Good evening. Let's all stand
together. We'll sing hymn number 283. 283. Oh, how sweet the glorious message simple faith
may claim. Yesterday, today, forever, Jesus
is the same. ? Cheer the sick and lame ? Cheer
the mortar, calm the tempest ? Glory to his name ? Yesterday,
today, forever ? Jesus is the same ? All may change, but Jesus
never ? Glory to his name ? Glory to his name He who pardoned Aaron, Peter,
never needs thou fear. He who came to faithless Thomas,
all thy doubt will clear. He who left the love-disciple
on his bosom breast Bids thee still with love as tender lean
upon his breast Yesterday, today, forever, Jesus is the same All
may change, but Jesus never Glory to His name, Glory to His name,
Glory to His name All may change, but Jesus never Glory to His
name He who made the raging billows waft upon the sea, still can
hush our wildest tempest as on Galilee. ? In Gethsemane ? ? Drinks with
us each cup of trembling in our agony ? ? Yesterday, today, forever,
Jesus is the same ? ? All may change, but Jesus never ? ? Glory
to his name, glory to his name ? Glory to His name All may change,
but Jesus never Glory to His name As of old he walked to Emmaus
with him to abide So through all life's way he walketh ever
near our side Soon again shall we behold him hasten, Lord, the
day ? But we'll still be this same Jesus as he went away ?
Yesterday, today, forever, Jesus is the same ? All may change
but Jesus never, glory to his name ? Glory to his name ? Glory
to his name All may change, but Jesus never. Glory to his name. Sorry about that. That's faster
than we can sing. Faster than I can sing. In our
chorus books, we'll sing the love of God on page 34. Yep, the last verse is not in
your books. We'll sing it anyway. The love of God is greater far
than tongue or pen can ever tell. It goes beyond the highest star
and reaches to The guilty pair bowed down with care God gave
his son to Al His erring child he reconciled And pardoned from
his sin O love of God, how rich and pure How measureless and
strong It shall forevermore endure The saints' and angels' song
? When glory times shall pass away
? And earthly thrones and kingdoms fall ? When men who hear refuse
to pray ? On rocks and hills and mountains call ? God's love
so sure shall still endure all measureless and strong. Redeeming grace to Adam's race,
the saints' and angels' song. O love of God, how rich and pure,
all measureless and strong. It shall forever The saints and angels sung. Could we with thee the oceans
fill, And were the skies of parchment made? Were every stall on earth
a quill, And every man a scribe by trade? To write the love of
God above Would drain the oceans dry Nor could the scroll contain
the whole Though stretched from sky to sky O love of God, thou
reach and be Acts 13. Acts 13. Start at verse 42 and read to
the end of the chapter. And when the Jews were gone out
of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought that these words might
be preached to them the next Sabbath. Now when the congregation
was broken up, many of the Jews and religious proselytes followed
Paul and Barnabas, who, speaking to them, persuaded them to continue
in the grace of God. And the next Sabbath day came
almost the whole city together to hear the word of God. But
when the Jews saw the multitudes, they were filled with envy and
spake against these things which were spoken by Paul, contradicting
and blaspheming. Then Paul and Barnabas waxed
bold and said, it was necessary that the word of God should first
have been spoken to you. But seeing you put it from you
and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn
to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded
us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that
thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth. And
when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified
the word of the Lord, and as many as were ordained to eternal
life believed. And the word of the Lord was
published throughout all the region. But the Jews stirred
up the devout and honorable women and the chief men of the city
and raised persecution against Paul and Barnabas and expelled
them out of their coast. But they shook off the dust of
their feet against them and came to Iconium. And the disciples
were filled with joy and with the Holy Ghost. Our Lord and our God, and our
Father, our Savior, our Master, the one we bow to, the one we
submit to, the one we worship, the one to whom we want to attribute
all glory, all honor, and all praise. For Lord, not unto us,
not unto us, but unto thy name be glory, for thy mercy and thy
truth's sake. And Father, we've gathered here
to worship. We've gathered here to, as these
Gentiles did and these people did, to hear the word of God.
And Lord, that's what we want. We want God, your word, not mine,
not anybody else's, but yours. And Lord, we thank you for those
who's come out and pray your blessings upon them. And Lord
Jesus, we pray for those who are not with us through providence
or sickness or affliction or whatever may be with them, we
ask for your mercies. And again, we pray for Dee and
his family. God bless them, Lord strengthen
them, give them grace, give them abundance of grace. Lord, meet
with us tonight. Have mercy, oh God, have mercy
upon our lost loved ones. Create in them a need. Lord,
they don't have a need. But there was a day I didn't
have a need. There was a day I wasn't looking. But Lord, you
found me and you saved me by your grace. Lord, they're lost
and you can find them. You can go where they are. You can strike fear in their
hearts. You can cause them to, oh Lord, start seeking you. And
we pray that you'd do that for our lost loved ones, for our
children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, sons and daughters, husbands
and wives. Lord, we will continue to bring
them. Trust that you and your sovereign
mercy one day will cross their paths. Please be with us tonight
for Christ's sake. Amen. Amen. Let me tell you all
this. I had a wonderful conversation
with Duke Parks today. You know, he's, of course, he's
on hospice, but he was in a very, very good, he felt good and we
talked for a long time. Talked about a lot of things,
but continue to pray for that family. Continue to pray for
them. They need our prayers, they really
do. Page 33 in our course books. He did it all for me. This was
written by Dwayne Allen and Powell, Sager Powell, performed by the
Oak Ridge Boys. Once a man whom we know as the
Son of God hung upon a cruel tree. He suffered pain as no mortal
man. He took my place. He did it all for me. He did it all for me. Each drop of blood He shed for
even me. When the Savior cried, Thou didst
stand and die. O praise the Lord, He did it
all for me. when I step just inside of those
gates of pearl and the Master's face I see. ? I'll gladly kneel at His left
scarred feet ? Oh, praise the Lord, He did it all for me ?
He did it all for me Each drop of blood He shed for
even me. When the Savior cried, that is,
said, and died, O praise the Lord, He did it all for me. Good song selection tonight,
that's so good. Turn with me back to Acts 13.
I want to talk about those that
were ordained to eternal life, ordained to eternal life. I read
these 10 verses to you. You remember that the Holy Ghost
said, Separate me, Paul and Barnabas, to the work whereunto I've called
them. And they went out and started
preaching, and they ended up in Antioch in Galatia. And Paul preached the person
and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, and he especially dealt
with His resurrection, really dealt with His resurrection.
And he also said that unto you is this word of salvation sent.
God saves people with His Word, and He has to SEND the Word.
He has to send it to us, and He especially sent the Word to
us when He sent His Blessed Son into this world, who was the
LIVING Word, the CREATING Word, and He s the one who saves us
by His Gospel. And so, we start here in verse
43, and let s look at this tonight. There is a great and great encouragement
for these men, and he said, Now, when the congregation was broken
up, many of the Jews and religious proselytes followed Paul and
Barnabas, who, speaking of them, persuaded them to continue into
the grace of God. The Jews had left, and the Gentiles
asked, there that these words, in verse 42, that these words
might be preached the next Sabbath day. What was it that they wanted
to hear? It's not that they wanted just
to hear Paul, but he had used the scriptures. He had used so
many Old Testament scriptures. He talked about all the witnesses
that witnessed of the Lord Jesus Christ. And he quoted, oh, how
many scriptures he quoted. And he preached that through
this man, he got down to it and he said, through this man, through
Jesus Christ, this man that God raised from the dead, this man
who was in the grave but did not see corruption, this man
is, through him is preached the forgiveness of sins. and justification
by which you could not, no way, be justified by the law of Moses
and justified from all things. And so they heard these words
and they said, listen, we want to hear these words again. We
want you to preach to us some more. Boy, I'd love to be in
a place like that. You know, I had the folks, you
know, when you get done, and Ruby used to say this every,
every, Everyone should say, now you can preach exactly the same
thing tonight, and that'll be all right. Just preach that again
tonight, and that's what we do. You know, I've not had anything
new to say in years. We just deal with the scriptures
as we come to them. But they wanted these words.
They wanted the words preached to them. The Word, the Word of
God. And that's what we want. We want
the Word of God. And he said the next Sabbath,
and what a great and great encouragement it was to them. He said there
in verse 43 again, What a real interest from the Gentiles and
the Jews. And it says when the Jews and religious proselytes,
now a religious proselyte was a Gentile who became a Jew. He
became circumcised. and he went under the law, he
was proselyted and become what you'd call a Jew, and there's
lots of folks that do that. They entered the Jewish religion,
and that's what they did. But these Jews and Gentiles and
religious proselytes, look what it says, they FOLLOWED Paul and
Barnabas. Now you're talking about encouraging.
Now there was a whole week between them. There was a week between
the time that they gathered to worship, gathered to preach.
But these fellas followed them. Wherever you go, listen, we want
you to speak to us. And that's what they've done.
They've been speaking to them. Now we don't have any idea how
much preaching they've done. in the middle of that week. Now,
I know Paul was very, very adamant about teaching and preaching
every day somewhere. He would get people together,
he'd go in the marketplace, he'd go wherever people would be gathered
together, and he'd get them and said, These folks had a real,
real interest, and they followed Paul and Barnabas. They were
persistent, they were persistent. They said, Listen, they just
followed them around and followed them around. And it says there
they're speaking to them, Now it just, when they're speaking
to them, that means they taught them for a while. They didn't
speak to them and then just say one thing to them and then go
about their business. They followed them and they're
speaking to them. And they learned enough through
this man's preaching and Barnabas' preaching that they knew something
about the grace of God. They understood something about
the grace of God because he said to them, persuaded them. persuaded
them to continue in the grace of God. You're a Jew, continue
in the grace of God, not the law. You're a religious proselyte. You're a Jew, you're a Gentile
became a proselyte. Continue in the grace of God.
Don't go back to the law. Don't go to ceremonies. Don't
go to rituals. Continue in the grace of God. Why in the world would they have
to be told and persuaded to continue in the grace of God? Well, if
you know yourself, if you really know yourself, and you know your
own heart, if you know your heart, consider your own heart and how
deceitful it is, you will find it astonishing that you have
to be persuaded to continue in the grace of God. If you know
yourself, you know your weaknesses, you know your frailties, you
know your own mind, you know your own inclinations. And I
tell you something, every person that I know, every person that
I know that's been saved by the grace of God, we're still prone
to self-righteousness. We're still prone to pride. One fellow told Scott one time
when he was talking about election, he said, election will take the
pride out of you. He said, yeah, but not all of
it. And that's why we come to hear
the grace of God, because of this pride. This is self-righteousness
we got. We hear people say all the time,
well, I don't believe I'd do that. If you haven't done it,
you've thought it. Now that's the truth, you know
I'm telling you the truth, and then you know what I'll tell
you another reason. We was, every one of us born
by nature, we were free willers. Every one of us by nature are
free willers and work mongers. Everyone's born with this idea
that we have to do something to please God, have to do something,
have to do some kind of work to get a blessing, and that's
natural to us. And that's why we have to continue
in the grace of God. Continue in it. Oh, continue,
don't never falter from it. Don't turn left, don't turn right. And then here's the thing about
it. because of who we are and what we are and all we're prone
to. You know, Peter, he yielded to
self-righteousness two or three times. He gave in to self-righteousness
and he said, I'll never die, no one will deny you, but he
did. I'll go to prison with you, but he didn't. I'll die with
you, but he didn't. So I'll tell you, and then, so
listen, that's why they continually followed them. So let's continue
in the grace of God. We have to, he persuaded them
to. And then look what happens in
verse 44. So they was teaching them and preaching
them about the grace of God. You continue in the grace of
God. And the next Sabbath day, came almost the whole city together. She's talking about encouragement. First time they went, there wasn't
very many people. But boy, when they followed them
around, they began teaching to them and preaching to them. They
said, we want to hear this. And it didn't say the whole city.
Almost the whole city came out to hear it. Oh, my. Almost people were ready to listen. People were ready to hear. and
oh, what would they want to hear? They came together to hear the
Word of God. God's Word is the most powerful
force on the face of this earth in the hands of the Holy Ghost.
What it does is so powerful enough that it gives dead men life.
It's powerful enough to turn men from darkness to light, powerful
enough to take sinners and make them righteous, powerful enough
to change men s hearts, powerful enough to save a sinner from
the top of his head to the sole of his feet, and never let him
be anything else BUT a sinner before God. It's got that kind
of power to it. And I'll tell you, not only that,
it has the power to make us understand things that we never understood
before or seen before and exposes our hearts and our thoughts and
our intents. You know, we'll come to a service.
Bruce Daley used to say this all the time. He said, Boyd said,
you read my mail this week. He'd come in, I'd be preaching
about something. He said, you read my mail. Who's been talking
to you about me? And that's because, you know
why that is? Because the Word of God goes to where we are. and speaks to us where we are,
and what we're thinking, what we're feeling, why our imagination
is where we've been, what we've done that week, and it brings
those things home to us. That's how powerful the word,
and these fellows said, listen, we're here, we're here, and that's
what Corneille said, we're here to hear the words that God has
given you for us. Oh, they came to hear the word
of God. But everywhere God's a blessing,
there's going to be some opposition. Oh, it just never not fail. And then look what it says here
in verse 45. Look what happens. Look at this
awful, bitter, bitter opposition that these fellas had. But when
the Jews saw the multitudes, oh my, they don't come hear us
like that. You know, we can't get a crowd
like that together. I don't, you know, I don't understand
this here. Here, these fellas come into
town, they're new and they're preaching something that we don't
agree with. And then when they saw the multitudes, look what
it says. They were jealous. They were jealous. And you know
how many times did they say that about our Lord Jesus Christ being
envious, being envious. You keep Matthew Acts 13, look
with me in Matthew 27, 18. Go over here in Matthew chapter
27 and verse 18. This is Pilate with the Lord
Jesus Christ. They were jealous. They were
envious. And you know what envy really
is? It's being greatly, greatly displeased and offended and troubled
by somebody else getting the attention, somebody else being
blessed and you not. Somebody else getting the attention
that you feel like you ought to get. And that's what it is. And then they said here, Therefore in verse 17, Therefore
when they were gathered together, Pilate said unto them, said to
the Jews, Whom were you that I release unto you? Barabbas,
or Jesus, which is called Christ. Now listen to this, For he knew
that for envy they had delivered him. Jealous of him, jealous of him. envious of Him. Everything about
the Lord Jesus Christ displeased them. His message displeased
them, His authority displeased them, His miracles displeased
them, His Word displeased them, He told them the truth, everything
about Christ displeased them. They were envious of Him and
that's the way religion is, they're envious You know, I'm not envious
of anybody that's having two services a day. You know, there's
a congregation that's making so much money and they got so
many people in it that they went out here and bought the theater
so they could meet in that theater. But if you're allowed to wear
shorts to church, sit and drink pops in church, and come in with
your pajamas on to a service, well, no wonder you'd have the
building full. No wonder you would. But what I'm telling you
is, I don't care about that. That don't have nothing to do
with it. You go in there and preach the gospel, they'll be
displeased with Christ. They're not interested in Christ.
They're not interested in the gospel. And these folks were
not interested in Christ. Paul preached to them the Sabbath
before, the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. He said,
This David, God promised him a son. Yes, we know he's going
to be the son of David. And we know that he's going to
be the king. We know he's going to be the Christ. He knows he's
going to be the Messiah. We know that. He said, Well,
I'm going to tell you who the son of David is. Jesus Christ
of Nazareth. And I tell you what, you killed
him. You killed him, you Jews killed him. In Jerusalem, the
elders killed him. But God didn't leave him dead.
He raised him from the dead. And you know why he raised him?
Because God said, this day have I begotten thee. This day I've
raised you up. And you shall not suffer thine
holy one to see corruption. And them Jews heard that and
they said, I don't want it. Don't want it, don't want it.
And that's what they went on to say. Look what it says here.
They saw the multitudes, they were filled with envy. And now
it's bad enough to be filled with envy. And keep your mouth
shut. Jealousy's crueler than the grave,
is what the Bible says. Jealousy's crueler than the grave.
And it's one thing to do that, but keep your mouth shut. These
fellas couldn't keep their mouth shut. And they spanked. against those things which were
spoken by Paul. They said, they got up and said,
that fellow's lying. That fellow's not telling the
truth. That fella's preaching against Moses. That fella's preaching
against the law. Listen, don't hear a word that
man's got to say. Don't listen to him. He said,
you know that we got Moses. You know that we got the law.
You know we got rituals. You know we got ceremonies. You
know we do. We got to eat certain things.
We got to wash certain ways. And oh my, I spake against those
same words. And listen to this. Contradicting. try to contradict
them and blaspheming. You talking about some fellas
that's on dangerous ground. When you start contradicting
God, in God s Word and God s man as He s preaching, you start
contradicting Him and BLASPHEMING what He has to say. Call HIM
a blasphemer, call HIM a liar, call HIM to contradict everything
He s got to say, and I believe you crossed the line. I believe
you went across that line where God said there s a sin that s
unpardonable. When you start attributing something
to a man and say that he s blasphemous and they were BLASPHEMING, Paul
His gospel, they, listen, you know what they blaspheme? Be
it known unto you, therefore, men and brethren, that through
this man, this man that God raised from the dead, this man that
was crucified, this man that's at the right hand of God, this
man that lived on this earth for 30, this man, through this
man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins. Wait a minute. We don't need our sins forgiven.
Why do we need our sins forgiven? And who in the world ever heard
that anybody was crucified and rose from the dead? And He said, and I'll tell you
something, He'll justify you. He can justify you from everything
that you've ever done, from all things. We've done a lot of things. A lot, a lot of things, but everything
you've ever done, he said, you're going to be justified from all
things. And they said, we don't like
that. Oh my, these fellas were a deliberate
and willful rejection of the known truth. And Paul was using
the Paul was using the Word of God, and that's all he was using.
You know what God did? He sent these men a strong delusion
that they should believe a lie and be damned. I'll tell you
something. I'll tell you a couple of things
that happened to me over the years. There's two or three men
that I used to know, and know them very, very well, and used
to preach with them and run with them. But when God taught me
the Gospel, and I was beginning to hear the Gospel, They stood
up publicly, everywhere they ever went and everywhere out
there. And they said, I will not, I'm not identified with
Donnie Bell, not identified with Bruce Crabtree. I don't believe
what they preach. I don't believe in election.
I don't believe in depravity. I believe that man's got, God's
got all power except over man's wheel. And he said, I'm not. And he
got got on the radio and said that. Said, I don't, I'm not
identified. I want you to know that, that
I do not agree with anything that man preaches. That man's dead and gone now.
And another fella, another fella, I mean, he got mean, dirt dog
mean. fighting me and he is a preacher
I mean he punched and prodded and pushed and poked and pushed
around and pushed me around done all kinds of things and when
I'd mention God's sovereignty or particular redemption he'd
call me a liar And I mentioned one time, the last time I saw
him, I mentioned, you know, that God's sovereign and his will
is going to be done. He said, God's not sovereign.
Said, he's not sovereign. He ain't got, he ain't got no
will over even the people that's sick and in the hospital. He
got no will. He got no power over his will. Six months later,
he took a shotgun, blowing his own brains out. Been a preacher for over 30 years.
But if you cross the line, when you start, that's what Gamal
said, said, listen, if these men are not of God, it'll come
to nothing. But if it's of God, you better
leave them alone, because if you don't, you're gonna be fighting
against God. And if you can't win that battle,
you can't win that battle. And oh my, God sent these men
a strong delusion. Then look what, well how in the
world you reckon Paul and Barnabas is gonna deal with it? Well,
listen, gonna have to get somebody to give him some baby aspirin,
you know, to get him through. Oh, give me some medicine to
get me through this thing. No, no, look what happens. Verse
46, then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold. He didn't bother these
two men at all. He never shook them up a bit.
I mean, they just, they waxed bold then. The more they blasphemed,
the more they contradicted, the more they spoke against them.
Paul and Barnabas waxed bold. They got to, and then not only
waxed bold, but they used very plain speech and said, It was
necessary that the word of God should have been first, have
been spoken to you. Talking about these Jews who
were blaspheming and contradicting. He said, it was necessary to
speak to you first. But listen to what he said, now,
seeing then that you put it, put it away from you. Oh my,
you got this gospel, you got this word, you got Christ, and
you say, put it away. Put it away! Seeing you, put
it away! Put it away, huh? From you and
judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life. You know what
we're gonna do? Since you fellas don't want it,
you don't want the gospel, you hate the gospel, you hate Christ,
you despise Christ, you despise God's Word, you blaspheme, we're
gonna turn to some folks that wanna listen. We're going to
go to the Gentiles. We're going to go to a bunch
of heathen people that had idols all their life. Didn't know nothing
about God's law. And we're going to go to them.
We're going to turn to them. Oh my. Judge yourselves. And then
look what he said here now. And then he talks about God's
purpose. God's purpose and God's will. He says, so the Lord hath
commanded us. Oh my. He didn't ask him to. He said commanded us. saying,
I've set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that thou shouldest
be salvation to the ends of the world. You know where that's
found at? Look in Isaiah 49, in verse 6. Keep Acts 13 now. Isaiah 49,
verse 6. And you know it says in one place,
and I'll show you that too here in a minute, where Christ is
given a covenant to the Gentiles to be a light. And look here in Isaiah 49 verse
6, and he said, It is a light thing that thou shouldest be
my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved
Israel. He said, I will give also thee
for a light to the Gentiles that thou mayest be my salvation. You see what he said? My salvation
unto the end of the earth. And that's what Paul said, that's
what he said, give us a light for salvation under the ends
of the earth. And oh my, and Isaiah 42, 67,
you don't have to look there, but he said there, he said, I
have given thee, talking about Christ, thee, a covenant to be
a light for the Gentiles. Oh, Christ in the covenant. Now
watch what happens now, look in verse 48. When they said, we're going to
go to the Gentiles, the Lord commanded us to go to the Gentiles,
start preaching for them. I'll bring salvation to them.
My salvation will be brought to them. And when the Gentiles
heard this, they heard what these fellows had to say. Watch what
happens now. They were glad. Don't the gospel make you glad?
Don't the gospel make you glad? When you, you know, when you
hear it, it makes you glad. Oh, so glad. Look what he said.
And they said, and listen, they glorified the word of the Lord. They took God's word and they
glorified and said, this is the word of God. This is salvation. This is the grace of God. These
men are preaching the gospel, preaching the word of God. And
listen to this right here now. and as many as were ordained
to eternal life believed. Now that's a reason to glorify
the word of the Lord. God chose us. God elected us. God ordained us. He passed by
them Jews and He come to us. I chose you. When did you choose
me? Before the foundation of the
world. Why did you choose me? Because it pleased me. Where
did you choose me? In Christ. I was glad too when I found out
election. I was glad too when I found out
I was a believer because God chose me and ordained me to be
a believer. And you know how he done it?
Just like Paul. Somebody went and preached to
me, and preached to me, and I started hearing some preaching that's
different than anything I'd ever heard all my life. Different
than what I was preaching. And I said, oh my. We said, that's
it, that's it, that's it. If that's not it, there ain't
no it nowhere. And oh my, I was overjoyed. Remember the first time you learned
about God's electing grace? The first thing you did, you
start crying. You start crying. You start crying. Big tears come down your face.
Oh, God, you love me. God chose me. God ordained me. God predestinated me. Never got over it yet. As many
as were ordained to eternal life. Oh my, that's why we glorify
the Lord, the word of the Lord. God did this, salvations of the
Lord. And then look what happens now.
But it says here now in verse 49, and the word of the Lord
was published throughout all the region. In other words, everybody
went out publishing, preaching the word of God. You know, we
got up, the Bibles are published. But they went out, they didn't
have a Bible then, they had the Old Testament. But they went
out publishing, preaching the gospel, gossiping the gospel.
All over that region, all over that region. Now look what happens. But the Jews stirred up. They're
not satisfied with standing against Paul and blaspheming and contradicting,
speaking against him. But the Jews went out and they
got to going around people and stirred up. Look what kind of
people they stirred up. First of all, devout, people
that were devout. I mean, they were super, super
religious, devout, devout, honorable, honorable people, devout people. And honorable women, honorable
women. And then look what, and the chief
men of the city, everybody's anybody in this town, that's
what he said. So I mean, these are some, all
these were some, all these were the big shots in town. And they
all got together and they stirred them all up. And they raised,
look what I said, and they raised persecution against Paul and
Barnabas. They got all these devout people,
all these honorable women, and all these chief people, and everybody's
anybody. They said, listen, they went
to Paul. Paul and Barbara said, if y'all don't get out of town,
you're in trouble. We're going to get you. We're
going to get you. And they expelled them. Could you, you know, our
Lord Jesus was going into Samaria and one time they sent word to
him, said, don't come in here. Depart from us. Can you imagine
somebody telling the Lord to depart from us? And that's what
they did. Said, depart from us. Depart
from us. Well, how do you think Paul and
Barnabas would act this time? They run them out of town. Run
them out of town. Expelled them out of their coast.
But they shook off the dust of their feet. That's what our Lord
said. If they don't receive you, and that don't mean that they
walk outside of town and do like that there. That's not what it
means. That's what it means is that they leave and never worry
about them again. Never going to preach to them
again. Never going to have any more dealings with them again.
God, just leave them to God and let God do what He will with.
And came unto Iconium. Now listen to what happens here.
And the disciples, those that were disciples in Antioch, those
that were believers in Antioch, in Galatia, were filled with
joy. They had heard the gospel. They
glorified the word of the Lord. They was ordained to eternal
life. Oh, this is a joyful thing to believe. They had joy. And
oh my, What caused them such joy? God filled them with the
Holy Ghost. Oh my. So I tell you what, God
used these men there, set up a church there, and that church
lasts for hundreds and hundreds of years. It's gone now, but
that's where it started. And I tell you, I wouldn't be
in a person's, I wouldn't, I wouldn't be in a person's shoes for 10,000
worlds like this that stands up against Christ and against
his gospel and blaspheme and contradict him. Wouldn't do it.
Wouldn't do it. Our father, our blessed savior. Thank you for meeting with us
tonight. Thank you for your precious word. Nothing like it. Oh, I
thank you for it. God bless it to our hearts. God
bless it to our minds. God bless it to our souls. And
Lord, those that are listening tonight, may they be blessed
by it. May they be instructed by it. May we be instructed.
Help us to always, always by your grace, continue in grace. You saved us by grace. You keep
us by grace. And we shall one day enter into
glory by the grace of God. Lord, never let us veer from
that in any way. Bring glory to yourself through
us, for Christ's sake. Amen. Amen. Amen. Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. There's just something about
that name. Master. Savior. Jesus, like the fragrance after
the rain Jesus, Jesus, Jesus Let all heaven and earth proclaim. Kings and kingdoms will all pass
away. But there's something about that
name. See you Sunday, God will it. Hmm.