In the sermon titled 'The Rigors of Ministry,' Peter Allison explores the challenges faced by Paul during his missionary journeys as depicted in Acts 13. Paul encountered both physical and emotional hardships, including dangerous travel conditions and the desertion of his co-worker, John Mark. Despite these challenges, Paul remained steadfast in his mission, focusing on spreading the Gospel. The Jews in Antioch opposed Paul's message, driven by envy, leading to his persecution and expulsion from the region. The sermon emphasizes the inevitability of tribulations in the Christian life, urging believers to endure hardships with the strength provided by the grace of Jesus Christ. Paul’s unwavering commitment to his mission, despite adversity, serves as a model for Christians to focus on their God-given missions and to endure with joy. The sermon also highlights the significance of communal support and divine grace in overcoming the rigors of ministry.

Our scripture is Acts chapter 13, and I neglected to read what I intended earlier. So I'll begin reading at verse 13. At verse 13. Acts 13, 13, Now when Paul and his party set sail from Paphos, they came to Perga in Panthelia, and John departing from them returned to Jerusalem. But when they departed from Perga, they came to Antioch in Pisidia, and went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and sat down.

And after reading the law and the prophets the rulers of the synagogue sent to them saying, men and brethren, if you have any word of exhortation for the people, say on." Then Paul stood up and motioning with his hand, said, Men of Israel, and you who fear God, Listen. I'd like to jump down to verse 42. Well, this morning I jump over his message to pick up in verse 42. At the conclusion of that message. So when the Jews went out of the synagogue, the Gentiles begged that these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath.

Now when the congregation had broken up, many of the Jews and devout proselytites followed Paul and Barnabas, who speaking to them persuaded them to continue in the grace of God. And on the next Sabbath, almost the whole city came together to hear the word of God. But when the Jews saw the multitudes, they were filled with envy and contradicting and blaspheming. They opposed the things spoken by Paul. Then Paul and Barnabas grew bold and said, it was necessary that the word of God should be spoken to you first, but since you reject it, and judge yourself unworthy of everlasting life, behold, return to the Gentiles, for so the Lord has commanded us.

I have sent you as a light to the Gentiles, that you should be for salvation to the ends of the world." Now when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and glorified the word of the Lord. And as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed. And the word of the Lord was being spread throughout all the region. But the Jews stirred up the devout and prominent women and the chief men of the city, and raised up persecution against Paul and Barnabas and expelled them from their region. But they shook off the dust from their feet against them and came to Iconium.

And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit." May we not delay to keep all of His commandments. Heavenly Father, please give us faith to hear Your Word, to believe Your Word, to rest in it, and to obey it. And I ask that you would sanctify my lips, that the gospel of your grace might be proclaimed through a vessel of clay, that you, Lord, might be glorified, that you might increase, and we might decrease. In Jesus' name, Amen. Well, Paul faced many, many hardships in his ministry.

Last week we focused on the invisible enemy, the spiritual warfare that Paul engaged in. And this week we want to examine some of the other hardships that Paul faced and overcame in the course of his ministry. And to learn from Paul's handling and dealing with these hardships. He faced a number of physical and emotional difficulties in addition to spiritual warfare. He had co-workers, as you see, forsake him and leave him to join the other side.

He had enemies mock his abilities. But he also had a number of physical hardships and deprivations that he endured. Our text says, and so we want to look at those this morning and how he dealt with them. We dealt with them. Our text says in verse 13, that they went from Perga to Antioch in Pisidia.

There were some sixteen different cities called Antioch in what we call Turkey, going back to the days of Alexander the Great and the Seleucid Empire. But there are two that are mentioned in the New Testament, Antioch of Syria where they were sent and commissioned, and this Antioch of Pisidia where they preach. Between Perga, where they set out from, and Perga in Pamphylia, and this Antioch that they went to, is some hundred miles of some of the most difficult and dangerous terrain of the Tars Mountains in what is today southern Turkey, with peaks of around 10, 000 feet, very steep valleys with rivers prone to flash flooding. This was a very physically challenging and grueling trip. And it's no wonder John Mark turned back.

He didn't really sign up for these kinds of deprivations. He came from a more wealthy family. His mother had a big house in Jerusalem. And this was difficult. There were a couple of routes that they might have reasonably taken to get from Perga in Pamphylia up to Antioch, a hundred miles away, over through this mountain range.

One was a longer route to the west that essentially went around, a little bit more around the mountains. It was a less rigorous route. Followed a Roman road. And then there was a more direct central route up the Crestos River. And based on what Luke records in Acts 14, 24, the next chapter, on their way back, it says that they passed through Pisidia on their return trip to Pamphylia.

So they basically retraced all their steps coming back. And the route that goes through Pisidia would be the central route, not the western route that would have been longer, but maybe a little less arduous. There are other reasons that Paul probably took this central route, and that is that there were Jewish settlements along that way. And he may have wanted to go through there and stop in there, and may have wanted to use those for rest points and places, because this was a very challenging and grueling journey. It would be today.

And in her day it was no less, probably more. Some commentators suggest that Paul's description in 2 Corinthians 11, where he says that he was in journeys, in perils in waters, in perils of robbers, in perils of countrymen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils in false brethren, weariness, sleeplessness, hunger, thirst. Some believe that he's referring to some of the things that would have happened on this trip. It was a dangerous, generally a dangerous place, not only physically arduous, but dangerous. There were robbers in this area.

In fact, a little bit to the east of this area, Alexander the Great even had difficulty with the robbers and the pirates. And there were just apparently thousands of these, such that a hundred years earlier, the Romans sent Pompeii in to deal with them. To deal with the Roman army. So this is maybe some indication of some of the hardships and difficulties that Paul would have faced. Their trip would have entailed many of these dangers.

So there is the physical hardship of ministry. It's very real. And even though we tend to discount it when we're talking about ministry, it actually has a big effect on ministry. When my folks went to Nigeria, Nigeria is what we might call a bit of a third world country. They don't have the same standards of living, the same expectations.

And there are a lot of just physical challenges. The power is very unreliable, the phone service is unreliable, the post office is unreliable. Most things like that are unreliable. You have people that might set up roadblocks, arbitrary roadblocks to collect tolls and so forth. And so there was, prior to them going there, there were seven, I should say nobody had been able to go there and stay even a year.

But they all come back because of the difficulties, the physical difficulties living in that culture. And so that's what Paul is facing here, and that's probably a big part of what turned John Mark back. But another rigor of ministry is this abandonment by team members. Paul and his party set sail from Paphos. Notice it's Paul's party.

It's now Paul and Barnabas. Paul has taken the leadership on this trip. So they traveled with the team, Paul and his party, it says at sale. There's at least four people, Luke, so Paul, Barnabas, Luke, and John Mark, but probably likely there were a number more. And There's a website that Stanford University recently put together that allows you to calculate travel time and cost traveling around in the Roman world about 8200.

Now that's 150 years later, but it gives you some estimate of what it was like. So it takes into account a number of factors, including the most likely sea routes that they would have followed based on historical records, based on wave heights, and so on. And according to this data, the first missionary journey that Paul took here was over 1, 500 miles. It would have taken 53 days of travel time, just not counting the time that he spent teaching and preaching and ministering, just 53 days in travel. And they weren't flying in 747 airliners with first-class seats.

They were traveling through swamps and crossing streams in the wilds many times. And so this was no little operation going on here. There's at least four and probably a lot more people that are going with Paul, and each person on the team would have had an important role. There were logistics that needed to be taken care of. Food and lodging to be procured.

These basic necessities of life don't just disappear because you're on ministry. They need to do these things. And so each of these team members had a role to play, and the rest of the team is depending on them to carry out their role. And so John Mark's desertion from this team would have posed a hardship and even increased danger to everybody else in Paul's party. In this kind of mission there's not a lot of extra people around.

Everyone is critical And for somebody to just desert them and head in the middle without warning is another hardship. It increased the work on everybody else. It increased the danger that everybody else would have faced. This desertion will come up later, and Lord willing we'll look more deeply into it at that time, but it's clear from the things that Luke says later that this was a significant hardship for Paul, and not one that should be overlooked. And this isn't the only abandonment that Paul had.

He told Timothy in 2 Timothy 4 that Demas has forsaken me because he loved this present world. And he's departed for some other city. So in this case, John Mark left and went back to Jerusalem, which is where his mother lived. The next hardship that we see, and certainly not all these hardships are equally challenging, but the next hardship we see is inattentive hearers. In verse 16, Paul has been invited to say a word.

So the typical process was, if a visiting rabbi or teacher was present, It was customary for the ruler of the synagogue to maybe invite that person to address the congregation. And here was Paul, a Pharisee of the Pharisees. He studied at the feet of Gamaliel. So It's like having an equivalent of an Ivy League education. It didn't make it right.

It was just a prestigious education. Barnabas was a Levite. And so to have men of this caliber present wasn't an everyday occurrence for them. And so after the regular service, and Luke tells what that consisted of, it said they had read the law and the prophets. And there would have been prayers and the creed from Deuteronomy that would have been also probably part of the synagogue service.

And so after their regular service is done, how do you all feel? Well, it's your time, you're ready to focus on something else, right? And that's probably what was going on here. So after their regular service was done, they'd read the law, they'd read the prophets. Then these rulers of the synagogue, there was plurality of them, they saw Paul and Barnabas and his party sitting in the back.

They'd come in and sat down. And they went to them and said, brothers, if you have any word of exhortation, feel free, say on. And so Paul now gets up and he's going to speak, but of course everybody's focus and attention is gone. And they're not paying attention to him, their service is done, they don't really need to hear what he has to say. And so he has to motion with his hand and say, hey, you all listen here, I have some things to say.

And so he's dealing with inattentive hearers, which if you're a teacher, for example, and none of the students are paying attention to you, that's exasperating to say the least. So He stands up and he motions with his hand to get them to listen. He wasn't introduced by the rulers. They didn't set the stage for him. They didn't promote him and so on.

They apparently left him to do that for himself. And then On top of that, he has an unpopular message. You see, because the afflictions and the rigors of ministry aren't limited to the physical realm or the emotional realm. Paul has a message that's inherently unpopular to the Jews. And he doesn't shy away from giving it.

And we didn't read this, but let me read to you Acts 13, verse 26. As he introduces this message, he says, Men and brethren, sons of the family of Abraham and those among you who fear God, so it would be two groups of people, the Jews and the God-fearers, who were Gentiles who came to the synagogue but didn't get circumcised. They didn't go all the way in following the Lord. Amen and brethren, and those among you who fear God, to you the word of this salvation has been sent. For those who dwell in Jerusalem and their rulers, " that's the Jews, "'because they did not know him, nor even the voice of the prophets, which are read every Sabbath.'" Now that's a very strong statement.

Here these rulers don't know the message of the prophets which are read every Sabbath. They just sat through a reading of the prophets. And Paul is saying those rulers in Jerusalem don't know the message that they're reading every Sabbath. That's not a pleasant message to bring to people. He says, those who dwell in Jerusalem and their rulers, because they did not know Him, nor even the voices of the prophets which are read every Sabbath have fulfilled them in condemning Him.

Because they didn't know the message of the prophets, they actually fulfilled the message of those prophets when they condemned Jesus. They have fulfilled them, the message of the prophets, in condemning Him, Christ. And though they found no cause for death in Him, they asked Pilate that He should be put to death. And now when they had fulfilled all that was written concerning Him, they took Him down from the tree and laid him in a tomb. And these people would remember what things had been prophesied about the Messiah.

He was stricken, he was smitten, he was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was upon him, he was despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows, an acquainted with grief, and so on." So that's not a pleasant message to give to them, and we'll see a little later here that it leads to their rejection of Him. That's not unexpected is it? If you give a message like that, you wouldn't be surprised when the people reject you And that's what Luke records in verse 45. After this message has been given, Luke records that the following week, the whole city showed up to hear Paul speak. The Gentiles had begged that these were, after the first week's service, they begged that he would speak to them again.

And the next week, nearly the whole city turns up, Luke says. But when the Jews see these crowds, eager, desiring to hear the Gospel and to hear Paul's message, they're filled with envy, and they begin contradicting Paul and blaspheming. They oppose the things that were spoken by Paul. So here you have people hungry for the Word, hungry for the truth, hungry to be taught, and these Jews then pop up and start contradicting and making it difficult. It's hard enough to explain something, but when you have somebody standing there contradicting and challenging everything that's being said, and that is difficult.

It's a challenge. It's one thing to have a hard job, but it's another thing entirely when that hard job is deliberately made harder and more difficult. The Jews are envious of Paul's success in verse 45. And envious people are destructive people. See, because people who envy are of the mindset that if I can't have what you have, then I don't want you to have it either.

And they will do all in their power to keep you from having what they are envious of. It doesn't make sense. It's not rational, but that's what envy does. It drives people to destroy the object of their envy. The thing that they like even, they end up destroying.

And in this case, it leads them to reject the message that Paul has given and to reject Paul himself. Not because The message is contrary to the Scriptures, but because they were envious of Paul's success with the Gentiles in bringing that message. And so the Jews, in their envy of Paul, and in their rejection of Christ, and the rejection of the Gospel that he preached, they stir up all the people in the city against Paul. They realize they're not powerful enough to do anything to him, so they stir up the rulers in the city, and specifically the prominent women and the leaders, the rulers of the city. And they raise up a persecution against Paul and Barnabas.

And they get them, as a result of their efforts, they are able to get Paul and his team expelled from the region. Luke doesn't give the details of what that persecution was, but they persecuted them, they hounded them, and we can be sure that it wasn't pleasant. We can be sure that whatever they were doing was an affliction, was added to the rigor of an already rigorous ministry. Even if there was no physical torture involved being rejected like this is a challenge. And for many, for some, I shouldn't say many, for some it could be a temptation to discouragement.

To wondering whether they're doing the right thing. But what do we learn from Paul in how to deal with these challenges to ministry. Well, the first thing we see is that Paul's focus was on his mission. His focus was always on the mission that was before him. And so he could push aside all of these challenges, all of these physical, emotional rigors of this ministry.

The mission and completing the task that he'd been commissioned to do and called to do, that was uppermost in his mind. And so Paul wastes no time mourning his rejection at Antioch. He's persecuted and expelled from the region. What happens? He shakes the dust off his feet, and they go to Iconium.

There's never a backward glance, never any time spent in pity or in the temptation to be discouraged. He simply shakes off the dust of his feet and goes to the next city some 85 miles away. This was his attitude that he expressed to the Ephesian elders a few chapters later in chapter 20. He said this, You know from the first day that I came to Asia... So we just read about the first day that he came to Asia in his ministry.

In what manner I have always lived among you, serving the Lord with all humility, with many tears and trials which happened to me by the plotting of the Jews. How I kept back nothing that was helpful, but proclaimed it to you." If you're being rejected and your message is being rejected, there's a temptation to say, okay, I won't bother to give that to you anymore then. But he says he didn't withhold. He didn't withhold. He didn't keep back anything that was helpful to them, but he proclaimed it and taught them publicly from house to house, testifying to Jews and also to Greeks, repentance toward God and faith toward Jesus Christ.

His focus was always upon his mission. Remember when Samuel was rejected by the Israelites and God told him, they haven't rejected you, they've rejected Me. And Samuel's message to them was far be it from Me, that I should sin against God in ceasing to pray for you, but I will teach you the good in the right way. And That's the same focus that Paul has in the face of difficulty, in the face of rejection, in the face of abandonment, in the face of physical rigors, deprivation and so on. And some even believe that he probably had malaria in this time, A disease that would come and go and leave him debilitated.

And some have speculated that possibly that was what drove John Mark, turned him away. You saw Paul laid out with malaria, and yet he was still pressing on on his mission. And Paul goes on to say in Acts 20, and see, now I go bound in the Spirit to Jerusalem, not knowing the things that will happen to me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies in every city saying that chains and tribulations await Me." Now here's His response to all of that. To all of those rigors of ministry. This is what He says.

This was his attitude. This was his focus on the mission. But none of these things move me. None of these things move me. Nor do I count my life dear to myself.

Why? So that I may finish my race with joy and the ministry which I've received from the Lord Jesus to testify to the gospel of the grace of God." That was Paul's undivided focus, to finish His race with joy and this ministry. So we may not have the ministry that Paul has, but we've been given a race to run. And our focus ought to be on finishing that race with joy. With joy.

See, our focus needs to be on the mission that we have been given, to which we've been called. Being a Christian involves tribulation. In this world, Jesus said, we will have tribulation. But be of good cheer, I have overcome the world. Being a Christian father, being a Christian mother, being a Christian husband or wife involves tribulation.

Being a Christian brother or sister involves tribulation. And some people have simply given up on being a Christian because the going got too difficult. And they thought it wasn't worth it any longer. Why should they put up? Why should they cope with all of these tribulations, all of these difficulties, emotional, physical, toils and hardships of being a mother, of getting up ten times a night to take care of a baby, to feed a baby, of the toil involved in working.

Why? When they give up. But Paul said none of these things matter because his focus was on finishing his race with joy. So what we learn here is that we should expect hardships. We should expect hardships.

Paul wrote two letters to his son in the faith and his protege Timothy instructing him on how he ought to behave in the house of God. And he gives him many commands that are relevant to his calling and his mission as a pastor in that era. He was to preach. He was to rebuke. He was to admonish and so forth.

Because all those things were central to Timothy's calling. But each one of those things, he only commands once. But there's one exhortation, one command that he gives to Timothy and He repeats it three times in a very short letter. And you can guess what that command is. Endure affliction.

Endure affliction. Therefore, don't be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord nor of me as prisoners, but you be a partaker of the afflictions of the Gospel according to the power of God. You therefore must endure." That's an imperative. You therefore must endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. Therefore, I suffer trouble as an evildoer even unto bounds.

But the Word of God is not bound. Therefore, I endure all things for the elect's sake, that they may also obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory." We should expect hardship. And we must endure it. We must be ready for hardship. Oftentimes people get waylaid by hardship when they're not expecting it.

It arises. You ever have a pain that you just didn't expect? It catches you off guard and you react. But if you're expecting it, if you're ready for it, then you can deal with it much better. And as Christians, we should expect hardship.

Our mind should be ready for it. We should be armed with the Scriptures and the Word of God to deal with those tribulations. Hardship is a necessary part of warfare. You must endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. And often times, great soldiers do their best, most effective work in the context of the greatest hardships.

Not in the context of rest and ease. The greatest things are accomplished in the context of the greatest hardships. Think of the great military victories that were won through enduring of the greatest hardships. Think of Thomas Jackson's victory at Chancellorsville. It was won because his army endured a hardship that the Northern general thought was too great for anyone to do or to bear.

Hannibal won a great victory because his soldiers endured a hardship that the Roman generals thought no one could endure. Let's see, we are not called to endure hardship as lone rangers. One against the wilderness, as some would say. But we are called to endure hardship with brothers and sisters. Paul traveled with a party of people, and he ministered to churches, and he had his home church and other churches throughout his, as he built other churches and established them, they became part of his prayer network and part of his financial support.

And he also had the people that he traveled with that were his support. We're not called to endure hardship as Lone Rangers. Paul called Timothy to share in the hardships that he endured. We're called to endure hardships as a part of a host of fellow soldiers who will encourage us, who will pray for us, who will assist us, just as Erin and her held up the hands of Moses. We're called to endure these hardships together.

Even Christ took His disciples with Him to pray when He went to the Garden of Gethsemane. He took His disciples with Him. And then He took the three closest disciples even farther with Him. So receive. Receive the help of fellow soldiers and seek to help others as well.

But we're not called to endure hardship alone and we're not called to endure hardship without the grace that is in Christ Jesus. We are called to endure hardship with grace. All of the grace and all of the means and all of the provisions that God has made for us in Christ. You therefore, Paul told Timothy, you therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. He hasn't called us to endure hardship without any weapons, without any tools, but He's made available to us every weapon, every tool, everything that is needed, not only to endure, but to overcome against every weapon that is formed against us.

We're to endure by being strong in the grace of Jesus Christ. This is not grin and bear it. This is not pull yourself up by your bootstraps. This is flourishing in it because we are strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. This is an act of looking to Christ for strength.

It's an act of drawing our strength from Him. It's an act of reckoning every trial a joy, knowing that these trials will strengthen us and will produce perseverance. But I think lastly, we're called to endure hardship so that we might receive a reward. Those that would come to Christ must believe that He is a rewarder, that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. There is, Paul said, a crown of righteousness that is laid up for him.

But he said not only for him, but for everyone who loved the appearing of the Lord. You know, if pagan Roman Kings knew how to reward their generals, and they did. They could give them these elaborate victory celebrations. How much more doesn't the Lord know how to reward His faithful soldiers? So that we can say again with Paul that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that will be revealed to us.

May God give us His grace to focus on the mission, the race, that we might finish it with joy. And to endure the hardships that He sends as good soldiers of the Lord Jesus Christ, who are strong in the grace of God. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your Word that equips us and instructs us, that feeds us, gives to us the right mind, the right understanding. It gives to us truth in all of the lives that are around us, in all of the assertions and experiences that we have encountered.

Lord, Your Word is truth. Your Word will endure, firm and unshaken until the end. We thank You, Lord, for that word. That is sufficient so that we can be thoroughly equipped for every good work. We ask Lord that you would nourish us this morning, that you would strengthen us, that you would equip us for whatever trials, whatever tribulations, whatever calling, Lord, you have given before us.

We pray, Lord, that you might be glorified in our lives, that our mouths might tell of your praise and of your glory, and of your righteousness, of yours only. This we ask in Jesus' name, Amen.