So does anyone here still actually listen to the radio anymore?
Wow! So, you know, when you try to— just what? No. Yes. So have you— you know, when you're trying to tune the radio, and it's not so much anymore as the old-fashioned ones, but you know what it's like?
You turn the dial and at first all you get is noise. And maybe if you're of the generation that only streams music, you've never had to hear this horrible noise that comes in when you're trying to tune it. But there's also lots of old movies that you could be watching that talk about the old time radio. And it sounds like this.
Yep. I went to a DJ website. Just so you know.
I didn't know there was such a thing.
Yeah, yeah, you get the idea, right? Yeah, that noise, static, crackling, competing signals. If you keep moving the dial You might get half a voice coming in and a little bit of music, but without any of it really coming in clearly, right? But then you just keep wiggling, and then just a slight adjustment, and suddenly it's clear. The sound comes in.
It's recognisable. You can actually hear what's being said. But here's the thing: the signal was always there. It didn't just suddenly appear. It didn't get stronger.
You just tuned into it. And I think for many of us, that's exactly what our spiritual lives sometimes feel like. Not silence, more like static or just noise. So the question that we are going to try and answer today is: are we actually tuned in? To hear God.
So first, I want to start with a game. Okay? So all of you have to close your eyes and you cannot open them until I tell you to open them. And remember, God knows when you're cheating.
So close your eyes.
I'm going to make a sound and you're going to try and guess what the sound is without opening your eyes when you get an answer. Okay? Because otherwise you'll see the other ones. Keep your eyes closed.
Okay.
Well done! What's that? What's that?
Yeast. Well done. Okay, David, I need your help here. You can open your eyes. I need you to come up, okay, and play some music.
I'm going— keep your eyes closed. I said David can open his eyes. So I'm going to make some more sounds, but now David's going to be playing loudly at the same time. And Nick, you're back there, can you just keep like clapping at the same time? Just make noise back there, okay?
Ready, go! Clapping, clapping, clapping. Listen for what I hear.
Did you hear that one? Keep going.
Thank you. You may open your eyes. Could you hear those last ones? I was pouring water into a cup. I dropped a book.
Sorry, Scott Hamilton. And I was tapping on the table. But it was hard to hear, right? Because there was all this other noise going on. You guys had no problem when it was quiet, right?
Yeah. So much harder to focus on what you're listening to when there's other stuff in your head. So sometimes God is speaking, but our lives are so full of noise that we miss his voice. And that's why we need to slow down, to be still, and to listen. But our lives are full.
They're full of busy schedules, constant notifications, opinions, worries, responsibilities, and somewhere in all of that we are saying to ourselves, "I can't hear God's voice." And because of that, we might jump to conclusions like, "Maybe he's just not answering me," or "Maybe he isn't even listening to me," or "Maybe I've done something to— that's stopping me being able to hear him." In other words, maybe my sin is getting in the way of God's voice. But what if God is speaking to you and you just aren't hearing him? What if we just can't hear him through all the noise? So today we're going to begin a new series. I know I said I wasn't going to do a summer series, but God had other plans.
So we're starting a new series and it's called Scent. And we'll be walking through Acts chapter 13, where we see a shift in the early church from being primarily a gathered people to becoming a people who intentionally participate in God's outward mission. So when I say that, people participate in God's outward mission, when I say that it sounds like action, right? It sounds like there's movement. Like something is happening, like something is being done.
But what's really interesting is this: even though this chapter marks the moment where the church begins to move outward in a new way, the storey doesn't actually begin with activity. It begins somewhere else. So before there is any sending, before there is any going, before anything is done, There is a posture the church takes. The storey doesn't begin with action, it begins with attention. It begins with the people who slow down long enough to listen.
So let's look at Acts 13:1-3. Now in the church at Antioch there were prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Menon, who had been brought up with Herod the Tetrarch, and Saul. While they were worshipping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, 'Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.' So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and sent them off. So just before we start digging into the scripture, I think it's a good idea to just review some of the background about the church in Antioch.
So Antioch was the third largest city in the Roman world with a population of around 500,000 people, and it was known as the Queen of the East. It stood as a major trade crossroads connecting routes to the north, the south, and the east, and through its nearby port to the west, giving it access to the wider Mediterranean world. This made it a hub of movement and influence. And the city was incredibly diverse and multicultural, home to Greeks and Romans, Jews, Africans, Asians, and many others. Now at the same time, it was religiously pluralistic and deeply idolatrous, filled with the worship of many gods.
Because of its diversity, influence, and connectivity, Antioch was the perfect place for a mission-minded church. Because it was positioned to reach people from all backgrounds and to send the message of the gospel out into the wider world. Antioch was a launching church, not just a local church. It was also the first major church where both Jews and Gentiles came together, and it was a church that reflected the diversity of the city it was in. This early church was a launching pad for global mission.
The church in Antioch had all the marks of a missional church, which you would see if you had read all the way through chapter 11. This church was effective in its evangelism because it was deeply engaged with the culture around it. They were willing to break through barriers to reach Gentiles and refused to isolate themselves from the world. They communicated the gospel with clarity, proclaiming Jesus as Lord in a way that made sense makes sense to those outside the Jewish context. And this movement wasn't led by famous figures, but by ordinary unnamed believers who simply lived with faithful obedience.
No platform, no recognition, just a willingness to share the good news. And ultimately their effectiveness came from God's power, as the Lord's hand was with them, just says Acts 11:21. Resulting in many people turning to the Lord. But evangelism was only the beginning. The church also practised dynamic discipleship.
Barnabas and later Saul came alongside these new believers to strengthen the church through accountability and encouragement and teaching. They ensured the work was genuine, built up people in their faith, and grounded them in the truth. This meant that growth, growth was not accidental, it was intentional. Antioch was not a comfortable church, but it was a strategic one, and at times it was definitely a pretty one. Instead of withdrawing, they engaged their culture, and their mission was driven by ordinary people, and their growth was the result of God's power working amongst them.
This was a church that listened for God, embraced diversity, focused outwards, and was willing to be sent. In the end, Antioch stands as a picture of a diverse, Spirit-led, sending church that actively engaged its culture and carried the gospel outward as it fulfilled its God-given mission.
So that's your background on Antioch. So now as we look at the first 3 verses of chapter 13, the first thing that we see is that the church in Antioch was a church that made space. So notice who was there. There were prophets and teachers, It says there was Barnabas there, Simeon, Lucius, Mana, and now he had been brought up with Herod the Tetrarch, and then there was Saul. So like last week with Axa, there was a name here that stands out because of the detail attached to it.
Mana is described as someone who grew up with Herod, not just an acquaintance, but he was actually thought of as a foster brother, raised in the same environment as Herod Antipas, the ruler who had John the Baptist executed. That means Menon likely came from privilege, from influence, and from inner circles of power. And yet here he is, not in the home of someone of influence, but in a prayer gathering, not wielding political authority, but serving as a prophet and teacher in the church. His storey quietly reminds us that the gospel reaches everywhere and it draws in people from every background, those from the margins and those from the centres of power, and it brings them together into one community. And what were he and the others doing?
Well, we know there were a few things that they weren't doing. They weren't strategizing. They weren't brainstorming outreach ideas. They weren't trying to figure out how to grow the church. What they were doing was worshipping.
They were fasting. They were listening. They created space to hear. And that's important because most of us don't struggle to hear God because he's being silent. We struggle because we are too full.
Too full of calendars, full minds, full lives. In other words, we are full of the noise of life and it makes it difficult to tune in to God, to be able to hear him clearly through the static of being full. And when everything is full, there's no room left to hear. The church in Antioch intentionally made space to be with God, not to get something from him, but simply to be with him. Because when we don't take the initiative to make space to be with God, we're likely to miss what he might be doing or what he might be placing right in front of us.
It's like when your favourite song comes on that radio that's tuned in, but yet you don't even realise it. The song is playing, the one that you usually sing and dance around the house to, but there's someone talking to you on the phone, the kids are in the other room fighting, the TV's blaring, whatever. There's noise coming from every direction, and the song ends up just playing and you don't even notice. You never stop to listen. You miss it completely.
Not because it wasn't playing, but because we couldn't hear it over everything else. And that is often true for us with God. It's not that God isn't speaking, it's that our lives are so full and so loud and so crowded that we don't even notice. We say God isn't speaking, but the reality is that we haven't created any space to listen, and because the distractions then make it impossible to hear.
So the next thing we see in this passage is a church that practised surrender. Verse 2 says they were, they were fasting. In scripture, fasting is the voluntary choice to go without food for a time, not as a religious performance, but as a way of deliberately refocusing the heart on God. It is a physical expression of surrender. By setting aside something as basic as food, believers are saying with their bodies what prayer says with words.
God, we depend on you more than we depend on anything else. And throughout the Bible, fasting shows up in key moments when people are seeking God's direction, repenting of sin, or longing to hear his voice more clearly. In Ezra 8:23, the people fast and pray for protection on their journey. In Jonah chapter 3, verses 5 to 9, the city of Nineveh fasts as an expression of repentance returning back to God. In Joel 2:12, God calls his people to return to him with fasting and weeping.
And here in Acts 13, the church in Antioch fasts as they worship, pray, and listen for God's leading before sending out Barnabas and Saul. It wasn't about impressing others or trying to earn God's attention. Jesus makes that clear in Matthew chapter 6, verses 16 to 18. It's not —something done to be seen, but something done before God in humility. It's about quieting the static so the heart can tune in again.
And when you step back and you look at what fasting is doing in scripture, a pattern begins to emerge. It's not just about going without food. It's about learning to recenter the heart. It reorders our attention away from what usually fills it and turns it back toward God. It's a way of saying, God, we are listening, we are dependent, and we are available.
In other words, fasting doesn't just change what people are doing, it changes the posture they are living in. The church in Antioch was not gathered to strategize or make plans for ministry. They were gathered for worship, to be present with God. And that shows us something important. Before we do anything for God, We are first called to just be with God.
Our first course of action must always be to surrender ourselves to God, both as individuals and as his church. But that's not how we tend to like to operate. We want plans. We want clarity. We want action steps.
We want to know what should we do. We're not comfortable with waiting on God. We want to feel like we're doing something. Because that makes us feel as though we're in control, or that we have— that we're making progress, or that we've accomplished something. But God often begins somewhere else.
He calls us to listen and to slow down and to trust that he is already at work even when we don't yet see the way forward. Because before God shows us what to do, he invites us to hear his voice. And before we can follow him with clarity, We have to learn to trust him in surrender.
The third and final point that we're going to discuss today is that the church in Antioch was a church that heard God. So out of that place of worship, fasting, and prayer, the Holy Spirit speaks: Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them. So do you see how the direction came after the devotion? How clarity came after surrender? God spoke into a space they had already prepared.
But also pay attention to something that he does and doesn't say. He doesn't give them a detailed plan. He doesn't lay out a 5-step strategy. He calls them to set aside people, or a work, a mission that will take them out. Barnabas and Saul are being sent beyond the walls of the church into new places, new people, new territory.
This is the beginning of the church's first intentional missionary movement. They are not waiting for people to come to them. They are being sent to go and meet people where they are. And just as important as the calling is the response, because the church doesn't resist it. They don't cling to their two best leaders and say, um, let's think about this for a while.
They don't argue about whether or not sending Barnabas and Saul out in mission will benefit their particular church. Instead it says, then after fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them and sent them off. They lean in further, they pray again, and then they release them. The whole church gets behind what God has said. They recognise that this isn't Barnabas' and Saul's mission, it's God's mission, and he has placed a call on their lives to go out in obedience.
The role is not to control the mission, but to participate in it. This is what it looks like to be a church that hears God. Listening, hearing, and then responding in obedience being willing to be sent. Because when God speaks, he doesn't just inform us, he invites us to join him in what he's already doing in the world. And here's what's beautiful about the example the church in Antioch models for us: when they heard God, they responded.
They prayed, they laid their hands on Barnabas and Saul, and they sent them out. Mission flows from listening, not the other way around. They didn't go first and then hope God would bless it. That sounds like obvious, but how often do we do something and then say, "Really hope God gets on board with this and blesses this," right? They didn't go first and hope God would bless it.
They listened first and joined what God was already doing. So what does this mean for us? Well, it means that we can feel encouraged by the work we've been doing in developing the spiritual ears through our weekly exercises. The prayer and the reflection that we do on our own, and the prayer discernment journey that we're— that people here are participating in. Because what is described here in Acts 13 closely models what we are doing in our church.
We are coming to understand that before we can be a sent church or a missional church, we must first become a listening church. A church that carves out time to be quiet and still with God. Not just on Sunday mornings, but every day. And not just out of duty, but because it's how we tune in. So remember that static?
The signal was already there, wasn't it? But you can't hear anything clearly. But God is not distant. He is not silent. But we often need to adjust the dial.
We need to quiet the noise, and we need to make space. Because a church that truly hears God becomes a church that lives differently, devoted in prayer, guided by the Spirit, and living open-handedly for his mission. So before we go anywhere for God, we learn to be with him. And before we speak, we listen. And before we act, we surrender.
Before we even think about strategy, we start with surrender. We are learning to be a people who tune into God so that we can be a people who are sent out to share his story.
That's exciting.
Like, the idea that God calls us to partner with him in the work that he's already setting up for us.
Like, how awesome is that? Let's pray. Loving God, teach us to quiet the noise within us so that we can hear your voice again. Give us hearts that are attentive, spirits that are surrendered, and lives that are ready to follow wherever you lead. Make us a people who listen deeply and who live faithfully for your mission.
We pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen.
