Summary:

Paul’s same old routine involved entering a city and making a beeline for the synagogue (v.1).  But he didn’t pass over Amphipolis and Apollonia because God told him He hadn’t chosen any of those people to be saved.  His new routine was to target big cities and let the gospel radiate out from them to small towns like those, and it worked (cf. IThes.1:8).

But why did he go to synagogues if he was “the apostle of the Gentiles” (Rom.11:13)?  It was to provoke them to get saved (v.14) by magnifying his office to the Gentiles.  “Emulation” is a form of jealousy that makes you want to emulate someone, and “emulate” means to want to equal or excel you at what you’re doing.  Paul was doing the Jews’ job of reaching the Gentiles, and magnifying his office would make them want to get saved and join him in reaching the Gentiles.   Some did, and became his equals, his fellows (Col.4:10,11).  Saved Jews will excel Paul at reaching the Gentiles in the kingdom (Rom.11:12; Isa.11:9).  In the meantime, God’s Word says that the best way to reach the Jews is by magnifying Paul’s apostleship to the Gentiles, as we do.

Paul was only in Thessalonica 3 sabbath days (Acts 17:2), or 14 days total, but the Philippians sent him money there “once and again” (Phil.4:15,16)—and they only had one messenger to do it (Phil.2:25-30).  How’d you like to walk 400 miles in 14 days? Paul says to hold Christians like that “in reputation.”

Paul preached boldly in Thessalonica, even though it got him beaten and imprisoned in Philippi (IThes.2:2).  It took bold-ness to do that because Jews didn’t want to believe their messiah was crucified (ICor.1:23).  Crucifixion was the death of crooks, not Christs.  This proves that Jews like Abraham and David weren’t saved by believing Christ would someday die for their sins, as some say (cf.Gal.3:8).  There were verses that said Christ would die, but Jews preferred the verses that said He would make their enemies die (cf.Lu.1:68-75).  Paul proved Jesus was Israel’s Christ (Acts 17:3) by quoting verses like Genesis 49:10, Micah 5:2, and Isaiah 35:4-6.

When “some” Jews believed, but “a great multitude” of Gentiles believed (Acts 17:4), that’s a picture of how the Body of Christ is made up of both, but this is a primarily Gentile dispensation.

“Envy” (17:5) is another form of jealousy, the bad kind (cf. Acts13:44,45).  “Lewd” means lustful, and “base” means low, like the base of something is the lowest part.  Envy in the heart of a few men ended with a city in an uproar, so don’t let it get so much as a toehold in your life (cf.Mt.27:17,18).

They assaulted “the house of Jason” because they thought Paul was staying with family (cf.Rom.16:21), but he wasn’t (Acts 17:6).  They were right/ Paul was turning the world upside-down, but Adam had turned it upside down, so turning it upside-down again would turn it right side up.  Paul did it with grace, but after the age of grace ends at the Rapture, the gloves are coming off, and God will turn the world upside-down with wrath. He’ll start with Israel, because they should have known better (IIKi.21:12-15; IPet.4:17).  But after that, He’ll turn the whole world upside-down in judgment (Isa. 24:1,19).  For now, He wants it turned upside down with grace, and not with angry petitions and protest marches.

If the charge of doing things contrary to Caesar sounds familiar, it’s because that’s what they charged the Lord with (Lu.23:1,2).  If the reaction Paul got sounds familiar (Acts 17:8,9), it’s because that’s the reaction the Lord got (John 19:12).  I Thessalonians 4:13-17 indicates that some of the believing Thessalonian Jews were killed.  That’s why Paul chose that church to talk to them about how the dead in Christ will precede the living at the Rapture (IThes.4:13-17).  The dead in Christ in Thessalonica hadn’t died of malaria, they died of persecution. 

A video of this sermon is available on YouTube: “Paul’s Same Old Routine” Acts 17:1-9

Summary:

The jailer was usually sleeping at midnight, but grace had him washing Paul’s back (v.25cf.v.33).  But how’d Paul baptize him?  The prison wasn’t likely to have a tub big enough to immerse him, and the river was outside of town (16:13).  The answer is, baptism was by sprinkling.  It’s purpose was to cleanse men from their sins (Acts 22:16), and cleansing was by sprinkling (Num.8:6,7; 19:18-20). God Himself will sprinkle believing Jews before the kingdom (Ezk.36:24,25).

The Greek word baptismos means to dip, and the English word “dip” means to immerse.  But it was hyssop that they’d “dip” in water to sprinkle people with (Num.19:18,19).  We know those washings were baptisms because the Greek word for “washing” in Hebrews 9:10 is baptismos. That explains why they didn’t ask John what he was doing (John 1:25).  They asked why he was doing it if he wasn’t Christ, the God who would sprinkle them right before the kingdom that John said was at hand (Mt.3:2).  Few if any homes in Israel had a tub of water big enough to baptismos a “table” (Mark 7:4).

The jailer likely never brought any other prisoners into his home (Acts 16:34), where they’d endanger his family.  But grace was working powerfully in him, so “he” served Paul dinner, not is wife.  But according to religion, this isn’t what was supposed to happen if you told a man he could be saved by believing, not by behaving (v.31). Religion says if you tell men that, they won’t behave, they’ll do what they want.  But when the man who was God in the flesh told a man to go his way, he went the Lord’s way instead (Mark 10:52).

If Paul told the man he had to behave to be saved, he couldn’t have rejoiced (Acts 16:34), he would have feared instead.  He would have feared that he hadn’t behaved well enough to be saved, or for long enough.  But the jailer understood he was saved by what Christ did for him on the cross, not by what he himself did or didn’t do.

The rulers heard the earthquake freed Paul, but he didn’t flee, so they figured his God sent it because Paul was innocent, and ordered him freed (v.35).  But Paul insisted the rulers free him officially in person (v.36,37).  He wasn’t protecting his reputation, he was protecting the gospel.  He knew the world would hear about his jailing, and he wanted the exoneration of the apostle of the Gentiles to be just as famous.

When the rulers heard Paul and Silas were both Romans they feared, so they walked to the prison in shame to free them.  That’s a type of the public humiliation the Lord gave heaven’s wicked rulers (Eph.6:12) at the cross.  When Lucifer won the victory over Adam, the human race became Satan’s “lawful captive,” just as Israel was Babylon’s lawful captive (Isa.49:22-26).  But the Lord spoiled Satan of his captives (Col.2:14) and forced them to officially release us in an open show before heaven’s unfallen host of angels.

People saw the opposite.  They saw wicked rulers shame and humiliate the Lord (Mark 15:16-20).  But later, He revealed the mystery to Paul that revealed how the Lord shamed those unseen rulers at the cross.  When the Lord ascended, “He led captivity captive” (Eph.4:8), which means to make captives out of the ones who held His people captive (cf.Judges 5: 12).  The “gifts” the Lord gave us are the thrones those wicked rulers will be forced to vacate in Revelation 12:7-9.  So when the rulers freed Paul in Acts 16:33, and then were forced to release them in person in verses 38,39, that’s a picture of how the Lord freed us at the cross, and we’ll humiliate Satan’s host when we pass through the realm of “the prince of the power of the air” at the Rapture (Eph.2:2).

Paul insisted the jailer imprison him again after supper (Acts 16:40), until the rulers officially released him.  That shows the respect for earthly rulers in government that all Chris-tians should have even when rulers are wrong.  And Paul comforted the brethren, even though he was the one beaten and jailed.  That’s the power of grace in a believer’s life!

A video of this message is available on YouTube: “The Power Of The Gospel Of Grace” Acts 16:33-40

Summary:

Paul and Silas probably prayed to get out of prison (16:25), but the reason Luke says the prisoners heard them is that they probably also prayed for the rulers who sentenced them, the men who beat them, and the jailer (Mt.5:44cf.Rom.12:14).

They also sang praises to God (v.25), possibly Psalm 142:1-7 (cf.IChron.16:9; Ps.98:5).  Under grace, we can sing psalms or hymns (Eph.5:19).  But if they prayed when they were afflicted, does that mean they were merry now that they were singing (James 5:13)?  Probably, because they knew they were where God wanted them to be in their lives (Acts 16:9,10) and had prayed and left their problem with the Lord.  You too can be merry in afflictions if you’ll do the same!  But today, God won’t send a vision to tell us where to go and what to do like He did for Paul during the transition period of Acts.  We must examine our lives as adult sons and decide what is the perfect will of God for ourselves (Romans 12:2).

In the dispensation of grace, God won’t send an earthquake to get you out of prison, even if you’re wrongfully imprisoned like Paul (Acts 16:26). There’s been a dispensational change. When the jailer thought the prisoners had fled, he was going to take his life (16:27) because Roman guards were responsible for their prisoners with their lives (Acts 12: 19). That word “examined” means tortured (cf.Lu.23:13, 14), so the guard knew falling on his sword was merciful.

Paul stopped him (Acts 16:28), because it was the right thing to do (cf.Pr.24:11,12), but not because he feared God would render him according to his works if he didn’t. Paul practiced grace (IThes.5:15) because he knew the man wasn’t saved, so he assured him the prisoners hadn’t fled.  When you’re tempted to let someone suffer because they wronged you, why not do what Paul did and bless them instead?

Why hadn’t they fled? They’d heard the apostles’ prayers  for those who abused them, and their songs of praise, and figured any God who could make His people pray and sing like that must be the true God.  And they knew the true God had likely sent that earthquake to free them because they were innocent, not guilty criminals like themselves.  So they feared God would strike them dead if they tried to leave!

When the jailer “sprang” into their prison cell (Acts 16:29), that shows they were down in a dungeon, so he called for a light.  Why would he tremble before a man who just saved his life?  He figured Paul’s God was none too pleased that he’d incarcerated His servant, and might strike him dead. 

Why’d Paul wait for the jailer to bring him out of prison after the prison’s doors and bands were loosed (v.30)?  He had such respect for governmental authority, he wouldn’t leave without the jailer’s permission, even though he was wrong-fully imprisoned.  God expects us to obey rulers even when they’re wrong, as long as they don’t ask us to do wrong.

Paul probably witnessed to the jailer when he was clapping his feet in the stocks, so now he asks how to be saved (v.30).  That has to be answered dispensationally, for the Lord told a man to keep the ten commandments (Mt.19:16-19), then added the kingdom gospel (v.20 cf. Lu.16:16) of selling all you had and giving the proceeds to the poor.  When the Jews asked Peter what to do to be saved, he added baptism (Acts 2:38).  But Paul just said to just believe and be saved (16:31).

Some grace believers don’t like this verse because it says to believe “on” Christ, not “in” Him (cf.Rom.3:26), but they are the same (John 3:18).  They also protest it doesn’t mention Christ’s death for our sins, but Paul covered that in verse 32.  When Paul also preached the word of the Lord to the jailer’s house, that shows that when he said in verse 31, “Believe on the Lord and be saved, and thy house,” that this meant that his house could be saved if they believed too, which they did (v.33).

A video of this sermon is available on YouTube: “What To Do If You’re Wrongfully Imprisoned” Acts 16:25-32

Summary:

Satan knew that Lydia’s salvation (v.14,15) was the start of something big, because he’d seen God call Paul to her home country (v.9,10).  So the devil had his empire strike back by sending a demon-possessed girl in Paul’s way (v.16).

Divination (v.16) is the noun form of the verb divine, which means to speak for God (cf.Ezek.13:7). Pagans had diviners to speak for their gods (Isam.6:2), but people had to pay to consult with this damsel. She was a soothsayer, the kind of diviner (ISam.6:2 cf. 2:6) that tells the future.  She brought her masters “much gain,” meaning a lot of people paid to see her, meaning she had a lot of influence in the community, something Satan is about to use against the community.

Why’d Satan think a soothsayer could stop Paul?  Soothsayers were associated with “priests” (ISam.6:2) and religion.  Most people who consult soothsayers have a religion.  They just do what the Philistines did and combine it with soothsaying.  That’s what Satan was trying to accomplish here too, so he had the damsel say things that made it sound like she and Paul were on the same team (Acts 16:17).

Satan got the Jews to combine Judaism with divination (ISa. 28:8; Isa.2:6; IIKi.17:17). They were already sacrificing animals.  Satan just got them to combine Judaism with paganism & sacrifice their kids.  In the New Testament, he tried to make it look like the Lord played on his team by having his demons preach the gospel (Luke 4:41cf.Jo.20:31) so he could add divination to the gospel later.  The Lord tried to silence them (Mark 1:25), but they just wouldn’t quit (Mark 3:11,12).  They only quit following the Lord when God put the kingdom program on hold, and raised up Paul to preach grace.  Then they began following him.  Satan recognizes dispensational changes that pastors often miss!

Once  the  demon  started  after  Paul,  he  just  wouldn’t  quit, following him “many days” (v.18).  Paul waited to cast the demon out of her so this influential woman could gather a crowd.  That way, many people would see him reject the devil’s testimony by silencing it.  She followed Paul and his helpers for many days (v.17), making them a type of grace believers throughout the many days of this dispensation. It didn’t take long before Satan got Christianity as infiltrated with divination as Judaism. Idolatry is part of divination (Zech.10:2), and Catholicism has had idols for 1700 years.  Catholic leaders preach the gospel just as those demons did in the Lord’s day by teaching “Christ died for our sins” so they can add things to the gospel like idolatry and works.

Another way Satan tries to stop us is to sic the law on us (Acts 16:19-21).  This was a trumped-up charge.  Rome had no problem with Jewish customs (Ezra 3:4; Luke 1:9; 2:27).  But it gets harder to win your court case if there’s an element of truth to your charge.  Paul did say there was another king besides Caesar (Acts 17:7), the king of the Body of Christ (Col.1:12,13).  But he wasn’t saying Christ was king of the Romans and that they should obey Him.  But many Christians say Americans should obey Christ, and some want to overthrow the government in the name of the God of the Bible.  God told the Jews not to rebel against governments (Jer.29:7), but when the Jews did (IIKi.18:1,7; 24:1), it later hurt the work of rebuilding the temple and Jerusalem (Ezra 4:19-21).  And if you tell Americans to obey Christ when it comes to homosexuality, abortion, gay marriage and transgenderism, etc., men will associate you with Christians who want to overthrow the government and keep you from building “the church, which is His Body” (Eph.1:22,23).

How’d the Jews overcome their problem?  A couple of things made a new king decide to let them rebuild, and one of those things is that he knew Jews prayed for his city.  That made him finance the rebuilding (Ezra 6:3-10).  And if we are known as a church that prays for our leaders (ITim.2:1,2), they’ll let us continue to build the church.

A video of this sermon is available on YouTube: “Satans Empire Strikes Back” Acts 16:16-24

Summary:

After God gave Paul a vision telling him to go to Macedonia (v.9,10), he went “straight” there (v.11).  And he must have been examining his method of going from one small town to the next, and realized he’d never reach the world that way, because he went to the “chief city” of Macedonia to preach, knowing the gospel would radiate out from there.  Ever after, he went to big cities like Thessalonica, Corinth and Athens.

History says that people in a Roman “colony” (v.12) were automatic citizens of Rome, so Paul picked the Philippians to talk about our conversation as citizens of heaven (Phil. 3:20).  Two ladies in the church were quarreling (Phil.4:2), and that was no way for citizens of heaven to act!

It wasn’t even a good way for citizens of Rome to act.  If Rome thought you disturbed the peace, they didn’t care who was right or wrong.  They came down on you like a ton of bricks (cf. Acts 21:27-33).  And God doesn’t care who’s right when we disturb the peace with our quarrels in the local church.  He just expects us to restore the peace by forgiving. People think Christianity is a failure because we sing about Christ coming to bring peace on earth—and there is none!  But there will be in the kingdom.  And we can show God’s peace in the meantime amongst ourselves. You have a right to retaliate when wronged, but why not waive your rights like the Lord waived His right to live (IICor.8:9; Phil.2:2-8)?

The Philippians waived rights that Paul didn’t even ask them to waive.  History says people in colonies didn’t have to pay taxes to Rome.  As members of the Body of Christ, the Philippians also had a right not to have to pay the tithe tax to Israel. But the Lord waived His right not to pay it (Mt.27:24-27), and the Philippians did too.  They were the Macedonians who gave the Lord more than ten percent (IICor.8:1-4).

The church in Philippi (Phil.1:1) grew out of this women’s prayer group (Acts 16:13).  They must have been Jewish women, for they were meeting on the sabbath (v.13).  Paul went there instead of going to Philippi’s synagogue because colonies were considered “little Romes,” and the king had ordered all Jews out of Rome (Acts 18:2).  So all the Jewish men left town, and there was no synagogue!

Paul’s first convert was a businesswoman (Acts 16:14) who worshipped Israel’s God by keeping the sabbath.  If she kept God’s other laws, it must mean He had no law against being a working mom with kids (cf.v.15).  God opened her heart (v.15) by opening her understanding of the Scriptures (Isa. 6:10;Lu.24:45), causing her to “attend” to what Paul said (cf. Pr.4:1,20).  But in Bible days, you had to do more than just attend to Scripture to be saved.  You had to be baptized (v.15 cf. Mark 1:4). But there was a dispensational change with Paul, and now salvation is “by the washing of regeneration” (Tit.3:5), and not the washing of water baptism.

So why’d Paul baptize Lydia?  God revealed the new grace program to him gradually (IICor.12:1), so at that time Paul didn’t yet know what he knew when he wrote ICorinthians 1:17).  After he knew it, he never baptized anyone else.

But what had she done that would cause Paul to judge her “faithful” (v.15)?  She believed the new grace message after believing the law—unlike other unsaved Jews Paul encountered.  But if so, why’d she have to “constrain” Paul to stay with her?  He wasn’t afraid of how it would look to stay with a woman, for they wouldn’t have been alone. She had children, and Paul had Silas, Timothy and Luke.  It was because Paul was a Jew, and Jews couldn’t be in a little Rome.  She’d been flying under Rome’s radar, but if she got caught harboring four more Jews, she’d be in big trouble.  Paul knew that, and didn’t want to endanger her, but finally relented.

Women also showed more courage than men when the men forsook the Lord (Mt.26:56), but not the women (27:55).

A video of this message is available on YouTube: “The Apostle Paul Goes Straight” Acts 16:11-15