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  

Theopolitan Reading

Peter J. Leithart, Theopolitan Reading (Theopolis Books / Athanasius Press, 2020)

Theopolis Fundamentals Series

116pp pb

ISBN: 9781735169002

£9.71 on Amazon UK today / $11.95 from the publisher

 

Anyone interested in reading the Bible more richly could benefit from spending time with this book.

 

This is not an elaborate hermeneutical text book of rules which allow the reader to insert the correct inputs, grind the machine and chunk out a correct reading. Instead, in an introductory chapter, Dr Leithart offers to serve as a mentor in the art of the Spiritual Reading of Scripture which pays close attention to the letter. Scripture is concerned for our intellectual and moral formation, which is partly achieved by our (sacramental) imaginative and liturgical formation. The church must be soaked in the Scriptures. We should aim to be at least as familiar with the story and detail of the Bible as we are with logos, brands, jingles, personalities and gossip of pop culture. We want to read the cues which the Bible gives us in terms of plot (division and reformation, exile and return, death and resurrection), character or setting (e.g. garden, temple, vineyard, wilderness, city, well) as readily as we can identify the genre or mood of a film from an establishing short or a change in the score. We want to begin to sense the biblical associations of mountains (and High Places and altars), water, trees, birds and animals, stars and all that God has made and spoken about to proclaim his glory.

 

The Bible is seen as a highly patterned (typological), artistic, symbolic, figurative and literal literary text. The end of the Old Covenant world might be described as the “stars falling from heaven”. This does not mean that the astrological bodies will hit the earth, but it does speak of an actual change of rulers and regime with the death and resurrection of the Messiah, which the Fall of Jerusalem in AD 70 caps, marking the end of the old world order of Temple and Law.  

 

The Bible’s main concern is not simply heaven and the soul but God-and-his-world-and-people, Christ and his body. It speaks of real events in this world (of a polis, a city) but most often in poetic and narrative terms. Scripture is not, in the main, a philosophical Dogmatics about God in himself but a developing drama of God’s dealings with the world, with Adam (and the Last Adam and his people) and Eve (and the Bride of Christ). All human beings are some variation of Adam and Eve, all places more or less Edenic.

 

The bulk of the book thus traces, sometimes lyrically, themes laid out in Genesis 1-3 and the Scriptural riffs on the world, Adam, Eve and Eden as originally created, fallen, redeemed and eschatological. Trained readers can hear allusions (overtones, harmonies, shifts in meter and instrumentation) as they attend to the “connotations, import and implications of what’s written” in all the Scriptures (p16).

 

Even if you worry this is fanciful in places, or you’re not convinced by each individual proposal, the overall approach seems compelling and the attention is worthy of the divine-human masterpiece which is the Bible. I would have liked a Scripture index so that I could more easily go back to the suggestions on the many individual passages that are scattered throughout the text.  

 

Take up and read. Taste and see!

Acts 15vv1-35 headings and jottings

A sermon outline:

Black pudding (vv20, 29)

“The Gentile problem”

The issues:

- How should Christians live? vv1, 5

- Mission to Jews and Gentiles

- Fellowship between Jews and Gentiles

- The gospel itself / salvation! v1

“The Council of Jerusalem” (vv2-4)

(1) The gospel principle:

  

God’s actions and the Scriptures show that it was always his plan that

Jews and Gentiles alike

should be saved by grace alone

through faith alone

in Christ alone,

not by circumcision

nor by keeping the Law of Moses

vv6-19 esp. vv8-9, 11 

Gospel Mathematics

Maybe I should have put the mathematics in inverted commas!

I hope this will be a helpful way of putting it and any mathematical pendants can see me afterwards!

I was assuming x > 0!

Jewish believers + Gentile believers = One Christian Church

1 + 1 = 1!

One family

One body of Christ

One church

Equality – no second-class citizens

V8 – Jews and Gentiles are equally acceptable to God in exactly the same way, on the same terms

Not two ways of salvation (one for the Jews and one for the Gentiles) but one

Grace + Faith à Salvation + Good Works

Not, Grace + Faith + GOOD WORKS à Salvation

Good works are a consequence not a cause of salvation

  

Christ + x does not equal the Gospel

Or, Christ + x = 0

To add to Christ is to take away the gospel 

We get into the church by grace and we get on within the church by being gracious

(2) A gracious plan:

 For the sake of fellowship and mission,

the Gentile believers should avoid giving any unnecessary offence to the Jews

by having nothing to do with pagan idolatry or immorality

vv19-21 esp. the reason given in v21

vv28-29

So, this passage calls for absolute clarity on the gospel of grace (point 1) but also for:

A loving practical policy (point 2), for kindness, generosity, thoughtfulness, sensitivity and empathy.

It calls for:

CLARITY and CONSIDERATION

TRUTH and LOVE

GRACE and GRACIOUSNESS

The GOSPEL and GENEROSITY

SALVATION and SENSITIVITY

FAITH and FAMILY

The Gentiles are exhorted to:

Servant heartedness

Giving up of their rights

Going the extra mile

* * * 

I have resisted as absurd more G and P headings like 

The gathering ponders / pronounces / publishes

and

The gospel / glad progress / peace / preaching / proclamation 

etc.!

* * * 

Other jottings:

Tom Wright, p43, “Basically, James and the conference as a whole were clear on two things. First, the law should not be imposed on Gentile converts. Second, they should be told that they had better keep some significant bits of it just in case. Get it? No?”

“James and the others work out the double principle of no needful circumcision on the one hand and no needfless offence on the other.” (p45)

Perterson: the Gentiles are asked “not to offend Jews by their behaviour in certain critical ways (vv. 19-21, 28-29). Here is an attempt to allow the gospel free course among Jews and Gentiles, maintaining a spiritual and practical unity among believers while showing a particular concern for the sensitivity and scruples of Jews.” (p423f)

Porneia could mean marriage within a relationship approved by Gentiles but not by Jews (Cook, p215)

A way in which Jewish and Gentile Christians can live together is agreed (Peterson)

 Peterson: “The Jerusalem Council acknowledged that Gentile Christians were not obliged to live under the yoke of the law. At the same time, it challenged them to exercise their liberty with wisdom, restraint, and love, recognising the concerns of some Jewish Christians about contamination through any association with idolatrous practices. The requirements commended to Gentile believers… were designed to keep the lines of fellowship open with Jewish believers by giving warning to the Gentiles about any compromise with the idolatry and immorality that was so much part of their world.” (p440)

The decree of the Council “was a warning to abstain from acts that would offend Jewish scruples and hinder social intercourse between Jewish and Gentile believers. But its deeper significance is the implied challenge to break completely with every pagan association and practice (cf. 2 Cor. 6:14-7:1) and to do all things, even eating and drinking, to the glory of God, causing no one to stumble ‘whether Jews, Greeks or the church of God’ (1 Cor. 10:31-32).” (Peterson, p446)

John Stott: The Council “secured a double victory – a victory for truth in confirming the gospel of grace, and a victory of love in preserving the fellowship by sensitive concessions to conscientious Jewish scruples.” (p257)

Spencer quoted in Peterson, p418:

Dissension (vv1-5)

Discussion (vv6-18)

Decision (vv19-29)

Dissemination (15v30-16v5)

Some friends on Facebook kindly suggested snappier versions of my headings:

1. Getting in: one gospel for all

2. Getting on: don't make Jews fall

1. We're one family in Jesus

2. So, bear with one another in Jesus.

Saved by grace

Saved for grace

Be committed to the gospel of grace

Be kind to the church

The principle of grace

The practicalities of love

Wiersbe: 'Don't close the doors!'

Don’t be annoying! Just because you can doesn't mean you should!

Midweek Meeting 22/7/20 - Philippians 4v10-end

There's no need to prepare, but if you'd like to think about Philippians 4v10-end before our midweek meeting on Wed 22nd July, hopefully you might find some of these questions helpful:

(Some notes to follow after the session too.)

STUDY QUESTIONS:

What gives you / people in general contentment or prevents contentment?

We’ve seen rejoicing / joy as a theme in this letter (1:4, 18; 2:2, 18; 3:1; 4:1, 4). What does Paul rejoice in according to these verses and why?

Paul talks about being content whatever the circumstances in v12. What were Paul’s circumstances when he wrote this letter? (What might the future hold for him?)

Do you think this contentment came naturally to Paul? Did he just happen to be a contented sort of person? (v11)

What do you think Paul meant by contentment exactly? Presumably he would have liked his circumstances to have been different. And he talked about pressing on and straining towards the goal in 3vv12-14 so presumably this contentment is not a total indifference / apathy / lack of effort. (Could you distinguish right and wrong types / manners of / reasons for contentment?)

What do you think the challenges of being in need, or having plenty, or being well fed or hungry or in want might be (v12)? When is it easier / harder to be content?

Why do you think Paul could be content?

How can we cultivate a godly Biblical contentment?

Might anything in the earlier part of chapter 4 (or indeed the rest of the letter) help us with contentment?

V13: I can do everything through Jesus? Really? Can I run the four-minute mile through Jesus? So what is the “everything” I can do which Paul is talking about here?

What do we learn about Christian partnership / fellowship / mutual support / financial giving from this passage?

How is the Philippian’s financial gift to Paul described in v18?

How does this motivate giving?

How might v19 enable us to give generously?

How would you describe / value God’s “glorious riches in Christ Jesus?” (v19)

Can you recall the meaning of the word “saints” in the New Testament? (vv21 and 22; see also 1v1) To whom does it refer?

Can you say anything about the main themes or big ideas of the letter?

Could you write a summary theme and aim sentence?

Is there anything that has stood out for you from the letter which you hope will stay with you?

You could perhaps choose a memory verse or two to learn and meditate upon.

Praise and prayer in the light of the passage and letter:

Acts 14

Some jottings / notes on one way of thinking about / preaching Acts 14 might be:

The Bible writers often invite us to play spot the difference:

They want us to be alert to similarities and differences:

They invite us to make comparisons and contrasts.

And we can see a number in our Bible passage today which I trust we’ll find illuminating.

If you can remember back to last week, some of today’s passage will be familiar.

Luke tells us in v1 that “At Iconium, Paul and Barnabas went as usual into the Jewish synagogue.”

One scholar goes so far as to translate it “what happened in Iconium was much the same.” (N. T. Wright)

That’s probably rather a stretch as a translation, but it’s a helpful idea, I think.

Luke doesn’t repeat himself for the sake of it.

He’s deliberately showing us a characteristic pattern.

Here’s a norm of gospel ministry:

Iconium is like Pisidian Antioch: a characteristically mixed response to the gospel, which is first for the Jew then for the Gentile.

  

...

In Lystra, Paul heals a paralysed man and we find that Paul is like both Jesus and Peter and unlike Herod.

Let’s think about those three in turn.

Paul is like Jesus: Jesus continues to work powerfully through his Apostles in the power of the Holy Spirit

In Lystra, Paul heals a paralysed man, like Jesus had done in Luke chapter 5.

In fact, there seems to be a deliberate parallel between Jesus in Luke chapters 4 and 5 and Paul Acts chapters 13 and 14.

In each case there’s a confrontation with the devil, a synagogue sermon and a response, and the healing of a paralysed man.

The point is the big picture of Acts:

Paul is doing Jesus’ work.

He’s like Jesus.

He’ Jesus’ faithful servant.  

The Apostles act as Jesus authorised representatives.

Remember that Acts is all about what the risen Jesus continues to do through his people.

...

Its no surprise if Jesus’ people suffer and are rejected because that’s what happened to the Saviour.

Paul is like Peter: all the Apostles preached the same gospel, but the presentation was carefully adapted to their hearers and their needs

The Apostle Peter is prominent in the first half of the book of Acts, as Paul is in the second half.

And Peter and John healed a paralysed man in chapter 3, as Paul and Barnabas do in this chapter.

Luke wants us to see that Paul is acting as a faithful, authentic Apostle.

That will be important because Paul is the great Apostle to the Gentiles.

He took the good news of Jesus to the nations in a big way (which was controversial) but he was continuing what Peter had begun by taking the good news to the Gentile, Cornelius.

There was one united Apostolic mission from Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth.

...

We could add another compare and contrast, then:

The same essential gospel is presented in different ways

...

Paul is unlike Herod: the Apostles are ordinary human beings sharing the good news of Jesus for the good of others and the glory of the only living, loving Creator God  

The Lsytrans’ desire to worship Paul and Barnabas as gods, might remind us of the people who call King Herod a god at the end of chapter 12.

...

Lastly,

All Christians are like Jesus and the Apostles: they can expect the cross then the resurrection, suffering then glory – “we must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God”

...

Who will you be like?

Will you be like those who gladly believe the good news of Jesus?

And will you be like Paul in boldly and wisely sharing it with others, though it means opposition?

Let me encourage you to ponder these comparisons and contrasts:

The same gospel of Jesus and Peter and Paul, presented in different ways and to different sorts of people.

Producing different responses: faith from some and opposition from others.

Let us resolve to stick with the good news of Jesus and share it with others, playing our part in the unstoppable mission of God.

And so to one living and loving creator God, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit be all honour and power and glory, now and for ever.

Should Christians love their temples?

Some may find Calvin's comments on Psalm 27v4 surprising:

One thing have I desired of the LORD, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the LORD, and to inquire in his temple.

We should now consider, whether the faithful are to be like-minded under the Christian or Gospel dispensation. [582] I own, indeed, that we are in very different circumstances from the ancient fathers; but so far as God still preserves his people under a certain external order, and draws them to him by earthly instructions, temples have still their beauty, which deservedly ought to draw the affections and desires of the faithful to them. The Word, sacraments, public prayers, and other helps of the same kind, cannot be neglected, without a wicked contempt of God, who manifests himself to us in these ordinances, as in a mirror or image.

https://biblehub.com/commentaries/calvin/psalms/27.htm

Philippians 4vv2-9 study questions

Some study questions on Philippians 4vv2-9 ahead of our midweek meeting on Wed 15th. There's no expectation that people prepare but just in case these are helpful in taking a look in advance:

STUDY QUESTIONS:

What can we tell (or not) about the conflict between Euodia and Syntyce from the letter?

Presumably Paul doesn’t necessarily want Euodia and Syntyce to agree about everything, so what do you think he is really asking them to do in v2?

Is there anything else in the letter that would help / motivate them to “agree with each other in the Lord?”?

What have we already seen from our studies that would relevant to the theme of Christian unity / how Christians should relate to one another?

What does this passage teach us about how to treat / resolve conflict / fallings out in the church?

Is there a Christian with whom you need to be reconciled?

Or Christians whom you might be able to help to be reconciled?

What steps might you take in the light of this passage?

What might it mean / look like to “rejoice in the Lord always” (v4)?

On rejoicing Cf. 1v18; 2v17-18; 3v1

This is a striking command. Why / how can we rejoice whatever our circumstances, even when we don’t feel like it?

What reasons do we have for doing so (from the letter)?

How might we rejoice in the Lord more fully / often?

How can we help one another in this?

(How might rejoicing in the Lord always help with the conflict described in v2?)

Are you anxious? What about? Why?

(What things threaten your joy or peace?)

How do you cope with anxiety?

What antidotes to anxiety does the passage suggest? (Why / how so?)

What difference might the nearness of the Lord make? (v5)

Can you think of examples of the things mentioned in v8?

(How would you sum them up / put them into your own words?)
How can we “think about such things” more?

(What would be the opposite of the stuff listed in v8? Are there ways we can avoid that stuff?)

Think about v9. Do you have any idea of the things Paul might particularly have in mind here? Can you think of things which the letter might have suggested Paul was exemplary in? (cf. 3v17. Arguably he also held up Timothy and Epaphroditus as examples in 2v19ff)

What could we “put into practice” (v9) from this study or from the letter as a whole so far?

How would you sum up this passage?

How might it be turned into praise, thanks and prayer?

* * *

NOTES:

We know that conflicts and fallings out can sometimes take place between Bible believing Christians and can do damage to a church and / or to its witness.

Commendable Christians can sometimes fall out! (vv2-3)

Paul obviously thinks this conflict is pretty serious – important enough to write to the whole church about.

We might be tempted to ignore / avoid / belittle conflict. Paul thinks it needs to be sorted out.

He doesn’t treat their conflict as merely private.

He seems to think that Euodia and Syntyche might need some help to agree and he wants Syzygus to get involved.

Paul doesn’t tell us what the conflict is about.

And he doesn’t take sides.

Maybe both sides need to change / forgive?

V2 agree, lit. think the same things

Gentleness / reasonableness / forbearance / moderation perhaps an undervalued virtue? (v5)

V5 - “The Lord is near” – cf. Ps 145:18 – “The LORD is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth”

Cf. Ps 34:18 – The Lord is near the broken-hearted

V7, guard = garrison, cf. the garrison of Roman soldiers based at Philippi