Well, open in your Bibles to Acts chapter 17. Over the next number of weeks, we're going to be opening up and looking into Paul's letters to the saints in Thessalonica. And here in chapter 17 of Acts, we have the in-breaking of the gospel to this city. So listen, as I read these first nine verses, this is God's word. Now, when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews. Then Paul, as his custom was, went into them and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the scriptures, explaining and demonstrating that the Christ had to suffer and rise again from the dead and saying, this Jesus whom I preach to you is the Christ. and some of them were persuaded, and a great multitude of the devout Greeks, and not a few of the leading women joined Paul and Silas. But the Jews who were not persuaded, becoming envious, took some of the evil men from the marketplace, and gathering a mob, set all the city in an uproar, and attacked the house of Jason, and sought to bring them out to the people. But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some of the brethren to the rulers of the city, crying out, These who have turned the world upside down have come here too. Jason has harbored them, and these are all acting contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying, There is another king, Jesus. And they troubled the crowd and the rulers of the city when they heard these things. When they had taken security from Jason and the rest, they let them go. Then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews." Well, the books of the book of Genesis the letters, the epistles that Paul wrote to the saints in Thessalonica were some of the earliest books of the New Testament to be written. And they were written probably not too long after Paul was here, probably within about a year or so. And yet it's appropriate for us to reflect upon the context into which the gospel came as we begin then to think about those letters. It's always a beautiful thing for you to think back upon when you first came to love and to trust in the Lord Jesus. For a number of you, that was from a non-Christian background. You had not known the Lord, you had not grown up in a Christian family, and yet the Lord brought His gospel to bear upon you and He changed your heart. And you can no doubt look back upon those days with great joy in your hearts as you became aware that you'd been taken out of darkness and brought into the marvelous light of the gospel. And for others of you here, you grew up in a Christian home and yet there were points in your life at which you understood the gospel better and better and committed yourself to the Lord all over again and had that new and fresh sense of gratitude for what God had done in your life. it's a life-changing and it's an exciting sort of ministry that the Lord did in your hearts and it's an exciting thing to be part of. And so what we see here is Paul and Silas being used in this kind of a way in the city. And what we pray is that the Lord would use us in similar kinds of ways in the lives of other people to see them brought out of darkness into the light so that they too would tell the story of God's great works of salvation being applied to him. There's dramatic change that took place here in this city. And we want to look, first of all, at what caused this change, and then secondly, what was the result of this change? Well, in verses 1 through 4, we see the cause, verses 1 through 3, rather, the cause of this change. And really, to catch the context, we need to go back into Acts chapter 16. Where had Paul and Silas just been? Well, they had just been in Philippi, and you remember what happened in Philippi. Paul and his companions, and it appears that Luke had been with them up until they went to Philippi, and then he probably stayed there in Philippi later, but Paul and Silas, at least, had been beaten. This was their entry into Europe. They had come across from Asia Minor, and they are beaten there in Philippi. when they were charged with all sorts of false accusations, they were beaten even as Roman citizens. And then of course there was the earthquake and the prison doors being thrown open and the conversion of the Philippian jailer. All of that happened relatively quickly and Paul had been staying with Lydia. And we see that when they were let out of prison in verse 40, to go to the house of Lydia. When they had seen the brethren, they encouraged them and departed. So Paul and Silas had fresh wounds on their back. This is the context. These men were not well. They had stripes, wounds that had been inflicted only hours, really, probably, before they took off. And what is it that they do? Well, they pass through Amphipolis and Apollonia These are two cities along the Ignatian Way. That's the road, the highway that they were on going southwest, sort of down the coast there in Greece. And they came then to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews. What caused this change in Thessalonica? Well, it was the faithfulness of Paul and Silas to go, wasn't it? Paul and Silas don't go in faithfulness to the Lord. God at least wouldn't have used those particular means from a human standpoint. The gospel would not have gone. You think about this with St. Patrick. He was born in Scotland. He was carried captive as a slave, as a young boy, into Ireland and finally escaped and went back to Scotland where he became a Christian. And the Lord laid it upon his heart to go back to the land of his captors, to take the gospel there. And the Lord used him in mighty ways to see his gospel go forward there in the land of Ireland. The Lord wants us to be a people who are a going people, a church that is a going church, that are saints who are looking for opportunities to be involved in this kind of ministry. It's exciting to see the Lord do this kind of work. Now, not all are called to do the kind of work that Paul and Silas are called to do. But the Lord has called his church together to be a team that takes the gospel forward. God wants you as his saints to be people that carry, even amidst hardship, his gospel forward into our community and our communities. It's often when we're most beaten down that the Lord is pleased to use us in the richest of ways. That's the context here. Paul and Silas coming with beaten backs, but they went. They were faithful. They obeyed the call of the Lord Jesus. That was the first thing that brought about this change in Thessalonica. The second thing we see here in verse 2. Paul, as his custom was, he went to them and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures. They proclaimed the Word of God. They reasoned for these three Sabbaths in the synagogue from the Scriptures. He went to where he knew the people would be interested, the synagogue, the people who had all the promises of God from the Old Testament, and he reasoned with them from the Scriptures. Now, Paul wasn't trying to use reason from Scripture to argue them into the kingdom. But he was reasoning from the Scriptures. He was taking the Scriptures, all of the revelation they had from the Old Testament, to show how it was fulfilled in Christ Jesus. And he was showing them the implications that the Scripture had upon their lives. And he kept doing it as long as the door was open. Now, as we put together the Book of Acts and try to line up the dates and so forth and references we have from various letters, it appears that Paul probably stayed in Thessalonica in this first visit, which was on his second missionary journey, for about six months. But he was apparently only in the synagogue for three weeks. And yet, nevertheless, he took advantage of that. He was probably kicked out by the Jews. They didn't like this teaching that they heard from Paul. But nevertheless, he took advantage of the opportunity that he had there in the synagogue for those first three Sabbaths. And then he continued to teach them from the scripture. And by the end of that six months, that group must have had some maturity. It's an amazing thing what the power of God's Word can do. It's amazing that the power of God's Word in such a short period of time to see people discipled and built up such that there was a whole church established there by the time Paul would write back in another six months to a year later. So we're to be a going people, but if we're a going people that's of absolutely no value unless we have something to give. and that is the scripture. And when we talk with people and when others taste us like peanut butter and honey sandwiches and they see that there's something different about us, what should we offer them? We should offer them the scripture. And we don't just stick the book under their nose, but the Lord gives us grace to lead and to guide people around us to be able to see how it is that the scripture applies to their lives. Are you ready, if the Lord sends a person to you, are you ready to give some explanation, the reason for the hope that is in you, as Peter writes? Are you ready to do that? Are you ready to reason from the scriptures with people? You don't have to be a scholar. but you do need to know what the reason for the hope is that is in you. And Paul delighted to do this with the people as he opened the scriptures to them. It's the power of God unto salvation, and we put our faith and our trust in that. There are other books that have their place. There are other resources that might be helpful to people who want to know what it is that God says. But more than any of those things, we need to point people to the Scripture. It's the power of God unto salvation, and it cuts as far as the division of soul and spirit of both joints and marrow, and it's able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. When God speaks and He changes a person's heart, they will listen. So, if we want to be involved in this kind of exciting ministry, we've got to be people who go, who look for opportunities among our neighbors among the people that we're walking among and talking with, and we need to be ready with the scripture to place it in front of them and to say, here's what the Lord has to say. How do you respond? Because it is a message of hope that people need. Well, they reasoned from the scripture, and then what did they do foremost of all? In verse three, they're explaining and demonstrating what? that Christ, that the Christ, had to suffer and rise again from the dead, and they were saying, this Jesus, whom I preach to you, is the Christ. More than anything else, what Paul wanted these people to see is the person and the work of Jesus Christ. That Jesus had to come to fulfill the Old Testament, to take away, to be the Lamb of God, to take away the sins of the world. We preach Christ and Him crucified. We don't preach and proclaim self-help. We don't proclaim a message of helping people merely feel better, or becoming a better themselves, or becoming the very best that they can be, as is unfortunately so often produced by Christian book houses today. We preach Christ, the one who comes and He takes away sins and he removes guilt. Is the name of Christ much on your lips? Is he the one that you love and that you want other people to know? It certainly was for Paul. He's the one who is alive today. And he's the one who changes people's hearts. That's the cause of the change that happened here in Thessalonica in a very short time. People went. That's Paul and Silas. They opened the scriptures. And they preached Christ as the one who is crucified, the one who had to come, suffer, and rise from the dead. He is the fulfillment of everything that comes before him. If we do this, brothers and sisters, if we do this as the people of God, the Lord can turn this place upside down. We don't know that he will be pleased to do that. We can't demand that. but we know that this is the means that he uses to do that. His people speaking the truth in love, declaring the scriptures and declaring that Christ is Lord of all. It's through that that the Lord turns people's lives upside down. And if we are simply faithful to the things he's called us to do, the Lord will do great things in our day as well in his own way and in his own time. Well, what was the change that happened? That's the cause of the change. What's the change that resulted in all of this? Well, we see it here in verse 4. Some of them were persuaded. The word some there gives us the idea that there weren't a large number of the Jews in the synagogue who were persuaded. Some, but at least these some were persuaded. They were taken from darkness to light. And then on top of that, a great multitude of the devout Greeks. These were Greeks who were known as God-fearers. They hadn't gone all the way as to become initiated, circumcised into the Jewish faith, but they would come Saturday by Saturday to hear God's word proclaimed. They had a certain respect for the Lord. And when they heard about the Lord Jesus, they were persuaded And in addition to some of these Jewish men and a whole multitude of these Greeks, there were a number of the leading women, not a few of the leading women who joined Paul and Silas. And we see that these people were converted and they weren't simply converted, but they did what else? In verse four, they joined Paul and Silas. Here we see the church being established. People weren't simply left to wander, but the result was there was a body of people gathered together. So that Paul, when he's writing just what, six months to a year and a half later, says that he's writing to the church that is in Thessalonica. So the church was formed, the people were gathered together, they joined with Paul and Silas. So this new body of God's people comes together. And we're going to see in 1 Thessalonians some of what happened, some of the ministry that Paul and Silas had in their midst. We'll see that over the next few weeks and months as we go through these books together. But they were gathered together and lives began to be changed day by day. But that wasn't all. dramatic change that happened is that the Jews, who were not persuaded, we see in verse 5, they took evil men from the marketplace and gathered a mob and set all the city in an uproar and attacked the house of Jason and sought to bring them out to the people. But they didn't find them there. And when they didn't, they dragged Jason and some of the brethren to the rulers of the city, crying out, these have turned the world upside down. They've come here too. They were irate. Unbelievers hate it when they see people defecting from the cause of darkness. It's something that's alarming to them, and they're disturbed by it. And so it was, and they came and brought this accusation against poor Jason. And Jason, you know, he wasn't like a leader of the apostles or anything. He was a simple layman. but he had been apparently housing Paul and Silas, and so he is called to account for all of this. And they said, they took him to the rulers, and in verse 7 they say, Jason has harbored them, and these are all acting contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying there's another king, Jesus. we ought to expect that there will be people who are not happy when they see people being converted from darkness to light, when they see that there is another kingdom, a kingdom that is not of this world, but nevertheless there is a greater king. Now we see this in our day, don't we? There are many people who are not content to see people converted to Christ They're not content even to allow Christianity to simply exist in their midst, but they go so far as to say that Christianity is really the problem in our culture. Richard Dawkins does this, Hutchins does this, I can't remember his first name right off, but a partner of Richard Dawkins, and they argue and they write books that the real problem in our culture is Christianity. It's not simply a benign thing to them, but it is the heart of the problem. And that was what these Jews, who were not persuaded, believed. That these men had turned the world upside down in the most wicked of ways. So we need to be prepared to be misunderstood. But what greater compliment could these men have been paid and these saints in Jason's house and the others who were taken in with him? I mean, wouldn't it be a wonderful thing if we were able to see the Lord draw people to himself such that at the end of the day, people say, these folks have turned the world upside down. Now, ultimately, the truth of the matter is no person can turn the world upside down, aside from the Lord Jesus Christ. It's his work. But the point is, when the world sees people converted, they know that things have been turned upside down. You can't simply add God into your life. When the Lord Jesus takes over a person's heart, he takes it over entirely and he turns that person's world upside down. He turns their family upside down. He turns their business upside down because of the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the work of his spirit. So, what's the final result of it all? Well, they troubled the crowd and the rulers of the city when they heard these things. And when they had taken security or taken a bond from Jason and the rest, they let them go. And there was a period of calm then that came about. But the brethren sent Paul and Silas away, we see here in verse 10, by night to Berea. The apostles weren't able to be around anymore. but the influence would go on because the Lord Jesus had been taken. He'd been introduced to this place. And so Paul and Silas could go on trusting the Lord that his word would prevail in that place. Well, we as a congregation trust and we want to be involved in this kind of life-changing ministry. And we pray as a people, and I trust that you pray in your homes that the Lord would do this kind of work in our midst. We need to see it, don't we? We need to see people come to faith in Christ. Our children need to see people's worlds turned upside down and then begin to change the way they live and what they believe. We need to see this kind of power of the gospel, and so you, brothers and sisters, are called to be faithful, called to be faithful to go to those around you in love, even when it's not necessarily convenient, and to speak the truth in love, and to keep the Scripture before people. and then simply to proclaim the risen Lord Jesus Christ. And as we're faithful to do that, we can trust that the Lord in His time and in His way will be pleased to turn this place, or at least the lives of individuals in this particular point in time, He'll turn their lives upside down to the praise and glory of His name. Let's pray. God, we thank you that you have turned our lives upside down. We thank you, Lord, that you sent others into our lives at some point in the past to open to us the Word of God. Whether that was parents or friends or others around us, you sent people. And then, Lord, you took your all-powerful Word and you touched our very souls with it so that we would wake up and see that Jesus is the Christ. He is the one who had to suffer and to die and to be raised again. Lord, it's our longing that we would see that same sort of thing happen here in Southfield and in Southeast Michigan. We pray, Lord, that you'd be pleased to do that in our midst. Lord, we look forward to the things you have for us from your books of 1 and 2 Thessalonians and the work and the ministry that you did through Paul and Silas and others among the saints who were there. And we pray, Lord, that you would continue to add to the chapters of the Book of Acts your work in the world of the way you're changing people's hearts and changing people's lives. We pray, Lord, that you'd give us a greater heart for people around us and a greater desire to see your kingdom expanded and your name glorified in the midst of the whole world. We pray now, Lord, you'd go before us, and that you would give us grace to be faithful. And then, Lord, that you would give fruit in your good time. We pray it in Jesus' name. Amen.