It is not that I did choose thee,
Lord, O Lord, that could not be. Todd's Road Grace Church would
like to invite you to listen to a sermon by our pastor, Todd
Nivert. We are located at 4137 Todd's
Road, two miles outside of Manowar Boulevard. Sunday services are
at 1030 a.m. and 6 p.m. Bible study is at
945 a.m. Wednesday services are at 7 p.m. Nursery is provided for all services.
For more information, visit our website at toddsroadgracechurch.com. Now here's our pastor, Todd Nivert. When Paul was writing to the
Church of Corinth about the events that took place in Acts chapter
16, when the churches of Macedonia were started, he referred to
it as a door that God had opened. I've entitled this message, When
God Opens a Door. In Acts chapter 16, beginning
in verse 6, we read of some attempts Paul made to go places to preach
the gospel, and God forbid him to. He wasn't allowed to. Do you realize what a blessed
thing it is to be enabled to hear the gospel? Do you know
many people never hear the gospel? That's a sobering thought. God
can turn the lights off and not let the gospel go in a place
as a judgment against certain people. In verse 6, now when
they had gone throughout Phrygia and the region of Galatia and
were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia, they
wanted to go into Asia and preach and the Holy Spirit forbid them
to do it. After they had come to Misea,
they had said to go to Bithynia, but the Spirit suffered them
not. He wouldn't allow this. And they, passing by Misea, came
down to Troas, and a vision appeared to Paul in the night. There stood
a man of Macedonia, and prayed him, saying, Come over into Macedonia,
and help us. And Paul realized that God had
opened this door. Now, when God opened the door,
to preach the gospel. It's because he has some people
there that he's going to save. Remember when the Lord said to
Paul when he was at Corinth, fear not, hold not thy peace
for I have much people in this city. When God sends a preacher
somewhere, it's with the purpose of calling out his people. We're
on the trail of God's sheep. That's who I'm looking for. I'm
looking for God's people in preaching the gospel. And he gave Paul
assurance, I've got some people there. Verse 10, and after he
had seen the vision, immediately we endeavored to go into Macedonia,
assuredly gathering that the Lord had called us for to preach
the gospel unto them. So they go through several places
and they wind up in Philippi. Let's read about the humble beginnings. They came to Philippi, which
is the chief city of the part of Macedonia, a colony. And we
were in that city abiding certain days. And on the Sabbath day,
we went out of the city by a riverside where prayer was wont to be made.
And we sat down and spake unto the women which resorted thither. They just came to a riverside
where a bunch of women would get together and pray. And Paul
began to preach to them. Now in verse 14, And a certain
woman named Lydia, a seller of purple of the city of Thyatira. Now it's interesting, Thyatira
was in Asia. That's the city where, or the
place, the region where Paul was forbidden to preach. However,
one of God's elect was in that place, and he's going to bring
her out to the city of Philippi where she can hear the gospel.
God is always going to cross the path of His people with the
gospel. So, we read about this woman
Lydia. She was a seller of purple. She
was a businesswoman. Highly successful, no doubt,
a seller of purple. And it says, she heard us whose
heart the Lord opened. Whose heart the Lord opened. Now, I have three points to this
message. A cause. A conflict. And a confession. All three of those points are
found in Acts chapter 16, but here's the first point, a cause. Whose heart the Lord opened. It doesn't say she opened her
heart to the Lord, but it says whose heart the Lord opened. She heard faith cometh by hearing
and hearing by the word of God and the Lord opened her heart.
Now the Bible has a lot to say about the heart. What is meant
by the heart in the scriptures? The heart is the whole man. The
heart is the understanding. The heart is the affections.
The heart is the will. It's the whole man. And the heart
of the natural man is closed against God. The understanding
is closed. The intellect is closed. I may
understand the theory of relativity. I may be able to explain E equals
MC squared, but the natural man cannot understand the gospel. Listen to this scripture. But
the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God
for their foolishness unto him, neither indeed can he know them."
He lacks the ability to know them because they're spiritually
discerned. I have to have the Holy Spirit
to understand the Gospel. I have to have a new nature to
understand the Gospel. A natural man lacks the ability
to understand the Gospel. The intellect is closed. You
can't figure this thing out. We're totally dependent upon
God to reveal himself to us. And he's got to give us the heart
to receive his word. The intellect is closed. The affections of the natural
man are closed. The scripture says men love darkness
rather than light because their deeds were evil. Men love darkness. Men love salvation by works. They hate the light, the light
of how God saves sinners. The affections are closed to
the gospel. And the will is bound by sin. Now, we all have a will, but
that will is not free. That will is controlled by a
sinful nature. There's no such thing as free
will. God doesn't have a free will. He can't sin, can He? He
can't choose to be evil. No. His will is controlled by
His holy nature, and our will is controlled by our evil nature. Our Lord said, you will not come
to Me that you might have life. Those who are born of God are
born not of the will of the flesh, not of the will of man, but of
God. But when God saves somebody,
He opens the heart. He opens the understanding. So
I'm made to understand that the righteousness of Christ is really
the only righteousness that God will accept, the only righteousness
by which I can be saved. I'm made to understand that I
can't be saved by my works. That I can only be saved by His
grace. I'm made to understand that I can't do anything about
my sin. Only the blood of Christ can put away my sin. But not
only is my understanding open, like Lydia's heart was open,
my affections are open so that I love God's way of saving. And
my will is made such to where if I'm given the choice between
being saved by what Christ did or what I do, I choose what Christ
did. I'm set free. whose heart the Lord opened,
and it takes a miracle of God's grace to open the heart. And He does. He opened this woman's
heart. And you know, every aspect of
salvation begins with God. It doesn't begin with us. He
opened this woman's heart. Why? He elected her. He justified
her. He redeemed her. He regenerated
her. He called her. It all begins
with God. And this woman didn't open her
heart to the Lord, but God opened her heart and it became open. And what is the evidence? The
scripture says she attended unto the things which were spoken
of Paul. She believed the gospel he preached and she was baptized. You see, when God opens your
heart, you're going to want to confess Him in believer's baptism. Whoso believeth and is baptized,
the same shall be saved. Now, the act of baptism doesn't
save anybody. I hope you understand that. But
if the Lord has saved you, this is your confession of Him. You
confess that you were saved by His life, death, burial, and
resurrection. And that's what you confess in
believers' baptism. So the Lord opened this woman's
heart. Here's the cause of salvation,
the Lord. the Lord. We see that he kept
Paul from going into these different places, and then he opened this
door for them to go into Macedonia, and he opened this woman's heart,
and there was a believer there, and her whole house was saved,
and the cause was the Lord Himself. Now here's the second point,
a conflict. Verse 16, And it came to pass,
as we went to prayer, a certain damsel, Possessed with a spirit
of divination, she was a fortune teller, which brought her masters
much gain by soothsaying. She was a real moneymaker. The
same followed Paul and us, and cried, saying, These men are
the servants of the Most High God, which show unto us the way
of salvation. Now, find me one thing wrong
with what she said. Find me one thing you disagree with. These
were the servants of the Most High God, and they did, in fact,
show the way of salvation. Yet, as we go on reading, Paul
cast the demon out of this woman. This woman was a false prophet,
yet everything she said was true. Now, what that tells me is a
false prophet is identified not so much by what they say, but
by what they leave out. What this woman said was true.
She did tell the truth when she said these men are the servants
of the Most High God which show unto us the way of salvation.
But she never showed the way of salvation herself. It was
all just talk. And she was demon-possessed,
Paul said. Now let's go on reading. And
this she did many days. Now Paul could have left it alone
and nothing would have happened. But here's what he did. But Paul,
being grieved, turned and said to the Spirit, I command thee,
in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her. And he came
out the same hour. Now, if he would have left this
alone, nothing would have taken place. If he would have kept
his mouth shut and went about his business, there wouldn't have
been any trouble. There wouldn't be any conflict. But here's what
took place because he did this. Verse 19, And when her masters
saw that the hope of their gains was gone, they caught Paul and
Silas and drew them into the marketplace unto the rulers.
and brought them to the magistrate, saying, These men, being Jews,
do exceedingly trouble our city. And they teach customs which
are not lawful for us to receive, neither to observe, being Romans. And the multitude rose up together
against them, and the magistrates rent off their clothes and commanded
to beat them." Here's the conflict, because he exposed this woman
who was saying true things as not telling the truth. Here's
where the conflict began. And when they had laid many stripes
upon them, they cast them into prison, charging the jailer to
keep them safely, who, having received such a charge, thrust
them into the inner prison and made their feet fast in stocks." Paul's beat to a pope with a cat of nine tails. thrown
into prison, feet placed fast in stalks for preaching the gospel. Now, whenever the gospel is preached,
whenever the Lord opens a door, there will be conflict. And Paul experienced that. Verse
25, And at midnight, Paul and Silas, now remember, they'd been
beaten severely. Their feet are fast in stalks. Their circumstances are horrible. And at midnight, Paul and Silas
prayed and sang praises unto God. And the prisoners heard
them. I bet they were thinking, what
in the world is this? And suddenly, verse 26, God always
gives grace when it's needed. And he gave Paul and Silas the
grace to praise him under these adverse circumstances. And suddenly
there was a great earthquake so that the foundations of the
prison were shaken. And immediately all the doors
were opened and everyone's bands were loose. All the prisoners
could have ran away. They could have escaped. And
the keeper of the prison, he was asleep while Paul and Silas
were singing these praises. He didn't know what was going
on. And the keeper of the prison, awaking out of his sleep and
seeing the prison doors open, he drew out a sword and would
have killed himself. He was going to commit suicide.
knowing that he'd be put to death if the prisoners escaped. And
he just assumed they had been. He would have killed himself,
supposing that the prisoners had been fled. But Paul cried
with a loud voice, saying, Do thyself no harm, for we're all
here. I love the humanity of Paul here.
This man had mistreated him. I suppose this is the man that
had beat him. But he says, Do yourself no harm. We haven't
escaped. Then he called for a light. And there's a lot of typical
significance to that. He needed light as to how God would have
anything to do with him. He called for a light and sprang
in and came trembling and fell down before Paul and Silas and
brought them out and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved? That is the most important question
that can ever be asked. That is the most important question
that can ever be considered by you and I. What must I do to
be saved? And here is the confession. Paul
and Silas gave him an answer. They didn't say, well, there's
nothing you can do to be saved. Salvation is by grace. You're
trying to come into God's presence on the basis of your works. No,
they didn't say anything as foolish as that. They gave him an answer. And here is our confession. Believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. In believing the gospel, In believing
on the Lord Jesus Christ, you are saved in the fullest sense
of the word. Saved from your sins. Matthew
121 says, Thou shalt call His name Jesus, for He shall save
His people from their sins. And that's what He did. He saved
His people from their sins. If you believe on Christ, you're
saved from the condemnation of sin. You're justified. You stand
before God without guilt. That's what justification is,
it means you didn't do anything. Christ's righteousness becomes
yours so that you're actually just before God without sin. You're saved from the power of
your sin. There was a time when you can't believe, when you couldn't
believe, but now believing, He gives you the grace to believe
and you believe. You've been rescued from the power of sin,
saved from the presence of sin in the sense that as Christ is
in glory in heaven, you are too if you're in Him and you're glorified.
Save to the uttermost, completely and perfectly save so that God
will never condemn you. Save so that no sin will ever
be brought against your charge. Save so that you're preserved
all the way to the end. Save. Believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ and thou shalt be saved. Now, this is not all he said.
We read in verse 32, and they spake unto him the word of the
Lord. This man heard the gospel. If all you heard, was believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ and you'll be saved. If that's all
you heard, you haven't heard the gospel yet. He has to tell
you why you're to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ because
of what he did, what he accomplished, who he is, where he is now. He
spake unto him the word of the Lord and to all that were in
his house. And he took them the same hour of the night and washed
their stripes and was baptized. He, in all his straight way,
obviously heard something about baptism. And when he brought
them into his house, he set meat before them and rejoiced, believing
in God with all of his house. When he believed in the Lord
Jesus Christ, he believed in God with all of his house, because
Jesus Christ is God. Believing on the Lord Jesus Christ,
you believe is God. Believe on the Lord. He's the
Lord. That means He's the supreme power. That means He's the dictator.
That means He's the controller. He's the Lord of creation. He
spake the world into existence. He's the one who created all
things. All things were created by Him and for Him. And He's
before Him and by Him. All things consist. He is the
Lord of Providence. That means everything that happens
is neither more nor less than His will being done. He controls everything. He's the Lord of Providence,
and most especially, He is the Lord of salvation. That means
salvation's in His hands. That means that whether or not
you or I are saved, it's up to Him. It's not up to me. It's
not up to you. It's up to Him. We go to Him.
Lord, save me. It's up to you. Salvation is
in His sovereign hands. He can save me or He can pass
me by. Whatever He does is right. But He's the Lord of salvation. Believe on the Lord Jesus, the
Savior, Christ, God's anointed prophet, God's anointed priest,
God's anointed King. Believe. on the Lord Jesus Christ,
and thou shalt be saved." Now, what is this thing of believing
on Christ? Now, this man asked this question,
what must I do to be saved? And Paul answered him, and here's
our confession, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt
be saved. Now, in the Scripture, we read
of believing in Christ and believing on Christ. And while those two
things are different, They can't be separated. Wherever you have
the one, you have the other. Believing in Christ and believing
on Christ. Now, what is the difference?
He says to this man, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and
thou shalt be saved. Let's see if this illustration
helps. Let's say there's a house on fire. And there's a little
boy up on the second floor. He tries to get down, tries to
escape the flames, can't get down the steps. The room is filling
with smoke. He runs to the window, looks
out the window, and there's a strong man down at the bottom. And the
man says, jump, and I'll catch you. And that little boy looks
at that man, and he's a big strong man, and he can see that he's
got the ability to catch him. He believes he has the ability
to catch him. And that's necessary. If he didn't
believe that he had the ability to catch him, he wouldn't bother
jumping. But he believes. But if that's
all he does, it's not going to do him any good. It's not just
believing he has the ability to catch him, he's also got to
jump. He's got to jump out the window
and totally commit to that man catching him. If that man doesn't
catch him, all of his bones will be broken and he'll be killed.
Now, you believe in Christ when you believe in His ability to
save you. You believe on Christ when you
commit the salvation of your soul to Him. You jump out the
window trusting Him to catch you, knowing that if He doesn't
catch you, if He doesn't do it all, you've had it. You're finished. Commitment is what this is called.
In 2 Timothy 1.12, Paul said, I know whom I have believed.
And I'm persuaded he's able. That's believing in it. I'm persuaded
he is able. Abraham was said to stagger not
at the promise of God through unbelief, was strong in faith,
giving glory to God, being fully persuaded that what he had promised
he was able also to perform. I know whom I have believed.
And I'm persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have
committed to Him. What did you commit to Him, Paul?
The entire salvation of my soul. Now, if I believe in salvation
by works in any measure, to any degree, If I think salvation
is in any way dependent upon me, I have failed to commit the
salvation of my soul to Him. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,
and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. Now, I would like
to try to illustrate this with a story out of the book of Esther.
Now Esther, let me give you the setting. King Ahasuerus wants
to parade his wife in front of everybody. And I suppose she
was one of the first feminists. I really like this woman in that
she wouldn't do this. She refused. She wasn't going
to let him parade her around everywhere. So he got upset,
and the men at his party got upset, and they said, you've
got to do something about this woman, because all of our wives are
going to do the same thing she does, and they're going to despise
us, so you need to get rid of her. So the king did get rid
of her, and they came up with a new plan, and we're going to
have a beauty pageant, and we're going to find the prettiest woman
in all the land, and she's going to be your wife. And that woman
happened to be Esther. Somebody found her, saw her beauty,
brought her in, and the king chose her, and she was a Jew.
The king didn't know this, but she was a Jew. She was raised
by a man by the name of Mordecai. Her parents were dead, and Mordecai,
her uncle, had raised her. Now, Mordecai is a man who wouldn't
bow before heathens. And there was a man named Haman
who was the king's right-hand man, and Haman expected Mordecai
to bow to him and Mordecai wouldn't do it. He refused to bow to him
and Haman got so mad he came to the king and he talked about
the Jews. He said, all the Jews are trouble. We need to kill
them all. They're not going to be for your profit. And the king
said, OK, we'll do it. Now, the king did not know that
Esther was a Jew. So Mordecai comes to Esther to
tell her about what had taken place, how the king had decided
to kill them all. And look what she says. This
is how she responds after Mordecai tells her this. All the king's
servants and the people of the king's province do know that
whosoever, whether man or woman, shall come into the king in the
inner courts who is not called. There's one law of his to put
him to death, except to such as whom the king shall hold out
the golden scepter, that he may live. But I've not been called
to come into the king these 30 days. I can't come. He hadn't
called me. I can't go represent the Jews. And they told the Mordecai
Esther's words, and Mordecai commanded to answer Esther, think
not with thyself that thou shalt escape the king's house more
than all the Jews. For thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time,
then shall their enlargement and deliverance arise to the
Jews from another place, not from you. But thou and thy father's
house shall be destroyed. And who knoweth whether thou
art come to this kingdom for such a time as this? Then Esther
bade them return to Mardukai, this answer, Go gather together
all the Jews that are present in Shushan, and fast ye for me,
and neither eat nor drink three days or nights. And I also and
my maidens will fast likewise, and so will I go unto the king,
which is not according to the law, and if I perish, I perish."
Now here's the way I come to Christ. The law condemns me. My sin condemns me. But I'm going
to go to Him. And if I perish, I perish. I have no other hope but that
He will take me. And do you know what? Everyone
who comes to Him like that, He receives. He has never turned
down a sinner who comes to Him for mercy. Oh beloved, believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Now we have this message on cassette
tape, on DVD and CD. If you call the church or write
or email, we'll send you a copy. This is Todd Knibert praying
that God will be pleased to make Himself known to you. To request a copy of the sermon
you have just heard, send your request to messages at toddsroadgracechurch.com
or you may write or call the church at the information provided
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