Acts 16, verse 40. And they,
Paul and Silas, went out of the prison and entered into the house
of Lydia. And when they had seen the brethren,
they comforted them and departed. Now picture this in your mind's
eye. Lydia and the brethren in her
household had been converted not many days before. And they're gathered there in
Lydia's house. And very likely joining them
is the Philippian jailer and those brethren in his household
who were converted by our Lord. And these are new babes in Christ. And there in
Lydia's house before them is Paul and Silas who preached this
glorious gospel to them, who they were so thankful for
that God used them to come and preach this gospel to them. And
here these young converts are looking at two men whose wounds
have to be horrible to look upon. They've been beaten. They're
bloody. They're bruised. These men were
stripped naked publicly, humiliated, shamefully treated. No justice
carried out whatsoever. thrown into prison, horribly
treated. Can you imagine that these new
believers would have had some questions? Can you imagine that
they sat there wondering what to make of all this? What should
we think of this? We've just openly confessed Christ,
and look what it brought upon our preachers, the ones who came
preaching this Gospel to us. What's going to happen to us? And so the Word says, when they
had seen the brethren, Paul and Silas comforted them. My title tonight is Comfort of
the Bound and Beaten. Comfort of the Bound and Beaten. Back in Acts 14.22, when Paul
was beaten there and left for dead, it says he came to the
saints and confirmed the souls of the disciples. That is, he
strengthened and consoled them by preaching Christ to them.
And he exhorted them to continue in the faith. He encouraged them
to persevere, trusting Christ Jesus the Lord to hold forth
the Word of life. and that we must, through much
tribulation, enter into the kingdom of God. Paul instructed them
in what to expect, but with this expectation comes the earnest
expectation that our God shall give us more grace. Well, sometime
later, if you'll be turning with me to Philippians chapter 1,
sometimes later, when he was suffering captivity at the hands
of this world, in Rome. Paul wrote this letter to the
church at Philippi and we know that the Apostle Paul's gospel,
his word of comfort didn't change from the day that he sat there
in Lydia's house and when he wrote this letter. If anything,
it became more encouraging and more comforting as he himself
was grown in the grace of God. So let's look here in this epistle
to the Philippians and we'll see a few of the words that Paul
may have used as he comforted them there in Lydia's house. This is what he used to comfort
them later. And we'll get some idea of what
he said to them as he stood there in Lydia's house. Now, we'll
start here in Philippians chapter 1, verse 1. He writes, Paul and Timotheus,
the servants of Jesus Christ, to all the saints in Christ Jesus
which are at Philippi with the bishops and deacons, Now, as
Paul and Silas gathered there in Lydia's house, it said they
comforted the brethren. Here, he calls them saints. Do you know how a sinner comes
to be a saint? You're going to have to be a
saint to enter into God's presence. Do you know how a sinner gets
to be a saint? Jude said, You're sanctified
by God the Father and preserved in Jesus Christ and called by
the Holy Spirit. That's how a sinner comes to
be a saint. So Paul says here, grace, verse
2, grace unto you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ. Now this is Paul's prayer for
them. He prays for God's grace and God's peace upon them and
in them. Verse 3, he thanks God for them. He said, I thank God upon every
remembrance of you. Verse 4, he says, always in every
prayer of mine for you all making requests and it brings me great
joy. He says in verse 5, and I'm thankful
for your fellowship in the Gospel from the first day, that day
out there when he preached to Lydia and that group of women
by the river. That day when he preached to the Philippian jailer
in the prison. That day when he stood there
in Lydia's house in our text and preaches to them. He said
since that day up until the day that he wrote this letter, he
said I'm thankful for your fellowship in the Gospel of Christ. But
something struck me about this when I read it. It's his prayer
for them, his intercession for them. But in another place, Paul
said, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech
you by us. Whenever John came back to deliver
the revelation of Jesus Christ, he said in chapter 2, verse 7
of Revelation, "...he that hath an ear, let him hear what the
Spirit saith unto the churches." It was John writing it, but he
said, let them hear what the Spirit saith. So, there you are. You're sitting in Lydia's house
with your brethren. and you're troubled, and you're
afraid, and you don't know what to make of all that's happened
to your beloved preacher, and you wonder what will happen to
you next. And here comes one of Christ's ambassadors, that
one who was beaten, and bruised, and wounded, and shamefully treated. Here he comes with words. And as He speaks, the Holy Ghost
speaks to your heart saying, grace unto you and peace from
God the Father and your Lord Jesus Christ. That's what happens
when the Gospel is preached. That's how we have comfort through
the words of Christ's ambassadors is Christ says to you, grace
to you. My grace is yours and my peace
I give unto you. Is it too much to think that
what Paul said here is he made intercession? Is the very intercession
of Christ Jesus our Lord? Christ has made us one with God
and therefore we can be sure that as the Son of God our Savior
joys over each of His saints. Grace and peace are yours forever
from God the Father and your Lord Jesus Christ. That's great
comfort to know that our Lord intercedes on our behalf. Now,
here's the first thing that Paul says to the Philippians that
would give them great comfort. The God of free and sovereign
grace shall complete the work He has begun in you. Verse 6. Paul says, being confident of
this very thing, that He which has begun a good work in you
will perform until the day of Jesus Christ. Now, this work
performed in you and I, which He has begun, you who are believers,
is the work of regeneration, of conversion, the forming of
Christ in you. And it's by this work of God
that He begins in the center that we first begin to apprehend
and have a knowledge of God's everlasting love for us. If you'll turn with me, I want
you to place here in Philippians. Turn to Ephesians chapter 1. Beginning with the good work
of regeneration, God makes known to us that God the Father began
this work. He began this work. in verse
4, according as He hath chosen us in Christ before the foundation
of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before
Him in love. Not that someday we would be
holy and without blame before Him in love, but putting us in
Christ so that from then forward we're holy and without blame
before Him in Christ. When He put us in Christ. And
by doing so, verse 5 says, He predestinated us unto the adoption
of children by Jesus Christ to Himself. And He did it according
to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of
His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved. Now
that's when the work began. That's what we begin to behold
when He comes to us and begins this work in us. We behold it
way back before the world was ever made. He began this work.
Did He carry it through? Did He carry it forward in time?
This work that He began in eternity? Well, verse 7 says, In Christ
We have redemption through His blood. He sent His Son and His
Son came and His Son lived righteously under the law of God and went
to the cross and laid down His life, having been made sin for
us, having our sin put upon Him, He became what we were that we
might be made what He is. And in Him we have redemption
through His blood. We have the forgiveness of sins
according to the riches of His grace. And yet we had no idea
that this had happened. So did God continue His work
in time? Did He carry on this work so
that we who Christ represented, who He put in Christ, who Christ
died for and redeemed, who have forgiveness of sins, did He come
and reveal this to us? Verse 8 says, He made known unto
us the mystery of His will according to His good pleasure which He
purposed in Himself. He abounded towards us in all
wisdom and prudence. Now, by our regeneration, we've
been made partakers of the inheritance with the saints in light. And
because it pleased God that in Christ all fullness should dwell
when Christ is formed in us, it really and truly is God making
known unto us the riches of this glorious mystery called salvation. And Christ in you is our hope. Listen to Colossians 1.27. To
whom? To you who God has begun this
work in. God has made known what is the
riches of the glory of this mystery among you who are Gentiles, which
is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Do you see that? And the
God of all grace was Paul's confidence for his brethren and for himself. So when he stands there and they
behold him with these wounds and these sores and bleeding
like he was, Paul could say to them there in Lydia's house,
whether we be in bonds or whether we're free. whether we be defending
the gospel before those who hate Christ or confirming the gospel
to our brethren like I'm standing here doing to you now. Remember,
it's God who began this good work in you and he did it by
the free and sovereign grace which you and I both are partakers
of. That's what Paul said. Look there
in verse 7. Philippians 1.7, Even as it is
meet for me to think this of you all, because I have you in
my heart, inasmuch as both in my bonds and in the defense and
confirmation of the gospel, ye all are partakers of my grace.
once this work was begun in us in regeneration. He individually
did this work in us to collectively bring us together to work in
us as his body to set forth the gospel into all the world that
he might do this same work of grace in the hearts of others
that he put in Christ and whom Christ redeemed. Therefore we
read the Lord said because I live ye shall live also But he's going
to do this work through much Tribulation to prove to us that
he's the one who began this work, and he must be the one to carry
this work on but Paul says We're confident of this very thing
that he which has begun a good work in you will perform it unto
the day of Jesus Christ and That would be comfort if you were
there in this house and you beheld this. That would be great comfort.
And that doesn't stop being the comfort. It's the comfort from
day one, and it's the comfort from then on. Now, here's the
second thing. I can assure you that as they
sat there in that house, there was some there entertaining the
thought that, I don't know if I can continue in this. If this
is what's going to happen to me, I don't know if I can continue
trusting the Lord, if I've done the right thing in confessing
Christ. I don't know that I could stand
before the magistrates and confess Christ. And so, the one thing
that we have to make sure, the one thing that's pleased God
the Father, to continue this work, to save us, to continue
it, is the preaching of the Gospel, us hearing the Gospel. And so
here's the second thing. Give yourselves to hear and to
learn more about Jesus Christ that you may grow thereby. Look
at Philippians 1.9. In this I pray that your love
may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment,
that ye may approve things that are excellent, that you may be
sincere and without offense to the day of Christ being filled
with the fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ unto
the glory and praise of God. Look over with me at 1 John.
I want to show you something. 1 John chapter 4. Now when Paul talks here in Philippians,
he says, I pray your love may abound. yet more and more in
knowledge and in all judgment. You know that we don't begin
to love, we don't begin to love until God gives us His Spirit. All that that you called love
prior to God giving you His Spirit was just lust. It wasn't love. Look here at 1 John 4, 9. Because
to behold true love and to really love We have to behold what love
is. Look at verse 9. In this was
manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent His
only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. Herein is love, not that we love
God, but that He loved us and sent His Son, the propitiation
for our sins. His son, the words to be are
added, his son was the propitiation when he came. He was the one
who was going to put away our sin and whom we're going to have
mercy and reconciliation with God. And he says, Beloved, if
God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. No man has
seen God at any time. If we love one another, it's
because God dwelleth in us. It's not because we see God,
it's because God dwells in us. And His love is perfected in
us. Now hold on to that word, I'm
going to show you something about it. And hereby know we that we
dwell in Him, and He in us, because He hath given us of His Spirit. That means when God gives us
of His Spirit, the love He imparts in us is unfamed. That's what the word perfect
means. It's unfeigned. It's not hypocritical. It's unfeigned. It's true love. It may be cold
at times. It may be nonexistent at times. But the love of the Spirit given
in us is true. Could the Spirit give us anything
else? But a true love, it's God giving
us of His Spirit. And just like His love for us
was manifested by God giving His only begotten Son, when we
behold His only begotten Son, you know how we manifest our
love? By giving His only begotten Son. How can I give His only begotten
Son? By declaring His only begotten Son. by giving you words of encouragement
through His only begotten Son. How did Paul love his brethren
when he came out of this prison? How did he manifest that he had
this spirit of love of God in his heart? Before he did anything
else, he went to these brethren, these young converts, these babes
in Christ who had all their questions and would be perplexed by what
had taken place. He went to them and he gave what
God gave. He gave the Son of God. He gave
Christ Jesus the Lord to them to comfort them. That's love,
brethren. And this love grows us in knowledge
and in judgment. Look back there at Philippians
with me. In Philippians there, Paul said, I pray that your love
may abound. yet more and more that it may
grow in knowledge and in all judgment." Now listen, the love
which the Holy Spirit sheds abroad in a sinner's heart, it's not
a sentimental, a blind, or a fatalistic, or just some infatuation. When we know that God's love
is particular, distinguishing love, don't we? You know why,
Christine, you know why Scott's love means more to you than anything
else? Because he's not loving 15 other
women. He's loving you. And it's distinguishing
in particular love. And so we know that it's that
way with God, and we know that God's love's in Christ Jesus,
His Son, and it's toward those whom God put in His Son. And
because that's the case, we know God's love saves in spite of
the sinner's hatred for God, in spite of the sinner's desire
not to have God love us. Because that's what we were by
nature. And God's love saved us in spite of that. In spite
of hatred, God's love conquered us. And so we know therefore
that God's love saves absolutely. It's not a love that is just
this the heart the love of concubines and harlots and just far and
wide it with no particular distinguishing effect and and saving uh power
towards anyone it's toward a particular people in Christ Jesus and therefore
this love saves it saves And so as He grows us in His love,
and it truly is His love for us, He grows us in knowledge
and sense, discernment. We have some understanding. We
have spiritual senses, and it results in some things. Look
at verse 10 there. He says that you may approve
things that are excellent. In Hebrews, he said, strong meat
belongs to them that are full age, who by reason of use have
their senses, their judgment exercised so that they can discern
both good and evil. Do you see that? How are you
going to know what God approves of and what are excellent things?
You're going to hear the Gospel preached and you're going to
experience some trials. Let me show you this next thing
it does, verse 10, that you may be sincere. You know, there's
a lot of folks who come and hear the gospel preached. And when
they hear the gospel preached, man, they talk to you and you
think, well, this person right here is on fire for the gospel. They're sincere about the gospel.
And then you don't see them. You don't
see them anymore. That sincerity is a continuing
thing. It means whatever it is that
comes up that is that great fun thing that our flesh would love
to do, I sincerely am not going to go after that thing. I'm sincerely
going to stay the course. I want to go hear Christ declare.
I want to go hear Christ preach. I want to grow in grace and knowledge
of Him. And this thing is growing as
we grow in love. We grow in that sincerity to
where less and less we care about those things that we once cared
about. And more and more, we're sincere. We don't want anything
to come between us and our Savior. And then it says here, and that
you might be without offense to the day of Christ, when He
gives us this desire, this sincerity, this love to behold what Christ
has done, He gives us a desire not to offend God. In other words, we don't want
to compromise on what God says is the truth. We don't want to
compromise with what God says is approving of what He approves
of and what is excellent in our worship, in our walk, and in
our witnessing of Him. And in every one of these, we're
going to be growing in these things in the midst of some harsh
tribulation in this world, opposition in this world. And all of these
though, brethren, these fruits of righteousness are those which
Christ fills His saints with. Verse 11, and he said, I pray
that you'll be filled with the fruits of righteousness which
are by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God. Now
how does He grow us in these things? In this love, in knowledge
and understanding that we may have these fruits of righteousness?
He does it, one, through the Gospel. And then secondly, He
does it through trial. Now, God began this work. How? In the brethren there at
Philippi. How did He begin this work? Through
the preaching of the gospel, didn't He? He sent Paul and Silas
and Luke and Timothy and they went there and preached Christ
to Him crucified. And God saved Lydia and her household. God saved the Philippian jailer
and his household. That's how He began this work.
And then God began to grow them through this trial with Paul
and Silas. He did it immediately, didn't
he? Immediately. This woman comes saying all these
things about Paul and Silas. And immediately, when Paul speaks
in the name of Christ and that spirit comes out of her, they
were drugged before the magistrates. And they were beaten, stripped
and beaten, and shamefully treated and thrown into prison. A trial
begins for these Philippian brethren immediately. And then, How does the Lord continue
to grow them in His love for them? To teach them that He loves
them and nothing can separate them? How does He continue it?
He sends Paul and Silas out of prison, right back into Lydia's
house. And what do they do? They stand
up and preach the Gospel to them again. Do you see it? You come
here and I preach the Gospel to you. Look at Romans 8. You
come here and here's what I tell you. This is what Paul, as he
preached this gospel, this is what Paul preached. These are
Paul's words. Look. Verse 31, What shall we then
say to these things? If God is for us, who can be
against us? He didn't spare His own Son.
He delivered Him up for us all. How shall He not with Him also
freely give us all things? Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? Is God to justify? Who can condemn? Is Christ that died, yea rather
that's risen again, who's even at the right hand of God, who
also maketh intercession for us? Now look at this. Who shall
separate us from the love of Christ? Huh? Now, if I just said
that to you, if Paul just preached that to these brethren, and he
said, who's going to separate us from the love of Christ? Shall
tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness,
or peril, or sword? As it is written, for thy sake
we're killed all the day long. We're accounted as sheep for
the slaughter. Now, Lydia and the brethren could hear this
and they could sit there and say, well, I believe that we won't
be separated from Him. And they've heard it preached.
But now, after Paul and Silas have gone through this trial,
and God sends them right back to Lydia's house, and there these
brethren sit and hear Paul and Silas stand up and preach it
again. Now, these brethren, these new
converts who have suffered this trial, they suffered it just
like Paul and Silas did. But then beholding it in Paul
and Silas, how they came back and still preached this gospel.
Now they can say, nay, in all these things, we are more than
conquerors through him that loved us. We've experienced the trial. We've been through it. But they
came back and preached it to them again, didn't they? And
reminded them of it. So I come and I preach this to
you. And then we leave here and we
go out and we experience the things that we go through every
day and all the trials we go through and the opposition that
we face. And sometimes in our lives, we
go face some serious opposition and we face those things and
we come back and we hear the gospel preached again. And we
begin to realize that tribulation really does work patience. And
patience really does work experience, maturity. And maturity really
does increase us in hope. Because as we go through these
things, we experience the fact that the Holy Spirit really does
continue to shed abroad in our hearts the love of God for us
in Christ. And that's how we grow and abound
in love more and more, in knowledge, And in sense, we have our senses
exercised. We understand this thing so,
and it's real. So, Paul says here, our comforts
knowing that the God who began this work, He's going to finish
it. He's going to continue it. And then secondly, therefore
let us give ourselves to know more of Him through this gospel
because that's how He's going to grow us, through this gospel,
so that we'll be fit and equipped for the trials that He's going
to bring us into. Now here's the third thing. Hold forth the
word of life. Can't you just hear, I can just
hear Paul saying this to them, these three things. No brethren,
that God who began this work's gonna finish it. Now you give
yourself to the Word of God because that's how God's going to grow
you in love, in knowledge, and in having your senses exercised
in His trials. And then brethren, do this because
this is equipping you for the reason you're here. And the reason
you're here, that God has saved you and left you in this world,
is to hold forth the Word of Life. Hold forth this Gospel.
Now look here with me. Verse 12. Paul wanted the brethren,
when he wrote this to them, later on, this is a different occasion,
but when he wrote this to them, he wanted to know that his mistreatment
had resulted in the furtherance of the Gospel. Verse 12, he said,
I would, ye should understand, brethren, that the things which
happen unto me have fallen out, rather, unto the furtherance
of the Gospel. Isn't that exactly what happened
when Paul was imprisoned by those magistrates? Didn't it fall out
for the furtherance of the gospel? Paul, I said to you before that
those magistrates, when they sent and said, let these men
go, they did it for natural causes. And I was very careful in how
I said that because I was coming to this point eventually, I knew,
and I wanted to make this, Christ, Christ, gave them over to do
what they did to Paul and Silas, to put them in prison, because
Christ had a child that he redeemed there in that prison. And when
the mission was accomplished and God, through his grace, through
his messenger, sent forth his gospel and quickened the heart
of that jailer in his household and brought them to faith in
Christ, the mission was accomplished. And so Christ put it in the hearts
of those men. Now you send and let them go.
I got other work for them. They got to go to Lydia's house
now and comfort my brethren. You think this thing is just
hocus-pocus and helter-skelter? Christ is working everything
according to His good pleasure. He's reigning and ruling. And
He's doing this thing precisely. Surely the wrath of man shall
praise Thee, and the remainder of wrath shalt Thou restrain.
Look at Isaiah 46.9. I read this again today after
looking at this point. It was a blessing to me. Look
with me. Isaiah 46.9. Isaiah 46 verse 9 remember the
former things of old for I am God and there is none else I
am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the
beginning and from ancient times the things that are not yet done,
saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure,
calling a ravenous bird from the east, the man that executeth
my counsel from a far country. Yea, I've spoken it. I will also
bring it to pass. I've purposed it. I will also
do it. Hearken unto me, ye stout-hearted.
Far from righteousness. I bring near my righteousness
It shall not be far off and my salvation shall not tarry and
I will place salvation enzyme for Israel my glory Now there's
no ifs ands or buts about that. He said that's what I'm gonna
do You reached out hard about all you want to but he said this
is how I'm doing it now back there Philippians 1 As He grows
us in love and we become more assured that God shall bless
this work that He's begun, and we become assured that He's going
to do it no matter what opposition we face. Look there in verse
19. Listen to what Paul said. I know, I know, he said, that
this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer and the supply
of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Ain't no doubt about it. according
to my earnest expectation and hope you see that love that abounded
in knowledge and and he'd had his senses exercised and by this
time paul says my earnest expectation and hope i've had the love of
god should have brought in my heart i've heard this gospel
preached i've I've been had my senses exercised through trials
and I've got a good hope and I expect that in nothing I shall
be ashamed but that with all boldness as Always as I've always
preached so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body now listen
to this whether by life or by death For to me to live is Christ
and to die is gain. Now, this grace, this growth,
this maturing in love and knowledge and good sense makes Christ the
believer's life, brethren. This is what your life comes
down to. If you're a believer, what God's going to grow you
to behold more and more and more is this is what your life is
about, right here. If I have life, it's because
Christ liveth in me. And if Christ lives in me, the
life that I live in the flesh right now, I live by the faith. the faithfulness, the Christ
in me, the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. That's
how I'm living and that's for whom I'm living. And so if I
live If I continue tomorrow by the faithfulness of the Son of
God living in me, the same God who loved me and gave Himself
for me, by His Spirit in me, if I live tomorrow, if He lets
me live tomorrow and I remain tomorrow, it's going to be for
one purpose. To worship Him and to prepare
to further the Gospel of Him. That's why I'm here. That's why
I'm here. In other words, He's going to
make us lay aside our selfish, sinful ambitions in order that
we might pursue His work. Does that mean you're going to
go out tomorrow and quit your job and say, well, I'm going
to work for the Lord? He said in another place, if
He's put you in that job, He put you in that job and saved
you when you was in that job to use that job to support this
work, to further this Gospel. You can further it there by those
you come in contact with. You can further it by By whatever
means that he's provided for you through that work But that's
where he's placed you and he said use it, but no it's not
it's not to be used as Abusing this world just to try to get
stuff to consume it upon the lush look on the flesh. I've
got a whole new Ambition now and it's for Christ my Savior
for me to live is Christ and if I die if he if I die today
It's going to be to be with Him for all eternity. So my life,
whether I live or I die, is Christ. It's Christ. Now if I'm sitting
there in Lydia's house and I hear Paul say something like that,
now I've got some understanding of how a man could go through
what Paul and Silas just went through. Now I've got some I
got some purpose to my own life. I see why Christ saved me, and
in this joy and rejoicing I have in Him, why He didn't just take
me out of the world right then. But He left me here for some
reason. If I live, it's for Christ. It's to glorify Him. It's to
honor Him. It's to set forth this Word concerning
Him. Now, let me give you an application
here real quick, and I will go home. Look here with me. Within
the church, look at verse 27, this is what he says, only let
your conversation, that doesn't mean just what you say, that
means everything about you, only let your conversation be as it
becometh the gospel of Christ. That whether I come and see you
or else be absent, I may hear of your affairs that you stand
fast in one spirit. with one mind striving together
for the faith of the gospel. Give yourselves to learn of Christ
and to worship Christ. You're all born of the same Spirit. You all speak in the language
of free grace. You all wear in the garments
of Christ's righteousness. You all are eating the same spiritual
meat, the bread of life, the water of life. You all live by
Christ living in you. Therefore, we all work together
for the faith of the gospel to bear witness of Christ. If I
live, it's for Christ. Look over at Philippians 2.14.
Philippians 2.14. Do all things without murmurings
and disputings that you may be blameless and harmless, the sons
of God, without rebuke in the midst of a crooked and perverse
nation among whom ye shine as lights in the world, holding
forth the word of life. You see that? Now, back in Philippians
1.28, and concerning those who would oppose you, he said, and
in nothing terrified by your adversaries. Don't be terrified
by them. Because when you're not terrified by your adversaries,
that's going to be to them an evident token of their own perdition,
of their own destruction. But it's going to be an evident
token to you of salvation and that of God. You see. When the owners of that slave
girl charged Paul and Silas falsely, and they drug them before the
magistrates, and the magistrates had them beaten, and they were
cast into that prison, and then after the magistrates came and
said, now let these men go, and Paul and Silas sitting there
knowing that they're at the mercy of these magistrates, they can
do anything they want to to them, have just experienced the inflicting
blows that they've put upon them, stand there and say, let them
come get us and walk out of here with us, so everybody will know
that they're wrong and we're right. Those magistrates and
those fellas that owned that poor slave girl beheld in Paul
and Silas everything that they weren't. They beheld in them. Those fellas, if you put enough
pressure on them, just like any sinner in this world, put enough
pressure upon them, I don't care who they say they stand for,
they wouldn't stand for themselves or anybody else, much less Christ. They would change their direction
and their thoughts and their testimony or whatever it is,
their stance for whatever they stood for, with enough pressure
they'd change it. And it was an evident token to
them that they weren't saved. They didn't know anything about
grace. Paul and Silas had something they didn't know anything about.
And then to Paul and Silas, it was an evident token that they
were saved. and that of God. You know why?
Because Paul and Silas knew they were just like the magistrates.
And if enough pressure was put on them, they'd do the same thing.
And the only reason they stood there and said, give it to us. Meet us. We won't leave here
until you come and get us and walk out. The only reason they
did that is because God's grace gave them the strength to do
it. That's the only reason they did
it. Look at the next verse. For unto you it is given in the
behalf of Christ, not only to believe on Him, but also to suffer
for His sake." Now get what he's saying there. He's saying that
this gift of faith is given to you in the behalf of Christ.
And likewise, the gift of steadfastness in the face of opposition is
given to you in the behalf of Christ. He's not just saying
it's given to you to believe on Him, but now you've got to
suffer for Him too. He's saying by the same grace that you receive
the gift of faith, you receive the gift to suffer, to bear up
under suffering, to withstand suffering for Him. How else do
you think you're going to read Hebrews chapter 11 and find out
about folks who were burned at the stake? Like they say, Isaiah
was torn in half. And these men never denied Christ. They stood for the grace of Christ.
Do you have the strength to do that by yourself? I don't. I can tell you I don't. Peter
proved to us that God said, Peter, it's nothing that you're going
to pull out your sword and defend me in the face of a bunch of
soldiers. I'm going to show you what you are. I'm going to leave
you before a little damsel comes up to you, and then you tuck
tail and run. That's what I am. That's what
you are. The gift of grace that gave you faith to believe Christ
is the same gift that is given to you to bear up under suffering
and that in the behalf of Christ the Lord. So that when you glory,
you glory one place in Christ the Lord. That's all. What kind
of conflict? Verse 30. The same conflict which
you saw in me. When he wrote this, he was referring
back to when he was standing there in Lydia's room, in her
living room, beaten and bloody and had been stripped naked and
all that stuff. He said that same kind of conflict.
That's the kind of conflict I'm talking about. And the kind of
conflict you now hear to be in me. He's in Rome at this time.
So He says, this one who's begun this work in you, he's going
to finish it. He's going to grow you in love.
He's going to grow you in knowledge and experience so that you know
more of Christ, so that you're going to be given a heart to
want to know more of Christ, to give yourself to hearing about
Christ. So give yourself to Him. And
that you might want to hold forth the Word of Life. So hold forth
the Word of Life. That you want to Be assured that whatever from
the very beginning from that that gift of faith all the way
to the end when you're standing there Tied to a stake and they've
poured gasoline all around you all over you all over your feet
and they about to strike the match He said from beginning
to end the same grace that's going to hold you and preserve
you so that you say Christ is my all He said it's gonna be
all of him now. That's the message that's gonna
comfort a believer. That's the message that's going
to cause a believer to get up in the morning and to go forth,
to want to know more of Him. What are you going to do? What
are you going to do whenever you go to work or you go to the
grocery store or wherever you are and somebody comes up to
you and they say, Melinda, I was listening to your husband preach.
Now tell me about this salvation and show it to me in Scripture.
Go show them. If you don't study this Word,
you're not. If you don't know where it is to show them, you're
not. And it's not enough to just spout off something. Show them.
Show them. So Paul says, he says, give yourself
to this thing. Give yourself to it. That's what
we're here for. That's the only reason we're
here for. Give ourselves to this Word. And then He keeps giving us these
trials and this severe opposition. And He gives us steadfastness.
And we behold that we are dependent more and
more upon Christ. Have you ever noticed how that
it almost sounds like The gospel of this present day, that's not
the gospel, but this message is to get a believer to some
sort of point of where they're so strong that they can just
stand now. I told you this analogy before,
but we're backwards, you know. God said, my ways are not your
ways, and our very way of doing things In our families is backwards
compared to what how God does it we start out with our kids
in the house Trying to get them out of the house God starts out
and we're out of the house, and he's growing us up to move us
in the house Ain't that right? He's making us not more independent
he's making us more dependent That's growing in grace That's
growing in knowledge and understanding and having our senses exercised
to know that I can't be left to myself. I got it. I'm dependent
on him. But that'll make you strong in
the faith and strong for Christ. And that's what he's doing. That's
what he's doing. All right.