Bible Passage: Acts 14:21-22
Pastor: Joel Jenswold
Sermon Date: May 22, 2022

Bulletin May 22, 2022

In the name of, and to the eternal glory of, Jesus, .

There is a legal and moral principle called “full disclosure.”  Full disclosure means that in many situations it is required that you tell everything you know about something.  For example, if you are selling your house and you know that every time it rains you get two inches of water in the basement, you are required to tell an interested buyer.  You can’t just keep that as your own little secret.  That’s “full disclosure.”

The apostle Paul believed in full disclosure too.  It wasn’t full disclosure about a house he wanted to sell.  It was full disclosure about Christianity.  It was full disclosure about what following Jesus would be like in this world.  Paul didn’t want there to be any secrets or surprises.  So he gave Christians the honest truth.  He gave them Confirmation Full Disclosure.  (My dear young friends who are being confirmed today, we owe you the same.)

What do we mean by “confirmation full disclosure”?  Here’s what I mean.  In our text Paul is revisiting the churches he founded on the first leg of his first missionary journey.  Paul is making a second pass to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch.  Might not seem like a big deal.  But can I tell you what happened to Paul in these places?

In Lystra, Paul was stoned by an angry mob and left for dead.  In Iconium, there was also a plot to abuse and stone Paul and Barnabas.  But they were able to get out of town before the plot could be unleashed.  In Antioch, a similar thing had happened.  Paul had preached Jesus, and a number of people now trusted in Jesus as Savior.  But once again, there were those who didn’t like Paul’s preaching.  They stir up persecution against Paul and Barnabas and get them kicked out of the district!

Why would Paul want to go back to these hostile places?  Because there were new Christians there!  And their souls needed strength and encouragement.  And so we are told Paul and Barnabas went back to these places strengthening the souls of the disciples (v. 22).  That word “strengthening” could also be translated as “confirming.”  In fact there are ten English translations that translate this verse using the word “confirming.”  “Confirming” means “making strong” or “making firm.”  And in our text, we notice this was “full disclosure” confirmation.  For this is what Paul “disclosed” to these new Christians:  We must go through many troubles on our way to the kingdom of God.” (v. 22)  Paul wanted them to know that Christianity isn’t easy. 

Confirmands, on this your Confirmation Day, there needs to be a little “confirmation full disclosure.”  Now, you are not new Christians in the sense of recently converted, like the people in Lystra and Iconium and Antioch.  But you are young Christians.  And so in the interest of full disclosure I am morally obligated to tell you, “We must go through many troubles on our way to the kingdom of God.”  Between here and heaven, you will go through many troubles.

You need to come to grips with the truth that being a faithful Christian is not easy.  Your love of Jesus will bring you into tension and maybe even conflict in this world.  It makes you the target of bullying and mocking.  Thankfully in our country it has not come to this yet, but the day may come when your faith in Jesus will make you the target of open persecutions.  Paul could show you the scars he had from the rocks in Lystra!

But listen carefully to this text.  We must go “through” tribulations.  How could that not be the case in this world?  This world has been contaminated by sin, cursed because of sin!  This world is populated with humanity estranged from God and one another!  How could there not be tribulation in a world where people hate God and they hate each other?  Such a place could never be a heaven!  But all this is temporary.

But we are passing “through.”  We’re just travelers here.  We will go “through” tribulations until we are finally taken “out of” it all.  That is the wonderful scene in Revelation 7!  John sees the throneroom of heaven and it is filled with people wearing white robes.  And then he is told about those wearing white robes:  These are the ones who are coming out of the great tribulation.  They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. (Revelation 7:14)  There is a way “through” and “out of” all of this!  Did you hear it?  It is the blood of the Lamb!

Today our confirmands wear white robes.  They wear white robes for a reason.  To symbolize that they have washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb.  They are forgiven and clean and pure in God’s sight.  Those robes are also a reminder that they are passing through.  Passing through the destruction and the devastation sin has done to God’s perfectly created world.  This world is like passing through a war zone!  Rubble and bomb-craters everywhere – worst of all is the rubble and the craters sin leaves in human lives.  But we are passing through, on our way to heaven through the blood of Jesus.

My dear young friends, that is what THIS is all about.  All this “church stuff.”  All this “Jesus stuff.”  All the “catechism stuff.”  All this “confirmation stuff.”  All this “communion stuff.”  It is so that you know that the Lord Jesus washes you clean in his blood.  It is so that you trust in Jesus’ cleansing blood.  It is so that you keep your trust in Jesus’ blood and stay close by his side.  It is so that you are always wearing your white robe, through faith.

It is so that you are ready for the greatest full disclosure ever!  That disclosure will happen when you finally pass completely “through” and are taken “out of” this tribulation to be in the presence of God in heaven.  On that day Jesus will fully disclose to you his heaven and his glory and the glory that will be yours forever and ever!  So don’t be shocked or discouraged when tribulations come.  It’s all temporary.  Even now you are dressed for heaven, washed and robed by the holy, precious, innocent blood of Jesus.

Amen.