Cultural Compasses | Sunday, September 11, 2022

Good morning, Cross Connection Church. Welcome to Church Online.

Twelve years ago, almost to the week, we were blessed here at Cross Connection Church to host a fascinating guest speaker. At that time, at the end of August 2010, we were just about to begin a 15-week class here at the church called Perspectives on the World Christian Movement, or simply Perspectives. Perspectives is basically a graduate-level class on Christian missions. Our church had chosen to host the class, and nearly a hundred people from the church were enrolled and ready to attend, along with others from different churches in the area.

Perspectives is an eye-opening journey through the Scriptures and church history, considering the work of Christian missions throughout the Bible and bringing it forward to our day. It encourages us to think about the remaining task that we, as followers of Christ, have in finishing the mission that Jesus gave us, commonly referred to as the Great Commission in Matthew 28: "Go into all the world and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." Christians have been doing that since the birth of the church in Acts chapter 2, all the way through the last 2,000 years, and the Bible has much to say about it. Church history provides us with all kinds of insight, so the Perspectives course was all about that.

The class is meant to open your eyes and change your perspective—not just about what God's mission is in the world, but also to help you see how you, as a child of God, are to be involved in His mission. God has called you and me to be a part of that mission.

Perspectives follows a pretty interesting format. Each week of the 15 weeks, a different speaker comes in to teach, and most of those speakers...

As the host church, we had to work on trying to get the different speakers to come. They provided us with a list of possible speakers for each topic, but every single speaker was basically an expert in their field of study. The speaker we selected to open the class, scheduled for the very first session, was not just an expert on one topic but on many different aspects of the Christian faith, especially missions. He was not merely an academic or a seminary-type individual; he was a practitioner of the things he was going to teach. He was not on the theoretical side but on the experiential side, having actually been out in the field working on mission-related activities.

He was an expert, and he came to Cross Connection a few days before the class started to be a guest speaker at our church. His name was Don Richardson. Don passed away a few years ago, and when he was here, he was about 75 years old. He spoke on the subject of what he called cultural compasses. According to Don, cultural compasses are artifacts within cultures that point people, like a compass, toward God.

If you had the chance to sit down with him for a meal, which I did a couple of times while he was here, he would have told you that these cultural compasses are given to every culture in the world. In every place you can think of, all the peoples with specific languages, customs, and cultures, God has intentionally built these cultural compasses into them. Sometimes, even into their language, God has embedded these compasses.

In fact, Don would have pointed you to a passage of Scripture to support his view, found in a 3,000-year-old book in the Bible called Ecclesiastes. Solomon, one of the great kings of Israel, wrote in Ecclesiastes chapter 3, verse 10, "I have seen the God-given task with which the sons of men are to be occupied." He continued, "He, God, has made everything beautiful in its time, and He also has put eternity in their hearts."

God has given us a purpose and a task. He has placed into every human being, as Solomon says in Ecclesiastes chapter 3, eternity in their hearts. God has given us an understanding of these things. He has placed into the hearts and cultures of man compasses that are directed to Him. God has designed us in such a way that there are certain things hardwired into us, including a moral law, as well as an inclination toward love and a desire for eternal life. All these aspects are built into our hearts, guiding individuals toward Him.

What we have here today in Deuteronomy chapter 19 is, I believe, one such cultural compass for the Hebrew people, the Jewish people, directing them in the right direction toward the Messiah. If you would, please look at the text with me. Deuteronomy chapter 19 begins with the following verses: "When the Lord your God has cut off the nations whose land the Lord your God is giving you," indicating that they are preparing to enter the Promised Land. They will dispossess the inhabitants of that land.

When you dispossess them and dwell in their cities and houses, note this: "You shall separate three cities for yourself in the midst of your land, which the Lord your God is giving you to possess." You shall prepare roads for yourself and divide into three parts the territory of your land, which the Lord your God is giving you to inherit, so that any manslayer may flee there.

What we have here is something we have already discussed in Deuteronomy, specifically regarding cities of refuge for manslayers. The children of Israel, upon entering the Promised Land, were to govern themselves according to God's law as outlined in the book of Deuteronomy. There would not be an active law enforcement system; there were no police officers. Therefore, if a crime was committed, it was the responsibility of the people to handle the prosecution.

Crime and the criminal involved in it can lead to severe consequences. In a number of instances, capital punishment could be the penalty for the crime, especially in cases of homicide. Homicide is the unlawful killing of a person. When there is an unlawful killing, and the person ends up dead, there needs to be a way to deal with the individual involved in that death.

It is important to understand that homicide is not always intentionally premeditated murder, or what we would call murder in the first degree. Sometimes, homicide occurs unintentionally; it is not premeditated. In those circumstances, both 3,000 years ago and today, we refer to that situation as manslaughter. Manslaughter is the unlawful killing of a human being without malice or forethought. It is not something that was premeditated; it just happened. It is unfortunate, terrible, and unlawful, but it was not intentional.

In Deuteronomy 19, we find direction from Moses, and ultimately from God, on how the children of Israel were to deal with the capital crime of homicide when it was determined to be manslaughter. Many of God's laws given to Israel were revolutionary reforms to the contemporary customs of that time and place.

In the ancient Near East, where Israel was 3,400 years ago as they prepared to enter the Promised Land, the customs surrounding death were quite different. At the time of Moses, if a death occurred due to the direct actions or inactions of an individual, that individual, the killer, would typically be put to death. This punishment was often carried out by a relative of the deceased person.

Imagine the scenario: God forbid, you find that you have killed someone. The near of kin, a close relative of the person you have killed, becomes what the Bible calls the avenger of blood. This avenger of blood, who is a relative of the deceased, now has the responsibility to hunt you down and kill you.

Life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth. The avenger of blood is going to come to avenge the death of the person who died upon the person who killed them. Often, it didn't matter, or there was not enough time or opportunity to determine whether the death occurred intentionally or unintentionally, whether it was premeditated murder or manslaughter. If you happened to be directly involved in the death of another person, it was quite likely that you would be put to death, and that would probably happen rather quickly by the relative of the deceased person, again called the avenger of blood.

But for God's people, it was to be different. As Moses is telling them in this passage, and as we have already seen some information about this previously in Deuteronomy, there were to be cities of refuge for those guilty of manslaughter. In Deuteronomy 19:4, we read about the case of the manslayer, the one who has committed manslaughter and flees to one of the cities of refuge so that he may live. Manslaughter occurs when a person kills his neighbor unintentionally, not having hated him in the past. There is no premeditation; he didn't lie in wait to shed blood. There is no malice or first-degree murder here—it's just unintentional manslaughter.

Moses gives an example in verse 5: when a man goes out to the woods with his neighbor to cut timber, and his hand swings with the stroke of an ax to cut down a tree, if the head of the ax slips from the handle and strikes the neighbor, causing his death, then the man who had the ax and accidentally killed the neighbor with the ax head shall flee to one of these cities and live. This is to prevent the avenger of blood, while his anger is hot, from pursuing the manslayer and overtaking him, because the way is long, and killing him, though he was not deserving of death since he had not hated the victim in the past.

Therefore, I command you, saying, you shall separate three cities for yourself. These are the cities of refuge that are to be set aside in the land of the children of Israel. In God's economy, there were limitations within His law, especially as it related to capital punishment. There were provisions if homicide was determined to be unintentional. Continuing in verse 8, Moses states that if the Lord your God enlarges your territory...

He swore to your fathers and gives you the land which He promised to give to your fathers. If you keep all these commandments and do them, which I command you today, to love the Lord your God and walk in His ways, all His ways, always, then you shall add three more cities for yourselves besides these three. Lest innocent blood be shed in the midst of your land, which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, and thus guilt of bloodshed be upon you.

But if anyone hates his neighbor, lies in wait for him, rises against him, and strikes him mortally so that he dies, and he flees to one of these cities, then the elders of the city shall send and bring him from there and deliver him over to the hand of the avenger of blood, that he may die. Your eyes shall not pity him, but you shall put away the guilt of innocent blood from Israel, that it may go well with you.

So that's the word of the cities of refuge. If there is a homicide, someone dies at the hands of another, it needs to be determined by the judges before the avenger of blood can come and bring capital punishment on the supposed murderer. It needs to go through a process of determining whether or not it was premeditated or was it manslaughter. If it's determined that it's manslaughter, then we have this provision, which we find in other places in the Pentateuch, where the manslayer can stay in the city of refuge and stay alive, and not be subject to death at the hand of the avenger of blood.

But if it is determined, as we see in those last verses, verses 11 and 12, that the homicide happened by premeditation, that there was hate involved, and the person did lie in wait to shed blood, then that person is going to be given over to the avenger of blood to bring about justice.

Now, if you were with us two years ago, in August of 2020, then this may be somewhat familiar to you, because back in Deuteronomy chapter 4, we saw a previous reference to the cities of refuge, as there were already established three cities of refuge on the east side of the Jordan River. The nation of Israel is going to be divided by a river, or was for a long time.

On the east side of the Jordan River, you have the country of Jordan. On the west side of the Jordan River, you have the country of Israel. But in the time of Moses, when they came into the Promised Land, they had territory on the east side of the Jordan River, where there were two and a half tribes of Israel. Then there was the larger territory on the west side of the Jordan River. They were to have three cities of refuge on the east side of the Jordan River. Those have already been established, and you can read about that in the end of Deuteronomy chapter 4.

And then you have three more cities on the east or the west side of the Jordan River as they enter into the land. We are told in this passage that if the land was to increase and the nation grew, then God says that you are going to need to make more cities of refuge in the future. These cities were supposed to be spaced throughout the land of Israel such that they were no more than a single day's journey for the one who needed to flee there.

If you were, as described in this passage, out in the woods cutting down a tree and the head of the ax slips, killing your partner who has been helping you, you would find yourself in a dire situation. As soon as this is found out, the brother or father of the deceased would come after you as the avenger of blood. You would need to get to a city of refuge quickly, or you would face death. They would hunt you down, leading to a manhunt. Therefore, you would flee to a city of refuge, with three cities on the east side of the Jordan River and three on the west side, always within one day's journey.

The roads to these cities were to be kept prepared, as we see in this passage. Not only were they maintained, but there were also markers pointing to the cities of refuge. The cities were provisioned and cared for by the Levites, the priestly tribe. One of the jobs of the priests and Levites in the land of Israel was to take care of the cities of refuge, which presents a beautiful picture.

When you really look into the provision of six cities of refuge and the potential for more cities if the nation was to increase, there is a substantial outlay of resources in Israel that were committed to these cities. When considering the taxation of the people of Israel 3,400 years ago when they came into the Promised Land, it was relatively low, and most of it was geared towards the work of the tabernacle. They would give to the work of the tabernacle or for the welfare of the poor. However, a significant portion of their resources was allocated to ensure that roads were made, cut, and kept ready to the cities of refuge, that the cities themselves were taken care of and provisioned, and that everything was in place. There were signs, and this was all maintained. The people were financially responsible for putting together these resources. Thus, there was a substantial outlay of resources for these cities of refuge, which were clearly an important matter for God and His people.

But from what we can tell in studying the Old Testament scriptures, we do not see much to indicate how often these cities were actually used by manslayers. That's not to say that they were not used, but there is not, that I can think of in the Old Testament, a story where someone actually fled because of manslaughter to one of the cities of refuge.

So, what is the purpose of this rather costly provision in the land of Israel? Well, I want to suggest to you, aside from the practical considerations for someone potentially guilty of manslaughter, that these cities, these cities of refuge that had to be provisioned by the people, and their taxes went to provide for all this sort of stuff, were a cultural compass directing the culture, the people of Israel, to God.

Just like Don Richardson talked about years ago when he came here, one of the interesting things that you can discover, if you ever read one of Don Richardson's books called Eternity in Their Hearts, which I highly recommend if you are a reader and you're looking for something to read as we come into the fall, is that there are other cultural groups, other people groups that had very similar things to these cities of refuge, and that this was not entirely unique to Hebrew culture. Again, this is a cultural compass that God has put into the hearts and minds of people and cultures for the purpose of directing them to the Lord.

As I shared a couple of years ago, when we looked at the cities of refuge back in Deuteronomy chapter 4, the provision of these cities, in some sense, teaches us that God goes to great lengths to provide mercy to the guilty. The person who would go and live in the city of refuge was guilty of effectively murder. It wasn't murder in the first degree; it was manslaughter. They were guilty of homicide. Yet God goes to great lengths to provide mercy to the guilty. He expected great care and expense to be apportioned to provide refuge and mercy to the guilty.

That's an awesome thing. Not only is God concerned about those who are guilty and wants to deal with them mercifully, but He also wants His people to deal with guilty people mercifully and to be just.

This is a just way to deal with this. He did this all to show His mercy and to show His grace. However, He also did this, as I've been sharing with you, as cultural compasses. He did this to direct people to Him. The cities of refuge were a cultural compass.

King David, considered one of the great kings of Israel and the great psalmist of Israel, recognizes that this idea of refuge and the city of refuge points to God. He writes about it in some of his psalms. For example, we read this in Psalm 91, verse 1: "I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge, my fortress, my God; in Him will I trust. Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the perilous pestilence."

In verse 9, it says, "Because you have made the Lord, who is my refuge, even the Most High, your dwelling place, no evil shall befall you, nor shall any plague come near your dwelling." David, when he writes these words about 400 years after Moses in Psalm 91, is clearly pulling out in this imagery the idea of the city of refuge. You can flee there and find refuge, as that is your dwelling place. If you are guilty of manslaughter and you are in the city of refuge, you have refuge in that place as your dwelling place from the evil that could befall you, as long as you are in that place.

Later, it becomes more clear when you realize that each of us is ultimately guilty of unintentional homicide. This idea of the city of refuge being a cultural compass pointing to God becomes really clear when I begin to realize, when I open the pages of Scripture, that I am guilty. Though it happened unintentionally, there was no premeditation; I unwittingly am guilty of homicide. Unintentionally and unaware, I, and you, have acted in such a way that we have caused someone to die.

Jesus, because of my sin and because of your sin, died upon Calvary's cross. We have no hope but to flee for refuge from the coming wrath of His avenger of blood, His Father. So, Jesus' Father is the avenger of blood.

His wrath will come upon us unless we flee for refuge. But where do we flee for refuge? There is no place like Bezer or Hebron where we can escape to a city of refuge. So, where do we go? The New Testament book of Hebrews says in chapter 6, verse 17, "Thus God, determining to show more abundantly to the heirs of promise the immutability, the unchangeability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath that by two unchangeable, immutable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong comfort, consolation, who have, note this, fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us."

This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, which enters the presence behind the veil where the forerunner has entered for us, even Jesus, having become high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

As I said, we don't know how often manslayers fled to the cities of refuge in ancient Israel, but we do know that the cities of refuge ultimately pointed to Jesus Christ and to our need for refuge in Him. Israel's cities of refuge were markers posted to direct us to Christ.

Moreover, the cities of refuge were not only markers given to direct Israel and us to Christ. Paul, in the book of Galatians, states that it is not just the cities of refuge; he says the law, all of the law, was given to do the same. In Galatians chapter 3, verse 24, it says, "Therefore the law was our schoolmaster, our tutor, or a signpost to bring us to Christ so that we might be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we are no longer under the tutor."

The children of Israel were given the law of Moses, the Ten Commandments, and all the other 603 commandments that they were set to observe. All those things were given to them to direct them to Jesus, to show them their need for Jesus. It is a tutor, a schoolmaster, to bring them to Christ so that they would be justified by faith, because you cannot be justified by the law.

Thus, the cities of refuge were a cultural compass pointing people to their need for refuge in Christ. The law was also a cultural compass pointing the people to Christ and their need for Him.

I mean, that's not all. There are many other things in Israel's history and in their culture that point forward to Christ. They are all God-given cultural compasses to direct them to God and their need for God.

Think of the manna that the children of Israel ate when they were in the wilderness. The New Testament tells us that this was a pointer to Jesus. Jesus says, "I am the bread that came down from heaven. Moses gave you bread to eat in the wilderness. I am the bread that you truly need for life."

There’s an interesting story at the end of Exodus chapter 15. When the children of Israel have just crossed over the Red Sea and come into the wilderness, they arrive at an area where they are really thirsty. They find some water, but it is bitter and not sweet to drink. They can't drink it. Then God tells Moses to cast a tree or a branch of a tree into the waters. This tree makes the waters drinkable and sweet. The tree that made the bitter water sweet is a cultural compass that points to Jesus.

Think about the spotless lamb in the book of Leviticus, where we read about the offerings of Israel. All of those offerings in the book of Leviticus are meant to direct us to Jesus, but especially the spotless lamb for the sin offering is a cultural compass pointing to Him. When Jesus was introduced by John the Baptist in the Gospel of John, chapter 1, verse 29, it says that John the Baptist saw Jesus coming toward him and said, "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world." That’s the one; follow Him.

John is pointing back to the Levitical priesthood system of sacrifice for sin offerings. He’s saying, "Remember all those lambs, those sheep that we offered as sacrifices? They were pure and spotless. Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. That’s the one; follow Him."

All of these things are cultural compasses. I think of another one that comes to my mind, one of my favorites. In John's Gospel, chapter 3, a man comes to Jesus by night, a religious leader named Nicodemus. He comes to Jesus with a question. Jesus and he are going back and forth, and Jesus explains to this religious man, who followed the law and the traditions of Israel, that he needs to be born again or he will not see the kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven. Nicodemus, this religious man, genuinely wants to understand this. He is trying to figure out what Jesus means by being born again.

I don't get it. Explain to me how the new birth comes. Jesus describes the new birth as coming not by an action of our bodies, not by some physical thing that we do, but by our faith. He does this by pointing back to a rather obscure event in Israel's wilderness wanderings from the book of Numbers. Jesus says this to Nicodemus in John chapter 3, verse 14: "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness."

In the Old Testament book of Numbers, there's a story about the children of Israel. They are in the wilderness, murmuring and complaining, which they were really good at. You probably never do that, but they were murmuring and complaining against God. As a judgment or consequence of their sin, venomous snakes start to come into the camp and bite them. Fiery serpents bite them, and people are dying because of these venomous snakes.

Then the people cry out to Moses, saying, "You have to rescue us from this snake." He calls out to God, and God says, "Here's what you're going to do. You're going to lift up a bronze serpent on a pole in the midst of the camp. Whoever is bitten by the snake, if they will look at it, they will be saved."

What on earth is this about? It's a cultural compass. Returning to John chapter 3, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so, the Son of Man, Jesus, must be lifted up. Where? On the cross. That whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.

Now, the most famous verse of the Bible: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved."

The bronze serpent in Numbers chapter 21, that strange situation with the children of Israel in the wilderness when people were getting bitten by the snake and dying, illustrates a profound truth. All they had to do was trust in the snake, lifted up on the pole, and then they would be healed. Why? It was faith, their trust that brought life.

Jesus explains how the new birth comes. That old event during the time of Moses was a cultural compass pointing forward to Jesus because the Son of Man, Jesus, is going to be lifted up on the cross. There are some beautiful typological pictures happening in that whole story, which I'd love to explore further.

To get into it would require more time than I have here. But basically, bronze is a symbol of judgment in the Scriptures, and the serpent, the one who introduced sin in Genesis chapter 3, is an image of sin. So, you have judgment upon sin on this pole, or on this tree, on the cross. Jesus, when He is lifted up, represents judgment upon sin on the cross. Our trust in Him, our faith in Him, is what brings salvation. These are all cultural compasses given to the children of Israel to direct them to Jesus.

The cities of refuge mentioned in Deuteronomy chapter 19 serve as cultural compasses to point to Jesus. But that begs the question: What about non-Jewish peoples? What about other cultures? Are there cultural compasses for other people groups?

While ministering to the Greek-speaking Gentiles in the region of Galatia, specifically in the city of Lystra, the apostle Paul spoke these words, as recorded in Acts chapter 14, beginning at verse 14. When the apostles Barnabas and Paul heard what was happening—this is quite a story—they had just healed a man in Lystra, and all the people of the city, upon witnessing this healing, thought that Paul and Barnabas were gods who had come down to them.

When the apostles Barnabas and Paul heard this, they tore their clothes and ran among the multitude, crying out, "Men, why are you doing these things? Why are you worshiping us? We also are men with the same nature as you, and we preach to you that you should turn from these useless things, this paganism, and turn to the living God who made the heaven and the earth, the sea, and all the things that are in them. He, in bygone generations, allowed all nations to walk in their own ways."

Note this in verse 17: Yes, He, God, did not leave Himself without witness, in that He did good, gave us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness. Notice that He did not leave Himself without witness. God is not as hidden as we sometimes assume. I believe He has left His fingerprints throughout creation.

The heavens declare the glory of God, and the earth shows forth His handiwork, as stated in Psalm 19, verse 1. His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, including God's eternal power and Godhead, as mentioned in Romans chapter 1, verse 20. We see God's imprint in creation.

We see God's handiwork in the design of the universe. When we look up at the stars in astronomy or down through the microscope in biology, chemistry, and physics, we observe the intricate nature of design. We understand His wisdom, power, and understanding when we encounter conscience and consciousness. The fact that we know things, that we know that we know things, and that we can discern certain things as good or bad, beautiful or not, true or false, points back to God. It is His fingerprints left upon creation, conscience, and consciousness in so many different ways.

We are directed to Him at the signposts woven into the fabric of every human culture. He did not leave Himself without witness. Romans chapter 1, verse 19, states, "What may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them." God is knowable and has made Himself known. He will be found by those who seek Him. This is so important and so good. God is knowable, and I want you to recognize this.

Some people believe that there might be a God, but that He is way out on the edge of the universe somewhere, unreachable and unknowable. That is not what the Bible reveals. God is knowable. He has revealed Himself; He has made Himself known. This is His apocalypse. He has shown Himself and will be found by those who seek Him.

A favorite passage for many people is found in Jeremiah chapter 29, where we read these words beginning at verse 11. However, too many people stop at verse 11. Jeremiah 29:11 states, "For I know the thoughts that I think toward you," says the Lord, "thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope."

Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all of your heart. I will be found by you, says the Lord, and I will bring you back from your captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you, says the Lord, and I will bring you to the place from which I caused you to be carried away captive.

Now, yes, this is being spoken to the exiles of Israel who were going into captivity in Babylon, but I believe that in much the same way, this applies to every lost soul.

God will be found as we seek for Him with all of our hearts. In Acts chapter 17, when the Apostle Paul was in the great city of Athens, he was given an opportunity to speak among the Greek intelligentsia at a place called Mars Hill. The city of Athens was steeped in all manner of pagan idolatry. The most dominant feature of Athens, both then and now, is the giant rock outcropping called the Acropolis, upon which stand massive temples dedicated to Athena, Nike, Pan, Apollo, and other deities from Greek culture.

Throughout the ancient city of Athens, there were temples to Zeus, Aphrodite, Ares, and dozens of lesser-known deities from Greece, Rome, Egypt, and other places throughout the known world of that time. The Apostle Paul, 2,000 years ago, toured the city and observed all the different places where they worshipped. They worshipped every possible thing you could imagine, and they had all kinds of different temples and altars dedicated to these gods.

When he was given the opportunity to speak with the wise men of the city on Mars Hill, just below the Acropolis, he made a profound statement. I've been there; it's a beautiful place. In fact, we're taking a group of people there next year as part of our Holy Land tour cruise. We will start in Athens, visiting the Acropolis and Mars Hill.

In Acts 17, the Apostle Paul delivers a powerful message. He stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, "Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious. For as I was passing through and considering the objects of your worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: 'To the Unknown God.' Therefore, the one whom you worship without knowing, Him I proclaim to you."

He pointed out that these altars throughout the city to the unknown Theos, or God, were cultural compasses. He said, "The one whom you worship without knowing, I proclaim to you. You don't know Him, but I want to introduce you to Him, God, Theos, who made the world."

and everything in it. Since He is Lord of heaven and earth, He does not dwell in temples made with hands, like that up on the hill, the Acropolis, nor is He worshiped with men's hands as though He needed anything, since He gives life to all breath and all things. He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on the face of the earth and has determined their pre-appointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings.

Notice this, verse seven: He has made them; He has constructed these peoples so that they should seek the Lord and hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us. For in Him we live and move and have our being. As also one of your own poets has said, you have your own philosophers and poets; they have cultural compasses, for we also are His offspring. So, an Athenian poet knows this as written. Therefore, verse 29: since we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the divine nature is like gold or silver or stone or something shaped by the art of a man's devising.

Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now He commands all men everywhere to repent, turn to Him from their idols, from their foolishness, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead.

I know I'm going long today, but there's so much good stuff here that we need to consider. What did Paul do right there in Athens? Well, like a good anthropologist, he looked for the cultural compasses in Athens so that he might direct people to the one true God. God is knowable, and He has made Himself known, and He will be found by those who seek for Him. He has placed into the hearts of cultures, the hearts of individual people, compasses that direct us to Him.

He gave the Hebrews compasses to point them to Him: the lamb for the sin offering, the bronze serpent, the cities of refuge. He left pointers for the Gentiles of Lystra, the wise guys in Athens. If you pick up Don Richardson's book, the first one I mentioned was the book "Eternity in Their Hearts," and the next one is "Peace Child," then you will see the beautiful way that God revealed Himself through a phenomenal cultural compass to a group of people, a tribal people in New Guinea called the Sawi people.

In 1962, Don Richardson and his wife Carol and their newborn son Stephen, they only had...

One child at a time, they went as missionaries to New Guinea to a truly headhunting, cannibalistic tribal group called the Sawi people. Don spent months learning the Sawi people's language and culture so that he could introduce them to Jesus. Eventually, when he became fluent enough to speak their language, he began sharing the gospel with them, but soon he encountered a problem.

As he tells it in "Peace Child" and also in "Eternity in Their Hearts," this people group, the Sawi people, highly valued treachery. Remember, they are headhunters and cannibals, and they value treachery—turning on someone whom you have brought in close. Don shared the story of Judas betraying Jesus with a kiss. They cheered and valued Judas as the hero of the story. Don had a huge problem: how do you share the gospel of Christ with people who think that Jesus is the dupe and Judas is the hero? That's nearly impossible. What do you do?

It wasn't until Don shared with us, when he spoke here 12 years ago, that he revealed the next part of the story. Don and his family were getting ready to leave the Sawi people because there was tribal warfare among the people, and it had become dangerous for them to live there. The people did not want Don and his wife to leave. Don told them that they must find a way to bring peace, or his wife and he, along with their child, would have to leave.

His wife was a nurse, saving dozens of people among the Sawi from all kinds of ailments, including malaria and dysentery. They did not want them to leave. They said, "Well, if you can't find a way for peace, then we are going to have to leave." It was then that they told Don about a long-held custom in their culture regarding what was called a peace child.

I want to read from his book. This is from chapter three of "Eternity in Their Hearts." Don writes, "Praying for special help from God, we eventually found the Sawi had a unique way of making peace and for stalling outbreaks of treachery. If a Sawi father offered his son to another group as a peace child, not only were past grievances thereby settled, but also future instances of treachery were prevented, but only as long as the peace child remained alive." So they were not offering a human sacrifice. Our ready-made key of communication then was the presentation of Jesus Christ to the Sawi.

As the ultimate peace child, using Isaiah 9:6, John 3:16, Romans 5:10, and Hebrews 7:25 as the primary scriptural correspondence of the peace child analogy, the meaning of the gospel broke through among the Sawi. Once they realized that the one Judas betrayed was the peace child, they no longer viewed Judas as the hero. To betray a peace child was, for the Sawi, the worst possible crime. Since those days, approximately two-thirds of the Sawi people have, as they say, laid their hands by faith upon God's peace child, Jesus Christ. This alludes to their former requirement that recipients of a peace child lay their hands individually upon the given son and say, "We receive this child as a basis for peace."

There among the Sawi people was this beautiful cultural compass that pointed a tribal group that had never heard the gospel. Before Don, Carol, and their son Stephen arrived, they had never even seen white people. Don was trying to share the gospel with these people, and finally, he found a way. They had within their culture this custom of the peace child. If two groups were warring, the only way to bring a settled peace was for one man from one tribe to take one of his sons, a peace child, and give it to a man from the other tribe. That child would be raised as the adopted child of that other group. As long as that child was alive, there was peace.

These are cultural compasses, littered throughout culture and scripture. I would suggest to you that there are cultural compasses in our culture today. But it begs the question: What are the cultural compasses in our day? Honestly, these cultural compasses are everywhere; we just have to look. As Christians, we must be good biblical anthropologists who can look at culture through the lens of scripture and see how the connections are made between the story of scripture and the stories we tell ourselves within our culture.

You are a missionary. If you're a Christian, you are called to be a part of God's mission, and you need to look for these cultural compasses. They are everywhere, not just because our culture has a Judeo-Christian background. Think about this: our culture highly values love. Love is the greatest thing, we are told, in our culture; it is the most important virtue.

Most important value. Why do we think this? Why is it such an important thing? I would suggest to you that the cultural impulse comes from God, who made us. His very nature is love. God is love, says the Scriptures in 1 John. By placing in us a deep desire, longing, and yearning for love, I believe that an honest search for love will ultimately guide us in the direction of God.

We want a love that is genuine and pure, compassionate, sacrificial, and not selfish. Every other earthly form of love will leave you wanting. It will not satisfy the deep longing that we have. Ultimately, the love of God is genuine, pure, compassionate, sacrificial, and not self-seeking. That's just one of hundreds of markers that are littered throughout our culture.

I was thinking about this message this week, and then I heard a guy talking about a cultural compass. It had nothing to do with what I was looking at, but he brought up the blockbuster summer of 2012 film, Marvel's The Avengers. What is the storyline of The Avengers? Well, the storyline is fascinating. Boiling it down to its rudest form, a supernatural Satan-type being engages in a war in the heavens, rebelling against the gods. He then comes down to earth, where he desires to be worshipped by everyone.

This Satan-type being, who desires to be worshipped by all people on earth, has the power to possess individuals' hearts and minds, getting them to do things they wouldn't otherwise do to fulfill his bidding. He then turns them against one another to fight because he cannot defeat them by himself. Of course, the figure I'm talking about is Loki.

I don't know if you noticed, but that sounds like a pretty significant cultural compass that points back to the storyline of the Bible. Think about it. The dozens of superhero-esque movies that we entertain ourselves with—the biggest blockbusters in our culture for the last 20 years—have been these crazy superhero movies. Consider the manifold times that good fights evil and evil nearly triumphs, even to the point of the superhero being defeated to the point of death, only to resurrect and ultimately defeat the villain.

Does that sound like a cultural compass? Consider the deep inclinations in our culture towards liberty, justice, and virtue.

Morality, enlightenment, and eternal life—where does all of this come from? He did not leave Himself without witness. God, who made the world and everything in it, has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on the face of the earth. He has determined their pre-appointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings, where they live and when they live, so that they should seek for the Lord in hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not actually far from us.

I highlight all of this today to remind you that God has called you to seek for seekers. When we find the Lord or are found by Him, we ought then to become seekers of the lost. The Gospel of Luke, in Luke chapter 19, says that Jesus came to seek and to save that which was lost. That is His mission, and that certainly ought to be my mission if I am a follower of Jesus. If you make that your mission—to seek for seekers—you will not have to look very far. They are everywhere. They are at your work, on the school campus you attend, in your neighborhood, and they might even be within your own family.

When we look for these cultural compasses, we are engaged in a kind of biblical anthropological study of culture, recognizing that God has placed eternity in the hearts of every person. We need to look for these things to find the on-ramps for the Gospel, and then we need to seek to share the good news with others. That is our calling.

The good news, the Gospel, presents a superhero. There is one who lays His life down for others, who gives genuine, merciful, compassionate, non-self-seeking, sacrificial love. There is one who gives refuge. There is a Redeemer who is just, good, beautiful, and true, who gives liberty and eternal life. He is the peace child. His name is Jesus.

Father God, I thank You so much for this passage in Deuteronomy that speaks about these cities of refuge. I thank You for making provision for us to find refuge and to experience Your mercy and grace. Lord, I pray that You would open our eyes to see in our culture the compasses that point people to You, so that we can direct them to You through the Gospel.

Lord, help us to make those connections. Help us to have the boldness to share the good news of the Gospel with those people. There are so many seekers, and Lord, you are a seeker of seekers. So help us to be seekers of seekers as well, seeking those who are lost.

Because we once were lost, and now we've been found by you, Jesus Christ the righteous. We praise you, Jesus. We thank you for your word for us. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.