear was, he said, that he would set the church back 50 to 100 years. I love the response of Billy Graham. He just smiled and he said, “I need to apologize to the Lord because I promised the Lord, I would seek to set the church back 2,000 years!” Of course is it not true that there’s, at least in a sense, ways in which we need to return to that 1st Century spirit. I think hospitality is one of those ways. We need to become like Priscilla and her husband Aquila who opened their home and indeed their church to visitors.
The second life lesson this morning from Priscilla concerns courage. I want us to take a brief look at the subject of courage. Priscilla and her husband Aquila were renowned for their courage. Paul tells us in Romans, Chapter 16, that “Priscilla and Aquila risked their necks,” Paul said, “to save my life.” Paul tells us that their courage was renowned through all the churches.
Priscilla and Aquila had been banished from Rome by the edict of Claudius. They knew persecution. They were people of courage. We don’t know exactly how they saved the lives of Paul. We know that they did, and we know that their own lives were in danger. In the early church you needed courage to live for Christ. It was not easy to be a Christian in the Roman world and of course for centuries the Roman Empire was hostile to Christianity.
We live in a world today that honors courage. The Congressional Medal of Honor is given to people of courage, normally military people, but in 1999 it was given to Rosa Parks who showed courage in Montgomery, Alabama when she refused to get off that bus and she launched the Civil Rights Movement. As she was given the Congressional Medal of Honor in Washington, D.C. in 1999, President Clinton was there, members of the African American community from Andrew Young to Jesse Jackson. They were there but they wanted to honor her courage. We are in a nation like that. We give the Silver Star for courage. We give the Bronze Star for courage. In Great Britain they give the Victoria Cross for courage. In Germany, the Iron Cross. The world honors courage. But did you know, God loves courage? God looks for courage amongst His people. Heaven honors the courageous. That is why we; had Hebrews, Chapter 11, last week when we looked at heroes. God honors the courageous.
You can travel to Israel, and you can go to the Valley of Elah. You can stand there as Barb and I once did and you can see where the Philistine champion, the Giant Goliath, challenged the nation of Israel. You can see where the shepherd boy, David, approached Goliath in combat. You can almost hear the words. You can hear Goliath say, “Am I a dog that you should come to me with sticks? Do the men of Israel mock me to send a child against me?” You can hear Goliath say to David, “Turn back, lest I feed your flesh to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field.” You can hear the response of David as David says to Goliath, “You come to me with a sword, a shield and a spear. I come to you in the name of Jehovah Sabbaoth, The Lord of Hosts, the Almighty God of the Armies of Israel whom you have defied. This day the Lord will give you into my hands. I will smite you and the world will know there’s a God in Israel.” Is there any wonder that God loved David? Is there any wonder that God had a special place in His heart for David? Any wonder that God called David because, of course, David had courage. I think we need courage today. Oh, do we need courage today to live for Christ in this nation, in this culture, in this world.
I know many of you have heard to Polemicus. I think in world history there’s no more tragic era than the era of the Roman gladiators. It began in the year 264 B.C. and extended to the year 404 A.D. – 668 years Roman gladiators fought in hippodromes and amphitheaters throughout the Roman Empire. They were given weapons and they fought to the death, seeking to kill animals and each other. Hippodromes such as the Circus Maximus in Rome. Amphitheaters like the Flavian Amphitheater, better known as the Colosseum in Rome. A tragic era. You can drive into the city of Denver, and you can see Invesco Field at Mile High, and you can see Coors Field. You can see the Pepsi Center and you might think, “Oh, it reminds me of the Roman era with the amphitheaters and the hippodromes but don’t make that mistake. It is very different. You see, in the Roman world it was all about death, an effort to satisfy the blood lust of the Roman masses. It all came to an end in 404 A.D. That is when Polemicus, the Christian monk, the humble Christian monk, went out on the floor of the Flavian Amphitheater, the Colosseum, and he said, “NO MORE!” In the midst of a gladiator combat, he shouted out, “NO MORE! NO MORE BLOOD! God grieves in heaven. Life is precious. NO MORE!”
The crowds shouted and the gladiators were riled up and they attacked Polemicus, and they killed him, ran him through with a spear. He feel to the ground and the crowds silenced. It was the beginning of the end for gladiator combat. The Spirit of God just descended and changed the Roman world. Courage.
Is there anything you will take a stand against? Is there anything you will take a stand for? Long ago I grew tired of counselors who told me to keep silent on sensitive issues in our culture. They always would cloak their counsel with words like wisdom and discretion. It really had more to do with business than wisdom. It is not easy, I think, for any of us to seek to be faithful to the Word of God when Judeo-Christian values are eroding. I think it takes courage to obey. I think it takes courage to share your faith and tell another human being about Jesus. I think it takes courage to be salt and light in the corruption and darkness, but Jesus warns us, “If salt has lost its saltiness, what good is it? It’s left to be trampled underfoot by man.” “You’re the salt of the world. You are the light of the world, the salt of the earth. Be faithful. Have courage.” In every generation this is a virtue valued by Christ and exemplified and modeled by Priscilla.
Thirdly and finally we will look at Priscilla and Aquila and the subject of leadership and specifically women in leadership. There is no denying that Priscilla and Aquila were leaders. The church met in their home in Ephesus and perhaps also in Corinth. Paul tells us in Roman 16 that their leadership was known throughout the Christian world. Priscilla and Aquila were educated in the scriptures and actually able to instruct Apollos, the great orator. The great leader of the 1st Century Christian movement was instructed by Priscilla and Aquila as we are told in Acts, Chapter 18. Incredible as they expounded to him the way of God more accurately.
People kind of marvel at how, when the Bible mentions Priscilla and Aquila, Priscilla’s name comes first four of the six times mentioned. That is a marvel. You see their names six times, always together, but four of the six times Priscilla is mentioned first in the original language. This just was not done in the Greek world. It was not done in the Roman world. It was not done in the Jewish world. You never mentioned the wife before the husband but rather the husband before the wife. That was just the way of things 1n patriarchal society. Even today we have our traditions. Is it not rare today for a man to take the maiden name, the family name, of his wife? I have done over 500 weddings in my ministry, and I’ve never seen the groom take the maiden name, the family name, of his wife. We are Jim and Barbara Dixon, Mr. and Mrs. James Dixon. You do not call us Mrs. and Mr. Barbara Batt. That would be okay, but it would be rare, right? If we did that it would say something about us, wouldn’t it? It would say something about us.
Of course in the Roman world and in that Greek and Jewish world, the husband’s name was always said first. How strange that four times Priscilla is mentioned first. Scholars debate this. Why? Maybe she came from a very wealthy almost royal family. Or maybe she was more prominent in the early church. This latter view is what most Bible scholars believe. Priscilla was more prominent in the early church. The true leader. The churches met in her home and even when Apollos was corrected, her name is mentioned first as she was able to expound to him the way of God more accurately, a leader and a woman. The Bible scholar Harnak has suggested along with others that maybe Priscilla actually wrote the book of Hebrews in your Bible. It is speculation but possible. Certainly, she was a woman in leadership. A tough subject though, even today. A tough subject biblically.
This past week Barb and I were up at a conference in Estes Park for pastors in our denomination. This church is affiliated with the Evangelical Presbyterian Church. We discussed a problem that exists with regard to women in leadership. Apparently, the Presbytery of Florida has sent an ascending overture of the General Assembly recommending that women no longer be ordained as teaching pastors in the EPC. I don’t think there’s any way that this overture will prevail, but it has come from a Florida Presbytery where they no longer want women in leadership. In our denomination nationally, there have only been five women ordained as teaching pastors in the whole nation and three of them have been ordained right here in our church and were members of our staff. One was Joy O’Halloran who was ordained to the Gospel Ministry as a military chaplain, a member of our church in love with Christ. Another was Donna McClelland, the head of our Women’s Ministries. We ordained her as a denomination Presbytery and Church. She loves Christ and she is still serving Christ elsewhere today. Of course the third was Ramona Spilman on our staff today. We thank God for Ramona and her gifts. So in our denomination this church, incredibly in my opinion, is kind of almost viewed as renegade and rebel. We are not seeking to be. We just want to honor the gifts that the Holy Spirit gives and the call of God on the lives of people, be they men or women.
It is a tough subject and of course within evangelical Christianity today you see some polarity, some division. There are traditional evangelicals and more contemporary evangelicals with regard to women in leadership. Of course the controversy is all around the Greek word “hupotasso” which means, “submission.” There is no denying biblically that at times women are encouraged to be submissive in the context of the home and the church. In contemporary evangelical circles, those passages are viewed as accommodations to patriarchal cultures so that the Gospel might have credibility. Contemporary evangelicals point out, for instance, I Peter, Chapter 3, where Peter tells wives “to be submissive to their husbands.” He says, “In order that though they do not obey the word, they may be one without a word by the behavior of their wives when they see reverent and chaste behavior,” suggesting that submission is for the sake of evangelism in light of the culture. There is no doubt that as Paul employs women in leadership, he seems to do it differently in different parts of the world depending on the subcultures.
Of course traditionalists, traditional evangelicals, point out that oftentimes a women’s submission is viewed as a beautiful thing in the sight of God and that is true. It is also pointed out biblically that men and women at times are encouraged to submission. It is all beautiful in the sight of God. Even the Son of God willingly submitted to His Father.
These are tough subjects, really, really tough subjects. Of course the Bible is clear that men and women are equal in the sight of God. Both reflect the Imago Dei equally, the image of God. Both are co-heirs, equal heirs, “sunkleronomos,” equal inheritors of the grace of life and of heaven itself, equal. And yet not the same so this is a tough, tough subject but I know this. There are times as I go through the scriptures, I find myself kind of agreeing with the traditional perspective and there are times as I go through the scriptures and kind of find myself agreeing with the contemporary perspective. I approach it all with fear and trembling because I want to honor God’s Word. I want to honor His Word, but I know this. I know that today when you see certain kind of chauvinistic types try to kind of straitjacket women through biblical proof texting, almost inevitably they grieve the Holy Spirit, because you see the Holy Spirit gives gifts. He gives gifts to women and to men. The Spirit of God issues call into ministry and the God issues a call into ministry for women and men. We never want to ever get to the place where we do not honor God’s call and God’s gifts.
I do believe if Paul were ministering today as opposed to 2,000 years ago and in this culture, I believe Paul would use even more women in leadership. There is no question in my mind. I think the Bible is delightfully unpredictable. So many people want to put God in a box, and He keeps breaking out. The Bible is just delightfully unpredictable. You look in the Book of Judges and you see God raising up the leaders of Israel and who did He raise up? A woman, as God raises up Deborah and endows her with the gift of prophecy and appoints her judge by His divine call so that all of Israel must come before her for judgement and arbitration, men, and women alike. I’m sure that must have put a frown on the face of some men. Maybe a smile on the face of some women. I think a smile on the face of God as God is delightfully unpredictable and of course He can’t be put in a box. We want to always honor His gifts and His call. That is what we are going to seek to do and what we have sought to do here at Cherry Hills Community Church.
I had the privilege for six years of being on the Board of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, the national board. On that board I made a number of friends, and one was a guy named Danny Lotts. Danny Lotts was a dentist. He was a man who loved Jesus Christ and a lot of fun. Danny and I would kind of hang out together at national board meetings. Danny’s wife is Ann Graham Lotts, one of the daughters of Billy Graham. Barb and I would have dinner with Annie and Danny sometimes. We got to know them. Whenever we had our national conferences on Sunday mornings, I would speak but almost always on Saturdays Ann Graham Lotts would give the teaching. The quality of my preaching just paled when compared to the excellence of her teaching. The gift in her is just so powerful and strong. She is so anointed.
She told us that once she went and spoke to a group of Baptist pastors. She stood in front of them, and she opened in prayer. When she opened her eyes, they had all turned their chairs around and had their backs to her because they wanted to let their position on women teaching be known. I can tell you that to do such a thing as that is to grieve the Holy Spirit. To do such a thing as that is to deny the gifts that God has given her. To do such a thing as that is to deny the call of God. You do not want to make that mistake. Even if you are very traditional, you do not want to make that mistake. You do not want to deny what God is doing and so we seek to be open here and I hope that you would be open too.
We look at people like Priscilla and we see amazing things. We see someone who demonstrates hospitality. We want to be that way, more loving and more welcoming. We want to be like someone who demonstrates courage and oh how we need courage today. We see someone also who demonstrates leadership, and we want to be open to God’s gifting. Let us look to the Lord with a word of prayer.