Scripture: Acts 16: 4-40
Listen Link: www.lcepc.org then look for “sermons” tab
Life can take some unexpected turns. Since we started shopping for a house, we’ve made an offer four different times. The first two times, someone else made a better offer before ours was accepted. Then we made an offer and paid for an inspection. When the seller saw what he would have to fix, he backed out and decided not to sell to us. Finally, we made an offer that was accepted. It looked good. Paid even more for the official appraisal, waited more than two weeks for their decision, got that approved with a couple of minor repairs. Then that seller also backed out because they couldn’t get the financing for the house they wanted to move to. As of last Thursday, we start all over, looking for the house that God has marked out for us.
It is frustrating. But we are comforted by the fact that God is looking out for us and guiding us along and keeping us from getting into trouble. Not that’s all a bed of roses. It has cost a bunch of time and money! But we are trusting in the Lord’s leading, just like Paul did during all his missionary journeys. Now I would in no way imagine that my housing adventure is anywhere nearly as dramatic and difficult as Paul’s missionary journey. But Paul’s journey in a way teaches us principles that help us in any of our journeys of faith.
Here’s a true fact, life with God is not a straight line or a gentle uphill run while we make progress in holiness under his gentle guidance and general blessings. It’s more like this: There can easily be a big difference between your plan and God’s plan.
As we’ll soon see, Paul wanted to go to preach in Asia and ended up in Philippi. He got to be quite some distance to the west of his intended destination. That turned out really well in the long run, though not without some pain and suffering along the way.
Today we begin a new series, preaching through the Book of Philippians. As an intro to the series we’re going to visit Philippi and get to know the church there by reading through most of Acts 16. So, if you open your Bible to Acts 16, you can follow along. We want to get to know the city of Philippi and the members of the church there before we take a deeper look at the letter he sent back to them later in his ministry. The church at Philippi was probably one of Paul’s favorite churches. His letter to them is unique among the Biblical churches because we know more of the members of that church by name, than any of the other churches Paul wrote to. We will meet most of them as we read through Acts 16 today.
Philippi is an old Greek city that was conquered by Philip of Macedon in 300 BC and was re-founded over two hundred years later as a Roman ‘colony’ by retired Roman soldiers and their families. Philippi was an important gold-mining center, and gold coins were minted there. It was a busy commercial settlement on the Via Egnatia (the ‘Egnatian Way’) – an important routeway leading west along the coast and, eventually, across the Adriatic Sea to Rome.
There’s a map of Paul’s missionary journey on you bulletin cover. Philippi is in the upper left corner, pretty far from Israel. A little more than 6,000 miles! That’s crossing the US twice! Paul traveled that distance in about ten months of walking, though for some of it he went by boat. Still, that much travel time in Paul’s timeline meant that during this trip of revisiting the churches he established before, he couldn’t have stayed in any of the cities he visited for more than a week or so. Maybe just a couple of days in some.
So, let’s start reading in verse 6. Paul and his companions traveled throughout the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been kept by the Holy Spirit from preaching the word in the province of Asia. 7 When they came to the border of Mysia, they tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus would not allow them to. 8 So they passed by Mysia and went down to Troas. 9 During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” 10 After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.
I think that would be a pretty safe conclusion, a dream, with a request for help, to a place Paul had not intended to go. And to get there they had to hire a boat. In verse 11 we read, From Troas we put out to sea and sailed straight for Samothrace, and the next day we went on to Neapolis. 12 From there we traveled to Philippi, a Roman colony and the leading city of that district of Macedonia. And we stayed there several days.
Note, that, as long as he was going to Macedonia, he decided to stop at Philippi, because it was a leading city in the district. That’s strategy. Philippi was the place to be. Lots of folks would be going there or visiting there from all over Macedonia, because it was a leading city, an important center of commerce. So, if a church were planted there, soon travelers would spread the gospel all over Macedonia. And sure enough, there were Jews, involved in commerce, already strategically using that location for their business purposes. So, we read in 13, that “On the Sabbath we went outside the city gate to the river, where we expected to find a place of prayer.”
But since the place of prayer was not in a synagogue, we do learn here that there were not at least ten men present to open a synagogue. Instead, the Jews they found were women! The rest of verse 13 says, “We sat down and began to speak to the women who had gathered there.” We are not told how many women were there. Probably not a large group. But we do read in 14 that “One of those listening was a woman from the city of Thyatira named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth. She was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to respond to Paul’s message. 15 When she and the members of her household were baptized, she invited us to her home. “If you consider me a believer in the Lord,” she said, “come and stay at my house.” And she persuaded us.
Here we meet Lydia, the first believer of the gospel in Philippi. She responded positively to Paul’s message and was baptized soon after, maybe even the same day. She then invited the traveling ministers into her home. It may very well be that her house became the place of meeting for the first Christian house church in Philippi. It is where Paul and Silas stayed for the “several days” that were mentioned in verse 12. She was from Thyatira, that was back east in Asia. But she had a house in Philippi. Either she had moved there permanently for her business, or she had two houses. Either way, as a dealer in purple cloth, she was likely quite wealthy. The purple dye used in the cloth was very expensive. It is also more likely than not that since she was running the business, she was now a widow and had inherited the business from her late husband.
Her wealth would mean that Paul and Silas were probably quite comfortable as her guests. But things did not remain comfortable. Picking up in verse 16 we read, “Once when we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a female slave who had a spirit by which she predicted the future. She earned a great deal of money for her owners by fortune-telling. 17 She followed Paul and the rest of us, shouting, “These men are servants of the Most High God, who are telling you the way to be saved.” 18 She kept this up for many days. Finally, Paul became so annoyed that he turned around and said to the spirit, “In the name of Jesus Christ I command you to come out of her!” At that moment the spirit left her.
First, we may ask, why did Paul command a spirit to leave her when it was proclaiming the gospel? Well, Paul discerned that it was not the Holy Spirit, and therefore it must have been an unclean spirit. It may also have been shouting this repeatedly, even interrupting while Paul was trying to preach and teach. That would be annoying! But since this went on for many days, we may assume that Paul tolerated it for a while before he realized that the enslaved lady should be set free from the demon that possessed her.
At Paul’s command, under the authority of Jesus Christ, the spirit did have to come out of her. We pick up in verse 19 where we read. “When her owners realized that their hope of making money was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace to face the authorities.
We are not given details about how the slave owners realized that things had changed. But certainly, the slave woman’s demeanor changed. I hope she was overjoyed! And when they saw that she either could not, or would not, do any more fortune-telling, her owners became angry. This is understandable in the natural mind. To them, she was just a tool. It was as if Paul had broken their flashlight, or lawn mower, or some other highly valuable irreplaceable machinery. Now they wanted justice!
They found an accusation that would stir people up. 20 They brought them before the magistrates and said, “These men are Jews, and are throwing our city into an uproar 21 by advocating customs unlawful for us Romans to accept or practice.”
22 The crowd joined in the attack against Paul and Silas, and the magistrates ordered them to be stripped and beaten with rods. 23 After they had been severely flogged, they were thrown into prison, and the jailer was commanded to guard them carefully. 24 When he received these orders, he put them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in the stocks. This may be the actual site in Philippi that was Paul’s prison.
25 About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. Now right here is where we see a great example of Christian faith and devotion. They’ve been beaten. They’re bloody from their wounds. They are in pain. They are in a dank, dark prison cell, chained to the wall! Can you picture yourself in that situation? Would you feel like singing? Why would they start singing? Well, probably they didn’t start right our singing! They had perfect freedom to complain to God about their aches and pains and the injustice of it all. It is emotionally healthy to tell God what’s bothering us. And then as that peace that passes understanding comes in because we are leaning ion God, we begin to remember who He is and how much he loves us, and that he works all things for our good.
After a while, they must have remembered that they really believe that there is strength in the joy of the Lord and there is joy in the fellowship of suffering for Jesus! It must have been a regular feature of life as guided by the Holy Spirit. Back in Acts 5 we read that Peter and John had been arrested for preaching. The Jews “called the apostles in and had them flogged. Then they ordered them not to speak in the name of Jesus and let them go. But the apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name.” Paul and Silas had a similar emotional reaction to their suffering. Or maybe it was a deliberate choice to worship God no matter how they felt. At any rate, God responded!
Picking up in verse 26, “Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everyone’s chains came loose. Think of the jailer! He was probably Roman, but maybe more like a slave than a free man. He was charged with guarding the prisoners. The penalty for any escape was, kill the jailer! Talk about a stress filled job! It probably was not his preferred career, but it put food on the table. Now, there was an earthquake. That would have been scary enough. But he couldn’t just think of his family. He had to go check on the prisoners! And the door was open! He was pretty sure they would have all run away. That’s what prisoners do. 27 The jailer woke up, and when he saw the prison doors open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself because he thought the prisoners had escaped.”
It would have been quicker and less torturous to punish himself rather than wait for some angry soldiers to do the job. 28 But Paul shouted, “Don’t harm yourself! We are all here!” What a shocking surprise that would be! The prisoners did not run away. They all stayed with Paul and Silas! The jailer could hardly believe it. “29 The jailer called for lights, rushed in and fell trembling before Paul and Silas.
He had heard their message earlier. He knew that they were not ordinary criminals. He might have even heard them singing! But somehow, he knew that Paul and Silas were the ones to talk to now. 30 He then brought them out and asked, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” I wonder if he really meant saved from the punishment he would receive for overseeing a broken jail. But the answer he got was about his eternal soul, and escaping the punishment he would have received for his sins.
31 They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household.” 32 Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all the others in his house. They must have believed the gospel, because the jailer became hospitable toward Paul and Silas and cared about them. 33 At that hour of the night the jailer took them and washed their wounds; then immediately he and all his household were baptized. 34 The jailer brought them into his house and set a meal before them; he was filled with joy because he had come to believe in God—he and his whole household.
Now as we draw to a close on getting to know the church that met at Philippi, one more significant thing happens. Paul stands on his rights as a Roman citizen! Pickling up in verse 35, “When it was daylight, the magistrates sent their officers to the jailer with the order: “Release those men.” 36 The jailer told Paul, “The magistrates have ordered that you and Silas be released. Now you can leave. Go in peace.”
That’s the way they would have wanted it, go quietly, no bad publicity. The magistrates must have known, or figured out, that there were no legitimate charges against Paul and Silas, but that they had just reacted to the outcry raised by those angry men who lost their income.
37 But Paul said to the officers: “They beat us publicly without a trial, even though we are Roman citizens, and threw us into prison. And now do they want to get rid of us quietly? No! Let them come themselves and escort us out.” Paul wasn’t just pulling rank in the way that some people might say, “Do you know who I am?” He was not full of that kind of self-importance.
This was a strategic move to help the new church be left alone. The public rebuke of the magistrates would have helped to protect the new little church from any other kind of persecution. And Paul’s strategy was effective. This shows you that it is a good idea to use the laws of the land to our advantage whenever that’s possible. That’s one of the reasons I support the petition drive to protect and save the lives of innocent unborn babies, just as Paul used the laws if the land to protect his newborn church.
Back in at verse 38. The officers reported this to the magistrates, and when they heard that Paul and Silas were Roman citizens, they were alarmed. Roman citizenship afforded a great deal of prestige and came with legal rights that were not to be violated by anyone. Those magistrates would be in great trouble if Paul had wanted to take this matter to court. 39 They came to appease them and escorted them from the prison, requesting them to leave the city. Paul was satisfied and was actually letting them off easy, showing mercy. But it did work wonders to strengthen the new little church 40 After Paul and Silas came out of the prison, they went to Lydia’s house, where they met with the brothers and sisters and encouraged them. Then they left.”
So, there we have the church that meets at Philippi. First, we met Lydia. This new church plant also includes the jailer and his family. Maybe some of those prisoners also joined them! I would not be surprised if a little later on, the members of this brand new church also found and shared the gospel with the slave girl too, and she would join the church. What a mixture, a wealthy merchant, a blue-collar worker plus his wife and kids, and a poor slave girl with no visible means of support, and maybe a couple of ex-cons too. And think of how their lives all changed dramatically from what they had been used to. They had never been to church before! Lydia knew something about prayers and hymns anyway. But now she was worshiping Jesus! And the rest were pagans who completely altered the way the used to worship. And if they wanted to continue to worship Jesus, they also had to keep on loving each other. There was no other church to try and switch to. There’s a good lesson there for all of us too.
Over the next few weeks as we read through the letter to the Philippians, we will learn that it was a good church, one of Paul’s favorites, and very supportive of his ministry, with good reason, since the founding members had been so blessed by his ministry. For today, let’s end with this. Paul answered God’s call and did whatever God asked him to do. It wasn’t always easy. Paul made plans and God changed them. Paul was blessed with comfort and then he ended up in jail for a while.
We are also called by God to serve him and do whatever he asks of us. We’re on and adventure of serving the Lord right where we are. We probably will not travel far and wide the way Paul did, but there is plenty for us to do right here. We have our food pantry ministry going again this Thursday and I praise God for how many of you are pitching in to make that work well! It probably won’t always be might not be smooth sailing. There will sometimes be messes to clean up and suffering to endure, both physically and emotionally as we deal with things and with people we’re trying to love. But that’s okay. The Lord is with us, leading and guiding and as long as we sing praises to him after we cry about our troubles, and love one another, it will all work out for good and fruitful ministry. So, let’s keep on answering his call and see what he does with us. Amen.
Listen Link: www.lcepc.org then look for “sermons” tab
Life can take some unexpected turns. Since we started shopping for a house, we’ve made an offer four different times. The first two times, someone else made a better offer before ours was accepted. Then we made an offer and paid for an inspection. When the seller saw what he would have to fix, he backed out and decided not to sell to us. Finally, we made an offer that was accepted. It looked good. Paid even more for the official appraisal, waited more than two weeks for their decision, got that approved with a couple of minor repairs. Then that seller also backed out because they couldn’t get the financing for the house they wanted to move to. As of last Thursday, we start all over, looking for the house that God has marked out for us.
It is frustrating. But we are comforted by the fact that God is looking out for us and guiding us along and keeping us from getting into trouble. Not that’s all a bed of roses. It has cost a bunch of time and money! But we are trusting in the Lord’s leading, just like Paul did during all his missionary journeys. Now I would in no way imagine that my housing adventure is anywhere nearly as dramatic and difficult as Paul’s missionary journey. But Paul’s journey in a way teaches us principles that help us in any of our journeys of faith.
Here’s a true fact, life with God is not a straight line or a gentle uphill run while we make progress in holiness under his gentle guidance and general blessings. It’s more like this: There can easily be a big difference between your plan and God’s plan.
As we’ll soon see, Paul wanted to go to preach in Asia and ended up in Philippi. He got to be quite some distance to the west of his intended destination. That turned out really well in the long run, though not without some pain and suffering along the way.
Today we begin a new series, preaching through the Book of Philippians. As an intro to the series we’re going to visit Philippi and get to know the church there by reading through most of Acts 16. So, if you open your Bible to Acts 16, you can follow along. We want to get to know the city of Philippi and the members of the church there before we take a deeper look at the letter he sent back to them later in his ministry. The church at Philippi was probably one of Paul’s favorite churches. His letter to them is unique among the Biblical churches because we know more of the members of that church by name, than any of the other churches Paul wrote to. We will meet most of them as we read through Acts 16 today.
Philippi is an old Greek city that was conquered by Philip of Macedon in 300 BC and was re-founded over two hundred years later as a Roman ‘colony’ by retired Roman soldiers and their families. Philippi was an important gold-mining center, and gold coins were minted there. It was a busy commercial settlement on the Via Egnatia (the ‘Egnatian Way’) – an important routeway leading west along the coast and, eventually, across the Adriatic Sea to Rome.
There’s a map of Paul’s missionary journey on you bulletin cover. Philippi is in the upper left corner, pretty far from Israel. A little more than 6,000 miles! That’s crossing the US twice! Paul traveled that distance in about ten months of walking, though for some of it he went by boat. Still, that much travel time in Paul’s timeline meant that during this trip of revisiting the churches he established before, he couldn’t have stayed in any of the cities he visited for more than a week or so. Maybe just a couple of days in some.
So, let’s start reading in verse 6. Paul and his companions traveled throughout the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been kept by the Holy Spirit from preaching the word in the province of Asia. 7 When they came to the border of Mysia, they tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus would not allow them to. 8 So they passed by Mysia and went down to Troas. 9 During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” 10 After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.
I think that would be a pretty safe conclusion, a dream, with a request for help, to a place Paul had not intended to go. And to get there they had to hire a boat. In verse 11 we read, From Troas we put out to sea and sailed straight for Samothrace, and the next day we went on to Neapolis. 12 From there we traveled to Philippi, a Roman colony and the leading city of that district of Macedonia. And we stayed there several days.
Note, that, as long as he was going to Macedonia, he decided to stop at Philippi, because it was a leading city in the district. That’s strategy. Philippi was the place to be. Lots of folks would be going there or visiting there from all over Macedonia, because it was a leading city, an important center of commerce. So, if a church were planted there, soon travelers would spread the gospel all over Macedonia. And sure enough, there were Jews, involved in commerce, already strategically using that location for their business purposes. So, we read in 13, that “On the Sabbath we went outside the city gate to the river, where we expected to find a place of prayer.”
But since the place of prayer was not in a synagogue, we do learn here that there were not at least ten men present to open a synagogue. Instead, the Jews they found were women! The rest of verse 13 says, “We sat down and began to speak to the women who had gathered there.” We are not told how many women were there. Probably not a large group. But we do read in 14 that “One of those listening was a woman from the city of Thyatira named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth. She was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to respond to Paul’s message. 15 When she and the members of her household were baptized, she invited us to her home. “If you consider me a believer in the Lord,” she said, “come and stay at my house.” And she persuaded us.
Here we meet Lydia, the first believer of the gospel in Philippi. She responded positively to Paul’s message and was baptized soon after, maybe even the same day. She then invited the traveling ministers into her home. It may very well be that her house became the place of meeting for the first Christian house church in Philippi. It is where Paul and Silas stayed for the “several days” that were mentioned in verse 12. She was from Thyatira, that was back east in Asia. But she had a house in Philippi. Either she had moved there permanently for her business, or she had two houses. Either way, as a dealer in purple cloth, she was likely quite wealthy. The purple dye used in the cloth was very expensive. It is also more likely than not that since she was running the business, she was now a widow and had inherited the business from her late husband.
Her wealth would mean that Paul and Silas were probably quite comfortable as her guests. But things did not remain comfortable. Picking up in verse 16 we read, “Once when we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a female slave who had a spirit by which she predicted the future. She earned a great deal of money for her owners by fortune-telling. 17 She followed Paul and the rest of us, shouting, “These men are servants of the Most High God, who are telling you the way to be saved.” 18 She kept this up for many days. Finally, Paul became so annoyed that he turned around and said to the spirit, “In the name of Jesus Christ I command you to come out of her!” At that moment the spirit left her.
First, we may ask, why did Paul command a spirit to leave her when it was proclaiming the gospel? Well, Paul discerned that it was not the Holy Spirit, and therefore it must have been an unclean spirit. It may also have been shouting this repeatedly, even interrupting while Paul was trying to preach and teach. That would be annoying! But since this went on for many days, we may assume that Paul tolerated it for a while before he realized that the enslaved lady should be set free from the demon that possessed her.
At Paul’s command, under the authority of Jesus Christ, the spirit did have to come out of her. We pick up in verse 19 where we read. “When her owners realized that their hope of making money was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace to face the authorities.
We are not given details about how the slave owners realized that things had changed. But certainly, the slave woman’s demeanor changed. I hope she was overjoyed! And when they saw that she either could not, or would not, do any more fortune-telling, her owners became angry. This is understandable in the natural mind. To them, she was just a tool. It was as if Paul had broken their flashlight, or lawn mower, or some other highly valuable irreplaceable machinery. Now they wanted justice!
They found an accusation that would stir people up. 20 They brought them before the magistrates and said, “These men are Jews, and are throwing our city into an uproar 21 by advocating customs unlawful for us Romans to accept or practice.”
22 The crowd joined in the attack against Paul and Silas, and the magistrates ordered them to be stripped and beaten with rods. 23 After they had been severely flogged, they were thrown into prison, and the jailer was commanded to guard them carefully. 24 When he received these orders, he put them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in the stocks. This may be the actual site in Philippi that was Paul’s prison.
25 About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. Now right here is where we see a great example of Christian faith and devotion. They’ve been beaten. They’re bloody from their wounds. They are in pain. They are in a dank, dark prison cell, chained to the wall! Can you picture yourself in that situation? Would you feel like singing? Why would they start singing? Well, probably they didn’t start right our singing! They had perfect freedom to complain to God about their aches and pains and the injustice of it all. It is emotionally healthy to tell God what’s bothering us. And then as that peace that passes understanding comes in because we are leaning ion God, we begin to remember who He is and how much he loves us, and that he works all things for our good.
After a while, they must have remembered that they really believe that there is strength in the joy of the Lord and there is joy in the fellowship of suffering for Jesus! It must have been a regular feature of life as guided by the Holy Spirit. Back in Acts 5 we read that Peter and John had been arrested for preaching. The Jews “called the apostles in and had them flogged. Then they ordered them not to speak in the name of Jesus and let them go. But the apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name.” Paul and Silas had a similar emotional reaction to their suffering. Or maybe it was a deliberate choice to worship God no matter how they felt. At any rate, God responded!
Picking up in verse 26, “Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everyone’s chains came loose. Think of the jailer! He was probably Roman, but maybe more like a slave than a free man. He was charged with guarding the prisoners. The penalty for any escape was, kill the jailer! Talk about a stress filled job! It probably was not his preferred career, but it put food on the table. Now, there was an earthquake. That would have been scary enough. But he couldn’t just think of his family. He had to go check on the prisoners! And the door was open! He was pretty sure they would have all run away. That’s what prisoners do. 27 The jailer woke up, and when he saw the prison doors open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself because he thought the prisoners had escaped.”
It would have been quicker and less torturous to punish himself rather than wait for some angry soldiers to do the job. 28 But Paul shouted, “Don’t harm yourself! We are all here!” What a shocking surprise that would be! The prisoners did not run away. They all stayed with Paul and Silas! The jailer could hardly believe it. “29 The jailer called for lights, rushed in and fell trembling before Paul and Silas.
He had heard their message earlier. He knew that they were not ordinary criminals. He might have even heard them singing! But somehow, he knew that Paul and Silas were the ones to talk to now. 30 He then brought them out and asked, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” I wonder if he really meant saved from the punishment he would receive for overseeing a broken jail. But the answer he got was about his eternal soul, and escaping the punishment he would have received for his sins.
31 They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household.” 32 Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all the others in his house. They must have believed the gospel, because the jailer became hospitable toward Paul and Silas and cared about them. 33 At that hour of the night the jailer took them and washed their wounds; then immediately he and all his household were baptized. 34 The jailer brought them into his house and set a meal before them; he was filled with joy because he had come to believe in God—he and his whole household.
Now as we draw to a close on getting to know the church that met at Philippi, one more significant thing happens. Paul stands on his rights as a Roman citizen! Pickling up in verse 35, “When it was daylight, the magistrates sent their officers to the jailer with the order: “Release those men.” 36 The jailer told Paul, “The magistrates have ordered that you and Silas be released. Now you can leave. Go in peace.”
That’s the way they would have wanted it, go quietly, no bad publicity. The magistrates must have known, or figured out, that there were no legitimate charges against Paul and Silas, but that they had just reacted to the outcry raised by those angry men who lost their income.
37 But Paul said to the officers: “They beat us publicly without a trial, even though we are Roman citizens, and threw us into prison. And now do they want to get rid of us quietly? No! Let them come themselves and escort us out.” Paul wasn’t just pulling rank in the way that some people might say, “Do you know who I am?” He was not full of that kind of self-importance.
This was a strategic move to help the new church be left alone. The public rebuke of the magistrates would have helped to protect the new little church from any other kind of persecution. And Paul’s strategy was effective. This shows you that it is a good idea to use the laws of the land to our advantage whenever that’s possible. That’s one of the reasons I support the petition drive to protect and save the lives of innocent unborn babies, just as Paul used the laws if the land to protect his newborn church.
Back in at verse 38. The officers reported this to the magistrates, and when they heard that Paul and Silas were Roman citizens, they were alarmed. Roman citizenship afforded a great deal of prestige and came with legal rights that were not to be violated by anyone. Those magistrates would be in great trouble if Paul had wanted to take this matter to court. 39 They came to appease them and escorted them from the prison, requesting them to leave the city. Paul was satisfied and was actually letting them off easy, showing mercy. But it did work wonders to strengthen the new little church 40 After Paul and Silas came out of the prison, they went to Lydia’s house, where they met with the brothers and sisters and encouraged them. Then they left.”
So, there we have the church that meets at Philippi. First, we met Lydia. This new church plant also includes the jailer and his family. Maybe some of those prisoners also joined them! I would not be surprised if a little later on, the members of this brand new church also found and shared the gospel with the slave girl too, and she would join the church. What a mixture, a wealthy merchant, a blue-collar worker plus his wife and kids, and a poor slave girl with no visible means of support, and maybe a couple of ex-cons too. And think of how their lives all changed dramatically from what they had been used to. They had never been to church before! Lydia knew something about prayers and hymns anyway. But now she was worshiping Jesus! And the rest were pagans who completely altered the way the used to worship. And if they wanted to continue to worship Jesus, they also had to keep on loving each other. There was no other church to try and switch to. There’s a good lesson there for all of us too.
Over the next few weeks as we read through the letter to the Philippians, we will learn that it was a good church, one of Paul’s favorites, and very supportive of his ministry, with good reason, since the founding members had been so blessed by his ministry. For today, let’s end with this. Paul answered God’s call and did whatever God asked him to do. It wasn’t always easy. Paul made plans and God changed them. Paul was blessed with comfort and then he ended up in jail for a while.
We are also called by God to serve him and do whatever he asks of us. We’re on and adventure of serving the Lord right where we are. We probably will not travel far and wide the way Paul did, but there is plenty for us to do right here. We have our food pantry ministry going again this Thursday and I praise God for how many of you are pitching in to make that work well! It probably won’t always be might not be smooth sailing. There will sometimes be messes to clean up and suffering to endure, both physically and emotionally as we deal with things and with people we’re trying to love. But that’s okay. The Lord is with us, leading and guiding and as long as we sing praises to him after we cry about our troubles, and love one another, it will all work out for good and fruitful ministry. So, let’s keep on answering his call and see what he does with us. Amen.
Comments
Post a Comment