Good morning. Let's open up this
morning's service to the Spiral hymn book, number 42. Let us
praise the name of Jesus, number 42, if y'all could please stand. let us praise the name of jesus
prophet priest and sovereign king to him render adoration
blood and homage to him bring let us praise the name of Jesus
God incarnate from above came to save his covenant people sent
by God in covenant love Let us praise the name of Jesus who
upon Mount Calvary shed his blood and sealed our pardon, died from
sin to set us free. Let us praise the name of Jesus,
risen, conquering, gracious friend, advocate, and mediator, all our
hopes on him depend. ? Let us praise the name of Jesus
? ? For he brought us to his fold ? ? Come exalt his name
and worship ? ? May the Savior be extolled ? ? Let us praise
the name of Jesus ? Good morning. That hymn reminded me of what our Lord said to the woman at the well in John
chapter four, the father seeketh them who worship him in spirit
and in truth. That doesn't mean that God's
out looking for someone who's willing to serve him and worship
him in spirit and in truth. It means that God is the one
who seeks out and gives the grace to worship him in spirit and
in truth. And that's our hope this morning,
that the Lord will seek each of us out and that he'll speak
to our hearts and enable us to do what we just sang. We're going to be in Acts chapter
20 this morning, if you'd like to turn with me there in your
Bibles. And by way of introduction, I
want to read some verses from 1 Timothy chapter one. So you can hold your finger there
in Acts 20 Turn with me to 1 Timothy chapter one. Let's pray together. Caleb is
preaching in Pennsylvania this morning, so I want us to lift
him up in prayer as well. Our heavenly Father. In your good and merciful providence,
you brought us here to this place. You promised where two or three
are gathered together in your name, that there you would be
in the midst of us. Lord, you've said that you inhabit
the praise of your people, and Lord, we're dependent upon you
to enable us to praise you and to worship you this morning.
We ask for your mercy, we ask for your grace, we ask that you
would finish in us what you have begun and that you would enable
us to set our affections on things above where Christ is seated
at thy right hand. Lord, that we would find in him
all the hope of our salvation. We pray for our brother Caleb
and we ask, Lord, that you would enable him to speak this morning
Pray for the brethren there in Pennsylvania and for those here
and there who remain strangers to your grace, Lord, we pray
that you would call them out. We pray that you would shine
the light of the gospel in their hearts in the face of the Lord
Jesus Christ and turn them from darkness to light. We ask it
in Christ's name and for his sake, amen. I've asked you to open your Bibles
with me to 1 Timothy 1. I want to read a few verses here
that are familiar to most of us. We'll begin in verse 13. Paul is talking about his life
before the Lord arrested him. on the road to Damascus, stopped
him dead in his tracks and gave him life. And he says, before
that happened, I was a blasphemer, in verse 13, a persecutor, an
injurious man, but I obtained mercy because I did it ignorantly
in unbelief. thought he was doing the right
thing, thought he was serving God. We can say that when we
were, many of us were in religion before the Lord stopped us in
our tracks, that we thought we were doing the right thing, but
we did it in ignorance. If we went back to that now,
there's no reason for us to hope that the Lord would have mercy
on us. We wouldn't be doing it in ignorance now. In verse 14, and the grace of
our Lord was exceeding abundant with faith and love, which is
in Christ Jesus. The Lord's abundant grace and
his love, which is all in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ
showed me mercy. And this is a faithful saying,
and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the
world to save sinners, of whom I am chief. He didn't say I was
chief of sinners, he said I am the chief of sinners. Now, this
next verse needs to be understood in light of the verses that we
just read, because the Apostle Paul is highlighting the mercy
and the grace and the long suffering and the love of God toward him,
believing himself to be the one who's in the greatest need of
grace of all men. And so he says in verse 16, how
be it for this cause I obtained mercy. that in me first, Jesus
Christ might show forth all longsuffering for a pattern to them, which
should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting." I've titled
this message, A Pattern of Longsuffering. We've looked at this verse before
and we've thought, well, the events surrounding conversion
of the Apostle Paul is what he's referring to, and it's a pattern
of salvation, and that his life is a pattern. But that's not
really what he's saying here. He's saying that it's the long-suffering
of God that's a pattern. This long-suffering, it's patience,
it's endurance, it's steadfastness, it's forbearance, it's mercy. What What the Apollo Paul's pointing
to is not to his life. He's not saying my life is an
example or a pattern. He's saying that the long suffering
of God was demonstrated as a pattern of grace in the chief of all
sinners. What he's saying is if God did
this for me, where I was, could he not do it for you as well?
That's the point of the message here. If God did it for me, if
his long suffering reached as far as it reached to take one
who was a blasphemer, one who was persecutor, I remind you
that the Apostle Paul wasn't just speaking bad things about
the church. He was traveling with letters
from the high priests to arrest believers and have them put in
prison and put to death. He was killing Christians. And that's what he's saying here,
that God's long suffering, his patience, his endurance, his
kindness, and his love, and his mercy, and his grace. If it was
sufficient to save me, is it not sufficient to save anyone? Anyone? So the pattern is the mercy of God. It's the same thing that we read
in Hebrews chapter 11 about all those Old Testament believers. In chapter 11 of Hebrews, nothing
negative is said about any of them. And yet when we go back
into the Old Testament and read the account of their lives, we
find a lot of sin and a lot of unbelief and a lot of failures. And yet, The Lord concludes chapter
11 with chapter 12, verse one, where it says, seeing therefore
that we are encompassed about with such a great cloud of witnesses,
let us lay aside the sin that doth so easily beset us. What
is that sin? It's the sin of, if those people,
you see, brethren, we hold up these old, these biblical characters
as if they were As if they were some super spiritual, extraordinary
individuals, the Bible presents them as just the opposite. What
Paul's saying about himself is, if God could save me, he can
save anybody. If his long suffering was sufficient
to put my sin away, is it not sufficient to put yours away? Is he not able? So we are surrounded by a great
cloud of witnesses. And I remember in religion, we
love to take these biblical characters and exalt them as a pattern. You know, that their lives were
examples of faithfulness. And that's just the opposite
of what the Lord's telling us here. The pattern, the example. is the mercy of God towards sinners. That's the pattern. And we could take men like Gideon
and men like Abraham and Jacob and all these, Sarah laughed
at the promises of God. You could take these people.
Can he not save us? Can he not have mercy on you
and me? So now turn with me, if you will,
to Acts chapter 20, because I want us to look at the events recorded
in God's words surrounding the life of the Apostle Paul. And
I want us to think of them in light of what we just saw. This is not the acts of the apostles
as it is titled in most Bibles. This is the act, the acts of
the Holy Spirit. These are the acts of God working
out his purpose in the lives of these men and women that he's
called out who are no different from you and no different from
me. Verse 36 of chapter 20 is where
we left off And when he had thus spoken, the apostle Paul has
met with the elders of the churches in the area of Miletus and Ephesus. And he has told them that they
would not see him ever again, that the Lord has made it clear
that when he gets to Jerusalem, that he's going to be arrested
and bound and taken to Rome and that they would never He's on
his third missionary journey. He's been through this area at
least three times and greeted these brethren. And they've had
such a warm embrace and fellowship with one another. And now in
verse 36, it says, and when he had thus spoken, he kneeled down
and prayed with them all. And they all wept sore, fell
on Paul's neck and kissed him, sorry most of all for the words
which he spoke, that they should see his face no more, and then
accompanied him onto the ship." You see the scene here? Paul is saying farewell to these
brethren that he had loved and priests of gospel too, and shared
life with. And they're sad and he's sad. And then in chapter 21, and it
came to pass that after we were gotten from them, and the language
that's used here is to be pulled away. Someone had to take them
and unlock their embrace and push them apart from one another.
That's the picture. They were so grieved in losing
this fellowship of one another. And the idea that this brother
was not going to be seen by them again. With straight course unto Coas,
And the day following unto Rhodes, and from thence unto Patera,
and finding the ship sailing over to Phoenicia, we went aboard
and set forth. And when we had discovered Cyprus,
we left it on the left hand and sailed unto Syria and landed
at Tyre, for there the ship was unlaid of her burden." You ever wonder Why so much detail
in this travel log? What are we to, what do we learn
from this? I believe what the Lord's saying
to us here is that the minutest detail of providence in your
life is led by the hand of God. We passed this island on the
left-hand side. We went from here to there and
here to there. Is this not our life? Does God
not work all things together for good for them that love Him
and those that are the called according to His purpose? Is
His providence not perfect? You see, this is not just given
to us as a travelogue to acknowledge the places where the ship went. The Lord is directing this ship,
just like He directed the children of Israel through the wilderness.
Another picture of our life in Christ, the life of faith, the
walk of faith. We walk not by sight, we walk
by faith. And the Lord led the children
of Israel from one place to the other in the wilderness with
a pillar of fire at night so they could see and a pillar of
smoke by day so they could be protected from the heat of the
sun. And that fire and that smoke
was Christ. It's the Lord Jesus Christ that
we make our plans and God orders our steps. James says, do not
say I'll go to this city and to that city and to buy and sell
and make gain. Say rather, if it be the Lord's
will, we will go to this city and to that city. That's what
the Lord's doing. The rest of this chapter, it's
not just a travelogue. It's very detailed places and
events. And each of these places, there
are believers. And so the Lord's taking this
apostle from church to church to speak his farewells to them. Brethren, our God is faithful in a pattern of long
suffering in your life and in my life and in the grand events of the
world. Amos put it like this, has evil
come into the city and the Lord did not cause it? You know, we look at what's happening
in the world, and we rightly so accuse certain individuals
for being evil, and yet we know that the first cause of all things
is our sovereign God who reigns, and nothing happens outside of
His purpose and outside of His will. That's so comforting, isn't
it? We looked a few Wednesday nights
ago at the name of the Lord, Jehovah Saba, the Lord of Hosts, and we're just greatly comforted
in understanding something of our God's absolute sovereignty. We hear men refer to nations
as being sovereign, and we understand what they mean by that. We mean
that they're not under the authority or control of an outside influence
or of another nation, but it doesn't mean they're not under
the authority or control of another outside influence and that be,
that's our God. There's no such thing. Sovereignty
is an absolute, there are no degrees of sovereignty. And just like the other characteristics
of our God, immutability and holiness, these are absolutes. There's no degrees of them. There's only one that the word
sovereign can be given to. And that's our God. And He is
sovereignly ordering your steps and my steps to show the pattern
of His long suffering. You would not be here right now
if any event in your life, yeah, I, do you guys enjoy watching
time travel movies? I do. I like, I like those kinds
of movies where they change. I think about often one minor
detail in your life had changed in the past. You wouldn't be
sitting here today. You wouldn't be listening to
the gospel. Everything that's happened in
your life was necessary to have you here right now, worshiping
God and hearing the gospel. Who did that? Who did that? Who brought you here? Who took
you from Troas to Coas to Crete to, you know, to pass this island
on the left side and that island on the right side? Who did that? I remind you that these ships
were not powered by anything other than the wind. And the
wind is a picture of the Spirit of God, isn't it? And so the
Lord directs our steps. Second thing I want you to see
in this text, and if you'll go down with me, we don't have the
time to read all of these. A man by the name of Agabus in
chapter, in verse 10, confirms the prophecy that has been made
by taking Paul's girdle, which is a belt, and binding his own
hands and his feet with it as an illustration, prophesying
what's going to happen to Paul when he gets to Jerusalem. And
sure enough, it happens. And And all the believers are
saying to Paul, don't go to Jerusalem. The Holy Spirit is warning you.
He's warning you of what's going to happen when you get to Jerusalem.
No, he's not warning me. He's preparing me. He's not warning
me. He's preparing me for what's
going to happen when I get to Jerusalem. And that's evident if we begin
reading in verse 12. And when we heard these things,
both we and they of that place besought him not to go up to
Jerusalem. Then Paul answered, what mean
ye to weep and to break my heart? For I am ready, not to be bound
only, but also to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.
Now, we could look at this two different ways. We could look
at the Apostle Paul as some sort of stalwart, super spiritual
man who's willing to die for the name of Christ. But the truth
is, if you have faith, if you have faith, you're not going
to deny Christ, even if it means your life. The Lord won't allow
it. This is a testimony. This is
a testimony to His longsuffering. This is a testimony to the pattern
of His grace that the Lord would make Him so faithful. You say,
well, I'm not faithful as I ought to be. Well, neither was the
Apostle Paul. You read on in the next couple
of chapters, he's going to get to Jerusalem and James is going
to meet with him, who's the pastor of the church of Jerusalem, a
very, very large church. We know that there was at least
3,000, well, 5,000. And then it grew from there. So this is a mega church. And
James is the pastor and James meets with Paul when he comes
to town. And he says, you know, there's a lot of Jews in Jerusalem
that are accusing you of denying the law of Moses. And we need
you to prove to them that the accusations they're making are
not true. And so we've got a couple of men who've made a Nazarite
vow. We need you to join with them and shave your head and
go into the temple and make this vow. so that all the Jews will
be comforted in knowing that you haven't denied Moses. Paul did it. He did it. Now, the Nazarite vow involved
a blood sacrifice. This is the apostle Paul who
understood more the fulfilling of the law than this man whom
God had used. And yet, He thought, well, maybe this
will be the way to do it. He didn't get to fulfill that vow.
A riot broke out, and he got arrested. He got arrested. Again, we see the providence
of God stopping this man in his tracks, keeping him from doing
what he would have done otherwise, and reminding us that when we
are not faithful, he remaineth faithful, for he cannot deny
himself. He cannot deny himself. If you
are, if you're a member of the body of Christ as he is, so are
we in this world, he cannot deny himself. You see, this is a pattern
of his long suffering. This is a pattern of his grace.
This isn't, this isn't given to us in order to say to us,
you know, I need to, I need to pull myself up and be strong
and, and, and be more like the apostle Paul. In 1 Timothy 4, verse 7, Paul
said, I have fought a good fight. I have finished my course. I
have kept the faith. He's fought the fight of faith.
We labor to enter into his rest. Faith is resting in the Lord
Jesus Christ. It's resting in his glorious
accomplished work of redemption. It's resting in his person. And
we've got so many things that easily beset us. The sin that
does so easily beset us is the sin of unbelief. And we're always
being unfaithful. And yet the Lord is faithful
to never allow us to depart from the faith. If you're a believer,
you're gonna be a believer when you draw your last breath When you enter into glory, you're
going to be a believer. God's going to be sure of it.
He's going to take care of it. He's going to make sure it happens.
He cannot deny his own. Can't fall away. Paul goes on
in that passage in 2 Timothy chapter four to say, henceforth
there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord,
the righteous judge shall give me on that day and not to me
only, but unto them all that love his appearing laid up for me a crown of righteousness. The Lord, the righteous judge.
Is God judging you and me based on our faithfulness? He's the
righteous judge. He knows everything. He knows
every thought you and I have ever had. Every word we've ever
spoken, every deed we've ever... He knows it. You want God to
judge you based on your faithfulness? God requires absolute perfection. So when the Lord, the righteous
judge, shall give unto me a crown of righteousness, and not to
me only, but all those who love his appearing. Oh Lord, yes,
don't sacrifice your justice, but don't judge me based on my
righteousness. Look to my advocate, look to
my sin bearer, look to thy dear son, my savior, and be satisfied
with him because I know you're not gonna be satisfied with me. Psalm 35 verse one. David prays
this, plead my cause, oh Lord, with them that strive with me,
fight against them that fight against me, take hold of shield
and buckler and stand up for my help. Draw out also the spear
and say unto my soul, I am thy salvation. Lord, draw, see what
we're doing right now is we're wielding the sword of the spirit,
aren't we? Which is the word of God. And the word of God is
a two-edged sword. And the believer saying, Lord,
say, Lord, draw your sword and say unto my soul, I am thy salvation. Lord, speak that peace. Speak
that truth to me. Fight the good fight of faith. We fight from a position of victory. For the Lord Jesus Christ fought
the battle. He said, tell them their warfare
is accomplished. He got the victory. This faithfulness comes in the
midst of great conflict. Great conflict. Turn with me
to 2 Corinthians chapter 11. 2 Corinthians chapter 11. Paul begins by apologizing for
having to bring these things out. He's apologizing to the
church and he's making it clear. He said, I don't tell you these
things to glory in me. I'm telling you these things
because you've denied the work of God in me. You've denied the
pattern of long suffering and faithfulness and providence on
the part of our God. And you've turned away from the
gospel and you are entertaining the false doctrine of a false
gospel. And so there were men who came
in behind the apostle Paul and said, well, he's not really an
apostle. We've got a better understanding of the truth. And so they were
pointing men back to Moses, what they were doing. And so he says, Are they ministers of Christ?
I speak as a fool. I am more, in labors more abundant,
in stripes above measure, in prison more frequent, in deaths
oft." 2 Corinthians 11, verse 24. Of the Jews, five times received
I 40 stripes, save one. Paul was a Roman citizen. And
if you were a Roman citizen, you couldn't be. The Lord Jesus
Christ, they didn't stop at 40, 39. They had to do with the Apostle
Paul. They stopped one short because
they were in fear. If they went over 41, then they
were under the condemnation of the law. Verse 25, thrice was I beaten
with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck,
a night and a day. I've been in the deep and journey
and often in perils of water, in perils of robbers, in perils
of my own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in
the city, in perils in the wilderness, perils in the sea, in perils
among false brethren. in weariness and painfulness
and watchings often in hunger and thirst and fasting often
in cold and nakedness. And besides those things that
are without, here's the real burden. Besides those things
which are about, you say, well, that would have been wretched
experiences to have, to be left out in the middle of the ocean
for a day and a night, to be beat with rods and left for dead.
But what he's saying here is there's something even worse
than that. There's something heavier than that, that I've
had to bear. Besides those things that are
without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches. The colder I get and the weaker
this body gets, the heavier that burden becomes. Verse 29, so that you know he's
not exalting himself, he's talking about the pattern of God's faithfulness.
And let me say this, brethren, the Lord in his providence will
put us through some very difficult times and trials, troubles and
persecutions, cause us to depend upon Him,
cause us to cry out in prayer and to show us our own weaknesses,
our inability. Care of the church is a burden
that a man cannot bear. Who is sufficient for these things?
Paul said in another place. And the burden is just beyond
belief and causes a man to cry out. Lord, you're gonna have
to bear this burden. And we have such great hope in
knowing, coming to me, all you that labor in a heavy burden,
I'll give you rest. I'll give you rest. My shoulders
are broad enough. I can bear it. Who is weak? Verse 3rd, 29. And I am not weak? Who is offended and I burn not?
I think the word offended means tempted. Paul's saying, you think
I'm not tempted with sin and I don't have passions of like
manner as other men? No, no, God has put these things
on me. When James talks about Elijah
praying and withholding the rain for three and a half years in
chapter 5 of James, he said, a man of like passions even as
we are. And Elijah wasn't perfect. Elijah,
after praying for rain, runs from Jezebel and goes back to
the law. Isn't that what we always do?
We go back to the law. You say, what are you talking
about, preacher, going back to the law? You start looking for evidences
of salvation in your life rather than looking to Christ. That's
going back to the law. When the accuser of the brethren
says to you, how could you be a believer? And think like that. And what's the first reaction?
Same as Elijah, run back to Mount Horeb. And the Lord says, what
are you doing here, Elijah? Why are you here? This is no
place for you. Well, that's what we do. And this is part of the fight
of faith, isn't it? laboring to enter into his rest. The Lord is so faithful. He's so faithful. He's faithful
to call out his elect. He's faithful
to keep us. He's faithful to present us faultless
before his throne. He's long-suffering, impatient. And he did it for a man like
Saul of Tarsus, a murderer of Christians. And Paul's saying
to us, his long suffering is a pattern. My life's not a pattern,
his long suffering's a pattern. If God could do that for me,
can he not do it for you? Amen. Let's take a break.