The Book of Acts, Part 2

Well, I'm very happy to be able to present those certificates to our young people. Sounds like these young people are growing up in a church setting. They have names like Micah and Faith and Christian. Those are all pretty biblical-sounding. And of course, all the other names are just fine, too. But those clearly have a connection to the faith that God wants us to have.

So that's really incredible and something that whenever God says or Jesus tells us that unless we become like little children, we won't be a part of the kingdom of God. So learning even about some of the dependency and things that we see in our little children, those are helpful lessons for all of us. Mr. Jackson, we've already passed those out.

You passed those out early on. Very good. Well, ready and waiting. You already know what we're going to cover. Why don't you just look at the map and I'll just go home. Actually, this particular map, again, I gave you a different one last time. And it was focused a little bit differently. This is Paul's first missionary journey, as they call him, and his second missionary journey.

And we'll go over three and four and on as we go forward. But we have covered already a number of things about the Apostle Paul. And I pointed out to you how it was that God worked a miracle in his life to cause him to be converted. He also said that Paul was going to suffer. And of course, that was an example that if we're going to be apart, and he even states this, if we're going to be in the kingdom of God, then we're going to endure some tribulation.

We're going to suffer and struggle in order to be a part of what God holds out before us. And even what Eric was mentioning in the sermon, Nat here today, about how we use our time and what we choose to do, it really does have a lot to do with making good, and perhaps we could think of it as being better choices sometimes.

But as I mentioned about Paul, his conversion, his example of suffering, he was a Roman citizen, and that had certain rights and protections. They didn't always work, but ultimately, you know, he found that it did help even guide where he would eventually go. We talked about, last time, about how Antioch is a significant church congregation. Now, we often think of Jerusalem being kind of the leading church there in the Middle East.

And yet, at that time, yes, it was. It was where Jesus had been. It was where perhaps larger groups of people would come to see who he really was. But Antioch was a significant, and you could say, Gentile congregation, because many who were there were and had a Gentile background, although there were Jews and Greeks in many of the congregations that we see Paul going to.

Now, we covered how that Luke was the one who was recording all of this in the book of Acts. And actually, you find—and I don't have the verses written down, but I could get those for you if you wanted—there are verses that show that Luke appears to be writing from an eyewitness standpoint. He was there with Paul. It doesn't seem to be all the time, but it does seem to be a good part of the latter part of the time, and even as he, I think, in the third and fourth trips more so toward the end of the book.

But you see Paul's four different journeys detailed here in the book of Acts. And then finally, you see him in captivity. He later was released and was able to travel more, and then finally back in Rome, and that's where he was put to death. But I want to look at this map. If you look at the two maps, one of them is identified as the first and the other as the second, you see certain sections of the book of Acts being covered.

One of these, the one that's labeled for the first trip, actually covers Acts 13 and 14. And you can see it's kind of a shorter trip. He's only barely getting into what we would think of as central southern Turkey.

And he goes there, and he turns around and comes back. Now, that took several years, and yet that is the extent of that first trip. The other map, which is his second journey, goes a lot farther. It not only goes to some of these same areas, but it goes on further into western Turkey, and then over into Greece, what is called on the map there Thrace and Macedonia, and later Achaia. And then ultimately he stops by Ephesus before he comes back home. I think it's interesting to see where these different places are, because otherwise, when we read through there, we can read the names and we can kind of know where that is, but if we don't look it up, then we probably don't understand the setting as much as we might otherwise.

But I think it is important to do that because Paul would later write many of the books that make up the New Testament letters that are written to certain church congregations, or letters that are written to certain of what he would view as younger ministers, Timothy and Titus, or to Philemon.

To understand where he was or which one of those books, if you look at them in order in your Bible, Romans appears to be the first one. That's not the case, because we're going to see which ones appear to be the first ones that he was writing. But what I was mentioning was that the first trip that Paul took is covered in Acts 13 and 14. And then the second trip is covered in the very end of chapter 15 and in chapter 16 and 17 and 18.

You can kind of break those down pretty easily. We're going to find the remainder of the book from 18 on is covered in the third or fourth trips, and ultimately it ends with him being in Rome and being able to teach there. But I want to point out, as you study the book of Acts, and it's fun to me to try to get that in my head, try to kind of know if I can think through the 28 chapters in the book of Acts, it's nice to be able to know, well, the first part of it, Luke is writing about Peter and John and a little bit about James and about Stephen and about Philip.

But then from about chapter 9 on, much of that, from the time that Saul was brought to conversion, much of that is going to cover something about the one who would be called Paul, as his name was changed, and Barnabas and Silas and their travels. And that's what we're going to be covering here in these studies of the first and second tours that Paul made up into the area of Turkey and then later over into Greece.

But I do want to point out a couple of things, because the book of Acts can be easily broken up if we realize that these are kind of central points that we are aware of. The first one of these is in Acts chapter 15. The Acts chapter 15 is not about a travel, or it's actually about a conference, in essence a ministerial conference, in Jerusalem. And Paul and Barnabas have been sent there after his first trip, and so this had taken several years, a couple of years, to achieve this first trip.

But in, and I believe the correct date for this is about 50 AD. Chapter 15 is a conference. A conference where Paul and Barnabas and others are brought together, they're brought together with the elders in Jerusalem. They have to make a decision regarding what it is that we should teach the Gentiles. And again, I'm not wanting to go into that topic, because that's a whole topic in itself.

But that is kind of a break point. You see the first trip of Paul before that, chapter 13 and 14. You see this conference in chapter 15, and then his second trip begins then and goes in chapters 16 and 17 and 18. The other kind of section that I will point out to you is Acts 21 to 26. Now that's again a later part of it, and when you read through those chapters, and again this is pretty easy reading, and I would encourage you to read through the book of Acts and kind of get it in your head, and maybe even follow these maps some to know where these things were and what Paul was encountering in some of these congregations that he was actually establishing.

But in Acts 21 to 26, this almost entirely takes place in Israel. It's in Jerusalem, or it's in some of the close areas around Jerusalem up into Caesarea, which isn't very far from Jerusalem, or maybe it's even up into Antioch. I'm not sure. No, I don't believe it goes that far.

It's right in Jerusalem, and it actually covers a number of the defenses that Paul has to give for why he's being persecuted by the Jews. That's primarily where his persecution was coming. Some of it initially had come from the church who didn't accept him, and they had to come to understand what he was doing and how God had placed him in the role that he was in. But much of the trouble came from Jewish anger, Jewish hatred, and hatred to the point where they wanted to kill. Sounds similar to the type of hatred that is rampant in a lot of places and certainly here even in the United States.

And so you see Paul having to defend himself in different levels of Roman courts. And actually under the supervision, but I guess you could say under the protection of the Roman system, because as a Roman citizen he had a certain level of protection. He wasn't supposed to be receiving certain of the punishments that he even received. But at least you find actually the Romans coming and hauling him out of there so that the Jews can't get to him and try to kill him.

So I want to point out those two. I will mention chapter 27 and 28 is an entirely different trip. The last trip, the one that is by boat, the one that eventually goes to Rome. At least as far as what we have recorded in the book of Acts. You don't really have anything beyond that in the Bible.

You do have some historical record of where Paul would go after that, because it ends almost abruptly and almost without explanation. He's just there. He's in Rome. He's allowed to preach the kingdom of God and Jesus Christ. He's doing that from a house that he lives in.

So it doesn't sound like his house arrest seems rather lenient. Not so bad. He was at least willing or able to. And whenever you see in the Epistles the letters that he wrote to the churches and even what he wrote to Timothy and Titus, you'll sometimes see him referring to, I'm in jail. I'm in prison. Or I'm somewhere else. Sometimes he refers to, or I'm feeling I need to go here or there.

And again, as Eric pointed out with Joseph, it was remarkable how Joseph ended up in Egypt able to spare his family. And as he realized, I'm sure at some point, I'm not in charge of this. God is the one who brought me to where I am. He's the one. I'm not angry at these brothers. I probably was at one point.

But I'm not angry anymore. I understand God brought me to where I could protect and preserve the people of Jacob. And we see the same thing here with Paul being guided actually from one place to the next. Sometimes given some type of vision. Sometimes, like in the case of going to Rome, I'm sure that wasn't exactly... He didn't go to Rome as a tourist. He went to Rome as a prisoner. He went to Rome in captivity, but nonetheless, he got there. And he was able to interact with some of the Roman authorities. He was able to interact with those who were in the household of Caesar.

And so, you know, that's remarkable that God would work that out. Sometimes, I'm sure in a completely different way than Paul might have had it in his mind, although you don't really have a description of what he might think about it. So I'd like for us to look in Acts 13 and 14, and you can look on your page that's the first trip. And we'll kind of go through this. You probably have to do this quickly, but you could read back through it and study it later if you would like. But here in Acts 13, you see the beginning of a trip that was going to be the first journey that Paul would make.

And in essence, what we find with this particular trip is that he is going, he is preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, he is proclaiming a message that people need to accept that Jesus is the Son of God. He's very clear about that. That's exactly what he had to teach and preach. And yet, he ultimately would get people together, people who would become believers, people that God would draw to become a part of the church, and then there would be a church congregation.

However new that congregation might be, because undoubtedly, certainly here in chapter 13 and 14, most of these were brand new. Although some of them seem to have had a certain amount of training or a little information about the gospel, about Jesus Christ, even before Paul got there. He wasn't the only one who was doing that preaching. But of course, the book of Acts focuses on him, focuses on what he was going through.

Here in verse 1, it says, At the church in Antioch there were prophets and teachers, and it names many of those. And while they were worshipping God, and fasting the Holy Spirit said, They set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I called them.

And after fasting and prayer, they laid their hands on them and sent them off. They were actually commissioning. God was directing that Barnabas and Saul, as they would be called, and of course his name changes here in verse 9, to be Paul, and that's what he's referred to thereafter. You see, they are sent on this trip.

In verse 4, so being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia. Now, if you look on the map, they went down to the coast. Antioch is not on the coast, it's close to the coast, it's some miles from the coast. But they go down to Seleucia, which is on the coast, and from there, they sail to the island of Cyprus. And I'm not going to go through all of the information in each of these locations, but you see, when you're looking at the map, you see they came to Cyprus, they were in Salamis, and they would later go through the island and come to the city of Pamphos.

And from there, after they had finished what they could do as they were preaching and teaching the Word of God, they would then leave and go from Paphos up to the very southern, southern central coast of Turkey to Perga. In verse 13, Paul and his companions set sail from Paphos. They came to Perga in Pamphylia. Now Pamphylia is more or less the state or the province that Perga is in. Let's see, I don't see it on that map, but it is kind of the area right along the coast. And so it would be somewhat of a state or province designation.

It says in verse 14, oh, let's mention verse 13, because that's a significant verse. Paul and his companions set sail from Paphos. They came to Perga in Pamphylia. But John, John Mark, however, in verse 13, left them and returned to Jerusalem.

Now again, it doesn't say much about what happened. It doesn't say anything about, you know, was there a dispute? Was there, you know, did he get sick? You know, you find later that Paul thought he was kind of deserting them.

He thought he was turning his back on maybe what they were running into, because when you read what they ran into in Cyprus, there was some conflict. There was some accusation, not so much against John, but against the work that Paul and Barnabas were doing, and against, you know, opposition. And maybe John being a much younger, John Mark being much younger, maybe he said, I didn't know what I was getting into when I got in this.

And this appears to be somewhat of the early ministry that John Mark, who would later write an entire gospel, mostly at the direction from Peter. See, John Mark may have been around during the time of Jesus, but we find that his gospel was written in many ways from information that Peter would be giving him. But it's interesting to see. You don't have much to go on as far as his work in the ministry, but here, you see, he left them. He went back to Jerusalem. But it says in verse 14, they went on from Perga and came to Antioch in Pisidia.

And on the Sabbath day, they went into the synagogue and sat down. And after the reading of the law and the prophets, the officials of the synagogue sent them a message, Brethren, do you have a word of encouragement for the people? If you do, well, please give it. And so Paul stood up and with a gesture began to speak. Actually, you find much of what is the rest of chapter 13 is Paul talking to the people in Pisidian Antioch. And if you see on the map, that's kind of up a little further off the coast, up into the middle part of what you're going to find is ultimately the area that would be called Galatia.

Pisidian Antioch is in what you would say is Galatia. Now, you would also say there are numerous other towns, kind of like Pamphylia, that I mentioned being kind of a regional designation. Galatia is kind of a regional designation.

It's not a city in itself. But you come to Pisidian Antioch and you find that Paul begins preaching. And he's preaching about Jesus Christ. And he's preaching about how that, and of course he started off here with the Jews, how that David is dead and buried. He's not here any longer. He is, he didn't, you know, his body is corrupted. He's in the grave. And yet he said Jesus Christ could not be contained in the grave. He was resurrected by God. He was brought back to life. He is the Son of God that needs to be worshipped.

And you read that throughout the entirety of this, the remainder of this chapter in chapter 40, or excuse me, verse 42. Paul and Barnabas were going out and the people urged them to speak about these things again the next Sabbath.

And so, you know, as they were preaching, they were teaching, they were saying things that in a sense the Jewish sector didn't really buy into about Jesus having been the Son of God and about the kingdom that is to come. And yet a number of people wanted to hear. And so the next Sabbath, they would again come together. When the meeting of the synagogue broke up, many Jews and devout converts to Judaism followed Paul and Barnabas, who spoke to them and urged them to continue in the grace of God.

And so the next Sabbath, almost the whole city gathered to hear the word of the Lord. And so this was how it was that Paul would go about, Paul and Barnabas in this case, would go about doing their work. They would reach out to the Jews. The Jews in the synagogue were not only Jews, they were Greeks and Gentiles who were also outside, perhaps that they might have even invited in for certain things.

But it says in verse 46, both Paul and Barnabas spoke out boldly and said whenever the Jews kind of rejected, I guess, verse 45, the Jews saw the crowds. They were filled with jealousy and blaspheming. They contradicted what was spoken by Paul. And so Paul and Barnabas both spoke out and said, it's necessary that the Word of God should be spoken first to you.

And since you reject it, and since you judge yourselves to be unworthy of eternal life, we are now turning to the Gentiles.

And so that was there. You know, they would offer it to the Jews. And if they believed, if they accepted that, that was wonderful. They realized that God was drawing them to that conclusion. If not, we're going to go on to the Gentiles. And I think the description here in verse 46, you reject information about Jesus Christ and you judge yourself to be unworthy of eternal life. See, they clearly were not seeking eternal life. They were not seeking the only way you could have eternal life. Much in the same way as you see many people today, they are not seeking salvation. They're not seeking...they don't know what's beyond. They don't know what is beyond the grave. They just simply don't. And of course, there are a lot of theories and different ideas that people have and hopes about heaven. Let's see, that has nothing to do with what the Bible shows or teaches. And clearly, you know, they were not seeking eternal life even as these Jews were not. But it's interesting to see the description as He turns to the Gentiles in verse 48. When the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and praised the word of the Lord in as many as had been destined for eternal life became believers.

And so there was a certain level of destiny or a certain level of calling that God would draw someone to fully understand something about the purpose of life, something about, well, you know, our lives right now are temporary. They are subject to death. And yet, eternal life is what we should be seeking. That's having an understanding of the purpose of life enables us to grow toward eternal life. And the word of the Lord spread throughout the region.

The Jews continued to incite the devout women of high standing. In verse 50, in the leading men, they stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas and drove them out of the region.

So they shook off the dust off their feet and protested against them and went to Iconium. And so here you see Paul having come to the area of what we would say is in Galatia, in the Pacific and Antioch, whenever they had done what they could there. And again, you don't see the time frames always. Sometimes you find that Luke mentions, you know, we go the next day or we do, you know, you see a time frame. Sometimes you don't. Sometimes it may have been weeks. It certainly appears this was weeks, maybe months, that they were there in this city of Antioch in Pisidia. And yet, amazingly, in verse 52, the ones who became disciples, the ones who were believers, they were filled with the Holy Spirit and they were filled with joy from God.

People were thrilled to receive a message of the truth of God. And in this case, you know, this is going to be establishing a church there in Pisidia and Antioch that they would later come back to and that they would later be able to teach. And so it says they went on to Iconium. In chapter 14, verse 1, the same thing occurred in Iconium where Paul and Bonbus went into the Jewish synagogue, spoke in the same way, a great number of both the Jews and the Greeks became believers. But the unbeliever Jews stirred up the Gentiles. They poisoned their mind against the brethren. And so it says in verse 3, they remained there a long time speaking boldly for the Lord who testified to the word of His grace by granting signs and wonders to be done through them.

And so, you know, you can read through the description of what they were doing there. I just want to point out, you know, how it was that they followed this pattern. You actually see in verse 7, they were proclaiming the gospel. And they were, let's see, in verse 5, an attempt was made by the Jews and their rulers to mistreat them and stone them. But the apostles learned about it, and they fled to Lystra and Derby, cities in Laconia and to the surrounding country. And there they continue to proclaim the good news.

See, they were in Antioch. They were essentially going to be run out of there. And so they're going to go to some of the other cities that are close by. And I'm going to say, I'm going to say, when you look at this map, you can see that to the right of the area that I'm talking about there is the city of Tarsus. Now, that's where Paul was from. He was familiar with this area. This was not all that far away, you know, 30, 40 miles. It wasn't that terribly far away from where he had at least been born and had spent a certain amount of time. He had been there later after he had been converted. He had gone back to Tarsus. So I'm pretty sure he was familiar with the area of Derby, the area of Lystra, Iconium, Antioch. He was familiar with these areas to a degree, but not in the way of going there to proclaim the message of Jesus Christ. But in verse 8 in Lystra, it says there was a man sitting there, you know, who was crippled, so they healed him. And of course, I'm again not going to read through all of this.

You find that ultimately in Lystra it ends up badly. It ends up badly because in verse 19, the Jews came from Antioch and Iconium. So this sounds like a bunch of rabble-rousers who go from one city to the next, kind of following Paul and trying to figure out, you know, how can we impede him? But they came from Antioch and Iconium. They went over the crowd and they stoned Paul and drug him out of the city, supposing he was dead. But when the disciples surrounded him, he got up and went into the city. And the next day they went on with Barnabas to Derby. So you find God either resurrecting or healing Paul, and you see almost no record of it. I mean, you don't have any other information, except this is interesting. You would think that Paul would learn his lesson, not to go to Lystra. That's not the case. You find he goes on to Derby in verse 21. They proclaim the gospel, good news, to that city. They made many disciples. Then they return to Lystra!

That doesn't seem like the smartest move to me. But it's exactly, you know, you find him going up to Perga, up to Antioch, over to Iconium and Lystra and Derby. They get that far and then basically they're turning around and going back. Again, there's not giving us time frames here, but it appears that this journey took two to four years, you know, while they were doing this. So they were there in certain, at least two years, and maybe even longer. I've read different, I guess, thoughts on that as far as just how long each one of these were taking. But this one was initially establishing congregations in some of these locations that essentially would be called Galatia. They would be there in the area of Galatia and he would later write a book to the Galatians. And you also find that Colossae is in this area as well. And of course, he was later going to write a book to the Colossians. And again, I don't even see it on this map. Let's see if it's on the other side. Yeah, it is on the other side. It's not too far. It's a little further to the left, so a little further to the east, I guess it would be. No, to the west. I'm sorry. To the west, you find the city of Colossae. And so, I think it's amazing.

And actually, probably a memory verse that you have studied in the past, that you may have read to you even when you were baptized, is in verse 22.

And the setting for Paul to say this is, having been stoned in Lystra, having gone to Derby, having preached there, and then turned around and went back to Lystra and to Iconium and Antioch, there it says in verse 22, they strengthened the souls of the disciples and encouraged them to continue in the faith, saying it is through many persecution or much tribulation that we must enter the kingdom of God. And after, in verse 23, after they had appointed elders for them in each city with prayer and fasting, they entrusted them to the Lord in whom they have come to believe.

So that was a pattern that Paul would use, that he would reach out to people, he would preach to them the correct information, the truth of the kingdom, the truth of Jesus Christ. He would be an example of suffering, clearly, because he's always being chased around by the Jews who are trying to poison the minds of the people that he would be talking to. But then he would continue to strengthen them, continue to encourage them, continue to encourage them to have faith in God and entrust them to the Lord in whom they had come to believe. And so then, in verse 24, they passed through Pisidia, they came to Pamphylia. When they had spoken the word in Perga, they went down to Atalia. That is right on the coast if you see kind of backtracking there.

Derbe was kind of the end of the route. Came back to Lystra, back to Iconium, back to Antioch, back to Perga. But then over to Atalia, right again on the coast, right close to Perga.

And from there, they are going to sail back in verse 26 to Antioch. This would be Syrian Antioch, where they had been commended to the grace of God for the work that they had completed.

And when they arrived, this would be back in Antioch, they called the church together and related all that God had done with them and how he had opened a door of faith for the Gentiles.

And they stayed there with the disciples for some time. That's the conclusion of the first trip.

That is pretty much the setting. It's the location, mid-southern Turkey today.

And yet the area that we would call Galatia and the city of Colossae that isn't on this map, but is on the other. So, as I said, chapter 15 is kind of a... it kind of breaks up the story flow.

It is a ministerial conference. And in the latter part of chapter 15, in verse 36, it says, after some days Paul said to Barnabas, let's return and visit the believers in every city where we proclaim the word of the Lord and see how they're doing. And so here was, again, an example. He wants to go back and see how it is that the brethren are doing. He had an interest. He was. He later would talk to them in the letters that he would write. He would talk to them, that I view you as my children. I want you to see me as a parent, as a father to you, because I've brought you to an awareness of the truth of God. And of course, they're to look to God as our Father. And yet he said, I have a love. I have a concern. And I want to return and visit the believers in every city where we proclaim the word of God and see how they're doing.

But you see in verse 37, Barnabas wanted to take with them John called Mark.

And Paul decided not to take with them one who had deserted them in Pamphylia and had not accompanied them in the work. So again, you see a little more description. You don't see a lot of information here, but you find that Paul was irritated about whatever John Mark did.

It was more a concern to him than it appears to be to Barnabas, because we're going to find Barnabas would take Mark and go ahead and continue to proclaim the message of God. And later, Paul would have some very favorable words to say about Mark and how he had been effective in his work and in his ministry. But it says in verse 39, the disagreement became so sharp that they parted company. And Barnabas took John Mark with him and sailed to Cyprus. And Paul, as a different partner here now, chose Silas and set out the believers, commending him to the grace of the Lord and went through Syria and Cilicia, strengthening the churches. And so this is the beginning of his second trip. He has come back to Antioch at the end of the first trip. He later would go down to Jerusalem. That's what chapter 15 is about. But then now they're heading out. They have a letter and information from the decisions that were made there in Jerusalem at this council or this conference that they're going to be passing on to the congregations, mostly Gentile, that they would be coming to. But here you see Paul heading out. Again, I would say this would be one of the reasons why Paul was not married. I mean, he says he has a job that doesn't really lend itself to being married. It doesn't lend itself to being home. I'm traveling. I'm being stoned. I'm being lashed. I'm being shipwrecked. That's kind of hard to drag a family around. That was something you see about Paul. So in chapters 16 and 17 and 18, all cover the second journey that Paul makes. You can again see, if you look on the map, you can see he's starting out. There's a star here on my map in Antioch. So this is where, again, he is starting. This is again a large city and an area that he starts almost all of his trips from. He had come from Jerusalem up to Antioch. And it appears, from just looking at the map, that he went from Antioch over to Tarsus. And from Tarsus, he would go back to Derby, back to Lystra, back to Iconium, back to Antioch in Pisidia. And later, he would continue west and go up toward Mysia and Troas, which is on the coast. Again, this is all in Turkey.

And yet, we read some interesting things here in chapter 16, verse 6. They went through the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia.

Exactly how this occurred, what it was that caused them to realize, we can't go to the northeast.

You see the word Asia there. It's kind of to the north. It looks like they're going around it.

Or Asia, I guess, would be from where they are to the southwest. And it also says, when they had come opposite Mysia, they attempted to go into Bithnia, which would have been to the northeast. You can't go this way, you can't go that way. I want you to continue on.

And so, the Spirit attempted, or the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them. And so, passing by Mysia, they went down to Troas. And during the night, Paul had a vision, and there stood a man of Macedonia pleading with him and saying, come over to Macedonia and help us. And when they'd seen this vision, he immediately tried to cross over to Macedonia, being convinced that God had called us to proclaim the good news to them. See, so in a sense, Paul had an idea of where he wanted to go, and he had gone to some of the congregations there in Galatia that he had established on his first trip. He had been able to confirm their faith, but he also knew, I need to go further. And they couldn't go to the right or to the left. They needed to go to the coast where they could go on to the area that you can see on the map is called Macedonia, and Thrace looks to be the little bigger kind of provincial names that are there.

And there you're going to find the cities of Neopolis and Philippi and Amphipolis and Apollyona and Berea and Thessalonica and Athens and Corinth. These are all in Europe. These are all in Greece, we would know it today. And these are all, of course, along the Aegean Sea, along the eastern coast of the Aegean Sea. And you can read verse, let's see, chapter 16, verse 13. They came to the city of Philippi. Now, Philippi is a church that we are a little bit familiar with in that we have a book written to the Philippians. It's one of the more positive, one of the more optimistic, what almost seems to be one of the more favorable letters that Paul would write to the people there in Philippi. But you also see two examples, two examples of people that God converted in Philippi. And I would say that they ultimately make up the core, they make up the foundation of the Philippian church. They make up, they have the attributes that are able to cultivate the congregation. One of them, verse 13, on the Sabbath day, we went outside the gate by the river where we suppose there was a place for prayer, and we sat down and spoke to the women who gathered there. And a certain woman named Lydia, a worshipper of God, was listening to us, and she was from the city of Thyatira and a dealer in purple cloth. And so the Lord, in verse 14, opened her heart to listen eagerly to what was said by Paul. Again, she just didn't all of a sudden become a Christian, and she didn't give her heart to the Lord. It says that God affected her heart, her mind, her outlook, her understanding even of God. And she listened intently to what Paul had to say in verse 15. She and her household were baptized, and she urged us, saying, if you have judged me to be faithful, O Lord, come and stay at my home. And so she prevailed upon them. She obviously was very, perhaps she was able, and she had the ability to be able to help provide, not only for Paul, but for his traveling group. She was able to cultivate an atmosphere of hospitality, of caring and serving. That's really what you see about the Philippian Church, is that they are a group of people that have tried to help, and Paul received help from them. It says in verse 16, well, then you see Paul running into a Paul and Silas, running into a demon-possessed girl that they helped. But then that, of course, became an obstacle to her handlers, I guess you would say. And so in verse 25, after throwing Paul and Silas into jail, about midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God. So this is the right thing to do in jail. If you ever find yourself in jail, it's the right thing to do to pray and to sing hymns. And so they found that they could reach out to God in that way, and the prisoners were listening, and suddenly there was an earthquake so violent that the foundation of the prisons were shaken. Immediately the doors were open, and everyone's chains fell off. Again, this had happened to Peter. This was something that God had inspired Peter to go through as well. He could hardly believe it. Whenever he came and wanted to tell, he was in Jerusalem at the time, and even the others couldn't believe it. They were all praying for it, but they couldn't believe it actually happened. And so you see a similar thing happening to Paul and Silas here in Philippi.

And they are. Verse 27, when the jailer woke up and he saw what had happened, he decided, I need to kill myself. The prisoners have all gotten loose. I'm going to be blamed. I let them go or I couldn't contain them. And so Peter called out, don't hurt them yourself. We're all here.

The jailer called for lights and rushed in. Verse 29 fell down, trembling before Paul and Silas.

And when he brought them outside, he said, Sir, what do I need to do to be saved?

See, undoubtedly, he had to have a little more information. He knew why Paul and Silas were there.

He knew kind of what they had been teaching or preaching, that they were teaching a way to salvation, a way that would only be through Jesus Christ. And so, fabulously, you see that he was coming to see, you know, I need help. I need Jesus Christ. I need, if I'm going to have salvation, if I'm going to have eternal life, then I need to know the way to that.

And so it says, verse 31, Paul told them, Well, believe on the Lord Jesus and you will be saved, you and your whole household. Again, sometimes people read that verse and that's all you got to do.

Well, that's not the entirety of the instruction, but certainly that is a part of the instruction. That's the beginning part. You have to start somewhere. And so they started in belief.

And so they spoke the word of the Lord to him in verse 32, and to all who were in his household. So they explained more, said you need to be baptized. You need the Holy Spirit. You need to understand who Jesus really was and what he did here not that long ago in the last 20 years. See, at this time it was in the last 10, 15 years as they were starting off from, well, I guess it would be almost 20 years because we're going from the early 30s to 50 and then probably a couple of years after 50. So 20 years later, after the death of Jesus, Paul is speaking the word of the Lord to them in the same hour of the night. He took them and washed their wounds. This was the jailer helping them. And he and his whole family were baptized without delay, and he brought them into the house and set food before them. His whole household rejoiced that he had become a believer in God. See, this was, in essence, again, a foundational part of the Philippian church.

Again, a church that, I mean, what kind of tales could this jailer tell to people who would later come into the church who would be drawn to want to know more about the gospel than to describe what he had seen firsthand and certainly what Lydia was familiar with and the hospitality that she was able to give. Verse 35. I'm going to only get through chapter 16, so I'm going to have to cut this short. But it's interesting to see that the morning came, the magistrates came from the police. They said, let these men go. And the jailer reported the message to Paul, said, the magistrates said, you can go. And Paul said, well, they have beaten us in public. Verse 37. And we are un-condemned. And we are Roman citizens. And you all have thrown us in prison. And now they're going to just discharge us in secret. Paul doesn't seem to be the laid-back type of person that some of us might be at times. He's going to goad the rhino. He's going to poke at them. And so he said, certainly not. Let them come and take us out themselves. And so the police reported these words to the magistrates, and they were afraid. When they heard, they were Roman citizens. So they came and apologized to them. Nice move. Smart move on their part, because Paul had just been released from jail by an earthquake. His chains had just fallen off, and the jailer had converted to whatever Paul was preaching. So interesting how it is that that particular section is recorded by Luke. And it doesn't say directly, I believe, that he was there. But he had to be recording that from someone, Silas having told him, or Paul having told him. But it says that they came and apologized to them, and they took them out and asked them to leave the city. So it appears their attitude changed quite a bit. And after leaving the prison, where'd they go? They went back to Lydia's house. They went back to the brethren that they knew were receiving, welcoming, encouraging, uplifting, hospitable. They went back to Lydia's house, and when they had seen and encouraged the brethren there, they departed. So they're going to go on to Thessalonica, but we'll pick that up in chapter 17 next time. But I think it's fascinating, again, to see these different trips. And actually, Paul is building on what he did the first trip. The first trip established a number of churches. He goes back to those areas, but now he is sent on by God's guidance to go into Greece, which is where Philippi is and where this mostly chapter 16 is recorded. So we will continue with trip 2 next time.