Participants: Jim & Mark Howard
Series Code: ABOTB
Program Code: ABOTB00018B
00:01 Welcome back to Books of the Book.
00:02 We are in Acts chapter 16 and we are looking at the Macedonian 00:07 call that has just come to Paul and his team and now they've 00:11 responded to the call and they are heading to the area of 00:15 Macedonia. We're picking up in verse 11 of Acts 16. The Bible 00:19 says, Therefore sailing from Troas we ran a straight course 00:23 to Samothrace and the next day came to Neapolis and from there 00:28 to Philippi which is the foremost city of that part of 00:31 Macedonia, a colony. And we were staying in that city for some 00:35 days and on the Sabbath day we went out of the city to the 00:39 riverside where prayer was customarily made. And we sat 00:42 down and spoke to the women who met there. Now a certain woman 00:46 named Lydia heard us. She was a seller of purple from the city 00:50 of Thyatira who worshiped God. God opened her heart to heed 00:53 the things spoken by Paul and when she and her household were 00:57 baptized she begged us saying, if you have judged me to be 01:01 faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay and so she 01:06 persuaded us. Now this is the first real convert that we find 01:11 here or the experience we find in this area of Philippi. 01:14 So already heeding the Macedonian call brings fruit 01:18 for the New Testament church. Now there are a couple of things 01:21 here that are interesting for us to note. First of all it says 01:25 that on the Sabbath day they went out by the riverside. 01:29 It's important for us to note that we see this consistently 01:33 in the New Testament church that the practice of the apostles, 01:37 including the Apostle Paul here, is to worship on the Sabbath 01:41 day. Now sometimes people say well Paul worshipped on the 01:44 Sabbath in the New Testament because that's when the Jews 01:47 worshipped. That's the time the synagogues were open. Well first 01:50 of all, we find throughout the book of Acts that the synagogues 01:52 were open every day. And furthermore, we find here that 01:56 there isn't a synagogue and so what do Paul and his team do? 02:01 They go down by the riverside where prayer was customarily 02:04 made. In other words, it's not a one-time thing. It's a custom 02:08 on the Sabbath day. It was Paul's practice, his custom, to 02:13 worship on the Sabbath day and I don't know if we had talked 02:19 about the idea of going to prayer. 02:23 Yeah, in verse 16 it speaks of that. 02:26 Okay. So you'll touch on that in a moment. One other thing here 02:30 about this woman Lydia now. They went down. They met with the 02:34 people there. There was a woman named Lydia. A couple of things 02:38 about Lydia. Sometimes I've heard talk of the Bible being a 02:43 very patriarchal, man-centered book where women were demeaned 02:48 and looked down upon. While that I'm sure was the case in some 02:53 places of the world, and it even is today in some places of the 02:57 world, it doesn't seem to have been the case in Philippi. This 03:01 woman, Lydia, is listed as a seller of purple. In other words 03:06 she was a business woman, a prominent business woman and 03:10 scholars assume that this woman Lydia, from what we know about 03:14 her, was a woman of means and influence. So whereas there may 03:18 have been places in the Bible and cultures where women may 03:22 have been looked down upon that was not the case universally in 03:26 scripture and Lydia is an example of that. She's a woman 03:29 of influence which is also important when Paul is 03:33 witnessing because when she makes her decision and she has 03:36 influence there's an impact, a ripple effect that going to go 03:40 through this area. Now the Bible tells us further of Lydia that 03:44 the Lord, and I love the way it words this in verse 14, The Lord 03:48 opened her heart to heed the things spoken by Paul. You know, 03:53 sometimes when the truth is presented we're all about 03:58 hearing and not heeding. The Lord opened her heart not just 04:03 to hear and cogitate and meditate on it and have some 04:08 mental assent to something, but to change her practices, her 04:13 life practices to heed the things spoken of by Paul that 04:17 would materially change her life and she was open to doing that 04:22 and that openness led to her baptism and, notice, her 04:26 household was baptized. So again speaking of her influence and 04:30 this became the beginnings of the church in Philippi. 04:34 That's right. And you know touching on your comment about 04:38 the prominence that Lydia had as a female in that society, as 04:41 we keep going through the book of Acts we'll find a couple of 04:46 different places where the writer of Acts, Luke, notes the 04:51 number of prominent Greeks and leading women who came to the 04:55 faith. So the Bible is very clear to give this sense of 05:00 equality in terms of everyone now being open to the door of 05:04 salvation and being seen as equals in value and worth in the 05:08 eyes of God and that's just a beautiful part that we see in 05:12 the book of Acts. That's right. Now in verse 16 it 05:14 says, Now it happened as we went to prayer, and this is what you 05:17 were mentioning a moment ago, this is a phrase that in the 05:22 common vernacular might just be we went to church. But still I 05:25 think it's worth mentioning that as evangelistic as Paul was and 05:29 as active as he was he took time for prayer. He didn't get 05:34 so busy that he didn't make sure that he kept his communion and 05:38 connection with God. Here we find that, As we went to prayer, 05:42 a certain slave girl possessed with a spirit of divination met 05:46 us. Now that's interesting, a spirit of divination. Now we can 05:50 get the idea here that more than likely this is going to be not a 05:54 good spirit. If you would pardon me to go 05:59 back just a little bit. That point you made on prayer. 06:01 I've encountered people involved in ministry, and of course I'm 06:06 involved in ministry, can tend sometimes to 06:10 feel like that ministry exempts 06:12 them from things like prayer meeting and things like that 06:15 because I'm a part of ministry. Sometimes people will say well 06:19 Pastor I know you're a part of ministry too but you go to 06:23 prayer meeting because you have to, it's your job. But the 06:26 reality is I go because I need to and that's what you're seeing 06:29 in the life of the Apostle Paul. I mean, the man was always 06:32 ministering. But even when he wasn't leading out in something 06:35 he felt his own personal need to be at the house of prayer, be at 06:39 the prayer meeting, be at the worship services and investing 06:42 himself in the work of God and participating in the fellowship. 06:45 That's right. He had a commitment, a discipline, that 06:47 was really the anchor for his faith. Well now we come back to 06:51 this slave girl who is possessed with this spirit of divination 06:55 and it says, She brought her masters much profit by 06:58 fortune telling. So apparently someone found out about the 07:04 strange abilities of this woman and she has this spirit of 07:08 divination which we would assume would probably be an evil 07:13 spirit, but as we keep reading we'll find out. It says in verse 07:16 17, This girl followed Paul and us and cried out saying, these 07:20 men are the servants of the most high God who proclaim to us the 07:24 way of salvation, and this she did for many days. So you get 07:27 the sense that, well, this is a good thing to say, right? I mean 07:31 they are servants of the most high God. She's supporting them. 07:35 But isn't it the case that whenever the cause of truth is 07:39 going forward that fanaticism attends it. Whenever you're 07:43 trying to make a clear stand on something somebody else stands 07:48 with you who happens to have some crazy ideas. It removes the 07:51 credibility of the stand that you're trying to take and that's 07:55 what's happening here with Paul. This woman clearly is not of a 07:58 right spirit but she's on their side and he gets, the Bible 08:02 says, annoyed. Greatly annoyed. Yes he does. It says, But Paul, 08:06 greatly annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, I command you in 08:11 the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her. And he came out that 08:15 very hour. But when her masters saw that their hope of profit 08:18 was gone they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the 08:22 market place to the authorities. So this kind of reminds me of 08:26 when Jesus cast the legion of demons out of the demon 08:29 possessed man and they went into the swine. You know that story. 08:33 And the swine ran off the cliff. Then the owners of the swine 08:37 that was part of their possessions there. They wanted 08:40 Jesus out of town. They weren't so concerned with this spiritual 08:44 healing as much as their physical loss and that's what 08:48 you see here. They're upset only because this woman was bringing 08:51 them money and now she's ruined when really she was healed. 08:54 It's also interesting to note that she was foretelling things. 08:58 That's right. But she was doing it from the wrong spirit and 09:01 once again just because there's some supernatural something 09:04 doesn't mean it comes from the Lord. Many times it can be 09:07 derailing us and deceiving us. 09:08 One of several times in the book of Acts where we see that. 09:10 In verse 20 it says, They brought them to the magistrates 09:13 and it says, These men being Jews exceedingly trouble our 09:16 city and they teach customs which are not lawful for us 09:19 being Romans to receive or observe. Then the multitude rose 09:22 up together against them. The magistrates tore off their 09:24 clothes and commanded them to be beaten with rods. Once again, 09:29 sufferings that the apostles experienced. And when they had 09:34 laid many stripes on them, they threw them into prison 09:36 commanding the jailer to keep them securely. Having received 09:40 such a charge, he put them into the inner prison and fastened 09:44 their feet in the stocks. I feel like I've seen this before. 09:47 That's right. The last time I think we saw this Peter was 09:51 guarded by the four squads of soldiers... 09:53 With two soldiers chained, one on each arm... 09:55 one on each side, that's right, that's right. 09:57 So he couldn't get away. There's no way the Lord can take him 10:01 from us or anybody could break him free. 10:03 But the Lord allowed them to have that type of strength of 10:07 security so that he could show his power. 10:10 That's right and so we see it again. Here they're taken, 10:12 they're put into the prison, as you said, the inner prison and 10:16 their feet are in the stocks. Now what's fascinating to me, 10:20 Jim, in this narrative is that they've just been beaten with 10:25 rods and the beating takes place on the back and they lay stripes 10:29 which is just a word for the fact that it's cut into your 10:33 flesh and left scars. Now there are fresh wounds on their backs, 10:37 they're in this jail cell and I'm sure it's not all that clean 10:42 hard dirt or concrete floors or stone floors and their feet are 10:47 in the stocks which means their feet are up somewhere. You know 10:50 sometimes the arms would be in the stocks, but in this case 10:55 their backs are left with their feet up in a position where 10:59 those fresh wounds are on that floor and you can imagine the 11:03 pain of that just having gone through the beating. So what are 11:06 they doing? Cursing or depressed and more. No. Look at what it 11:10 says in verse 25. At midnight Paul and Silas were praying and 11:14 singing hymns to God and the prisoners were listening to 11:18 them. They were amazed. What's going on here? And the Bible 11:22 goes on to say that suddenly there was a great earthquake 11:25 so the foundations of the prison were shaken. So you know the 11:28 Lord has one way or another to open them up. This time it's not 11:31 an angel, it's an earthquake. And immediately all the doors 11:33 were opened, everybody's chains were loosed and the keeper of 11:36 the prison awaking from sleep and seeing the prison doors open 11:39 supposing the prisoners had fled drew his sword to be about to 11:42 kill himself. Remember the guards were killed when Peter 11:46 was set free. So he figures he'll be killed, I may as well 11:50 kill myself. But Paul calls out, in verse 28, with a loud voice, 11:53 don't do yourself harm. We're all here. And of course the man 11:56 now is amazed. He sees there's a supernatural hand and he 12:00 trembles. Sirs, what must I do to be saved. And verse 30, And 12:03 they said to him believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will 12:07 be saved, you and your household and they spoke the word of the 12:11 Lord to him and all who were in his house and the Bible says 12:15 they all believed and were baptized. Once again the 12:19 Macedonian call results in now the salvation of another 12:23 household. These households, Lydia's household and the 12:26 household of the Philippian jailer became the beginnings 12:30 of the Macedonian church, the church of Philippi as a result 12:35 of them answering the Macedonian call. 12:38 Amen. Well we get into verse 35 and it says, When it was the day 12:42 the magistrates sent the officers saying let those men 12:45 go. So now they're going to let them go as if they couldn't have 12:49 gone on their own. And in verse 36 it says, So the keeper of the 12:52 prison reported these words to Paul saying the magistrates have 12:56 sent to let you go. Depart, go in peace. But Paul answers a 13:00 little bit surprisingly. He says They have beaten us openly 13:03 uncondemned Romans, and that's the key word here, and they have 13:07 thrown us into prison and now do they put us out secretly. 13:11 No indeed. Let them come themselves and get us out. 13:16 So you see while Paul was willing to surrender and be 13:20 submissive and you saw the great humility of the Apostle Paul, he 13:24 also, when the law demanded it, he would hold people to 13:28 accountability and he was holding them here to 13:30 accountability. It says in verse 38, The officers told these 13:33 words to the magistrates and they were afraid when they 13:36 heard that they were Romans because that was a great offense 13:41 to abuse a Roman citizen. So they had reason to be afraid. 13:44 But they came and pleaded with them, brought them out, asked 13:47 them to depart from the city. So they sent out of the prison, 13:49 they went back to Lydia's house, and when they had seen the 13:52 brethren they encouraged them and departed. And now the 13:55 Apostle Paul brushes off the dust and he's off to 13:58 Thessalonica. One encouraging visit after another, one answer 14:03 to the Spirit's call after another. May God bless you as 14:07 you answer the Spirit's call. |
Revised 2014-12-17