The Book of Acts, Part 3

Well, good morning again, brethren, and it's wonderful to be able to see all of you today. Hank, I don't know if everyone needs one of those maps. If you have the map from last time, please don't take another one, because this is the same one that I gave out last time. But if you need it today, we can go ahead. I'll take the ones that we don't use back. I didn't know whether they would be needed or not.

But as you know, I've been going over here in services to help us gain an insight into the Word of God, and particularly into the writings of the Apostle Paul, but also the information that we find in the book of Acts, just regarding the work of the Apostles originally, or early in the book of Acts, Peter, and John, and James, and what works Stephen and Philip did. But then, after about chapter 9, you see mostly the work of Paul, and the life of Paul, and the journeys of Paul. And what we find, and I think it's interesting to see, that even though Luke was not an Apostle, he was not designated as one of the original Apostles, he was a doctor, a medical doctor, it appears, he was around the church an awful lot.

And of course, he ultimately would write the book of Luke, he would write the book of Acts, and in the book of Acts we find him actually stating we talking about Paul and us, talking about being with Paul. He mentions that a number of times, kind of later on in his writing. And so, he was an eyewitness to much of what it was that Paul had gone through. So I want us, in the subsequent messages, we have covered the conversion of Paul, which is a remarkable miracle in itself.

We also went over, in a sense, his first journey, his first trip up into, away from Jerusalem, away from Antioch, which is where he left from, up into what we would say is being southern central Turkey today. That's where his first church, or first trip was. He went through Cyprus, and then up into the middle part of the southern part of Turkey, cities that we read about or hear about, the area of Galatian, the city of Colossae, or in that area, although we didn't directly go there that trip. But then you see him returning. And in Acts 15, there's a big ministerial conference in Jerusalem, and so Paul is there.

And following that, and I don't intend to go through all of this, but I want to lay the context for what we can cover today. Following the conference in Jerusalem in Acts 15, you see Paul heading out, not this time with Barnabas, but with Silas. And they are going to go back through and continue to work with the churches.

They're going to continue to encourage the churches that have been established, and he's going to then continue to add to the churches that he would ultimately raise up, that God would cause to become part of the church of God, that God would draw to him. And I want to point out something, because in this section, this second trip of Paul's is essentially covered in Acts 16, 17, and 18.

Those three chapters pretty much cover the summary of the trip that Paul made, at that time, again, guided by God. He wasn't allowed to just go anywhere. He couldn't go to the northeast. He couldn't go to the southwest. He needed to go on up to the area that would be into the Macedonian or Achaia area. He was sent up there. He was guided by God to go there. He had a vision that I need to go and care for people that God is calling up in Philippi, in Thessalonica, and later down in Athens or in Corinth.

That's where he was going to head on this particular tour. But what I want to point out to begin with is not just the travels that Paul encountered or what it was that he ran into, because in many ways he ran into obstacles almost everywhere he went.

But I do want to point out what it was that he was teaching. What did Paul teach? Well, he clearly was following the example of Jesus, of preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God. But you also find, if you read any of the literature that the United Church of God puts out today, we show that the gospel is a message about the kingdom of God, but it also is a message about Jesus Christ. It's a message about the king of the kingdom. And so that's the way not only that we describe it, that's the way the Bible describes what the good news is.

Here in chapter 16, I want to show you a few of these verses before we go through kind of the sequence here. Acts 16, verse 31. This is actually Paul talking to a jailer in Philippi, a jailer who had just seen Paul released miraculously out of jail, a jailer that feared for his life, but a jailer that was beginning to see that, you know, I'm dealing with someone who is connected with the great God. I'm dealing with someone who has knowledge of the king of the universe.

And whenever you see in verse 30, this jailer, you know, after he had brought Paul and Silas outside, he said, Sir, what must I do to be saved? And Paul answered him, saying, well, in verse 31, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved, you and your household. And he went on to say, they spoke the word of the Lord to them and all who were in the house, and at that same hour, you know, they went out and washed their wounds and they were baptized.

So clearly, you know, he told them that belief in Jesus Christ was a part of the gospel. He told them that coming to see your need for salvation. See, whenever it says in verse 32, they spoke the word of the Lord to him, you know, it says they said a little more than, well, you just have to believe. Sometimes people read this and they think, well, you just have to believe.

Well, belief is a beginning point. It certainly is necessary, but it's not the whole ball of wax. So belief and that belief that leads you to eternal life or salvation is necessary to understand the gospel. Here in chapter 17, as they went over to Thessalonica, in verse 2, Paul went in, as was his custom, and on three Sabbaths he argued with them from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Messiah to suffer and for the Messiah to rise from the dead, saying, this is the Messiah, Jesus, whom I am proclaiming to you.

So again, Paul's message about the gospel, his gospel message, included belief. It included a recognition of what Jesus had gone through and suffering. It included a recognition of his resurrection from the dead. If we drop down to verse 7, it's interesting to see the description here. Verse 6 talks about a people who have been turning the world upside down, and they've come here as well. And verse 7, Jason has entertained them as guests. They are all acting contrary to the decrees of Rome, the decrees of the emperor, saying that there is another king named Jesus.

It was Paul preaching the kingdom of God. Well, there are many verses that you could use to show that he was. He was preaching the kingdom of God, but in this case, he was preaching the king of the kingdom of God, who is Jesus Christ. If we drop on down to chapter 7 here in verse 18, this is when he had gotten to Athens. It says, the Epicureans and Stoic philosophers debated with Paul and said, what does this babbler want to say?

And others said, well, he seems to be a proclaimer of foreign deities. And in parentheses it says this was because he was telling them the gospel, telling them the good news about Jesus and the good news about the resurrection from the dead.

See, a resurrection is a wonderful thing to come to understand, to come to understand how it is that through the resurrection God gives hope, not only for us, but for every human who has ever lived. But again, you see a description of what Paul was preaching as the gospel. He was preaching that good news about Jesus and the resurrection in verse 24. The God who made the world and everything in it, He who is Lord of heaven and earth, He does not live in shrines made by human hands, nor is He served by human hands as though He needs anything, since He Himself gives us all life and breath and everything.

See, now, what was Paul proclaiming there? Well, he was talking to the Athenians. They had an idol that was dedicated to the unknown God, and he says, I'm here to tell you about that unknown God. That unknown God is the Creator. He's the one who created you and fashioned you and shaped you out of the dust of the ground and breathed into you the breath of life. He's the one who's given you physical life, and He's the one who is the author and can give you eternal life.

This is what Paul's gospel was. It involved belief. It involved understanding what Jesus had done, and understanding His resurrection, understanding that He was the King of the Kingdom of God and that He was the Creator of all. Here in verse 29, verse 29 says, since we are God's offspring, this is the verse right after what Ken read in verse 28, since we are God's offspring, we ought not to think that the deity is like gold or silver or stone or image formed by art or imagination of mortals. See, we are the offspring of God.

We, as human beings, have been created with a potential, a potential to be in God's divine family, a privilege to be able to relate to God and to have eternal life with God and to be glorified with our Savior Jesus Christ. See, this is a part of his message. In verse 30, he kind of concludes wrapping up his speaking about the gospel of the kingdom of God and of Jesus Christ by saying in verse 30, while God has overlooked the times of human ignorance, that may be a way that we could describe what we find ourselves in today in this country.

Now, there's a great deal of ignorance being spread around all over the place. And yet, God is, in a sense, kind of looking aside. While God is overlooking or has overlooked the times of human ignorance, now he commands all people everywhere to repent. See, he called them to repentance. That was a part of the gospel. All of these things are part of the gospel that Paul taught, not only to the Jews that he would talk to initially, but also to the Gentile world that he would essentially be addressing.

And so he says, everyone, everywhere needs to repent, because God is fixed today on which he will have the world judged in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed, and of this he has given assurance to everyone by raising him from the dead. See, Paul was preaching Jesus Christ and the kingdom of God.

And I think it's exciting whenever we think about the message that we extend to the world, and a offer of hope is wrapped up in what the gospel really is. See, the gospel is not simply about Jesus and what Jesus did. It clearly does involve that and clearly includes that, but there's much more. And then there's much more that we have to do. So I wanted to point that out as kind of a theme of what we might learn from how Paul interacted here in this second journey.

In chapter 16, we basically got through chapter 16 in our sermon last time, we find that Paul had gone through Lystra and Derby, and he had gone on to several of the smaller sites that he went to where a church doesn't appear to have been raised up, and he had a vision where he should go up into Macedonia. And so he went into Macedonia. If you're following on your map, you can kind of see how he went through all of Turkey and over to the edge, I believe, to Troas.

I'm not looking at the map. And from there, he goes on up into Greece. He goes into what would be described there as Macedonia. He goes into the cities there on the coast, and then he comes to the city of Philippi. And we see in chapter 16 a good section of it there, Paul's interaction with Lydia, his interaction with the jailer, who saw him released from the shackles and released by an earthquake from God.

And these were individuals who were founding members of the church in Philippi, a church that Paul would later write to. Now, I want to pick this up in chapter 17, because here in chapter 17 and 18, or where we're going to focus today, and in chapter 17, it says, Paul and Silas, verse 1, passed through Amphipolis and Apollyana, and they came to a city named Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews, and Paul went in. Verse 2, as was his custom, and so Paul was customarily keeping the Sabbath.

He was customarily going to the Jews, who were also keeping the Sabbath, and he would be interacting with them. And it says, on three Sabbath days, he argued with them about this, from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Messiah to suffer and to rise from the dead.

See, this is what I read earlier about this was his message. This was a part of what he had them recognize and acknowledge. And, as I also read in verse 6, they were being accused. There were civil authorities who were accusing them. Jason was one of those who received Paul. It says, Jason is the one who's entertained them as guests. It says, these people in verse 6, who have been turning the world upside down, have come here as well. See, how was it that the message of the kingdom of God was received in this society in Philippi?

Or, this one is in Thessalonica. I'm sorry, I don't want to get mixed up here. The cities, you know, these should become familiar names to us, because these are going to be locations where churches are located, and then Paul is later going to write to these churches. And he's going to teach them and instruct them in the Word of God. And so, in verse 6, you see a description there. That is one of the ways that people might view the gospel of the kingdom.

Well, that's overthrowing my entire life. That's overthrowing the entire world! Well, yeah, in a sense it does, because we become not so independent, as Mr. Wellburn said in the sermonette. We become very dependent on God, depending on His Word, dependent on His Spirit, dependent on His plan, dependent and involved in His purpose for our lives. So, I want to then drop down to verse 10, because the believers sent Paul and Silas away to Berea. And you see them going to Berea in verse 10? They went from Thessalonica.

In verse 11 it says, The Jews there in Berea were more receptive than those in Thessalonica. They welcomed the message eagerly. And they examined the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so. They were regularly studying the Bible. They were wanting to read. Of course, they were reading the Old Testament. They were reading what they understood to be the Scriptures at the time. And yet, they were diligent about it.

And of course, that's an example for us. If we're going to stir up the Spirit that to be thriving and be burning in us, then we're going to need to have a desire and then an application of studying the Bible. That's part of why we're going over this. I want to be able to understand the Bible better.

And I want to be able to help you understand the Bible better, because it's not just a hodgepodge of books that have been somehow thrown together. God put these together in a particular way, and we can understand whenever Paul is going to be writing to some of these churches, like the one that is raised up in Philippi, he later would write the book of Philippians, the one that was raised up in Thessalonica.

He's going to write a couple of letters to the church at Thessalonica. But what I want to point out, brethren, is these are brand new Christians. They are just then getting some booklets. They're just then getting some information to try to, ah, the Sabbath is to be observed! Or, you know, the resurrection of the dead. That's a reality. Christ is going to return. He's going to set up a kingdom. The message of the kingdom of God had to be a remarkable thing to these new people who were being drawn into the church of God.

And so if we go down to verse 15, or 16, I guess it is, you see Paul then, and if you look on your map, you see, he's gone to Philippi, he's gone to Thessalonica, he's gone to Berea. He then goes down into the, you know, Kallen almost looks like the island areas there on the map, but close to there was Athens. And then from Athens, you're going to find that he will go over to the city of Corinth.

And from verse 16, down through the remainder of chapter 17 to verse 34, you see his interaction, and I'm not going to read all of this because, again, it's pretty easy for us to read. It's fairly clear. Luke is writing this very plainly. You can see what Paul did. You can see how it was that when he was allowed to speak, he, in a sense, brilliantly said, I see here you're very religious, and I see that you have a God called the Unknown God.

Well, I want to tell you about that Unknown God. I want to tell you about the Creator God, who has nothing to do with these idols. He's not made out of wood or stone or any other type of physical thing. He's a spirit. He's a spirit being. He is the Creator. And, of course, as we read earlier, he calls upon everyone in verse 30 to repent. Everyone. Everyone that he talked to, Jew or Greek, they all needed to repent.

Now, you don't find that many of them did. In verse 32, it says, when they heard about the resurrection, they scoffed. And yet others said, well, maybe we'll hear you again about this. And at that point, Paul left them. But some of them joined him and became believers, including Dionysius the Areopagite and a woman named Damaris and others with them. See, these are some of the people in Athens who apparently became believers and who were drawn into the Church because of the message that Paul had to teach. And in verse 1 of chapter 18, we go on to Paul leaving Athens and going to Corinth. In essence, he's going to come through Turkey, up through the coast of what would be Greece to us today, through Philippi, Thessalonica, Berea, Athens, and then Corinth.

And then from there, that's where he's going to ultimately return back to Jerusalem and to Antioch.

But see, Corinth was a very important place for him. It's an important place because of what we read in verse 19 here. Or excuse me, verse 9. Chapter 18, verse 9. One night the Lord said to Paul in a vision, Don't be afraid. Speak and do not be silent, for I am with you. No one will lay a hand on you to harm you, for there are many in this city who are my people. There are many in this city, which was in many ways a metropolitan city. It was somewhat of a corrupt city. It was a maritime city. It had a lot of corruption, a lot of idolatry, a lot of immorality.

And yet God said, I have a number of people that I'm going to draw to be a part of the Church of God here in this city. And of course, all of us know that this city was going to be the home of a church congregation who would warrant a couple of letters from Paul. Actually, he's not going to write those until he's on his third journey, I can tell you.

But I will tell you that while he is here in Corinth, and that's primarily what we read about early here in the first part of chapter 18, it says in verse 4, every Sabbath he would argue in the synagogue and would try to convince Jews and Greeks.

He was not only talking to the Israelites or Jews who were there, but he was talking to the Greeks, talking to other Gentiles. He was teaching them the gospel. And as it said, God said, I have many people, or I have much people in this area. Now, I wish that were the case in mid-Missouri. I wish that were the case in Kansas City right now. I wish that were the case in many other parts of not only this nation, but in many other parts around the world. But it doesn't seem like God is attracting quite as many right now.

Because we live in a different time and different age, a lot of different obstacles, and yet God is clearly able. He's clearly able to do that. And so you read through down to verse 18. I'll tell you, from verse 18 down to verse 22, that's really his return trip. But what we find in verse 11 is that Paul stayed there for 16... or what's it say, a year and six months, 18 months.

He was living in Corinth. He was working with Priscilla and Aquila. They were tent makers, and that was an occupation that Paul also had. They were able to do that. He would be able to continue to teach and preach. And people would be drawn by God to become believers and to be converted. Now, what else do you think Paul might have been doing?

Paul's thinking was, you know, I have congregations that God has raised up in the middle part of Turkey, in Galatia, in Pisdi and Antioch, in Lystra, in Colossae, which was fairly close, although he isn't directly mentioning that now. And he says, I have people that God has drawn into the church in Philippi and in Thessalonica, and I'm concerned about them.

I'm concerned about these brand new Christians. And so in verse 5, it says, when Silas and Timothy arrived from Macedonia, Paul was occupied with proclaiming the Word and testifying to the Jews that Messiah was Jesus. See, this was, you know, Paul was working, but his co-workers, Silas, who also was an evangelist or an apostle, I guess we would say, with Paul, he was his close friend and close co-worker, and he, Silas and Timothy, a younger man, but a servant along with Paul, you know, they had been up in Macedonia.

Now, what are the church areas that are in Macedonia? Well, one of them is Philippi, but one of them is Thessalonica. And you find Paul writing from Corinth, you find him writing as Silas and Timothy came to him, and they could give a report of what's going on in the churches up here in Macedonia. And they could tell him, you know, well, that they're doing well, you know, they have maybe this understanding or that understanding, or they need help with this. This is what we find whenever we see or read the book of 1 Thessalonians.

See, 1 Thessalonians was written by Paul. It appears, I think most commentaries agree, 1 Thessalonians, both of whom seem to have been sent from Corinth, and probably from some of the information that Timothy and Silas could bring him about how were the churches doing, those two books, those were written from Corinth, and they were, in essence, to nurture the new Christians there in Thessalonica. And so I want to go to these books, because, you know, they were written in order to encourage and to uplift.

You find Paul writing, 1 Thessalonians, and then, as I say, as he was there for a couple of years. It mentions being there for 18 months, but, you know, there was time getting there, there was time being established, you know, there was a lot. It would appear it may have been closer to two, maybe closer to three years, where Paul is interested in the people and the congregations that he had established. So here in 1 Thessalonians, let's take a look at 1 Thessalonians.

You know, what is it that you remember? I think there are some things in many different books of the Bible that kind of stand out to us.

What is it that you remember about 1 Thessalonians? Anybody want to venture a, not guess, but what is it that you remember?

Are there any memory verses that you would have out of 1 Thessalonians?

To remind them of their responsibility toward the remainder of the church. And actually, you find the people there in Thessalonica, they are greatly to be praised. They are greatly to be encouraged because of their ability to do that. Tom?

Well, it's me that they always trade you in 1 Thessalonians, the C-chef of war, about the resurrection. And then we realize that we may not be caught up together in the clouds. And thus we will always be with the Lord therefore comfort one another with these words. That's correct. See, those of us who ever have opportunity to give a funeral, you know, a service of any type of memorial or funeral service or gravesite or anything, we're probably going to read 1 Thessalonians 4. And verse 13 talks about, you know, we don't want you to be ignorant, brethren, about those who have died. And he goes ahead to elaborate on the fact that there's a resurrection that is, you know, going to occur. And that resurrection is going to happen at the last trump, and it's going to happen when Jesus returns. And, you know, he said, encourage one another with these words. That's what I remember. You know, I mean, if I were to think of, you know, the main thing that I think of in 1 Thessalonians would be about the resurrection or about Christ returning in a resurrection at that time. But he also encouraged them that they were doing so well as believers. Let's look in chapter, I'll just quickly go through these, 1 Thessalonians chapter 1. Paul and Silas and Timothy are writing to the Church of the Thessalonians in verse 1. And he says, now what is it that he wants these new Christians to know? What is it that he wants them to be firmly grounded in? Well, he says in verse 4, we know, brethren, and beloved of God, that God has chosen you. You have been called by God to Jesus Christ. God has chosen you because our message of the Gospel came to you not in word only, but in power and in the Holy Spirit and with conviction. Just as you know what kind of persons we proved to be among you for your sake. He says, we were there preaching what God had done for you. And in verse 7, he says, you have become an example to all the brethren in Macedonia and Achaia. You're an exemplary church! You're a congregation. This again is talking to the people in Thessalonica. He's writing this to them from being in Corinth.

He did not go to them at this time, but he did have his emissaries. He had Silas and Timothy up there, and they had come back, told him how things were and what questions maybe were still lingering, because that's what he answers in 1 Thessalonians. So in verse 7, he says, you're an example to all the brethren in Macedonia.

And in verse 10, I want you, as new Christians, I want you to wait for Jesus to return from heaven. Wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who rescues us from the wrath that's coming. Again, he was teaching the kingdom of God. He was teaching the return of Christ.

We drop down to chapter 2, verse 17. He says, as for us, brethren, when for a short time we were made orphans by being separated from you in person, not in heart, we longed with great eagerness to see your face. Paul really wanted to come see him, but he couldn't get away from Corinth. He had a lot to do in Corinth because God's drawing a lot of people into the church.

He inundated with visit requests. He just had all kinds of people that he needed to work with and to try to encourage and to be teaching and training. And so, if we drop down to verse 18, we wanted to come to you. Certainly I wanted to come to you again and again, but Satan blocked our way.

See, Paul's thought process was that I know where you are, I know who you are. You are my beloved brethren. God has drawn you, chosen you to be a part of the church of God. I want to encourage you toward the responsibility that we have of maintaining, maintaining our commitment to God. And he says in verse 19, for what is our hope for joy or crown or boasting before our Lord? Except that is coming, is it not you? Yes, you. You are our glory and our joy. See, he understood that as they were to look to the coming of Jesus, that the real benefit was their responsiveness to God, their relationship with God, their rapport with God.

Here in chapter 3, it says in verse 6, But Timothy has just now come to us from you and has brought us the good news of your faith and love. He has told us also that you always remember us kindly and long to see us just as we long to see you. See, this is what Lorraine mentioned earlier about they were a responsive group of people who were caring for one another and caring for Paul and concerned about what was happening. We drop down to verse 10. Night and day we pray most earnestly that we may see you face to face and restore whatever is lacking in your faith.

But now our God and Father Himself and our Lord Jesus Christ direct our way to you. See, Paul would write to these new beloved Christians and he would say, I'd love to come see you, but I can't do it right now. I just am not able to do that. And in a sense, he had been prevented. In chapter 4, verse 1, he says, Finally, brethren, we ask and urge you in the Lord that as you learn from us how you ought to live and how you ought to please God, as in fact you're doing, you should do so more and more.

He was encouraging them in holy living, in living according to the words from God that had been instilled in their heart. In verse 3, this is the will of God, your sanctification that you abstain from fornication, that each one of you know how to control his own body in honor and holiness and honor, and not with lustful passion like the Gentiles who don't know God. He said, don't be like everybody else around you. Don't be like the rest of society. Brethren, we can't get out of living in this world. We can't get out of a lot of the corruption around us. But we can certainly identify it, and we don't have to join in with it.

He says in verse 13, a section that we mentioned probably is very familiar, I don't want you to be ignorant, brethren, about those who have died. Apparently, since Paul was there in Corinth for almost a couple of years, and his trip was to take three or four years, there were brethren who died. And certainly the new Christians wonder, we hoped Christ would return. From what you told us, we hoped that Christ would return real soon. That was the impression that they got. And I will tell you, here in the second book of Thessalonians, which he was going to write maybe a year later, he's still in Corinth, he's having to clarify, well, there are a number of things that are going to happen before Christ returns.

There's going to be a huge debacle of a deceitful worker, a man of sin who will be revealed. That's what he's going to tell them in the second book. But when you read 1 Thessalonians, you see, his concern for these new people, don't be worried about it. The first death is not a problem, because God is going to resurrect you from that first death, no matter what. You need to prepare. You need, if you're still alive when Christ returns, you'll be changed. But if you're dead, then you'll be resurrected. And you will be glorified with Jesus Christ.

And of course, he talks in verse 16, the Lord Himself, with the cry and command, with the archangels called, and the sound of God's trumpet will descend from heaven. And the dead in Christ will rise first, and we were sure alive, and remain shall be caught up together in the clouds with them to meet the Lord in the air.

So shall we ever be with the Lord. It says, encourage one another with those words. Was he trying to help them? Did he want them to... See, we read this as, oh, these are the doctrines of the church. So this is what the Bible says. Well, this was a live letter to people who needed help. And in chapter 5, verse 1, concerning the times and seasons, rather, and you don't need to have anything written to you for you yourselves know very much that the day the Lord will come like a thief in the night.

Again, could they misunderstand exactly how quickly Christ was going to return? Yeah, you could, from the statements that Paul made in this letter. But I then want to jump to 2 Thessalonians here, because here, as Paul was staying in Corinth, he would write not only 1 Thessalonians, but 2 Thessalonians, in order to clarify some of the things that he had said. And he, again, is remarkably uplifting to these people. He says in verse 3 of chapter 1, 2 Thessalonians, We must always give thanks to God for you, brethren, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of every one of you from one another is increasing, and therefore we ourselves boast of you among the churches of God, for your steadfastness and your faith during all your persecution and affliction which you are enduring.

He was telling them, look, I know you're going through suffering. I know you're being persecuted. I know you're in distress. But he says, I also know that I can talk to everybody else about how well you are doing, how you are growing in faith, how you are loving toward one another. In verse 5, he says, this is evidence of the righteous judgment of God, and is intended to make you worthy of the kingdom of God for which you are suffering. He says, you are going through trials and tests, and you're enduring those quite well. You're enduring those in faith, and you just need to keep your eyes on the kingdom of God.

In chapter 2, you have a whole chapter that I'm not going to try to fully cover here at all, not even going to read, because it describes something that he's going to tell them, look, this man of sin has got to appear, and there's got to be a great falling away, and there's got to be a number of things that will happen before Jesus actually returns.

And again, we read that today, and we have to try to place that now where that's even yet to be. And keep in mind, rather, in the book of Revelation would not be written for another 30 years. This was revelation from God about what was going to happen, and we see this noted in the book of Revelation, in chapter 17 or 18 or 19, toward the end there, right before Christ returned, the false prophet and the beast power, they are ravaging the earth.

And yet here, he says, in Thessalonians chapter 2, he talks to them about how they need to continue to believe in the truth in verse 12, and to love in verse 10 the truth. It says, some will perish because they refuse to love the truth and be saved.

Or in verse 12, so that all who have not believed the truth, but take pleasure in unrighteousness, will be condemned. So this is what we see elaborated on in Revelation 19, about how it is that people simply just refuse to repent, and they want to fight Jesus Christ and resist the truth of God. And here in chapter 3, again, I'm not reading through all of these, and I hope if you have time and are able to read through these pretty short books, a few chapters in each one, that you can keep in mind that this was Paul's encouragement to a new congregation that he had established and that he truly loved, and he could even brag about them, he could boast about how well they were doing to others, because they were concerned, and they were really, they're going to be really good about collecting stuff and sending it back to Jerusalem, we'll learn later.

Again, you might look here in chapter 2, verse 13, for this purpose God called you through our proclamation of the gospel so that you could obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. So brethren, stand firm and hold fast to the tradition that you have been taught either by word or mouth or by letter. He says, I want you to realize how well you're doing, and I want you to continue to put your faith and trust in God, and I want you to anticipate the coming of Christ, but in the meantime, and this is actually what you find here in chapter 3, in the very conclusion of this shorter book, you find Paul warning them, you know, you're waiting for Christ to return.

You're waiting for him to come back. You might die. He had already told them that in 1 Thessalonians. You might die, and some have died, and that's okay. The dead in Christ, you're going to rise whenever Jesus returns, and we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the air. He said, this is what's going to happen. This is reality. And of course, if we wanted to verify that, we would look at 1 Corinthians 15.

You know, we would go to other places, and yet this was, in essence, some of the very first information that we see Paul extending to cause this church to thrive. And he also then is going to warn them. Since you're waiting for Jesus to come back, don't turn into a busy body and be idle and just do nothing and wait for Christ to return. That's what we find here in chapter 3, verse 6. We commend you, brethren, in the name of the Lord, to keep away from believers who are living in idleness and not according to their dedication that they receive from us.

You know how we were diligently working when we were here, and in verse 10, for even when we were with you, we gave you this commandment that anyone unwilling to work should not eat. For we hear that some of you are living in idleness, some of you are busy bodies, some of you are not doing any work. Now such persons should be commended and exhorted in the Lord to do their work quietly and learn their own living. And brethren, don't be weary in what is doing, don't be weary in doing what is right.

See, that was Paul's encouragement. In essence, that's an encouragement to us today. We are waiting. We yearn for. We desire. We want Jesus to intervene. But in the meantime, we need not to be idle. We need to be active. We need to be working. We need to be doing our job. We don't want to turn into idle individuals or busy bodies who are worried about everybody else's problems. I've got enough problems to worry about my own. I've got plenty of stuff to work on. And so I want to do that.

And yet that was what Paul was telling us, or telling the people in Thessalonica. And I go back to Acts 18. So those were the first two books that it appears Paul wrote, or that we have recorded in the Bible for us to now understand better, understand the setting.

He was in Corinth. Timothy and Silas had come to him, told him what was going on. He could kind of communicate some information to them through these two different books, maybe over a year or so, one and then the other. And here in chapter 18 of Acts, you see kind of a conclusion to Paul's second journey, because from Corinth he's going to be going back to Antioch. In verse 18, after staying there for a considerable time, and this was talking about Corinth, even though a year and a half is distinctly mentioned, it would probably be even longer than that.

Staying there for a considerable time, Paul said farewell to the believers, and he sailed for Syria, sailed for where Antioch would be. He was accompanied by Priscilla and Aquila. At Cincria he had his hair cut, for he was under a bow. And when they reached Ephesus, he left them. Priscilla and Aquila, he left them there. Priscilla and Aquila are a very wonderful couple, and they had been in Rome. They had come to Corinth, they had been there, and they were working when Paul got to Corinth.

He took them with them when he sailed across over to Ephesus, and then they stayed in Ephesus. They were able to, in a sense, help and stabilize the church. They were able to encourage Apollos. We're going to read this next time. This is what they did. And yet it says, in verse 19, he left them there. But first he went into the synagogue and had a discussion with the Jews. When they asked him to stay longer, he declined.

But on taking leave of them, he said, I must at all cost keep the approaching festival in Jerusalem. I need to get back to keep the feast. Now, I'm not sure exactly which thesis was. I don't know if it's clearly delineated, but at least he was talking about returning to Jerusalem.

And he says, following that, I will return to you if God wills. And so Paul had not, at this point, spent hardly any time in Ephesus. He was there very briefly, it appears. He left Aquila and Priscilla there, and then he went on. He left, and he said, I need to get back to Jerusalem in order to keep the feast. And in verse 22, they sailed across the Mediterranean to the east. They landed in Caesarea, which is on the coast.

He went up to Jerusalem. He greeted the brethren there, the church. And then he went down to Antioch. That pretty much is a conclusion of his second journey. And yet I hope we can see that Paul was expressing a great deal of concern for new people, new converts, new Christians. And he was beginning to write letters that would eventually be in our New Testament.

That we would have for doctrine and for reproof and for correction and for instruction in righteousness. Because that again is what Paul would later write to Timothy. Well, that's why Scripture is inspired by God. But I think it's fascinating to see, you know, in a sense... Now, I'm going to tell you, I'm not able to fully know when Paul wrote every letter exactly. I see these being very early, and I believe that that's commonly thought to be the case. Some of the others were written on his next tour, and several others were written clearly when he is in prison, in Rome.

And so you can kind of identify him that way. And you see him writing then to Timothy and to Titus, because I'm going to have to turn over the mantle. I'm going to have to...

you know, I'm going to die. He knew that when you get to 2 Timothy. I'm going to be put to death pretty quick. But I hope you can see, and I hope maybe going back and reading through 1 and 2 Thessalonians, you can see what it was that Paul's concern was. He wanted them focused on the return of Jesus and the Kingdom of God. That was their focus. That was the big picture. That was the trunk of the tree. And he says, don't be idle.

You know, I have a lot of good things to say about you to everybody I meet. But I want you to continue to grow because you have an understanding of the Gospel that I'm teaching and preaching, and that I have set an example that I want you to follow. So that is a concluding point here for Paul's second journey. And we will probably get into the third journey next time.