SPIRITUAL SLEEPERS

 

 

Acts 20:6-12

 

Prayer

 

Paul was on his last missionary trip.

Luke was with him.

 

 

They stopped at Philippi and observed the Feasts of Passover and Unleavened       

Bread.

They boarded a ship.

 

 

They sailed for Troas.

This is the second time they made this trip.

 

 

The first trip took just two days (Acts 16:11-12).

This trip took five days.

 

 

Since Passover had just ended, we know it was springtime.

And storms at sea were quite common.

 

 

This probably explains why it took an extra three days to make the trip.

When they finally arrived, they spent a week with the Christians at Troas.

 

 

Luke tells us, “It was the first day of the week.”

This is one of several passages that clearly teach that the early Church

assembled on Sunday.

 

 

The first day of the week is Sunday.

And the disciples came together to break bread.

Some commentators say they had a meal.

Most say they observed Communion.

 

 

It was a special occasion because Paul and Luke were meeting with the         

group;

A special occasion because Paul was preaching to the group.

 

 

We don't know what time he started.

We just know that he preached a long time;

 

 

Too long for a young man named Eutychus.

He wasn't sitting in a regular seat.

 

 

He was sitting way up high in a window in the upper chamber.

Verse 9 calls it the third loft.

 

 

We would call it the third story.

Eutychus was tired.

 

 

He went to sleep.

It was a deep sleep.

 

 

The hours passed.

Paul kept preaching.

 

 

Midnight came.

Eutychus slumped down.

 

 

Then, all of a sudden, he fell out of the window.

That's bad.

He was three stories up.

Verse 9 reads, “He was taken up dead.”

 

 

The fall killed him.

The meeting came to a screeching halt.

 

 

Paul didn't stop for midnight.

He didn't stop because people were falling asleep.

 

 

But he stopped when this young man fell three stories.

And killed himself.

 

 

Paul went over to Eutychus.

He knelt down over him;

 

 

He raised him up in his arms;

He looked up and said, “Trouble not yourselves;”

 

 

“For his life is in him.”

Don't worry.

 

 

His life has been restored,

God has raised him from the dead.

 

 

Now, it's important that I back up to remind you of something.

Luke was there.

 

 

He was a physician;

A doctor by trade.

 

And he is the one who recorded this story.

So when this Holy Spirit-influenced doctor said Eutychus was dead,

 

 

The matter is settled in my mind.

Eutychus died from the fall.

 

 

But when Paul knelt down over him,

And raised him up in his arms,

 

 

His life was restored.

It was a miracle.

 

 

But this was God's doing not Paul's.

What did Paul do when Eutychus was raised from the dead?

 

 

He did what any good preacher would do.

He went back to preaching, of course.

 

 

At some point, he stopped to serve Communion.

They ate a meal.

 

 

Then, Paul preached some more.

Even till the break of day.

 

 

Now, all of us can see bits of humor in this story.

We’ve all heard about long-winded preachers.

 

 

I don't know any long-winded preachers.

And I hope you don’t know any long-winded preachers.

 

But we’ve all heard about long-winded preachers.

One preacher preached too long.

 

 

And one of his church members got up to leave.

“Where are you going,” asked the usher?

 

 

“To get a haircut,” he replied.

“Why didn't you get a haircut before you came,” asked the usher?

 

 

“I did,” he replied.

Now, that’s a long sermon-------or fast-growing hair.

 

 

Another pastor said, “Today, I'm going to preach on YALE.”

“I went to Yale.”

 

 

Y is for the young;

A is for the adults;

 

 

L is for the ladies;

And E is for the elderly.

 

 

It seemed like his sermon on YALE would never end.

But when it was over, one man asked his wife to wait while he went to the     

altar to pray.

 

 

She said, “I don't understand why this long sermon touched you so much.”

He said, “It didn't.”

 

 

 

 

“I just want to thank God that this preacher didn't attend the University of     

Tennessee.”

Can you imagine preaching through all of those letters?

 

 

We can all see the humor in this Bible story.

But there's a sad side too.

 

 

While the preaching was going on, Eutychus was asleep.

And while the preaching is going on today, multitudes are asleep.

 

 

I'm not talking about physical sleep.

I'm talking about spiritual sleep;

 

 

An unconsciousness of the soul;

The natural state of the lost.

 

 

The Bible says the unsaved person is in a state of slumber.

He's asleep.

 

 

But he doesn't realize it.

Today, I want to talk about seven characteristics of the spiritual sleeper.

 

 

1^st---The spiritual sleeper loves the darkness.

Jesus said, “This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and  

men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil”    

(Jn. 3:19).

 

 

Jesus is the Light of the World.

But some people don't want His Light.

 

 

They are afraid it will shine on their sins;

Afraid they will have to give up their sins.

 

 

They are undisturbed by God's command to repent or perish.

They will never attend Church;

 

 

Never listen to preaching;

Never come to Christ.

 

 

They love the darkness.

They don't want to change.

 

 

2^nd---Some spiritual sleepers are dreaming.

Instead of recognizing their eternal peril, they pretend that everything will       

turn out okay.

 

 

They remind me of Samson.

God gave him supernatural power;

 

 

Made him a hero;

Told him to never cut his hair.

 

 

As long as Samson obeyed, he could easily defeat his enemies.

But if Samson cut his hair, he would lose his great power.

 

 

You know the story.

Samson told his secret to Delilah.

 

 

He laid his head upon her lap.

He went to sleep.

He was dreaming that everything was okay.

His enemies slipped in.

 

 

They cut his hair.

He lost his power.

 

 

They overcame him.

It's the same way with the spiritual sleeper.

 

 

He's laid his head upon Satan's lap.

And Satan has him dreaming that everything is okay.

 

 

3^rd---Some spiritual sleepers are content with their condition.

It was this way with the rich farmer.

 

 

He had a great harvest.

He decided to eat, drink and be merry.

 

 

He was content, prosperous and self-satisfied;

God called him a fool.

 

 

God said this night shalt thy soul be required of thee.

This night your possessions will belong to someone else.

 

 

That night, probably while he was asleep, this contented, prosperous,

self-satisfied man died,

And he probably went to hell.

 

 

The spiritual sleeper is under the condemnation of God.

He should flee from the wrath to come;

Run down the isle to confess Christ.

But he’s enjoying his sleep.

 

 

And he doesn’t want to wake up.

But if he doesn’t wake up eternal life will elude him.

 

 

4^th---Some spiritual sleepers attend Church.

Eutychus was in Church when he went to sleep.

 

 

It was a fall from the Church window that killed him.

Unfortunately, sleeping Church members may be in the deepest sleep of all.

 

 

Why?

Because they have joined the Church.

 

 

They are good people by the world's standard,.

They are good-natured;

 

 

Moral;

Polite;

 

Friendly;

Well read;

 

 

Not mean;

Not offensive;

 

 

Not adulterers;

Not extortioners.

 

 

So what's the problem?

They're like the Laodicean Church.

 

 

Neither hot nor cold.

Just lukewarm.

 

 

They have confessed Jesus.

But they haven't changed.

 

 

Folks, if we haven’t changed something is wrong.

If we haven’t changed how can we say we’ve been born again?

 

 

How can we say we are a new creation?

Lukewarm is not acceptable to Jesus.

 

 

Jesus said, “Thou art wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked.”

“Anoint thine eyes with eye salve that thou mayest see” (Rev. 3:18).

 

 

Wake up.

Wash your face.

 

 

Wash your eyes.

5^th---Some spiritual sleepers have set an alarm.

 

 

They've decided to wake up at a certain time;

To get saved at a more convenient season.

 

 

They've persuaded themselves that salvation is a matter of their own will.

This is a terrible mistake.

 

We cannot live the way we want,

Believe when we want,

 

 

Repent when we want,

And be saved when we want.

 

 

Jesus said, “No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me  

draw him” (John 6:44).

Jonah said, “Salvation is of the Lord” (Jonah 2:9).

 

 

Salvation comes when the Holy Spirit is dealing with a person.

The person who sets an alarm to be saved at some future time is really          

admitting that he's lost right now.

 

 

He's running a terrible risk;

Gambling on tomorrow.

 

 

But we cannot count on tomorrow because the death angel could come        

tonight.

The Rapture could be tonight.

 

 

We don't know the day or the hour.

And we don't know what tomorrow will bring.

 

 

There was a king who loved to watch the jesters perform.

They made him laugh.

 

 

One particular jester appeared before him.

And made him laugh harder than he had ever laughed before.

 

 

He liked this jester so much, he decided to hire him as his own personal        

jester.

He gave him a trinket.

 

 

He said I want you to keep this trinket with you always.

And if you ever find anyone who is a bigger fool than you, I want you to give         

it to him.

 

 

Years passed.

The king was on his death bed.

 

 

He sent for his jester because he wanted to laugh one last time.

When the jester finished his performance, he asked to speak to the king        

privately.

 

 

The interview was granted.

He asked the king, “Where are you going?”

 

 

The king responded, “On a far journey.”

The jester asked, “How do you plan to get there?”

 

 

The king responded, “I don't know.”

The jester pulled out the trinket and gave it to him.

 

 

The king was stunned.

He asked, “Why are you giving me this?”

 

 

The jester said, “Today, I’ve found someone who is a bigger fool than I am.”

“You see, I only trifled with the things of life.”

 

 

“But you have trifled with the things of God.”

It's a mistake to plan on getting saved in the future.

 

 

We don't know what the future holds.

6^th---God is patient with the spiritual sleeper.

 

 

Eutychus went to sleep.

But Paul continued to preach.

 

 

The spiritual sleeper is asleep.

But God continues to speak.

 

 

He loves the spiritual sleeper.

He's longsuffering;

 

 

Compassionate;

Slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness (Psa. 86:15).

 

 

A God who relents from sending calamity (Jonah 4:2).

A God who wants all people to come to a knowledge of the truth (I Tim. 2:4).

 

 

He strives to wake us up.

But we should not take Him for granted.

 

 

He's not indifferent to sin.

And there's a limit to His patience.

 

 

7^th---God sometimes uses drastic means to wake a spiritual sleeper up.

He could have kept Eutychus from falling and dying.

 

But He didn't.

Letting Eutychus die, and raising him from the dead, helped others.

 

 

It brought glory to God.

He’s not cruel.

 

 

But He sometimes uses suffering to bring about good.

Some people have to get into the Intensive Care Room at the hospital before

          they will wake up.

 

 

Some have to have a loved one on their death bed before they will wake up.

I know a woman who accepted Christ when she was ten years old.

 

 

One night, when she was a teenager, her brother pointed a gun at her.

He said the gun isn't loaded.

 

 

He pulled the trigger.

It just clicked.

 

 

He pulled the trigger a second time.

This time the gun fired.

 

 

And the bullet hit his sister.

She was injured.

 

 

But she didn’t die.

Why did God let that happen?

 

 

 

 

He could have prevented it.

This woman says at the age of twenty, she realized that her childhood

salvation experience wasn't real.

 

 

She remembered the night her brother accidentally shot her.

She said she would be in hell, if that bullet had killed her.

 

 

She realized that no one knows how much time they have.

She quickly asked God into her heart.

 

 

It was another night.

God asked Abraham to look up toward heaven.

 

 

He told Abraham your offspring will be as numberless as the stars.

“And he [Abraham] believed in the Lord;”

 

 

“And he [the Lord] counted it to him [Abraham] for righteousness”

(Gen. 15:6).

Abraham believed God.

 

 

He simply accepted what God said.

And God COUNTED him righteous.

 

 

Abraham was not righteous.

But God included him with the righteous.

 

 

How can a holy God count an unrighteous man righteous?

They nailed Jesus to the cross.

 

 

 

Darkness covered the land.

He hung there with a thief or a transgressor on each side.

 

 

“And the scripture was fulfilled which saith, And he was numbered with the  

transgressors” (Mark 15:28).

Jesus was not a sinner.

 

 

But He was COUNTED with the sinners.

God could count Abraham with the righteous even though he was not

righteous because God counted Jesus with the sinners even though He          

was not a sinner.

 

 

The message today is don't be a spiritual sleeper.

Make sure you’re awake.

 

 

Make sure you’re trusting in Jesus.

If you are, when the roll is called up yonder, you’ll be COUNTED with the   

righteous.

 

 

You’ll be counted with the righteous because Jesus was counted with the      

unrighteous at Calvary.

 

 

Second Invitation.

 

I remember another night: The night the death angel passed over Egypt.

God said, “There will be a death at every house in Egypt.”

 

 

It will be the death of a lamb.

Or the death of the first born son in a family.

 

 

 

If they would sprinkle the blood of a lamb on the house, the death angel        

would pass over.

If they didn’t, the first born son would die.

 

 

This taught us something very important.

A lamb could die in someone’s place.

 

 

It prefigured the Lamb of God that could die in our place.

If you will accept Him as your Savior, I invite you to come forward while we

sing our closing hymn.