Acts 16vv16-end - an outline

 You might like to look away now if you are coming to Bodle Street or Warbleton in the morning and you like your sermons surprising!

 

The unstoppable power of Jesus and his gospel

… opens Lydia’s heart to respond to Paul’s message and to serve the gospel (vv14-15, 40)

… sets a slave girl free from the power of evil (vv16-18)

… provokes the slave owners, the magistrates and the crowd (vv19-24)

… enables Paul and Silas to sing hymns in prison at midnight (v25)

… sets Paul and Silas free from prison (vv26-28)

… saves and transforms the jailer and his household (vv29-34)

… alarms / humbles / humiliates the magistrates (vv35-39)

… creates a diverse church (v40)

 

Cf. Galatians 3v28 & Acts 16

 

Believe in the Lord Jesus (v31)!

 

Serve Jesus and his gospel (with your brothers and sisters in Christ) with joy and confidence, even in the face of suffering and opposition

 

Acts 16vv16-end - repeated words

 I have been working on Acts 16:16ff, the miraculous escape from prison in Philippi. 

It is perhaps just worth noting a couple of repeated words which might not leap out from the English translations. 

Vv18 & 19 – exe_lthen repeated – the spirit was gone from the slave girl so her owners’ way of making money was gone

Vv39 and 40 – repetition of parekalesan – v39, The magistrates appeased / besought / urged / begged / pleaded with / apologised to Paul and Silas and v40, Paul and Silas encourage / comfort / exhort the brothers

Dane Ortlund, Gentle and Lowly

 

My holiday Christian book has been Dane Ortlund’s Gentle and Lowly: The Heart of Christ for Sinners and Sufferers (Crossway, 2020).

 

The attractively produced cloth bound volume of 224 pages contains 23 meditations on biblical texts on the heart of Jesus, drawing on the work of Calvin, the Puritans, Edwards and Spurgeon. An index and Scripture index will add to its usefulness.

 

Ortlund focuses on the love, compassion and mercy of Christ, who said “I am gentle and lowly in heart” (Matthew 11:29), whilst seeking to uphold God’s simplicity and impassibility. More could have been said about the “emotional life of God” and I’m not completely convinced this is a helpful term even when qualified by ideas such as God’s eternity and incorporeality (see p73). It seems to me there is value in speaking of the “natural” and “strange” works of God (his love and his judgement) (chapter 15) but I think Ortlund is right to think that we risk questioning God’s divine perfections if we think of God as “conflicted within himself when he sends affliction into our lives” (p138).

 

I pick out a few highlights before:

 

The word used for the compassion of Jesus refers to the guts or bowels and reminds us how deeply he feels for us (p26, 106). The Son of God moves towards those who do not deserve his mercy but who desire it (p27).

 

As Thomas Goodwin said, “Christ is love covered over in flesh.” (p32) Peal back his skin and you would find love!

 

Goodwin imagines Christ interacting with the man who thrust the spear into Christ’s side. “I will cherish him in that very bosom he has wounded; he shall find the blood he shed an ample atonement for the sin of shedding it.” (see further p38)

 

Christ is the head and we really are his parts, which he loves (p40f)

 

C. S. Lewis on Jesus resisting temptation like a man continually walking into the wind. Jesus never gave up and lay down in the battle against temptation as we so easily do and therefore Jesus’ temptations were, in this sense, more testing than ours in that he continued to resist them (p49).

 

Notice the parallel between Hebrews 4:15 and 5:2, sunpathesai and metriopathein (p52)

 

Bunyan, Come and Welcome to Jesus Christ (1678)

 

We don’t feel the weight of our sin because of our sin! (p68)

 

Grace is not a thing. The gospel is Jesus Christ and his personal heart of grace towards us. (pp69, 211)

 

The work of the cross was “Finished!” but the intercession of Christ applies what the cross accomplished (p79). Jesus’ intercession hits “refresh” in the courtroom of heaven (p80).

 

Christ prays for us in heaven. Imagine we could hear him doing so now in the room next door! (p84)

 

Jonathan Edward’s sermon “To the children, Aug. 1740” (p95) – those aged 1-14 - ? 15-20 minutes – Matthew 10:37 – six reasons to love Jesus more than anything else

 

As with a photograph in crisp focus, precision in theology can help to bring out beauty (p99)

 

Compassion is the emotion more frequently attributed to Jesus in the Bible (Warfield, On the Emotional Life of Our Lord, 1912) (p105).

 

On the pactum salutis, the covenant of redemption between the members of the Trinity see p128f

 

Goodwin spoke from the floor more times than anyone at the Westminster Assembly (357 times) (p143).

 

On Exodus 33-34 see pp145ff. God’s glory is his goodness. Slow to anger, Heb., long of nostrils (p148)

 

Dt 7:9, not that God’s love will run out at generation 1001! (p149).

 

Pp152f – the parallels between Mark 6 and Exodus esp. Mk 6:48 and Ex 33:22, “pass by”. Jesus thus reveals the glory of Yahweh.

 

“as high as the heavens are above the earth” – Psalm 103:11 and Isaiah 55:9 (p158).

 

With respect to God’s covenant faithfulness, the opposite of his remembering his people for good is not really forgetting but forsaking (p165).

 

Heart, meah, Jeremiah 31, bowels / entrails as in 2 Samuel 20:10. Yearns, hamah, restless / agitated / growling / roaring / boisterous / turbulent (p165f).  

 

Goodwin on God loving your persons but hating your sins (p168)

 

Ephesians 2

Vv1-3 – why we need saving – the problem

Vv5-6 – what this saving is – the solution

V4 – why God saved us – the reason (p171)

 

Our law-ish hearts and Christ’s lavish heart (chapter 20)

 

Jonathan Edwards, “The creation of the world … that the eternal Son of God might obtain a spouse” – The Church’s Marriage to Her Sons, and to Her God – see p206

 

Ephesians 2:7, kindness = easy in Matthew 11:20 (p210)

 

Your death is not a wall but a door, not an exit but an entrance (p212)

 

The Christian life in two steps:

1 – Go to Jesus

2 – see 1! (p216)

https://www.10ofthose.com/uk/products/25689/gentle-and-lowly

Psalm 24 notes

 God-willing we're going to look at Psalm 24 in our midweek meeting on Wed 26th August. Far be it from me to steal my own thunder, but:

I preached on the Psalm here: https://www.warbletonchurch.org.uk/sermons-talks/?sermon_id=335

And it may be that someone might find some of the following jottings helpful:

 

Turn back to Psalm 24 (p555) [slide]

 

[slide]

Our Psalm begins with a little hymn of Praise to God the creator.

It’s as if the Psalmist is using the widest-angle lens possible here because it takes in everything, the whole cosmos:

 

 Vv1-2: “The earth is the LORD’s, and everything in it,

The world, and all who live in it;

For he has founded it upon the seas

And established it on the waters.”

 

God is the creator, owner, ruler and sustainer of all places and people

 

Everything, everyone, everywhere belongs to God who made them.

The earth, fruitful, peopled, solid and established is the Lord’s.

We depend on him for everything.

And we belong to him by right.

We didn’t make ourselves; we are God’s craftmanship and we bare our makers mark.

There is not a centremeter of the universe over which God doesn’t rightly say “mine!”

 

Seas / waters (v2) suggest threat / chaos

God rules over them.

His rule is certain and secure.

He governs and sustains and upholds all things.

 

We could break out into “He’s got the whole world in his hands!”

 

[slide]

So we begin with that wide-angle lens.

But twice in our Psalm, the Psalmist is going to zoom in.

(It would be cool is we had a video of this, but today we just have slides)

 

Vv3-4 zoom in from all people and all places to a particular place and some particular people

 

V3: “Who may ascend the hill of the LORD?

Who may stand in his holy place?”

 

Ascend = go up

 

The hill of the LORD? -  mount Zion [slide]

God’s holy place ? the temple? [slide]

 

Although the whole earth belongs to God, and of course he is present everywhere, the temple was the place God had promised to be specially present to his people, to meet with them and bless them. 

 

God’s holy presence

 

Holiness – separate from all sin and evil – blazing purity

God - Light in whom there is no darkness at all

His eyes are too pure to look on sin

 

[slide]

We sometimes imagine that God would happily welcome everyone, like a kind of friendly grandfather giving out Werther’s Originals

“God will forgive, that’s his job!”

 

But the temple in Jerusalem spoke of both welcome and no entry [slide]

 

God was present to bless his people

He wanted to meet with them

And he called them to come to him

 

But the temple also had a series of no entry signs

For the Gentile nations

For non-priests

For everyone except the high priest once a year carrying the blood of sacrifice

 

It is very hard for a sinful people to come into the presence of a Holy God

 

Terms and Conditions apply!

See v4

 

[slide]

God’s guest list (v4):

The Entry requirements:

 

Clean hands? – actions

Pure heart

Pure worship – he “who does not lift up his soul to an idol”

Pure lips – “or swear by what is false”

 

We might say it covers:

Right living

Right thinking

Right relationship with God

Right relationship with others

 

None of us perfectly meets those requirements

 

[slide]

But God promises blessing and vindication (justice / righteousness / justification) to those who sincerely seek him in his appointed way (vv5-6)

In the Old Testament, faithful covenant keeping sinners could come into God’s presence on the basis of sacrifice

Of course believers then knew they weren’t perfect and needed God’s forgiveness and mercy

The innocent animal died in their place so that they could be forgiven

And they trusted God for vindication

 

Our Psalm leaves us looking for a perfect king.

Who may ascend the hill of the LORD?

Who may stand in God’s holy place?

Is there one who can do so by right?

Is there anyone really totally and completely good?

Is there someone good enough?

And of course as Christians we know the answer!

 

[slide]

Only Jesus perfectly meets the requirements of v4

Think of his actions and his words…

Such love and compassion and humility and wisdom and…

Never did or said or thought anything wrong

Never for a moment gave in to temptation

Such total loyalty to God his Father and his purposes

 

He is the ultimate sacrifice for sin, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world

The perfect, faultless lamb of God without any spot or blemish

 

When we trust in him, we receive the gift of his righteousness, which is by God’s grace to all those who have faith in Jesus

 

[slide]

Vv7-10 zoom in again to focus on the LORD Almighty the King of Glory

 

[slide]

Imagine a city greeting the LORD as the victorious king, a warrior mighty in battle (v7-)

Although later than OT times, we might try to picture a Roman Triumph

The conquering hero acclaimed from the ramparts of the city

The gates are lifted up!

The ancient doors are flung wide!

So the great victor is welcomed in.

 

Look at the description of God in v8:

“The LORD strong and mighty,

The LORD mighty in battle.”

There are many demonstrations of that in the Bible.

Do we think of God as a warrior?

A frequent Old Testament description of God

The LORD of hosts, the LORD of armies

We would do well to reflect on it.

 

[slide]

A triumphal procession

Cf. Palm Sunday – Jerusalem greets Jesus as the king

 

[slide]

Cf. Jesus’ triumph by his cross and resurrection

Welcome Jesus the victorious King of Glory who defeated sin and death for us!

 

[slide]

Praise God trusting in Jesus, the victorious King of Glory, the perfect sacrifice for sin.

Clothed in Jesus’ righteousness, we are welcomed in and we rejoice to stand forgiven and clean in God’s holy presence.

 

* * *

 

Christopher Idle’s, This Earth Belongs To God

 

A tiny hymn about the power of God the creator

An entrance liturgy about the holiness of God the Lord

A procession liturgy about the victories of God the King

 

A procession

Enthronement ceremony

David bringing the ark of the covenant up to Mount Zion – 2 Sam 6; 1 Chron 15 and 16; 1 Chron 13:8

Maybe the installation of the ark in Zion was the greatest day of David’s life (Kidner)

Traditionally sung at ascension

The victor’s arrival to possess his citadel

 

The first emphatic word in the Hebrew is The Lord’s

 

V1 – tebhel – the peopled-world, the inhabited world

 

The sea (v2) representing chaos / threat

 

V2 upon or above

 

In a sense, of course, we are never out of the presence of God who is the creator and ruler of all things.

But v4 gives us 4 qualifications for coming into God’s presence

God made all places, but he has also made one holy place

 

Ex 15:2-3, 17-18 – coming to a mountain in the promised land

 

V5 vindication is lit. righteousness

 

Heb 12:22 – We have come to Mount Zion

 

* * *

 

Kidner:

 

King of Glory

 

Vv1-2: The All-Creating

Vv3-6: The All-Holy

Vv7-10: The All-Victorious

 

* * *

 

Motyer:

 

Fling Wide The Gates

 

Approaching (vv1-2)

Welcoming (vv3-6)

            Personal integrity (v4)

            Spiritual integrity (v4b)

            Social integrity (4b-6)

Entering (vv7-10)

            Request (v7)

            Interrogation (v8a)

            Reply (v8b)

            Request (v9)

            Interrogation (v10a)

            Reply (v10b)

 

* * *

 

Wilcock:

 

A very special occasion

A climax

A starting point

 

* * *

 

Goldingay:

 

Yhwh’s ownership of the world

Conditions for approaching Yhwh

Admitting Yhwh to the city

 

* * *

 

Expositor’s Bible:

 

The King of Glory is Our God

 

A The Great King (vv1-2) – the creator God

B The Hill of the Lord (vv3-6) – the holy God

A’ The Divine Warrior (vv7-10) – the glorious King

 

* * *

 

Wilson, NIV Application Commentary

 

Yahweh’s creative authority (vv1-2)

Preparation to enter the presence of God (vv3-6)

The King of Glory comes (vv7-10)

 

* * *

 

Spurgeon:

 

Part (1) glorifies the true God and sings of his universal dominion

(2) the true Israel who are able to commune with this God

(3) the ascent of the true Redeemer who has opened heaven’s entrance to his elect

Wafers at Holy Communion

I can't claim to know anything about this stuff, but I was interested to read this and thought it worthy of note:

According to The Privy Council in Ridsdale v Clifton (No.2), (1877) 2 P.D. 276, 349: “The practice of using fine wheat bread such as is usual to be eaten, and not cake or wafer, appears to have been universal throughout the Church of England from the alteration of the rubric in 1662, till 1840, or later.” 

The Privy Council found in this case that wafers proper were illegal but “there is no averment that the wafer, as distinguished from bread ordinarily eaten, was used." It was possible that the 'wafer' was in fact "bread “such as is usual to be eaten,” “but circular, and having such a degree of thinness as might justify its being termed wafers”. They went on to say that (page 349): “if it had been averred and proved that the wafer, properly so called, had been used by the appellant, it would have been illegal.”

Acts - The Big Picture

I am preaching my way through the book of Acts. (We are on chapter 16). I was heartened that with a little prompting the congregation could give what seems to me to be a pretty good account of the big picture of the book. 

The words of the risen Jesus to his Apostles set the agenda for the book in 1:8:

"you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

Although the Apostles are prominent in the book (especially Peter in the first half and Paul in the second) The Acts of the Apostles is not just about the Twelve or Thirteen. In vv1 and 2, Luke says his former book, his gospel, was about "all that Jesus began to do and to teach until the day he was taken up to heaven". Acts is about what the risen Jesus continues to do by his Holy Spirit through his people. This is a book about the mission of God, about what he is doing in his world. 

The Word of God or the gospel might be said to be the main character of he book. Luke frequently gives us little summary statements about the growth and spread of the gospel. There are all sorts of difficulties and persecution, but the mission of God proves unstoppable. The book ends with Paul in chains at the heart of the empire, but the gospel not chained: "Boldly and without hindrance he preached the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ."

All this should encourage us to pray for the power of the Holy Spirit that we too might play our part in the mission of God, taking the good news of the risen Lord Jesus to all the nations. 

Acts 15:36-16:15 - A Sermon Outline - ALL CHANGE?

It is debatable whether Acts 15:36-16:15 is the most natural unit, but it seemed a suitable section to preach on without making the next selection of material in the series tricky!

If you are coming to Warbleton tomorrow or watching online, you may care to look away now or prepare by studying what follows!

ALL CHANGE - but God and his powerful gospel mission are unchanged

The mission teams change (15v36-16v5)

A sad disagreement leads to two mission teams rather than one (15vv36-41)

Timothy is willing to change for the sake of the gospel mission (16vv1-4)

Biblical firmness and flexibility:

Unwilling to change the gospel…

… but willing to change for the gospel

Paul says:“To the Jews I became like a Jew,to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law.” (1 Corinthians 9v20)

Paul changes his plans as God directs His mission (16vv6-10)

God changes Lydia’s heart – and she demonstrates her changed heart by generous hospitality (16vv11-15)

“ALL CHANGE!?”

Has God changed your heart? And does it show in your changed life?

Are you willing to change for the sake of the gospel?

God and his powerful gospel mission are unchanged

He directs his unstoppable mission and can bring good out of bad