Morning. Happy New Year. Everybody kept
waking me up last night. I kept getting these texts, Happy
New Year, Happy New Year. I thought, man, I'm asleep. I'm
going to go to bed. Get to bed. We were in bed by
1030. Turn to Acts chapter 28. Acts chapter 28. Doug, lead us in prayer. Our Father, we thank You, Lord,
that we can begin this another year in this place of worship. Lord, help us to truly worship
this morning the Almighty Sovereign God, who does as He pleases in
the arms of Heaven with the inhabitants of this earth. Thank you for every blessing
of life that you've bestowed upon us. Thank you for our families. Thank you, Lord, for this people
that's gathered here this morning. Lord, may we all come and worship in our hearts for a loving
and kind God. Lord, we know you're also God
of bread. So Lord, we pray this morning
as we begin this another year. Lord, this might be a year of
honor and blessing to you in your holy name. Thank you, Lord,
for your precious promises. that are in need and going through
trials. Lord, you know each one. You
know each need. And Lord, we know that your grace
is sufficient. Lord, help our pastor this morning as he brings your word to your
people. Again, we thank you and praise
you. And that's all in Christ's gracious name. Amen. Acts 28,
we pick up in verse 12 and finish out this chapter, Lord willing. And I titled this lesson, Paul
Finally Arrives in Rome. You know, we have watched Paul. We've watched him go from Saul
holding the clothes of those men that were stoning Stephen,
making havoc of the church, despising the name of Jesus Christ, hating
that name and that way, the people of the Lord, becoming a flaming
witness of the Lord Jesus Christ and being stoned himself, even
left for dead at one time. Whipped, shipwrecked, And now
he's in Rome. He's coming to his journey's
end. One of the writers I was reading this morning said he's
about 60 years old now at this time. You know, 60 years of age
in that day, traveling the way he traveled was very difficult. Very difficult. But Paul didn't
count anything that he went through as too much. He did not say, well, this is
a little too much. He was glad to go through it.
He was glad to suffer the loss. He said, I have suffered the
loss of all things through the Lord Jesus Christ, and I'm glad
I did so. He didn't regret any of it. And
Paul now leaves the island of Malta, and he heads to Rome. And there has been a lot of stops. There's been a lot of stops from
that road to Damascus to this point. You know, when I was at the,
I was, I flew out to Arkansas. I had to get on one of those
trams to get to my next place. And it was all the way around
the airport. And we would go a little bit and stop. People
get on, people get off, you know, on and off, on and off. And we
must've stopped four or five times. And I finally arrived
at my destination. And I have to say, there's a
lot of stops on our way to glory. A lot of unintended stops by
us. There's a lot of things come
along in our life that we don't really intend. I didn't intend
coming to North Carolina. This never crossed my mind. being
a pastor here. All this time Rupert was here,
and I never thought about me being a pastor here someday.
You know, I was in business for 25 years. I never thought I'd
ever be in business myself for 25 years. I never even crossed
my mind. Our Lord has a lot of stops for
us along the way to glory. A lot of stops that He has purposed.
We didn't purpose them, but He did. Every stop along our way,
everything that comes our way has been predetermined, predestinated
of God. Our path is predestinated. It's
not a willy-nilly path. It's a predestinated path. You
here this morning was predestinated of God before the world began.
Now, some people that upsets, but not you. Not you who believe. I'm glad. I'm glad God predetermined
my steps. Aren't you glad? Someone said,
that just makes you a puppet. I can tell you this. Someone
said this. He said, I'd rather be his puppet than Satan's. I'd
rather he be pulling the strings than Satan be pulling the strings
and or me be pulling the strings. I don't want to pull the strings.
I don't know what's going to happen next. I don't know what
a choice that I make will bring. I don't know what it'll develop
into. I'm glad that God has predestinated and predetermined all things. We make our plans and I tell
you what you do. And this will help you. Buy you
a big trash can. Make your plans and buy you a
can. And be ready to throw your plans into it because God directs
our steps. God directs our steps. Vicki said one time, she said,
I didn't plan on marrying a preacher. She said this years ago. I didn't
plan on being one. I didn't plan on being one. You
know, Paul's imprisonment was purposed by God. His imprisonment was purposed
by God. Paul spent about five years About the last five years
of his ministry, he spent it in prison. He spent a lot of years chained.
Now think about this. For about five years, he spent
chained to another man, a soldier of Rome. That's how they, when
they were in prison, if you were a prisoner, they were chained
to you when they were delivering you to the prison. They were
chained to you all the way. He was chained to someone for
five years. Nearly five years. That's something
to, you're talking about trying your patience. What if you're
chained to somebody that's just a brutal person? A filthy mouth,
brutal person. And Paul had to be chained to
that. That's a trial. That's a trial. But the scripture
says this. With much tribulation shall you
enter the kingdom of heaven. So why do we complain? Why would
I complain? God said, with much tribulation
shall you enter the kingdom of heaven. You and I live in a sinful
world. We live in a very wicked world. And I've said this often. It's
difficult to live right in a wrong world. You're going to suffer
for it. You're going to suffer for it.
There's no such thing as an easy road to glory. Our Lord didn't
have it. Are we greater than our Lord?
Is a servant greater than his master? If you really want to know, well,
let me put this out first. We will never suffer what Christ
suffered. So all our suffering is light
compared to his. And as Paul said, our afflictions
are light compared to the glory that shall be revealed. It'll
be light. But now I want you to notice
something here. It says there in verse 12, and landing at Syracuse,
we tarried there three days. And from there thence, we fetched
a compass and came to Regium. And after one day, the south
wind blew, and we came the next day to Putoli, where we found
brethren. In the midst of our troubles,
God always sends comfort. He always sends comfort. And
one of the greatest comforts that God can give to me and you
is fellowship with one another in Christ. God sent brethren to Paul. In the midst of all his trouble,
He sent him comfort. Our Lord will not leave us comfortless.
He gave us the Holy Spirit who is called the Comforter, and
He gives us one another as comforters. We are brethren born for adversity. The trials that God has put you
through will be a comfort to someone else down the road. And
when God brought these brethren to Paul, these to me are the
little things we overlook. when we're reading the Scriptures.
You know, we pick up on the doctrine, but we overlook the little things
that happen day by day by day that gives us real comfort and
real joy and makes our day brighter. And God brings these men along,
and you know Paul, as a prisoner, chained to this guard, you know
how he comforts those brethren who are free. But He comforts
them. I have no doubt about that. And
they comfort Him. They are a big comfort to Him. First of all,
He sees that there are brethren. There are others who believe
the Gospel. And there are those, I'm sure, that He has preached
to and that He's met along the way that they're still there.
You know, there's nothing probably more sad to a pastor than when
someone who's been around a while and they just leave. They leave. You just break your heart. They
leave the gospel. They leave. I've seen this over
the years. I've seen it happen. But there in verse 14, he says,
we found brethren. We found brethren. And these
brethren came to Paul. God providentially brought them
together and made them a great blessing to each other. And then
there in verse 16, well verse 15 it says, from there, when
the brethren heard of us, God saw to it that they heard that
Paul was in town, they came to meet us as far as Apiphorum and
the three taverns, whom when Paul saw, he thanked God and
he took courage. He thanked God for them, took
much courage. But you know what? Those men
traveled, one of them was about 50 miles away, and the other
one was about 30 miles away, and when they heard that Paul
was where he was, they packed their bags and packed their lunch
and they went to meet Paul. 50 miles away. If you heard that
someone's 50 miles away, it'd be easy for us, we'd just jump
in a car. We'd be there in about 40 minutes, 45, 50 minutes. But they had to travel for a
long ways. But they wanted to hear Paul, they wanted to see
Paul and learn some more things of Paul and see how Paul's doing.
And I have no doubt that they brought some things for Paul,
some gifts, some things for his travel, some things he needed.
There's no doubt about that. But then here in verse 16, And
when we came to Rome, that's what got my attention. Paul finally
made it to Rome. God's purpose, God's promise,
because he told Paul he was going to be in Rome, cannot be broken. Being shipwrecked, being chained
to a guard, Even the men, the guards on that
ship wanted to kill the prisoners. Remember, they wanted to kill
the prisoners so they wouldn't get away. And that one centurion,
that one guard, it was Gordon Paul, talked him out of it because
for one reason, God's purpose. He didn't know that. He didn't
know that. You know the world has no idea.
They have no clue that they are fulfilling God's purpose. Even
this hour, God's purpose is being fulfilled. So Paul arrives at Rome. God
gives Paul favor to this centurion. You see here, when we came to
Rome, the centurion delivered the prisoner to the captain of
the guard, but Paul was suffered to dwell by himself with a soldier
that kept him. But he was allowed, he wasn't
put with those, he was allowed to be alone. That's the providence
of God. This is the overruling providence
and power of God. that God took his man and set
him by himself and not with the crowd of prisoners so that he
could receive people that are coming and going, he could preach
the gospel and freely do so. This is God at work. This is
God at work. You see, the heart of the king
is in the hand of the Lord. Like the rivers of water, He
turns and withers whoever He will. But not only is the heart
of the King, the heart of every person on this earth is in God's
hands. It's in God's hands. God controls the hearts of men.
You can look over in Exodus 11, 7 and Joshua 10, 21 where it
says, not even a dog moved his tongue against the Israelites.
Not even a dog barked at them. He controls even the tongue of
a dog against His children. Oh, that it would dawn on us
how minutely God looks after us, that He won't even let a
dog bark at you if it's not His will. I mean nothing. This is our Father's world. The
earth is the Lord, the fullness thereof, and they who dwell therein.
This is our Father's world, and He controls absolutely everything
and everyone in it for our good, for our good. What we may not
think is for our good is for our good. I wrote a little note
on a pad. You know, I write little thoughts
in my studies, you know, day after day after day when I'm
in there, but I write little thoughts. And it was something
that struck me about a tragedy. I was someone, and I jotted down,
a tragedy is not a tragedy if it works for your good. Is it? A tragedy is not a tragedy if
it works for your good. All things work together for
good to them who love God, to them who are called according
to His purpose. Now, in verse 17 through 20,
after three days, Paul called the chief of the Jews. He still held to this, to the
Jew first and also to the Gentiles. So when he went into a town,
if there were Jewish brethren there, he preached the gospel
to them. He preached the gospel to them. And so he looked up the chief
of the Jews and he tells them there in those three verses,
17 through 20, he tells them that that he's not in trouble because
he's a criminal or because something he's done, he's in trouble, he's
in prison, he's a prisoner because of the gospel he preached. I'm
paraphrasing, I just put it in our language. It's because of
the gospel he preached. It's because of the hope of Israel
is what he calls it, but he wants them to know. He wants them to
know that I'm in this trouble for the hope of Israel. The hope
of Israel was this, the Messiah. You know that wasn't given to
any other nation? No other nation on this earth had the promise
of a Messiah except Israel. The Philistines, the Amorites,
the Hittites, all those did not have the promise of a Messiah
except Israel. And Paul says, for this hope,
the hope of Israel, the hope of the promised Messiah, am I
in trouble, that I'm a prisoner? It's not because I did something
wrong, or I'm a criminal, I'm not. He's telling them, I'm not
a criminal. He lets them know he's there
because of the very hope they held to, the hope of a Messiah. Now, what's Paul saying? What's
he talking about in saying that for the hope of Israel? Well,
first of all, we have to understand who Israel is. Most people only count Israel
to be the descendants from Abraham. But you know what? You are Israel. You know that? You really are
Israel. You really are. We know through
the Scriptures that not all those who are of Israel are Israel. We know that. We know that through
the Scriptures. We know that most of the Israelites
are no different than the religious professors of our day. They're
no different than what we've got going on today, false religion.
The service had no real meaning to them. It lost its meaning. It only had a meaning to those
who believed. But those who believe not, it
was just a cold, dry, dead service. They would stand and they'd read
the law, they'd read from the book of Moses, mostly the first
five books, but they would read from the law and it was just
cold, dead reading. That's all it was. That's like
somebody, as you say, someone here that doesn't believe the
gospel. My preaching is cold, dead preaching. But not to you
who believe. Not to you who believe. It's
not cold, dead preaching. But to the Israelites, those
who did not believe, it had no meaning. They did not revere
God. They had no reverence for God.
They did not believe God. They went through their ceremonies
with outward form and no heart. And no heart. You know, it is
possible to be here in body and your heart somewhere else, isn't
it? Your heart could be out there on something else going on out
there. And you're sitting here, but
your heart could be somewhere else. And their heart was always
somewhere else. It was not in what they were
doing. It was not in it. They hated free grace. They hated
free grace. They were enemies of the truth. And what they did to the Lord
Jesus Christ was proof of their hatred of God. He says, come,
this is the heir, let us kill him. The Lord gave that parable.
But the true Israel of God are those who are born of God, those
whose hope is in God, in the Lord Jesus Christ, those who
look to the Redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ, they know the...
Listen, you know your Redeemer liveth, don't you? Job said this,
and Job is said to be one of the oldest books in the Bible.
He said, I know. I know my Redeemer liveth. I know He will stand on the earth
in the last days. I know I will see Him with my
eyes and not another's. Someone else is not going to
have to tell me about Him. I'm going to see Him. I'm going to
see Him face to face. He knew that. He knew that. And all the Old Testament saints
knew that. He was a Christian, just like
me and you. He believed God, just like we
do. He followed God by faith, just like we do. Every Old Testament
saint believed the same God we believe, believed the same gospel
we believe. There's no different gospel.
There's no two gospels. And we're going to look at this
in Galatians chapter 1 next. There's only one. I mean, from
the Old Testament to the New Testament, from the first one
that's saved to the last one that's saved, It's the same gospel. It's the same Lord. It's the
same message. Isaiah said in Isaiah 53, who
hath believed our report? It's the same one that was preached
back about the seed of the woman and Abel believed it. The same
one we believe today. It's the same message. They believed
it. Our Lord said this, Abraham rejoiced
to see My day. He saw it and was glad. The true Israel of God know this.
They know they need a Redeemer to redeem them from the curse
of the law, the power of sin, and the power of Satan. They
know that. They knew it in the Old Testament, and we know it.
We know it. And this hope of Israel that
Paul is talking about is Jesus Christ. It's Jesus Christ. Look here in verse 22. But we desire to hear
of thee what thou thinkest. You see, they hadn't heard. Paul
was defending himself, but they said to him earlier, they said,
well, we haven't received any letters. We don't know anything
about you. We don't know anything about you. But we do know this.
We do know this in verse 22, this sect, this sect, We know that this sect is spoken
against everywhere. Everywhere it's spoken against
as evil, as evil. And when they had appointed him
a day, these elders, these Jewish leaders, there came many to him
and to his lodging, to whom he expounded, he taught, and testified
the kingdom of God, persuading them concerning Jesus. the kingdom
of God, that it's a spiritual kingdom. They were looking for
a kingdom like that of David and Solomon. They were looking
for a physical king to come and deliver them from the Roman government
and all other governments. And they were looking to have
this kingdom set up and they would have the power and the
rule and they would not be subject to these other powers anymore.
They didn't realize it's a spiritual kingdom. They didn't realize the spirituality
of the law. They didn't realize the spirituality
of salvation. It's of the heart. It's born
of the spirit. That which is born of the spirit
is spirit. That which is born of the flesh is flesh. They didn't
understand that. They didn't understand that.
But Paul, Paul expounded and he took the Old Testament. They
knew, you know, now a lot of times when he went to the Gentiles,
they didn't have anything. Can you imagine? They had nothing.
He couldn't say turn to Acts chapter 28 or turn to this or
turn to that. He couldn't even, they didn't
even have what we have throughout the whole Old Testament. But
the Jews did. You know, when Paul went to a
lot of those heathen places, they didn't have anything but
heathenism. And they had their Greek mythology, they had a lot
of that stuff. But these men knew what he was talking
about when he was expounding the kingdom of God. He took them
all the way back to Adam. He took them all the way back
to the fall. He took them all the way back to the ceremonies,
because as I said, he expounded and testified the kingdom of
God, persuading them concerning Jesus Christ, both out of the
law of Moses, the ceremonial laws. Can you imagine these Jewish
leaders who were very, very well taught, instructed in these things?
And he said, that Passover lamb is Jesus Christ. That high priest,
Aaron, is Jesus Christ, our high priest. The tabernacle, that's
God in human flesh. God manifests in the flesh. That's
the Son of God in the flesh. He would reach back and he'd
take those types and those pictures and those promises and he'd apply
them to the Lord Jesus Christ. He preached to them out of the
law of Moses and out of the prophets. I have no doubt he took Isaiah
53 and went through it and other scriptures. And he did this,
listen, from morning till evening. You reckon his heart was in this? I'll tell you this. You can witness
to somebody out there on the street. Somebody comes along,
you have an opportunity to witness to them. But boy, when the Lord
opens the door for you to actually speak to your family, your children,
your mother, your father, your sister, your brothers, I'm telling
you, it's different. I mean, you'll talk to them for
more, as long as they'll sit there and listen. As long as
they will listen, you'll talk. You won't get weary. You won't
get tired. You'll talk as long as they'll
listen. Because you're hoping that by God's grace, they hear
what you have to say. That they hear the gospel. Paul was morning to evening talking
to his Jewish brethren. He's like, oh, that's like he
said in Romans 10, my heart's desire prayer to God for Israel
is that they might be saved. That God would save them. Standing
before Agrippa, And his wife in that crowd, he said, oh, I
would to God you were as I am, except for these chains. You
know, one of the things that really does concern me, it concerns
me, it concerns me more than you, is that I ever stand here
and preach with no heart in it, with no real heart and passion
in it, for you to hear me. I want you to hear. I want you,
my prayer is constantly, it's every week, my prayer is that
you and I will grow in grace and knowledge of Christ. And
I know, I know a large part of that I'm responsible for standing
here, preaching to you. And I want by God's grace to
do so from the heart. And listen here in verse 24.
And some believed, some believed, God granted faith to some. They,
I see, I see. But here's what's so amazing.
And some believe not. They heard the same message.
They heard the same message. People can sit in the same congregation
week after week and somebody says, I see, I believe. And someone else can sit there
for years and never believe and never see. That's it. Personally, it's scary, and there's
a part of it that's scary to me, and there's a part of it
that I rejoice in, because some do believe. Some believe the
Lord's still saving sinners. He's still saving sinners. Some
believe the things which are spoken, and some believe not.
And when they agreed not among themselves, they began to argue
among themselves, they departed after that Paul had spoken one
word and it was, listen, it was a word of condemnation. And here,
now listen, this is what struck me, struck me so strongly here. This was the last time, pretty
much the last time the gospel was preached to the Jews. And
then they were destroyed a few years later, a little while later,
they were destroyed. This is the last time that the gospel
is preached to them. And they turned away, those who
turned away. And then Paul, listen here, listen
to what he says. Paul quotes the scriptures. He's
going to quote the scriptures. Well spake the Holy Ghost by
Isaiah the prophet unto our father, saying, Go unto this people,
and say, Hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand, and
seeing ye shall see, and not perceive. For the heart of this
people is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and
their eyes have they closed?" It's like, no. It's like I'm
holding up saying, you see this? And they're like, no. No. It's
like you're trying to show somebody something, and they're standing
there with their eyes closed. I'm like, open your eyes. And they're like, no, I don't
want to look at it. I don't want to see it. I don't want to see
it. And their eyes, have they closed,
lest they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears,
and understand with their hearts, and should be converted, and
I should heal them. Be it known therefore unto you that the salvation
of God is sent unto the Gentiles, and they will hear it. They will
hear it. If the gospel ever leaves, if
it ever leaves this place, it won't be God's fault. It will
not be God's fault. Any time throughout history when
the gospel left the place, it was the people. Just go read
the letters to the churches there in Revelation 2. In Ephesus and
all those others that he chatted, he said, you've left your first
love. You're busy. Listen, look how busy they were.
And they were doing the right things, but their heart was not
in it no more. That's dangerous. It's dangerous
that you can come here and then your heart not be in it no more. It's possible. It's possible. It's possible. But the Gentiles,
he said, will hear it. And when he had said these words,
the Jews, listen, they departed. And had great reasoning among
themselves. And Paul dwelt two whole years
in his own hired house and received all that came in unto him. Preaching
the kingdom of God and teaching those things which concern the
Lord Jesus Christ with all confidence, no man forbidding him. But not long after this, after
Paul was, after they martyred him, not too long after
that, 70 A.D. I believe it was, that place,
Israel was, Jerusalem was decimated. And you know what? The gospel
hasn't been there since. Look at it over there. They making
money off of it. They make money off religion.
You know, religion's big business. They make money off of us, off
those, off of foolish, false religion. They wanna make a trip
to the Holy Land. I'm gonna make a trip to the
Holy Land one day when I die. That's my trip to the Holy Land.
When I go to, but I'm not gonna call land holy where the people
there hate God and hate Jesus Christ and despise him. and they're
making money off of him. They're like the money changers.
Remember when the Lord went into the temple and threw that table
over? Well, they're still doing it.
They're still doing it. They're taking advantage of the
religious ignorance of people, and they're going over spending
big money to see where, they said, the Lord. I saw this on
TV. I won't quit here. I saw this
on TV here not long ago. It was this advertisement. by Israel, and they said, this
is the exact spot. I mean, they had a circle around
it. This is the exact spot where Jesus stood. How'd they know
that 2,000 years ago? But there's some idiots out there
that's gonna, I shouldn't call them idiots. I mean, sometimes you call it
what it is, but religious duped people, they'll go over there
and they believe that. They believe that. And they spend
money for holy water, the Catholics. Here's some holy water. That's
no more holy than what's in a cesspool, as far as holy goes. Well, that's Paul finally arrived
in Rome. God's will was done. God's promises
were accomplished. Paul, he promised him these things,
that he'd be in Rome, and he did. God is a God-free Word.
This ought to encourage us, how he guides and directs and keeps
us along the way. All right.