June 28, 2026-Evening Service

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:10

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for this evening. Thank you, Father, for time we came out of your house to sing praises to your name and worship you. Father, you'll give us some rain in the next couple hours. Thank you for your love for us, and brethren, you'll speak to our heart tonight. We love you. We pray this in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Amen. So we said this morning, we're going to talk about the book of Acts, chapter 14. We're going to do that. But before we get into Acts 14, I want to address a question that was brought up to me earlier. Because it's a very interesting question. I like it when somebody asks me questions that challenge my brain to think. We had a question like that the last time we talked. We were looking at um uh the arm bear to uh Saul that supposedly killed him according to 1 Samuel 31. But then you get it in 2 Samuel 1, you see that Malachi kid actually did it. So you're not really sure if it's the truth, there's not. That's really interesting stuff. That's kind of questions. So, question came to me today about the idea of um story with um Joshua in the book of Joshua, then it's chapter 2. Uh, he sends some spies into Jericho. Like, remember the little song he used to sing? Joshua is the battle of Jericho, Jericho. Remember that little song? Okay, so we're talking about. But he sent two spies in there to check out the land. Now, Joshua and Table, they've been spies before, right? Like they've been sent in, you know, to go check out the land of canyons and milk and all this stuff. They saw people wouldn't go in. Well, now Joshua's in control, he's doing similar, similar things. And it's unique because when he sends the guys in, they go and stay at a house of a woman who is known to be a prostitute. That is, she partakes of things that are not spiritual of the Lord. And the question would be: why would God send somebody to that house? That doesn't seem to make sense. Nowadays, if somebody's going to a prostitute's house, they're going to get something. Okay. I'm just they're going to get some, but that's just how it works, right? Told you you shouldn't be able to do it. But we could use a similar illustration, like, why would we as Christians go to a bar where the point being, besides friendship, would be to get wasted. I'm not talking about just a social drink, I'm talking about get wasted. Okay? You got a problem with that. Well, today, what would we say? Oh, we're gonna go there. We're not gonna drink a lot, but we're gonna tell people about Jesus. Be a witness. Okay? Now Jesus turned around people with a drinks. Okay, so go easy on that. But if I told you today, I'm gonna go down to um, I don't even know the names of prostitutes, or I don't even know where they immediately. Okay, whatever that place is. You're gonna be like, but no, you're not going there with witness, you're gonna be gonna get yourself in trouble. All right? Okay, okay. So the question was, why would God do something like that? Now, I have to acknowledge that God is God and I'm not. And He works in ways a lot of times I don't understand. Matter of fact, in the book of Hosea, and he commanded to marry a prostitute, go home.

SPEAKER_04 3:39

Go back and get her another tongue.

SPEAKER_01 3:41

Yeah, and he thinks going good, then she decides she's gonna go back to her business, and she does that, and God sends her back. That makes absolute no sense when you first look at it. But when you look back and see what God doing, God was doing, it makes a whole different story. So that's what I did this afternoon, anything else to do today. So let me just answer this question by kind of breaking it down a little bit. A couple of things to think about. Joshua, part of the children of Israel. God's chosen people that are gonna be the light of the nations, they've got to help bring the good news of the gospel, right? We've got two groups of people. You've got those who are children of God, the children of Israel, and those who are not. Those would be everybody else, the Canaanites and Alechites, and all the otherites and Isms and things like that, okay? So you've got that group of people. So you've got Rahab, prostitute, a Canaanite woman, but like I mentioned this morning, she's listed in the genealogy of Jesus. You go back and look at it, and I was reading it wrong when I was talking about this morning. Um, but Rahab would be the great-great-grandmother of King David. Right. Did you hear that? In that lineage, this prostitute ended up married Salon. How do you pronounce his name? Salmon Salmon. Okay, I think it's Salmon. I don't say Salmon. Uh ends up married him, and all of a sudden she's married into the tribe of Judah, right? So God did something amazing through that lineage king, David, and if you follow far enough, it comes to who?

SPEAKER_04 5:15

Right. Billy then had both ass who end up being ruth, which is um very similar situation, yep.

SPEAKER_01 5:21

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 5:21

And she's in the lineage of Jesus.

SPEAKER_01 5:23

Yep. You see four different women in the lineage of Jesus.

SPEAKER_04 5:25

That's five, didn't you?

SPEAKER_01 5:26

Four or five. Yeah. Tamara, yeah, maybe just one few in there. But it's interesting the fact that the women is also interested. Many of them were not purebred children of Israel, you know. So what do you see in all that? You see God's doing something to let people know that his plan of redemption is going to come about. And that redemption is for all of mankind. Okay? It doesn't matter your family last name, but no matter where you're from, it doesn't matter the color of your skin or the language you speak, or how good looking you are, or how ugly you might be. Christ died for all. That message is for all. Doesn't matter how good you are or how bad you've been, there's still hope because of what Christ did. That's what we see in that lineage there of Jesus in the book of Matthew, chapter 1, verses 1 through 6. Um, so think about that. That in mind, think about the spies that sent two guys in. Now, this little part here is just my thinking. Okay, this is not written in the Bible, so there's no proof of this, but just give you something to think about. In scripture, there are cases when God was at work and he was sending people to do his job, that the people would concentrate themselves to be holy before the Lord. Okay. That being said, Moses doesn't the mountain of children's supposed to consecrate themselves for three days. What's that mean? Wash, be clean, and restrain from what? Y'all say it's all I'm gonna say. Yeah, that worked. Okay, so there's a small possibility, no proof of this, it's just my thinking, that maybe they had consecrated themselves, asked the Lord's direction before they went in. We don't know because it's scripture didn't tell us that. But there's a small chance that that could have happened. Okay. So things to think about Rahab. Listen to what it says in Joshua chapter 2, verses 8 through 11. Listen to her testimony of her faith. Okay, this is not somebody who worked in Sunday school. Okay, obviously. Okay, outside of that, she wasn't with the church of Israel. So it wasn't like she went to synagogue all the time. Okay, wasn't like she followed any Jewish rituals at all. She followed the world and all the rituals that the world does. Okay. So listen to what she says. Verse 8 of chapter chapter 2, it says that before the men lay down, she came up to them on the reef. She said to the men, I know that the Lord has given you the land, and that the fear of you has fallen upon us, and all the inhabitants of the land melt away before you. For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea before when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to the kings, two kings of Amorites who were beyond the Jordan, to Shihon and Log, who you devoted to destruction. As soon as we heard it, our hearts melted. There was no spirit left in any man because of you. For the Lord your God, he is the God of the heavens above, and on the earth beneath you. Now, if we go back and look at verses 1 to 7, you'd see how this all came about that the guys go and they go to their house. Some things think about if they're gonna go hang out at the prostitute's house, why would they want to do that? Well, we already mentioned one reason you go to a prostitute's house is for that. I'm gonna say SA. Okay, you heard what that means. Okay, we can say that, right? What's that camera? It just feels weird. People older than me. That's what you think they want to do. But in biblical times, it's very likely that many times those what you would call house of your repute today would be a place where that kind of activity would take place, but there would also be other rooms where it should be almost like an innkeeper, almost like a hotel, kind of like a hotel motel combined together, if you know what I mean. Okay, you're picking that up or putting that on. I'm saying as nice as I can. So uh it's it's that's likely a possibility. Okay, so it wasn't necessarily they only travelers and they're away from their wives and they want to get something. It's not necessarily that's the case, okay? They're being sent by Joshua. Okay, you go to a place like that, you're not out in the main square, you're in the little prime and off to the side location. A place where people, foreigners, come and go all the time. Because that's true that people want that sometimes, they'll cross state lines and go other places. Okay, so it's likely there's gonna be lots of people coming over. What would be their point? Uh, again, not for any kind of benefit they get from her, but it might be a place where they could slip in almost almost keyword there, unnoticed because sparkins are freaking all the time. People sit on the street, oh, there they go. You know, that's those guys who know what they're doing. Okay, but also, wouldn't it also be like going to the beauty shop or the bar shop? What I mean by that is just simply everybody talks, everybody knows the lay of the land, right? You go to the barber shop that blah blah blah blah blah blah. You go to the beauty parlor, they don't go, but I'm assuming, I'm assuming, maybe I'm wrong, but uh they talk, right? They do. Okay, good. Okay. So you got that going on. So keep that in mind. They're going looking for information if they can come out the spy of the land. And they do, they find this place, this Ringham's house. Got some rooms, obviously. And it says here the very first part of that verse eight, before the men lie down, she comes up to them on the roof. Okay, now that word to lay with can mean a lot of different things. It can mean the essay word, or it can mean just simply just laying down on the couch and taking a nap. It can mean a lot of different things. So there's people that would want to argue that they got something that night. Okay, you know what I'm saying? Like sure we're on the same page, okay? But at the same time, it's time for them to go down for the night. Now, what you're gonna have to look at in the scripture is how the rest of the story goes. Did they wake up the next morning and care about the business? If you look at the story, she's hidden them. She goes back, she confesses to them. And she's like, You gotta get out of here, they're looking for you. What does she do? After the gates are closed that night, she sticks something out the window, curtain, whatever. Somehow she makes cord road and lets them escape. So it's not like they had a lot of time to do anything else except get there, hear her story, hide from the soldiers and people coming look at Wargan and go on. But good so far?

SPEAKER_04 12:28

Love and Billy, another thought too is her house was on the wall, which was easy for them to scale up the wall, most likely, to get into the city rather than coming in through the gate. Yeah. So that might that was awesome. Her house was convenient or in whatever.

SPEAKER_01 12:51

Well, it just came out of the day to what I mean, really, until he looked about correctly.

SPEAKER_04 12:59

Yeah, no, just like Joshua said they just spot the land, the king also had heard about what Israel's got to do to them. So I'm sure they have spies also that was looking for any strangers that might look like they were gonna spy out the land, too.

SPEAKER_01 13:18

So imagine this. You're out there checking up the land, you go to a place, you're gonna try to hide a place that's kind of like sketchy, if you will. And then what does a woman do? She didn't rate on, we don't think she did anything else with it physically. But does she, outside of her technical, does she also proclaim her faith in God? That's right. Okay, she's a prostitute, she's not a one children of Israel, she ain't been in Sunog. No Synagogue's around. Okay, no temple, no nothing. Worldly personally, but she says, For the Lord your God, he is the God of heavens above and on the earth beneath. So what we gotta do is figure out now why did God send her there? We kind of answered briefly this morning, but we'll go a little bit more detail right now. Listen to this. There's a commentator named James Boyce, who's a theologian. He says something to this effect. He says, uh it is reasonable to think that the spies are sent to save Rahab, not and not merely just bringing information. Joshua didn't need information about Jericho. What he needed were the arrangements for saving Rahab and her family. Does that make sense? Let me read that again. It's reasonable to think that the spies are sent to save Rahab and not merely bring information to Joshua. Okay. Now, how is Joshua gonna take over Jericho? He was completely destroyed. What are they gonna do? They're gonna march around because they were destroying, okay? That's what he's gonna do. But was God up to something and wanting specifically to save her life, her family's life, knowing that she's gonna be the great great grandmother to King David. What her other is gonna put people where he needs them. Yeah, God's gonna put people where he needs them to get them to the cross. Okay, listen to this. Joshua didn't need a strategy for Jericho, he was interested in saving Rahab and her family. Um despised enter Jericho, they meet Rahab, and she tells them what she's heard, the great miracles of deliverance and the battles that Israel have won. Uh, the miracles, uh what Rachel understood was that God was a God of heaven and earth. Uh, and another way of saying that would be to her, they were to heard an aroma of life and of life, but to the neighbors they were fragrance of death and of death. Have you heard that saying before in 2 Corinthians 2, 15, 16? Listen to the statement here. It said, but thanks be to God who in Christ always leads us a triumphal procession, and through us the friends say, fragrance of knowledge of Him everywhere. For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. And one to a fragrance from death to death, another fragrance of life to life. The idea that for those seeking after the Lord, the good news, the gospel messages we bring is a pleasant fragrance. But to everybody else, it's a stench, right? That's why we have people that love the Lord and attend churches, but we have those who don't and turn away from the Lord. Uh so Rachel, I'm assuming Rahab, was one who heard of God, heard of the stories, and having the spies there was encouraging her. She wanted to have her life saved. Um, bottom line, I think God sent the spies there for Rachel. Uh, Rachel knew that the destruction was imminent, that her only escape to flee even Jericho to the people of God, she'd have to risk her life to protect the spies. Uh, she didn't only escape, as you know, but she joined the Israelites against the barian tribe of Judah, mentioned that earlier. She left behind all that she knew to inherit eternal life. You think about that? There was a little deal she made for the guys. Hey, they put this little scarlet third here. This is my pupil, ain't nobody even saved. They said, get in there, right? They got in there and it was time for the battle, they got her out. Wasn't much longer after that, where the entire place was destroyed. And I say destroyed, I mean like completely demolished. She gave up everything she had.

SPEAKER_04 17:40

A miracle was it. Her house, her hand house, wherever she lived, was on the wall. The walls collapsed on that seventh trip around. Her house didn't. They didn't get her out until after the walls were collapsed. So that was a miracle in itself that her house was saved.

SPEAKER_03 17:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 17:59

And didn't Ruth do the same thing? Didn't she believe in Naomi's God? And that's why she didn't have the million Jesus.

SPEAKER_01 18:06

Yeah. So we're moving here. We see the miracle, but now we're moving into a section of faith. Listen to Matthew 19, 29. It says, for everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or fathers and mothers or children or ladies, for my namesake will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life. That's in the New Testament. We see both examples, Ruth and Rahab, giving up all they had for Christ. A great example of faith. I've already mentioned uh about the jail of Christ. Um, honestly, her legacy doesn't end just with Joshua 2. Uh, scripture mentions her several times. Um, one time has to do with the idea of genuine faith. Remember in the book of Hebrews, chapter 11, the great faith. Abraham believed in Canada's righteousness, that story. Okay, listen to chapter 11, verse 31. By faith, the prostitute did not perish with those who were disobedient. Because she had given a friendly welcome to the spies. How did she save herself? By faith. Um throughout all scripture, she's considered a prostitute. But what's the catch on that? Look at how that shows the grace that was extended to her. So no matter what our background, where we come from, the Lord puts a call in there in our life, he's gonna forgive us. We can inherit eternal life. No matter how bad you know, if you've ever been a prostitute, don't answer that. But you have, you've been forgiven, and pretends about it. God can use you, all right? Let me read another verse. Talking about uh Rahab being a person of faith, James chapter 2, verse 25. And in the same way, it's not also Rayhat, the prostitute justified by works, but she received good messengers and sent them out by another way. So she's an example that uh James Hughes show uh we're saved, not just by belief, but putting the belief to action. Faith and works, all right? Do it together. Faith, she believed, she gave the testimony, works, she committed to doing what she said she was going to do, and then by then the uh spies committed to doing what they said they were gonna do. This idea of grace. It's like Christ sending out a rescue party to redeem her from her sin. Does that make sense? So you looked at the story as an interesting story now. Um it would be nice if we could give a lot more details because we like details. We don't we want to sit in the barber shop at the parlour, beauty park, we want to get all the juicy details. Like, did they do what she does in business wise? If it didn't say they did. I don't personally believe they did. If you research, you'll have some people that try to argue that based on the fact that they laid down. But if you look at that, that they laid down, she goes talk to them, they get a believe. So it's not like they did. But even if they did, what difference does it make?

SPEAKER_02 21:12

They did.

SPEAKER_01 21:13

Yeah, I'm saying they didn't. I'm just saying that if somebody wants to argue, and some some scholars that get out there are not necessarily what I call talk-not scholars, they're just different ideas. Yeah, yeah. So um, God's of work, he's gonna do the thing, but the attention is to not lose sight of the fact that what actually took place, or what God actually did, saved this woman to be part of the lineage of Christ. And not only that, just not just being part of the lineage, but also having eternal life because of her faith. No matter how bad our neighbors are. Many of my neighbors are watching, but how many are I talking about specifically about how bad anybody we know are? They're still hoping till they take that last breath. Let's be faithful to share the message. For the spice, they found out that people already heard the message. Our neighbors probably heard it. But we could show up in love and demonstrate that message, that can console, that can put in concrete their faith, and maybe the Lord could promote to himself. You know what I'm saying? Something to think about. You got questions, let me know. Sometimes I'll get them out that day, that night, sometimes it might take me a while, sometimes I might forget. But uh, thanks for the question. It was good. Uh easy enough. All right, let's take the stuff that's a little bit easier. Acts chapter 14. Let's take a look at Acts chapter 14.

SPEAKER_03 22:36

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 22:51

I know you didn't want to hear all that, but you're welcome. Now we're going to be in Acts now, chapter 14. You're crazy talking about that, so baby. Acts chapter 14. You got Paul and Barnabas have been faithful to do what God had called them to do. They were the apostles, they were doing what God had called them to do. They'd been sent out by the Church of Antioch to uh go and spread the gospel on the missionary journeys, if you will. They're heading out, they started out, and one of the first places they get to things turn out the rave, and all of a sudden they start to get persecuted and have to move. And that's where we pick up in chapter two, verse one.

SPEAKER_04 23:35

Chapter two of chapter 14. Chapter 14.

SPEAKER_01 23:40

Give me a second, give me a second. Hebrews is what we're gonna look at in a second. I've got a reference a moment. We're gonna look at chapter one, chapter 14, verse 1. It says now in Nconium, they entered together to the Jewish synagogue and they spoke in such a way that a great number, both Jews and Greeks, believed. They had traveled in Poseidon Antioch over 80 miles because of persecution. And they do what they mentioned before, they do the typical pattern, they go in first of the synagogue, speak to the Jews there. The idea they're giving a message or giving the cases of Christ based off the Old Testament. The Jews love the Old Testament, they want to make a connection because the Jews didn't necessarily see Christ as a Messiah. So that's how they're starting off. But what I want to mention uh after reading those first two verses is something we're gonna see here because we're looking at how the Holy Spirit should work in the lives of the apostles and the book of Acts. The whole thing is we're seeing what the Holy Spirit's doing. So there's one, two, three, four, five, six, six different spiritual gifts that we're gonna see that was activated in their lives in this story. So I want to mention those first, and then we'll talk about the story and we'll continue this in the weeks to come. One of the gifts that you see activated is found in verse one. Uh verse one says, now they're going, they entered together in the Jewish synagogue and spoke in such a way that a great number of both Jews and Greeks believed. One of the ideas that we see here, one of the gifts would be that of prophecy proclaiming Christ. They did that, and people came. I would almost argue that would also be like evangelism as well. Um, but the idea, you see what the Holy Spirit's doing, we see that these men were gifted by the Holy Spirit. Now, when we tell you the truth, shouldn't be mixed between us today and then back then. It's the same Holy Spirit, the same gifts. There's discussions on all the gifts still there over there, some say they are, some say they're not. Uh that point right now is neither here nor there. But the idea is those gifts still exist. Uh, so we should be displaying these gifts. So I'm going to point it to the ones that they're displaying, one prophecy, giving the word of Christ out. We also see that in verse 21 and in verse 25. Verse 21 says, But they had preached the gospel in that city and made many disciples that returned to Lysra and Iconium and to Antioch. So see, they're proclaiming the prophecy, the preaching there. And then uh also in verse 25, when they had spoken the word in the verga, they went down to at uh at the Leah. So you see three different cases of them using this idea of uh preaching or prophecying for coming Christ. Uh there's another spiritual gift that you see being used, and then that next one is teaching, the gift of teaching. If you look at verse 22, strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue into faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God. So you see the idea of teaching, the idea of what it says they're strengthening the souls. That same verse, you also see exhortation, because it says and they're encouraging them to continue into faith. Then another one there, uh, number four, is the idea of displaying the leadership. Look at verse 23. It says, and when they had uh when they had appointed elders for them in every church with prayer and fasting, they committed them to the Lord in whom they had to lead. What was with leadership? Appointing elders. Okay, so they're showing prophecy, they're preaching, proclaiming the word of God, they're teaching, they're exhorting, and they're showing leadership. Now, here's where it gets a little sticky, okay? There are other gifts that they display as well. Okay, now just say like it is, the idea for the apostles, as they go out preaching and teaching, there needed to be affirmation that they are who they say they are and what they say is true. Okay, today we have that with God's word. I can say, Ken, you know, God loved the world so much and gave his only begotten son, if you believe and all your neighbors believe, you'd have everlasting life. Then I can take the Bible and show that to them. Okay. Back then they couldn't do that, it hadn't even been written down yet. So, what do we see? We see two more spiritual gifts as listed in the Bible that they use. Verse 3 has one of them. Listen to verse 3. Verse 3 says, So they remained for a long time, speaking boldly for the Lord, who bore witness to the word of his grace, granting signs and wonders to be done by their hands. So as the apostles are out there doing the work, preaching, teaching, the Lord uses them. He backs up what they're saying by giving them the gift of miracles. You see what it says there? They're speaking boldly for the Lord, who bore, have it be the Lord, or witness to the word of his grace. So the Lord does this, he grants signs and wonders to be done by their hands. When I see that, that reminds me that all spiritual gifts are not something that we can work up on our own. That's something given by God. I'm not talking about like a talent. Like you saw a talent tonight that I spent from kindergarten and first grade through twelfth grade taking piano lessons. So I learned to play the piano, okay? That's not a spiritual gift, okay? There's lots of people up there who can get up there and do much better than I can do on the same stuff, right? Spiritual gift, something given by the Holy Spirit to build the body of Christ. I think obviously we can use natural gifts and talents in the church, obviously. But these are specific things. In this case, signs and wonders, miracles that were taking place. And there's another, look at verse 8. It says in verse 8, now Lister, there was a man uh who could not uh use his feet. He was scribbled from birth and had never walked. Verse 9. He listened to Paul speaking, and Paul, looking intently at him, seeing that he had a faith to be made well, said in a loud voice, stand upright on your feet. The Bible says that he sprang up and began walking. Okay, we call that what? Gift of healing. Okay, so when you look at the New Testament, you see all these different gifts. Uh, you've got the ones that are easy to talk about evangelism, teaching, preaching, prophecy, exhortation, leadership, etc., etc. Then you see some of the what we call terrorism, some of the sign gifts, uh miracles, uh, and healing. In this case, we don't see speaking in tongues or interpretation, we don't see it in here, but this is two that we see. So just know that as the churches were started, as the work gospel is getting out, the men that God is using, and women in other cases we'll see, they're using the gifts of the spirit to carry out the spirit's work. So if I were to ask you today, what are we doing to advance the kingdom of God? What are we doing? Don't answer just a process with me on this. Each of us, if we've been given a spiritual gift to use to build up the body, we need to be doing that. Okay, but we have to remember we can't do it on our own. That the Holy Spirit's gonna be the one to speak through us to enable us to do that. And it might be that that we might have one gift and maybe let it run, we'll have something different. It could change. It's not like this we don't have just one gift dog or lost. It could be, but it could be that you could have several gifts. Does that make sense? So when we look back, we're like, wow, look what God's doing. My argument would be he ought to be doing the same things now. Now, you know me, coming from the Southern Baptist tradition, coming from a conservative tradition. A lot of us think that these uh charismatic, you know, uh miracles, healings, and speaking of time, stuff like that make me pass away. That matter of fact, it hasn't happened for the point we're looking at tonight. What matters is we've still got other gifts. We've got plenty of gifts that we need to be using. If we know what those gifts are, or use of, but watch how God will build up his church.

SPEAKER_04 32:17

One of the scriptures says that some of these things will only come through fasting. So I think sometimes it matters how much we're learning to fast and pray as to what God will use us to do. And these men of God fasted and prayed continuously.

SPEAKER_01 32:43

I'm gonna skip the Hebrews passage, so it's mentioned earlier. Let's go back to verse one and now let's start walking through this. So we've looked at the idea that you see them using these spiritual gifts. Now we're gonna look at some characteristics that these uh me and Paul and Barnabas display as you walk through this. And the first one we're gonna see obviously is gonna be boldness. Uh let's look at verse one. Uh we've got one through about uh six. Somebody want to read uh chapter 14, verses uh one through six for them.

SPEAKER_02 33:14

Paul and Barnabas went about with you synagogue. There they spoke so effectively that a great number of Jews and Gentiles believe.

SPEAKER_03 33:25

They're six.

SPEAKER_02 33:26

But the Jews who refused to believe stirred up the gentiles and poisoned their minds against their brothers. So Paul and Barnabas spent their certificate time there speaking boldly for the Lord, who confirmed a message of disgrace by enabling them to do righteous signs and wonders. The people of the city were divided, some sided with the Jews, others with the apostles. There was a five foot among Kentiles and Jews, together with their leaders to mistreat them and stung them. But they found Alag and fled to like cities, the livestock and derme, and to the surrounding country.

SPEAKER_01 34:04

Yeah, okay. So we see they get to work, they get into Iconian there, they go to the synagogue and they speak, and God works. What happens? People start to believe, both Greeks and Jews alike. Again, as I mentioned earlier, they traveled so many miles to get there, getting far off what they thought would be far enough the way to start a new ministry without being harassed. But as they do now, when God is at work, there's gonna be people who are not gonna be happy about it. In this case, people in the when it's not a church, I have a synagogue, okay? People that fully believe what was going on, and they're gonna rebel and they're gonna cause trouble. That happens today, though. That even in our churches today, God starts working, his people are not gonna like this, or they start ministry, people complain. You know, just gonna watch for stuff like that. But look what it says. In this case, verse two unleading Jews started the Gentiles and poisoned their minds against the robe. It wasn't enough for them just to be mad about it and not believe, they start gossiping about it. And when you start gossiping about it, what happens? That starts spreading like what? Like what's it said here? Like wildfire or like poison, too, doesn't it? It says poison their minds against the brothers. Um but what happens? Do they get unbelief? No. It says here they continued, they stayed for, it didn't say how long, but they stayed for a long time, and they began to speak boldly. Time after time, time again. We'll see when there's persecution, many times the disciples would pray, Lord, give us boldness to stand up to truth. Well, we're not looking like today, the Lord gave us boldness. You know, we're a semi-Christian nation, semi-Christian state, semi-Christian county. You know, we get up for flame, we're not, to my knowledge, we're gonna have a lot of feedback on that. We're, you know, mostly Christian things are. But there are places in the U.S. where you start doing this, speaking after the Lord, even boldly, you're gonna have some trouble. But look what happens here. They continue to speak boldly for the Lord, they don't quit. And then what does the Lord do? The Lord steps in, Jesus has scripture gift of men ago. I talked about about miracles, signs, and wonders to prove to back up what they're saying, to say that these men are who they say are. Jesus is who he sends he is, and boom, here's a miracle to prove it. And then list all the miracles and signs that they did right there, but they must have done enough because it's in the plural form. Now we'll see the minute I've already read they do Peter talking the bonus to the lame guy walking. But just from that, we see that God is a work. But even though God's at work, it's like we look back and think, duh, I mean, come on, all these signs are going to bonus, but I believe this, there's still people who are not gonna believe. Okay, it's like there's a veil over their eyes. You ever try to talk to somebody, explain something to them, but they just don't quite get it? And you're like, come on, this is black and white, and you can go all day and go get them. This is how it is, okay. I'm not talking about somebody who's got an issue mentally where they're just having a bad day, and maybe their brain didn't function right. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about just there's like a veil, they just don't get it. That's what happens in verse 4. Look what happens. It says, But the people of the city are divided, some siding with the Jews, and some siding with the apostles. So some are listening to that junk, the gossip that's talking about, and then others are saying, No, I've seen the apostles, I know what they're saying. They're backing the words up with miracles. This is of the Lord. Now, note there when it says there in verse 4, some siding with the apostles. Now, who are we talking about? We're talking about the hall and Barnabas. So when we think about that and think about the word apostle, we have to be careful because we know there were twelve disciples, right? Judas jumped off board, and then Matthews got put in his place. Okay. The idea with the disciple or apostle, capital A, was somebody who had seen the resurrection of the Lord and been called by Christ himself. Okay. Barnabas does not fit that category. Paul did because on the road of Damascus, he had a face-to-face account of the Christ. Okay, but Barnabas didn't. The reason I mention that as you're reading this is my Bible's a lowercase A, I don't know why it isn't yours. It's more case to A. The idea, an apostle, another way to use that would be the term messenger. I would almost want to put in the term missionary because you're going, you're sharing a message, and they're doing what they call Paul's missionary journey. They're going from town to town. So when you see that, don't think, oh, Barnabas said he's supposed to be like a he's not an apostle, he wouldn't listen. Jesus didn't call him out. No, he didn't. Uh, in the sense they were sent out by the church. But just a little tip to keep in mind there. Look at verse 5. It said, when the attempt was made by both Gentiles and Jews, but their rulers, to mistreat, mistreat them and to stone them. Jews had this idea, if they want to execute somebody, they'd like to do it by stoning. And a lot of times the reason they'd want to do that is for blasphemy. So they've come across a situation where their life is going to be in danger. But look what happens in verse 6. It says they learned of it and fled to Lystrin, Derby, cities of Laconia, and the surrounding country, and they kept quiet here. So what your Bible says? No, right? Of course not. Leah's already rated. She said verse 7, and there they continued to preach the gospel. They had been given boldness, they had that boldness, but they also had a sense of it to listen, and when they knew that their life was in that much danger, it was time to move on. They didn't quit the assignment, they didn't give up and go home, they just moved to the next place the Lord sent them. In this case, the next couple towns, over. That makes sense? All right. Take a look uh at the next session. Let's look at verses 8 through 18. And so we first looked at the idea of the next spirits, they uh displayed boldness. Now we're gonna look at how they displayed humility. Okay, we've already seen they're using spiritual gifts as those names. We've seen boldness, now we see humility. Somebody read verses eight through uh eighteen for me.

SPEAKER_00 40:22

And they sat a certain way in restaurant, everton and his feet, being a crippled from his mother wound in everything walking. The king the same herd Paul's feet, who stood back to beholding him, and perceiving that he had faith to be ill. Say when a loud voice stand upright on that feet, and he leaped and walked, started walking, and when the people saw what Paul had done, and they lifted up their voices, saying in speech of the light of God, land near the gods are come down to us in the likeness of me. And they called Barnabas Jupiter, or Paul Mercury, because he reaches. We also again of life passions with preachers to you that you should turn from these vanities unto the line God, which made heaven and earth, and sea and all things without me. When times have suffered, allow all as to walk in their own ways. Nevertheless, he left without witness, and he did do it, gave us wave of health, and fruitful seed, filling our hearts with food and glass. And these things were straight. They would be that they did not know sacrifice or offering.

SPEAKER_01 42:28

They're moving out, being faithful, the preaching. Paul's up there preaching, he notices a guy there to scroll. And how our spirit works to do this, which I'm not sure how it works. Uh Paul's faith, obviously, and listened to spirit, realized that there's God's willing to do something, that means life you couldn't walk. Realizing that he had the faith, he likes circumstance, he tells him, get up and walk. And he doesn't. Like if I go to a healing service today in some church, I'm probably not gonna know about the church. And it could be real faith, I don't know. But in this case, the people there that lived there knew the person, they knew a miracle had taken place. So what do they do? They all of a sudden begin to think, oh, maybe this is one of these three gods that we've been looking at. Uh you mentioned Jupiter and Mars. Some versions say uh Zeus and Hermes, and different versions say different ways than that, okay? Just be aware of that. So they start thinking, oh, this must be who these people are because of the way they're acting. It says they're specifically in verse 11 that gods have come down this down to us in the likeness of men. And the reason they call Barnabas Zeus is Paul Hermes is because it's a chief speaker. Now, what's the problem with that? Who's about to get the glory? Or who's getting the glory at the moment? At the moment, they're getting the glory. Wouldn't it make you feel good if you, as the Lord, used you to heal somebody? Or used you to write a million-dollar check to bless the church or the community or something? It makes you feel good. But we have to give credit where credit's due. And then when worthy of any credit worship is God Himself. The guys knew Paul Harvest, they knew exactly that they were the ones. They had done it, but it was by the power of the Holy Spirit. Another sign, one of heavenly miracle, like we mentioned the men to go. So, in humility, what do they do? Try to get people's attention to say, hey, it's not us. We're not the one doing this. And then they give an explanation of how it really took place. Look what it says. Uh, verse 15 men, why are you doing these things? We are also men, trying to negate what they were saying as they thought they were gods. It says, uh, we're men of like nature with you, but we bring you good news. And here comes the good news. Then I'll start preaching again, okay? It says that you should turn from these vain things to living gods to made the heavens and earth to see all that is in them. And then explaining how God works, he says the pastor's arrangements, he allowed the nations to walk in their ways, yet he didn't leave his name without witness, but he did good by giving you rains from heaven and fruitful season satisfied your hearts with food, food, and blends. Even with these words, they scarcely restrained the people from offering sacrifices to them. They're speaking to them and playing with a pony so they can understand. We're just human beings. God did that, but they can't see it. They're missing the whole point. Nevertheless, where the disciples do, or the apostles do, or admitted boldness, walking in humility, and the next little section, they're gonna walk in persistence. Let's look at verses 19 and 20.

SPEAKER_03 46:12

But after the disciples had gathered around him, he bound up and baggage them still. The next day he had the burn must left for dirty.

SPEAKER_01 46:21

Some people just can't leave well enough alone, can they? In their own town, own city, they get mad, they chase people out. Then they hear it's going on again. Now, these are religious people. It's not just your average cherry in town wanting to keep the law of the land. No, these are religious people. And they're not happy with God. They tend to write. And apparently they were almost willing to die for it because they take off after these guys. And what do they do? Says there, they come from uh Antioch and Iconium, they persuade the crowds and convince them that they're blasphemy, saying that they're God and that talking about this Christ, and Jews saying that's not true. Here's the catch. They take him out, Paul, and they stone. And he appears to be dead. Now, how about that for going from being in a church in any house and really laying hands on you and say, Chapar, I'm gonna see you up on this little cruise, this little journey. Going to tell people about Jesus. And all of a sudden, telling people about Jesus gets you stoned. Okay? I ain't talking about drugs, I'm talking about a physical rock upside your body somewhere. Okay. That happened. Okay. Why? Because they were being faithful and bold and in humility, sharing the gospel of Christ. We get concerned because we're afraid somebody might reject us. But I don't know that we live in an area, maybe we do, but I don't think we do, where if we preach Jesus, they're gonna do rocks in us. Okay, rocks in the very word stone because it's bigger than the little rock. Yeah, we don't have to be rocks. I get through rocks for beautiful, beautiful rocks. Yeah, I mean, that's just how it works as kids growing up. But this is different. Paul's being faithful, and he's being stoned. How bad? They thought he was dead. Okay, but look what it says here. Verse 20. But when the disciples gathered about him, he rose up, entered the city, and on the next day went with Barnabas to Derby. So they take him outside the city, still him think he's dead. Disciples, other disciples that get around him, and the Lord's providence doesn't say how it happened. If they prayed, everybody didn't say, I imagine they were praying. He gets up. And where does he go? Back to where he just left because they had dragged him out. I don't know about you. I tried to be faithful to the Lord. But if I got trouble in an area, I'm probably not gonna go back. And if I am, I promise you I'm gonna be carrying stuff with me beside the Bible to defend myself. I know the Bible says mine saying the Lord, but sometimes I don't take matters of long end. But he just gets up and goes back in there, and then after that, obviously the next day, he continues on his journey. All right, if if I'm being persecuted like that, I might say I'm gonna be like, Lord, are you sure about this? You call me to do this? He knew what God had called him to do. He was listening, and they carried on their journey, like it says in verse 20. Um got about four more minutes left. Let's look at the next section. 23 through 20, I'm excuse me, 21 to 23. We've seen boldness, we've seen the persistence, we've seen humility. Now we're looking at the display characteristics of being carriage of people. 21 to 23. When they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra and Aconium at Antioch, strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God. When they appointed elders with them in every church, through prayer and fasting, they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed. Didn't put it on a map, didn't write it down, if you will, Tracy cities where they started from being sent up any of them, going to Poseidon, going to Ikonim, going to these places. Now they're returning back through these places. Not all those places that they get a complete warm welcome on the way out the door. They didn't have like, oh, we're gonna send you off again. No, stoned and ridiculed and chased out. But they go back, and what do they do? They find those who are believers and they seek to encourage them. Uh, like it says they're um they preach the gospel and sin, they've made disciples, and then return, they strengthen the souls of the disciples, so they start teaching them to make sure that they're maturing in their faith. So they didn't stay with them long on each of these occasions, but as they teach them, verse 22 says they also encourage them to continue in the faith, and then they give that little thought that they had experienced. Through many tribulations, we must enter the kingdom of God. There's a price to pay in the kingdom. Yes, it's a free gift, but to be faithful to the end, you have to endure things. Paul endured shipwrecks, he endured stoning and snake bites, etc. etc. We're gonna endure things. Things are gonna come along. We're gonna have to suffer. We don't talk much about a theology of suffering, but that's kind of what he's talking about here. So as he's preparing to leave verse 23, he says, uh, and when they had appointed elders with them in every city to every church, in prayer and fasting, they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed. So as they come back through, they evaluate the situation, they evaluate how God's work, how the people have matured, and they don't leave them as infants, they leave them with people who are capable of leading the church, appointing for them elders. Where it gets tricky, it says appointing for elders in every church, meaning there's more than one person leading the church. Nowadays in the congregational system, we have only you have like a senior pastor and then left other pastors, but in this case, they call them pastors that call them elders, and they had several of them doing that. Uh so we see them going back and caring for the people they had met with. Then we see the concept of mitnet in verse 24 and 25, and we'll get to this real quick. Then they pastored Vesadia and came to Pamvilia. When they had spoken a word in perga, they went down to Tileh, uh Tilehim. And then the last couple verses, they showed reverence. Um, from there, they said the Antioch, where they had been uh commended to the grace of God for the work which they had fulfilled. When they had arrived and gathered the church together, they declared all that God had done with them and how he had opened the door of faith to the Gentiles. And they remained there no little time with the disciples. What are you seeing? God sends them out, they're faithful to do what God's called them to do in the midst of all the suffering and the joy and the miracles. They return back, make the disciples along the way going back, and then they get back to the Sunny Church, and they have a little praise meeting, thanking God, telling everybody what God had done. You know that had to encourage the church. We like to missionaries come to hear what God's doing is encouraging us, especially because we send money to help support missionaries, and sometimes we ourselves make good things like that. But they got to participate in this hearing of what God had done for that ministry, and that was encouraging them. And ending at 14, they said they're quite a while with the other believers. But with that, we see the closing of chapter 14. Um, two weeks and I will pick up in uh chapter 15. Unless Rusty wants to do 15. You're welcome to do that if you want to. You don't have to, but you're welcome to do that. But uh next Sunday, uh Jordan Smith will be here with us. Looking forward to that to enjoy his time. And in the evening, Rusty's gonna be with us. Uh, we're looking forward to that as well. Um I just I'll pause because I'm closing down. A card just pulled up. That was that kind of made me wonder. But we got people watching the papers that we're good. Uh, any questions tonight of anything we talked about? Uh talk to David Beard and go answer all your questions. Love you guys. Hope you guys have a great week. Let me pray for us and we'll be dismissed and gone. Hell, Father, thank you for this evening. Thank you, Father, that we can look at how your work, how you were working the lives of the early church, uh making disciples and seeing the church grow. Help us, Father, to lean on you, to rely on you, to trust you, to be a being to go where you call us to go, and help us to acknowledge the gifts that you've given us uh to do your work and your will. We love you, we pray that you carry us out your segment and I call and just help us to be your hands and feet with those we come in contact with this week. We love you, we pray this in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Amen. Y'all have a good evening, be safe. It's dark out.