Good evening, let's all stand
together and we'll start by singing hymn number 62, hymn number 62. Crown Him with many crowns, the
Lamb upon His throne. Hark how the heavenly anthem
drowns all music but its own. Awake, my soul, and sing. of Him who died for thee, and
hailed Him as thy matchless King through all eternity. Crown Him the Lord of love, behold
His hands and side, Rich wounds yet visible above, in beauty
glorified. No angel in the sky can fully
bear that sight. But downward bends his wandering
eye at mysteries so bright. Crown him the Lord of life, who
triumphed o'er the grave. Who rose victorious to the strike
For those he came to save His glories now we sing Who died
and rose on high who died eternal life to bring and lives that
death may die. Crown him the Lord of heaven,
one with the Father known. One with the Spirit through Him
given from yonder glorious throne. To Thee be endless praise, for
Thou for us has died. Be thou, O Lord, through endless
days adored and magnified. Thank you and be seated. Hymn
number 176. Break thou the bread of life,
dear Lord, to me, as thou didst break the loaves beside the sea. Beyond the sacred page, I seek
thee, Lord, my spirit pants for thee, O live. Bless thou the truth, dear Lord,
to me, to me. As thou didst bless the bread
by Galilee. Then shall all bondage cease,
all fetters fall, and I shall find my peace, my all. in all. Thou art the bread of
life, O Lord, to me. Thy holy word, the truth that
saveth me. Give me to eat and live with
Thee above. Teach me to love Thy truth for
Thou art loved. O send Thy Spirit, Lord, now
unto me, that He may touch my eyes and make me see. Show me the truth concealed, Acts 23. Acts 23. Read down to verse 11, then we'll
deal with the rest down to verse 22 as we come to them. And Paul earnestly, Acts 23,
Paul earnestly beholding the council said, Men and brethren,
I have lived in all good conscience before God unto this day. And
the high priest Ananias commanded them that stood by him to smite
him on the mouth. Then said Paul unto him, God
shall smite thee, thou whited wall, for thou settest to judge
me after the law, and commands me to be smitten contrary to
the law. And they that stood by said,
revilest thou God's high priest? Then said Paul, I wish not, brethren,
that he was the high priest, for it is written, thou shalt
not speak evil of the ruler of thy people. But when Paul perceived that
the one part were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, he cried
out in the council, Men, brethren, I am a Pharisee, the son of a
Pharisee, of the hope and resurrection of the dead I am called in question. And when he had so said, there
arose a dissension between the Pharisees and the Sadducees,
and the multitude was divided. For the Sadducees say that there
is no resurrection, there is neither angel nor spirit, but
the Pharisees confess both. And there arose a great cry,
and the scribes that were of the Pharisees' part arose and
strove, saying, We find no evil in this man, but if a spirit
or an angel hath spoken to him, let us not fight against God. And when there arose a great
dissension, the chief captain, fearing lest Paul should have
been pulled in pieces of them, commanded the soldiers to go
down, take him by force from among them, and to bring him
into the castle. And the night following, the
Lord stood by him and said, be of good cheer, Paul, for as thou
hast testified of me in Jerusalem, thou must bear witness also at
Rome. Our great, great, great and blessed
God, glorious God of heaven and earth, the one who is pleased
to reveal things unto babes, and hide it from the wise, and
hide it from the brooded, that you had blinded the minds of
those that see not, but Lord, cause the light of the glorious
gospel to shine into our hearts. Lord, there's a difference in
people in this world. You're the one that makes it.
You're the one that set your people apart for yourself. You're
the one that loved your people before the world ever began.
You're the one that chose us, purposed us to be brought to
you. And we bless you for that. Thank
you for teaching us those things. Lord, as we sung tonight, break
down the bread of life. Oh Lord, the things that concealed
in your word, please make them known unto us that we may behold
you in your precious word. Lord, I thank you for those gathered
out tonight, and I bless you for them. And I also pray for
those who are watching and listening who are not able to be here,
whose bodies are weak, or they're far away and not able to come
here. God bless the gospel to them as they sit and listen and
watch. And our Father, cause the gospel
to run well here tonight. Bring glory to yourself. Have
mercy, oh Lord, have mercy upon our lost loved ones. God, they
have no idea what an awful state they're in, how far from God
they are. And, oh, Lord Jesus, you're the
only one that can make them see, see, see their need. And, Lord,
you did it for us, so we trust that one day, in your sovereign
mercy, you'll make them see their need of the Lord Jesus Christ. In his blessed name we pray.
Amen. Amen. Hymn number 118. 118. When I survey the wondrous cross,
On which the Prince of Glory died, My richest gain I count
but loss, And poor contempt on all my pride. Forbid it, Lord, that I should
boast Saving the death of Christ my God, All the vain things that
charm me most, I sacrifice them to his blood. See from his head, his hands,
his feet. Sorrow and love flow, mingle
down. Did e'er such love and sorrow
meet, Or thorns compose so rich a crown? Were the whole realm
of nature mine, that were a present far too small. Love so amazing, so divine, demands
my soul, my life, my all. Amen. Well, back here in Acts 23, I
want to deal with, be of good cheer, Paul. Paul had made a
grievous, grievous error, if you all remember right. He went
up to Jerusalem and he took a vow, a Nazarene vow with four other
men. had his hair cut off, and what
they do after a week, they burn their hair and then they offer
sacrifices, blood sacrifices. And he was going to offer a sacrifice
for sin, and God, who in His blessed providence, God of all
circumstances, stopped him on that awful, awful compromise
he was fixing to do. And how did he do it? by sending
a bloodthirsty mob and trying to kill him. They caught him outside the temple,
and some of them said, ìThis man has taken an Ephesian, a
Gentile, into the temple,î and they went berserk. And you remember
in Acts 21 when they all got around him, and they started
beating on him, and the Scripture said, ìSalt to kill him,î and
the captain, a chief captain, saw everything that was going
on down there, and they thought he was going to be killed, so
he rushed down there, and the Roman soldiers rescued him, and
they brought him up on the steps. Now, they re in Jerusalem, and
he asked him if he could speak, and he was a Greek, and he said,
Do you speak Greek? And he said, Yes. And he asked
him if he could speak, And he asked him who he was, and he
thought he was an Egyptian that had been an awful mean man. But he says, No, no, I'm not.
And he had all that crowd before him that was fixing to beat him
to death, and he held up his hands and started speaking to
them, and he spoke to them in the Hebrew tongue. and he told
them all that Christ had done for him, and all how he hated
Christ, and all the things that he had done, and that Christ
had appeared to him, and called him, and chose him, and ordained
him to go and preach the gospel. And they just listened with enraptured
silence until he got to the part where he says, I'll send thee
forth unto the Gentiles. And right then and there, they
all got so angry again. And they said, it's not fit that
a man should live. Not fit that he should live and
throw dust in the air. They're so upset and angry. Took
their clothes off and was gonna try to kill him again. And so
they took him into the castle. Now, oh my! So here he is, he
s held by the Romans, and the Romans are protecting him from
the Jews. But now look what happens back
up here in verse 30. This is what happens now, and
he said, Oh, and this is the chief captain. He wanted to know
why these Jews had such a hard time with Paul, and why they
wanted to kill him. So on the morrow, because he
would have known the certainty where he was accused of the jews
i want to know what they hate him so i want to know somebody
needs to tell me what that's this man's done and he loosed
him from his bands he didn't keep him in his chains and he
commanded the chief priest he didn't ask him he said you all
come down and all of your old council appear tomorrow and he
brought down paul down and set him before them now the council
There were 70 of these people. The Sanhedrin is what they're
called. These are the people that governed. It started in
Moses' day when they had 70 people to make judgments. Well, that's
what they had here. They had the council. And Haggai
said, I want all you of the high priest and everybody, that's
anybody, to show up here tomorrow. And so here Paul is, he's going
to give his defense again. And he opens his mouth in verse
1, and Paul earnestly beholding the council. I mean, he looked
at them, he understood what he was facing, he looked at them
with such earnestness. I mean, he looked at all of them.
I mean, I believe he looked in the face of every single one
of them. I believe he looked at that crowd and went right
around that crowd and looked at everybody's face, looked earnestly
on them. And he said, Men, brethren, Men
and brethren, I have lived, and you're talking about an astounding
statement, I have lived in all good conscience. Oh my, what
a mouth that. I've lived in all good conscience.
Could you say that? Could you say I've lived in all
good conscience? And not only did it say I lived
in all good conscience, but I lived in all good conscience before
God. right till this day, right here, right till right now. Oh,
what an astounding statement, not only to have a good conscience,
but to have a conscience, good conscience before God Almighty,
for God to look at your conscience and God finding not anything
wrong with it. Oh my, look over here in Acts
24 and verse 16, look what he says over here about his conscience. Oh, my, this is something that
I find so hard to understand. But he said in Acts 24, 16, And
herein do I exercise myself, I labor for this, I pay attention
to this, to have always a conscience void of offense toward God. I don't want my conscience to
have an offense before God, to offend God in any way. offend
God with my thoughts, with my feelings, and I don't want to
do that, or even toward men. I want a conscience void of offense
to how I treat people and how I am before God. Now, I don't
know about you, but this is something that I can't grasp. I can't grasp
this. That's a statement. It's a great
big statement. Now, when he was a Pharisee,
he no doubt lived a life of a good conscience before God, and the
reason was because he said, I had a righteousness after the law,
and I was blameless. And he says, So when you looked
at me as a Pharisee, you could not have found ANYTHING, you
could not find a fault with me in any way. Now this is Paul,
and I've got a whole bunch of things in there in my desk where
Paul may have well been that rich young ruler. When that our
Lord Jesus Christ, he said, what good thing must I do to inherit
eternal life? He said, keep the commandments.
He told him all that. And you know what? He said, I've
done that. I ain't have no problem with that. And that's the way
Paul was. When you looked at me as a righteousness
before the law, and I mean, when you talk about the law, you're
not talking about the 10 commandments. You're talking about, I mean,
that there's over 300 laws that the Jews have to keep. precepts
and things that they have to keep, and it s what he did. He
said he knowed these things, and you ll see here in a minute.
Oh, my, he had a righteousness, blameless, he said before the
law, and he told these people here that he was preaching to
And he told the Lord Jesus Christ, when Christ apprehended him,
he said, Lord, I was a blasphemer. I was a persecutor. And I stood
and held the clothes of those people who stoned Stephen, your
martyr Stephen, to death. And oh my, he made another statement
that's just absolutely astounding. Look in Romans 9. Look in Romans
9. Here's a man who made some statements
that's very, very hard to grasp. It is for me. It is for me, I
tell you what, I can... You know how you know if your
conscience don't have any offense? Don't never offend anybody. Don't
never gossip. Because you get upset with somebody,
get mad at somebody, and you tell them off, and guarantee
your conscience will bother you, and you'll have to go and say,
I'm sorry. Now Paul said, I'm not that way. I've got a good
conscience before God Almighty, and I've got a good conscience
toward man. I don't want to offend man or
God, either one. That's a tough way to live. My mind can't get there. My mind
can't, because I know what I am. But look what he said here in
Romans chapter 9, verses 1 through 3. I say the truth in Christ, and
I lie not, unless to get my conscience also bearing me witness in the
Holy Ghost, that I have a great heaviness and a continual sorrow
in my heart, for I could wish that myself were accursed or
separated from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen, according
to the flesh." Now, how in the world do you explain that? How
can you explain that? A fellow willing to be separated
from Christ to see the Jewish nation brought to faith in Christ.
And that s the same thing that Moses did. Moses, you know, the
children of Israel, they got God so angry at them, they murmured
and murmured and murmured, and God was fixing to destroy a bunch
of them, and Moses said, Lord, stop, stop, stop! He said, Don t do them that way! Take MY name, MY name out of
the book of life! But don't do these people, just
take, but don't separate yourself from them. Just take my name
out of the book of life. Don't charge these people. That's
the way our Lord Jesus Christ did. Let my sin, let your sin
be my sin. Let God deal with me the way
he would in justice instead of all of the Israel. And that's
the way our Lord was. And I tell you, when God smoked
Christ down on the Damascus road, God revealed to him how wrong
he had been in every possible way all his life, how he was. And he said, I've had a good
conscience, back over here in Acts 23. You know, conscience
is a wonderful thing, it really is. Romans 2 tells us it condemns
us or excuses us. And that's what it does, that's
what our conscience does. It'll condemn us when we do something
wrong. It'll excuse us sometimes when
we do something wrong. It'll justify us even when we
do something wrong. Or it'll condemn us when we do
something wrong. Or else we'll come and justify
ourselves when we THINK we've done something wrong, and we'll
talk ourselves into saying, well, that wasn't, it really wasn't
that bad what I said or done. And we'll try to justify ourselves.
But now I tell you what, the CONSCIENCE, the CONSCIENCE is
far from infallible. In fact, I'm telling you, I've
NEVER trusted my conscience, I never have, never have. Oh,
but I tell you, the only infallible thing that tells us right from
wrong, Evil light from darkness evil from good and that's the
Word of God That's the only infallible thing. We got to teach us right
or wrong my conscience. I'm not gonna trust it It's letting
me do too many things and get by with it It's let me say I
made too many promises that I wasn't able to keep oh my I And I tell
you, the only one thing that's infallible, and that's God's
Word. You can trust it. It'll tell you what's right or
wrong. Don't trust your conscience. And then look what happens here
in verse two. And the high priest Ananias commanded them that stood
by. Now Paul, all he had said was,
I've lived in all good conscience before God until this day. That's
all he got out of his mouth. And the high priest Ananias,
now he was the one reigning when Christ was crucified. He was
the same one, commanded them that stood by him to smite him
on the mouth." Bust his mouth! Hit him in the mouth! Why would
he tell them to hit him in the mouth? I don't like what he's
saying. I don't like what he believes.
I don't like him talking about having a good conscience. Oh
my! It caused him to be slapped across
his mouth, and then, oh my, why did he do that? Why did he do
that? I'll tell you why, because he
says, You're a rebel, that's what you are. You're a lawbreaker,
that's what you are. You're a follower of Jesus of
Nazareth, and I'll tell you what, he's nothing, and I'll tell you,
you're a follower of this Jesus of Nazareth. And then you want
to stand here and tell us all that you've got a good conscience
before God? And you're following Jesus of
Nazareth? How could you have a good conscience
following an imposter? Somebody we crucified, somebody
we took outside Jerusalem and said, we got to get rid of this
man. How could you not? How could you have a good conscience
before God when you believe on a false prophet? Believe on somebody
that's not even right with God. And then look what Paul said,
boy, his righteous indignation. And Paul said unto him, God shall
smite thee, thou whited wall. You know what he said? You're a white horse wall. That's
all you are. You ain't got no feelings, you
ain't got no emotion, you're just an old whited wall. It's
like our Lord said, you know, your Pharisees appear like a
whited sepulcher, beautiful white stone out over the grave side.
Got your stone up there, but oh, down underneath that stone,
that's white and glistening and bright, but out underneath that
stone, that's full of dead men's bones and all corruption. And
that's why he called him, you're a whited wall. and a wall s lifeless. He looked good in his outward
appearance, but oh, look what Paul told him here now. You sit
to judge me after the law, and the law he s talking about is
Deuteronomy 25, 1 and 2. You can go look at it yourselves. And what they were supposed to
do was they judged between the righteous and the wicked. Now,
when they bring men before the priest and bring men before the
judgment, the priest has to be the one to make a decision whether
that person's righteous and what he did was a righteous act, or
else what he did was a wicked thing. So this is what this man
done. Paul said, You said to judge
me after the law, and command me to be struck and smitten contrary
to the law. So you're the high priest and
you're not supposed to do that. Oh my, and I tell you what, and
if you was brought in before a council and you was brought
before the judge like they did in Deuteronomy 25, you had to
have two or three witnesses before anything at the mouth of two
to three witnesses, every word would then be established. They
just didn't take somebody's word for it. And oh, the high priest's
business was to condemn the wicked, not to smite the righteous, but
that's what he did. And look what they said in verse
4, And they that stood by said, Revilest thou the priest of God? Do you revile the priest of God? You know they told our Lord Jesus
Christ the same thing. They said the same thing about
our Lord Jesus. Keep Acts 23 and look in John
18. Look in John 18, they said the
same exact thing to the Lord Jesus Christ, exactly the same
thing. Look in verse 19, John 18, 19. The high priest then asked Jesus
of His disciples and of His doctrine. Our Lord answered him, I spake
openly to the world. I ever taught in the synagogue
and in the temple where the Jews all will resort, and in secret
have I said nothing. Why ask thou me? Ask them which
heard me what I have said unto them. Behold, they know what
I said. And when he had thus spoken,
one of the officers which took by, struck Jesus with the palm
of his hand, saying, Answerest thou the high priest so? Oh,
that's the same thing they said. Revile? You gonna speak to the
high priest in an evil way? He said, Oh, by, if I spoke an
evil, bear witness of evil. If you don't, why smite me? And
that's what Paul's saying over here. Why are you smiting me,
you whited wall? And they've done our Lord Jesus
Christ the same thing. Now look what happens down here.
Paul has a, he perceives something that's going on. In verse six,
back over here in 23. Paul said, It's written that
thou shall not speak evil of the ruler. He said, I was wrong
to do that. I'm sorry. It's written. I mean, he knew
the law. He knew the Old Testament frontwards
and backwards. He knew the dots and the titles.
And when Paul perceived that one part were Sadducees and the
other Pharisees, he looked out and he said, there's some of
these fellows are Pharisees. Some of these guys are Sadducees.
And he cried out in the council. There was this council around
there, 70 people, and he cried out in the council, ìMen and
brethren, I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee, of the hope
and resurrection of the dead, am I called in question?î He
said, ìAh, oh my!î And hereís what happens is the Sadducees,
and he goes on to say, ìWhen he had said that he was a Pharisee,
the son of a Pharisee, hope and resurrection of the dead, that's
why they got me here right now. And when he had so said, there
rose a dissension, there became a big argument between the Pharisees
and the Sadducees, and the multitude was divided. They got to arguing
among themselves and ignored Paul. You know, listen, I'm a church
of God, I'm a Baptist, you know, and they go on and on about what
they are. And that's the way these fellows were. Well, listen,
oh, listen, we know we're right, we're Sadducees. We know we're
right, we're Pharisees. And this says in verse eight,
for the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection. You know,
there's people today that don't believe in the resurrection.
Jehovah's Witnesses believe only 144,000 is going to heaven. The
rest of them, I don't know what they're going to go, where that's
going to go. There's only going to be 144,000 go. Well, there's only eight people
saved in the day of Noah, so that's quite a few more than
him. But I tell you what, I believe I'm in the ark, and I'm one of
them that's saved in that ark. But oh, look what he says. They
say there is no resurrection. There's no resurrection. And
there's no such thing as an angel. There's no such thing as a spirit.
But the Pharisees say that there's a resurrection, angel, and spirit.
They confess both. Oh my, and I tell you what, those
fellas started arguing among themselves. They divided. You
know, just the day before that, the day before that, they were
crying, away with such a man, it's not fit that he should live.
And now they're arguing over which one of them's right. Which
side are they on? And, oh, my, they were yesterday
crying away, the Pharisees said. And then look what it says here
in verse 9, And there arose a great cry, I mean, they was really
shouting at one another. That s what was happening here.
They were hollering at one another, shouting at one another, fussing
and fighting among themselves. And there arose a great cry,
and the scribes that were the Pharisees part rose up and strove,
saying, They hollered out, ìWe find no evil in this man, but
if a spirit or an angel has spoken to him, let us know, lest we
be fighting against God.î You know, if an angel appeared to
him, thatís Godís business. If a spirit appeared to him,
thatís Godís business. We donít want to fight against
God. And you know who it was that appeared to him? Oh, my! Remember, he said he had already
told them the Lord Jesus had appeared to him. Christ is a
person, not a spirit. And oh, when there arose a great
dissension, the chief captain, fearing less Paul, I mean, they
was arguing about him. Oh, the Pharisees trying to pull
him this way. Oh, he's one of us, he's one
of us, the Sadducees trying to you know, fight the Pharisees
because He s not one of us? And they started pulling and
tugging at one another, that Paul should be pulled in pieces
of them, commanded the soldiers to go down and take him by force
from among them, and bring him in the castle. Oh, my goodness,
they thought, Man, they re going to kill this man. They�re fighting
among themselves and they�re tugging and pulling! These Sadducees
think he�s an evil man! The Pharisees don�t THINK he�s
an evil man! Oh, and this is a common sin,
this is a common sin among men, putting PARTYISM, DENOMINATIONALISM,
BIGOTRIES, PERSONAL PASSIONS, and INTERESTS before the truth
of God and the cause of righteousness. There's lots of people like that.
Oh my, I'm right and everybody else is wrong. Oh, listen, I'll
tell you, everybody's got to be on my side and if you're not
on my side, you're on the wrong side. And I'll tell you, they're
more interested in what party they're in, what denomination
they're in or what they affiliate themselves with. And they'll
put that interest before the truth of God and before the cause
of righteousness. And I'll tell you, that's what
these fellows was doing. They didn't care about God. They
didn't care about God's righteousness. All the Sadducees did was wanted
Paul dead. All the Pharisees wanted was
for him to be set free because they didn't see any evil in him.
But oh my. They had to rescue him again.
This is the second time that they've rescued him, rescued
Paul. And then look what happens now. Oh my, and the night following
it, that night, after what happened all that day, and they took him
out from among that council, and they was, I mean, they was
having an argument. I mean, a knock down, drag out
argument. And the night following, at the
end of that day, that night, the following, going on that
night, look what it says, the Lord stood by him. Nobody else was standing with
him but God. They said the Lord stood by him. The Lord stood by him. Oh my, the Lord stood by him. Oh my, I want to show you something.
Look over in 2nd Timothy. Look in 2nd Timothy. You got
to see this. I know you're going to. You know, he says 2nd Timothy
chapter 4. In verse 16, look at this. Yeah, look at this. Oh my. He said in verse 16. And my first answer. No man stood
with me. No man stood with me. Now over
here, he's in Jerusalem. James is the head of the church
in Jerusalem. A lot of the apostles are in
Jerusalem. Do you see any of them standing
up for the defense of Paul? Do you see any of them coming
and defending him and telling him, you know, Paul had been
there and told him what great things God had done for him.
And James was the one who told him to go and identify with those
four fellas. And he said, at my first answer,
no man stood with me. All forsook me. And oh, he's
like our master. I pray God that it may not be
laid to their charge. Now listen to this. Notwithstanding,
the Lord stood by me. Oh, bless His name. He said,
the Lord stood with me. Nobody else did, but the Lord
stood with me. That by me the preaching might
be fully known, and all the Gentiles might hear, and I was delivered
out of the mouth. Of the lion and the Lord listen
to this and the Lord shall deliver me from ever we evil work And
I love this will preserve me unto his heavenly kingdom to
whom be glory forever and ever He said how he's gonna preserve
me till I get there till I get there now back over here at our
text with me again and Then back verse 11 the Lord stood by him
the Lord stood by And then he said, listen, be of good cheer.
Why did he tell him to be of good cheer? You know, remember
when Paul and Silas was in jail in Philippi, at midnight, they
had their feet fastened and stocked, and they began to sing, and they
began to sing praises, and God shook that place up and turned
them loose. They were singing, but this night
here, our Lord stood by them, and the first thing he said,
be of good cheer. Paul, be of good cheer. Why did
our Lord have to tell Paul to be of good cheer? Because I believe
Paul was down. I believe he was discouraged.
I believe he thought his death was imminent. He said in one
place, death and deaths oft. There's so many times that he
thought death was right there. And our Lord stood by him and
said, be of good cheer. Be happy, Paul. Smile, Paul. Be happy, Paul, be cheerful,
Paul. And I'll tell you what, if we understood that our Lord
stood by us, just like he did Paul, our Lord stands by us. He said over in Philippians 4,
he says, the Lord's in our right hand. The Lord's at hand, that
means he's in our right hand. The Lord's my shepherd, I shall
not want. He makes me to lie down. He leaves
me beside the still waters. He does that. He makes me to
lie down in such green pastures. And I tell you, he got two blessed
friends that follow me all the days of my life, goodness and
mercy. And then when that's all said and done, he said, I'm gonna
go dwell in the house of the Lord forever. And I said, Oh,
Paul, be of good cheer. Oh, my. He needed encouragement,
and all of us need encouragement. There are times that every one
of us need encouragement. You know, sometimes Sometimes
you can look at somebody and tell that they're not feeling
good, tell that they're down, tell that they're discouraged,
or they got trouble somewhere, and you can just look at them
and know that. But he needed encouragement, and Christ himself
is the one who gave him the encouragement. And I tell you, our Lord wouldn't
have told him, be a good cheer, had he not needed that. And you know, you go through
the Acts and look, I mean, in the Gospels, and look how many
times he'd come to his disciples. He was walking on the water,
and they got scared to death. Said, what's that? Who's that?
What's that going on? Somebody's walking towards us.
Our Lord got close, said, be a good cheer, it's just me. Don't be scared, it's just me. That's what, oh, that's what.
You know, he said, I'll never leave you, I'll never forsake
you. And that's what he said to Paul
here. And look what he told him, he said, and he called him by
name, Paul, called him Paul. For as thou hast testified of
me in Jerusalem, you testified to me right here in Jerusalem,
and all the things that I'd done for you, and all the works that
you'd done, and all the things that I'd, you told them everything
that you'd done, not anything that you'd done, but that I'd
done. And he said, you testified him in Jerusalem where I was
hated, where I was rejected, where I was taken outside the
city and crucified. But we were in Jerusalem where
religion abounds. But when I'm not, and you testified
of me in Jerusalem, where I'm not even welcome. But you told
the truth, you were faithful. You told the truth about me. You told the truth of your hope
in me, your salvation in me, your righteousness in me, of
grace that's given to you in me. And then look what else he
says. You testified of me in Jerusalem.
And so must thou bear witness also at Rome. At Rome. Oh my. You're gonna have to be
a witness of me and you'll be a witness of me until you die. And Paul was a witness of Christ
till he died. Till he died. You know he's called
the God of all comfort. And I tell you what, here he
comes and he comforts this dear old apostle. And how faithful
he is to us. to comfort us, never fails. None of his brethren stood to
defend him. James didn't stand up for him.
Barnabas didn't stand up for him, but Christ stood by him. Christ stood by him. Now let
me show you where, let me hurry on and get with the rest of this.
Then they had a plot. There's an awful plot. Look down
in verse 12. And when it was day, certain
of the Jews banded together and bound themselves under a curse,
saying that they would neither eat nor drink till they had killed
Paul. Now, they set a conspiracy here
now, and they were more than 40 which had made this conspiracy,
more than 40 people. And they came to the chief priests
and elders, said unto them, We have bound ourselves under a
great curse, that we will eat nothing until we have slain Paul.
Now I tell you what, these fellas gonna starve to death. They gonna
get over hungry because they don't get to kill Paul. But look
what happens now. Now therefore, he told the chief
priests and the elders. Now I tell you what now, tomorrow,
go on today, therefore go with the council and tell the chief
captain to bring Paul down unto you tomorrow As though you wanna
ask him some more things, you wanna inquire some more things
perfectly concerning him, and we, or ever he come near, we'll
kill him, we'll kill him. Get the captain to bring him
down, tell him you got questions for him, and then we'll kill
him. Oh my, what an awful thing, what an awful thing. Oh, you
know, they ain't going to get him because the Lord already
said he's got to testify for him in Rome. So you reckon these
fellas, they just going to be hungry for nothing. And oh my, the chief priest and
religion plotted against Christ. They always plotted against Christ.
They always plotted against His people. And then after they plotted
to do this, if they'd have been able to kill Him, you know what
they'd have done? They'd have went right back to the temple,
and they'd have went in there and prayed, and they'd give God
thanks that they killed an imposter, killed a false prophet, and they
would offer sacrifices, and thinking they'd done God a service. But
oh, anything that's hidden's gonna be brought to the light.
Now, look what happens in verse 16. And when Paul's sister's
son, Paul had a sister that lived in Jerusalem, and his nephew
heard of their lying in wait. And he went in and into the castle,
and he told Paul, you know, his sister and his nephew, Then Paul
called one of the centurions unto him, and said, Bring this
young man unto the chief captains, for he hath something, a certain
thing to tell him. So, oh my, down there he come.
They took him to the chief captain, and this is what he said in verse
18, Paul the prisoner. They called him Paul the prisoner.
You know what Paul called himself? A prisoner of Jesus Christ. Rome
calls him a prisoner of Rome. Paul said, I'm a prisoner of
Jesus Christ. And he said, called unto me and
prayed me to bring this young man unto you. I have something
to tell you. Chief captain took him by the hand, took that young
man by the hand, took him aside privately and asked him, what
is it that you've got to tell me? And oh, I tell you, these
things were hidden, these things were plotted, but I tell you,
our Lord says there's not anything done in secret that shall not
be known. And then He says, He said, The
Jews have agreed to desire thee that thou wouldest bring us down
Paul tomorrow unto the council, that they would inquire some
more of him perfectly, but don't yield unto them. Don't do it,
for thy line wait for him of more than forty men, which have
bound themselves with an oath, that they would neither eat nor
drink till they have killed him. And now they are ready, looking
for a promise from thee." They're just waiting. He went and told
them just exactly what was going to happen. And so listen, I'll
close with this right here. And so the chief captain then
let the young man go. and commanded him, charged him,
don't you tell anybody what you showed me these things. Don't
tell anybody. Let's keep this between us. And
then they took Paul and got him out of town. They took out him
out of town. But I tell you what, ain't it
something that our Lord Jesus Christ, if you ain't never heard
it before, you get it and listen to it. A message by Henry Mahan,
and the title of it is They Hated Me Without a Cause. That is one
of the best messages I ever heard. Preaches close to an hour, but
I'm telling you what, he goes through there and he tells everything
why they hated Christ. What he did to cause them to
hate him. And that why in the world would men want to kill
a man, kill a man that did nothing in this world, but witness for
the Lord Jesus Christ. But that's how much Christ is
hated in his gospel. Now they're not upset. They're
not upset with religion. They're not upset with going
to church. They're not upset with dress
codes. They're not upset with laws. They're not upset with
words. But they're upset when Jesus Christ is the only one
Savior in this world, the only mediator between God and man,
and Christ does the choosing, Christ does the electing, Christ
does the saving, Christ does the keeping, and He passes by
multitudes and goes and gets one. And people take that until
they hear that, and they'll say, I don't believe it, don't believe
it, don't believe it. Oh Lord, blessed be your glorious
holy name. I'm thankful that you show us
in your word. There's this the apostle, this
man, just a man, mightily used of God. He got discouraged, he
got down, but his Lord, the Lord Jesus comes, stood by him, stood
by him, loved him, preserved him, kept him, told him how long
he'd live, told him where he'd witness. Oh Lord, kept his hand
on him, preserved him until the day of his kingdom. And Lord,
you're doing the same for us. You're preserving us until the
day of your kingdom. You're preserving us until the
day that we can depart and be with you. And Lord Jesus, thank
you for allowing us to meet here tonight to look into your word. Thank you for breaking the bread
of life unto us. Blessed be your holy name. Meet
the needs of these dear saints for Christ's sake. Amen. Learning to lean. I'm learning to lean. I'm learning to lean on Jesus. Finding more power than I'd ever
dreamed. I'm learning to lean on Jesus. I'll see you Sunday morning,
God willing. Oh, Saturday, see you Saturday. Oh my, yeah. Yeah, don't forget. Somebody asked the other day,
said, told me, said, ask Brother Donnie what time we're going
to start gathering for the thing over at his house. I said, about
noon. She said, didn't I tell you he'd
say about noon? I said, let's see if he'd say
about noon. She said, ask him when he goes
to talk about noon.