I was looking over these verses this last week, chapter 9 verses 23 to 43, and you've probably noticed as you look a little bit before and a little bit after, that this section comes almost like a sandwich, like the middle part of a sandwich, between two very well-known stories from the Book of Acts. We're very familiar with the story of Saul's conversion on the road to Damascus. That's a very exciting story. It's out of the ordinary. It's something we wouldn't expect. And then the story about Peter and Cornelius and all that that has to do with the gospel coming to the Gentiles and the excitement there. So we have these two very well-known stories, and then in between we have some verses that talk about a few things that happened in the church. So I was reading through that and just looking for a connection there. What connects this section? Or are there a couple sections here that aren't necessarily related? And when I look through, the next few verses, trying to see what is there. One of the goals that I have is just to see what is the author seeking to communicate under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that's unique, that's different from other passages that this adds. And there are, of course, multiple things that recur in Scripture, but I think each passage has a unique purpose for us in our understanding of God and how we are to serve Him, how we are to live in the Church. And so as I was reading through this, a couple of phrases stood out to me. The word disciples shows up multiple times, and also the phrase among them all. So Saul is working among them all, among the believers, and Peter does that too. And then in the middle, we find this section that talks about the church, verse 31. It says, so the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace and was being built up. And walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it multiplied." And I think the key here is that as all of this ministry was being done, and it wasn't just those people, Saul and Peter, it was all of the people, the disciples that were heavily involved in the ministry that's being done here, God grew the church. And so in the midst of persecution, as we've talked about before, in the midst of all the other things going on, God grew the church through these things. And so as we look at this section, I think we see how God's plan is for the church to grow, how we are to participate as a body in the church growing together. So we're gonna look at that today. Before we read some verses here, as I was thinking through some of the ideas in this passage, I came across a story from 2006 when the World Championship basketball teams got together and played to see which team was the best. And many of you are probably aware that basketball is very popular in the United States, so you might think, well, maybe the United States would do really well in that tournament. Well, something that was very noteworthy in this situation in 2006 was that the USA's team was full of NBA stars. So all of the players were from the NBA. They were some of the best players in the country. So you would think, well, they're definitely going to win. They're going to have a really good chance of winning. So they played against the team that was from Greece in the semifinals, and something quite unexpected happened. Many of the players that were on the team for Greece, only one of them was seeking a spot in the NBA. They all worked together, and they upset the US team, winning 101 to 95. And as sports pundits evaluated that and looked at what was there, they said, you know, the skill level of the people on the US team was much higher of each of the individuals than the team for Greece. So what happened? And as they evaluated the multiple different events in the game, there were a few things that they noted. They noted that the Greece team played very well together, the Greek team. They were able to execute their plays. They did a lot of picks and rolls. If you're familiar with basketball, that's a play that involves a lot of teamwork, but can be very effective. They were able to score a lot. They had a very high scoring average. because they worked together as a team to get to the basket. In contrast, there was one event pointed out where one of the players on the U.S. team just attempted to get past all five of the defenders and tossed the ball up and ended up missing the shot because he was trying to do it all on his own. From that game, it was clear that it doesn't matter if you have a bunch of skilled people or if the people maybe aren't quite as skilled. If they all work together, they can accomplish something much greater by working together than the individual people trying to do everything on their own. And as we look at this passage, I think it becomes very clear that God's plan for the church is not that a few people that are really skilled work really hard and accomplish all of the ministry that needs to happen in church. But as all of the people, no matter what their status is spiritually, whether they're a new believer or whether they've been a believer for a long period of time and have experienced a lot of spiritual growth, all of those people are to be involved in ministry and God uses every single person. So no matter where you think that you fit on that range of spiritual knowledge, how much you've grown spiritually, God has a use for you, God is going to use you in this church body to accomplish his plan. And I think that becomes very clear even right as we start here in the beginning of this first section, I think points out clearly that God grows his church through the church working together, through teamwork. In the first section there in verses 23 through 25, God used Saul's disciples to pave the way for growth. So Saul was just converted in the passage before. Now there's obviously some days going on here. We see that he was there for some days with the disciples at Damascus in the middle of verse 19. But he had been there for a number of days, but not years. And what does it say here? In the beginning, it says, when many days had passed, so not months or years, but many days had passed, the Jews in Damascus plotted to kill him, but their plot became known to Saul. So Saul finds out that his life is threatened. So Saul has been here for a number of days, not months or years, and he already has disciples. He has people who have trusted in Christ who he knows well enough that they're concerned for his safety and they're going to actually help him escape from the city. So God used these disciples to pave the way for growth for the church. So God is using these people that have just come to Christ recently and are starting to follow the Lord to help Saul escape so that he can go on and continue ministering for the Lord. God is using these people that are new believers, Saul's a new believer as well, he's using them to accomplish his plan. Just want to make a quick note, there is a scripture that talks about ordaining people for ministry that haven't been saved for a long period of time. And so I just want to make a note there, I'm not saying that Saul's case was exceptional, there are special things going on as an apostle, so I'm not saying that as soon as someone gets saved we should have them become a pastor, you know, that kind of thing. What I am saying is it's clear here that God used everyone in the church, no matter what their length of time being saved, to accomplish his plan and to further the gospel ministry. So God uses Saul's disciples to pave the way for growth. So Saul escapes and he goes down to Jerusalem and so in verse 26 it says that he came to Jerusalem, he had come to Jerusalem, he attempted to join the disciples and they were all afraid of him for they did not believe that he was a disciple. This is understandable because the last exposure as we've been reading through the book of Acts that the Jerusalem disciples had to Saul was when he showed up on their doorsteps and tried to drag them off to prison. So it's understandable that they weren't ready to welcome him in as another believer, as one of them. They probably had doubts. Maybe they thought he was going to spy out what they were doing and then bring that to the high priest and drag them off again. So they had some doubts there, but God uses a man named Barnabas to help him. It says, but Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles and declared to them how on the road he had seen the Lord who spoke to him, and how at Damascus he had preached boldly in the name of Jesus." And you might be wondering who Barnabas is. Back in Acts 4, if you have your Bible out, you can turn a few pages back. We see Barnabas. He is mentioned there first. And it says that in verse 36, Thus Joseph, who is also called by the Apostles Barnabas, which means son of encouragement, a Levite, a native of Cyprus, sold the field that belonged to him, and brought the money and laid it at the apostles' feet." So this is the man that sold the field and brought the money to the apostles' feet that then led to the story of Ananias and Sapphira and what happened there. But notice that Barnabas means son of encouragement. So God is using this man in multiple ways. He's used his wealth to encourage the church, and now God is using him to encourage Saul as well and to bring Saul to the disciples and to stand up for him. And so then it says in verse 28 that, or I guess how Saul had preached boldly in verse 27, then in verse 28 the apostles accepted him, so he went in and out among them at Jerusalem preaching boldly in the name of the Lord. So Barnabas has helped Saul come into Jerusalem and become part of the body there. And the disciples that are there have accepted Saul based on Barnabas's encouragement, the apostles accepting the validity of what has happened to him. And so God is using a man who's not an apostle, just someone in the church who's being a part of encouraging other believers. And he's using this man to accomplish his plan so that then Saul has the stamp of approval in Jerusalem to go ahead and work amongst the church. and encourage the believers there. So in this case, God uses unlikely allies to open the door for gospel proclamation. When we think about the relationship that the disciples in Jerusalem would have with Saul, think about even what it would have been like after they knew that he actually was saved. they could have had a response of, hey, you dragged my parents off to prison, or you dragged my uncle off to prison, or I'm sure that some of them had experienced persecution by Saul. But instead of having the attitude that you did these things in the past and I'm going to hold them against you even though Christ has saved you now, they were willing to accept him and the gospel was able to move forward because of what they did, because they accepted his work. So Saul is able to preach boldly in the name of the Lord. And then it continues in verse 29 that he spoke and disputed against the Hellenists, but they were seeking to kill him. So you might have a question as to who the Hellenists were. There's a note, if you have an ESV Bible, in the bottom it says that they are Greek-speaking Jews, so these were Jewish people. Saul is well known, as he continues his travels, for going to the Jews and sharing the Gospel, and their response is quite commonly this antagonism, that they want to kill him, that they want to destroy him. But God is again going to use the relationships that Saul builds as he goes in and among the believers in the city of Jerusalem, God's going to use that to help them bring their concerns to him and send him out on another journey that's going to have him continue sharing the gospel and spreading it around the world. So it says that he spoke with them, but they were seeking to kill him. And when the brothers learned this, they brought him down to Caesarea and sent him off to Tarsus. So it's very clear here, these brothers, now these people that are part of the church, actually care enough about Saul to send him away for his own protection, so that he can continue spreading the gospel. It says these brothers, it starts with disciples and now a new level of relationship is clear there, that Saul has proven that he knows Christ, that he loves him, that he's preaching boldly in his name, and now God is using this relationship, this newfound fellowship with him, to multiply the spread of the gospel. And that's the the preface that we have for what we're going to see in the church being spread and multiplied. So we read verse 31 before. It says, the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace and was being built up. and walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it multiplied." So all of these activities in this passage, first Saul being sent out from Damascus, then Saul coming to Jerusalem, all of the people working together to encourage, to recognize that he is trusted in Christ, and then the disciples who are now viewing themselves as brothers with Saul, protecting him again and encouraging him to go out so that he can minister the gospel more, All these activities of the brothers loving one another, even accepting someone who is an outcast from them before, someone who persecuted them and hated them very deeply before, and they were welcoming him in, and now God is using that to multiply the church. They had peace, and they were being built up together by this working out. They were also walking in the fear of the Lord. What does that mean, the idea of walking in the fear of the Lord? As we look through Scripture, Proverbs talks about the fear of the Lord a lot, and it's often associated with knowledge of God. So as we have a right view of God, as we see who He is, we fear Him appropriately. You might think of the example of a father who cares for his child, but who also disciplines his child when that child is doing something that he shouldn't. So a child might go out in the road and be in danger because vehicles are coming by at high rates of speed. That child might not know why he can't be out in the road, but his father is very firm with him and makes sure that he will not go out in the road and be endangered in any way. It's very clear to him that he needs to follow his instruction to do that. So the child hopefully has a right fear of his father, knowing and trusting that his father is protecting him, but also fearful of what's going to happen with the discipline that he will receive if he crosses that line, if he goes out in the road. And I think that's where the idea of the fear and the knowledge of the Lord are tied together, is that as we know God and who he is, we love him, We know that he will bring us back to the place that we are and we fear that what will happen if we cross the line that he's given us that we are to follow because we love him and we know that we have a right view of who he is. And then it says, they walked in the fear of the Lord, and they also were in the comfort of the Holy Spirit. So they're going through a number of difficult circumstances. These Jews are wanting to kill them. Saul previously had been persecuting them. So they're facing difficult circumstances. But Christ said that the Holy Spirit was going to be the comforter, the one who encouraged them in the midst of difficulty. So you notice it says the brothers, What do you want for your brothers? Do you want them to have to be far away from you? Or do you want them to be able to be close to you? Well, they're sending Saul away because they love him, but they would rather that he could stay with them because they are brothers with him now. They know that there is a close relationship because of Christ. holding him back and saying, you know, we're going to keep him here even at his own peril. They sent him out, God accomplished his plan, and the Holy Spirit comforted them even as they missed being able to be with him. So as we think about how this should apply to our lives, how do we in this church right now, in Community Baptist in Greer, How do we live in a way that demonstrates this kind of teamwork? Not that we all get together and we huddle and we have a cheer that we're really excited about and that motivates us to go out and do what we're supposed to do. But how do we work together to accomplish God's plan? And as we do that, we ought to see people coming to want to be a part of that, to want to be a part of the team that God has assembled here. How do we do that? One thing that came to my mind as I thought about that was church workdays. Not as the only way that we can work as a team, but as an example of how that works really beautifully. When we have a church workday and people work together, we get usually some big piles of mulch to go through, usually we have a lot of cleaning, there's a whole list to get through. But as people come, as more people come, we all work together and we accomplish it quite quickly. Usually we might start around 8.30 or 9 and often we're done in maybe just a couple hours because everyone's contributing. If one person tried to do all that work, it would take them days, perhaps even a week to do all that. But as we work together, we can accomplish much more. And so just like that, as we think more of a spiritual level or perhaps a physical level on individual needs, as we as a church work to recognize those needs and encourage one another, we are able to build up the body of Christ. If all of that weight was on me, or was on one other person in the church, or maybe two or three other people in the church, we wouldn't be able to deal with those needs and encourage and build up one another. But if you just take the example of maybe sections in the auditorium, if just two or three people in each section of the auditorium were to reach out to the people around them, then everyone who comes to church would have someone talking to them, someone that can ask them, hey, how are you doing? What's going on in your life? How can I encourage you this week? And as needs arise, more people can be brought in to help and encourage. You know, we do this with the take-them-a-meal thing that we do for when people have needs. We have a sign-up and multiple people sign up and help out. Well, we can apply that same principle to how we encourage one another. We can work together as we see people around us. Perhaps, maybe you know certain people in our church that live close to you. That would be another way that you could reach out. You could notice who lives around you in the area, and reach out to those people, and perhaps get together with those people. If one person in our church tries to do all of this, then it will be impossible. The number of people that we have, it's not possible for one person to do it. And that's not God's plan anyway. God's plan is for all of us to work together as disciples of Christ to encourage one another on a regular basis, to be working together to help each other out, to recognize needs that arise and encourage each other and build each other up as difficulties arise as well. We want to make sure that we don't have the attitude of spectator Christianity. When you go to a Clemson football game, you have players on the field, and you have people in the stands, and there are way more people in the stands than there are on the field actually playing the football game. life within the church should work. We shouldn't have, you know, 5% or 1% or 10% of the people doing all of the work for the church and everyone else standing around cheering for them, like, way to go, that's good. It's great to encourage people in ministry, but we're all supposed to be out on the field working hard encouraging each other and building each other up in the faith. And I think it's very clear as we look at these verses and see how the whole church was involved. It wasn't just Saul decided he needed to leave, and so he found a way to escape the city. But people came to him and said, hey, we need to get you out of here. This is not a good situation for you. And they came up with a way for him to escape. God used them in his life to help encourage him. Even think about it from the standpoint of discipling other people. Who are you pouring your life into? Or maybe you're a new believer and you really need someone to pour their life into you. You don't feel like you're ready to pour your life into someone else. Well, go ask somebody. Say, hey, would you be able to get together with me and let's talk about how to live the Christian life and how to encourage each other. If Saul had not poured his life into these disciples, it's possible that they wouldn't have been ready to help him get over that wall and escape. But I think it's significant that it actually tells us that they are His disciples. It's not just that it says some men helped Him escape. It said His disciples. So it works both ways. You might think, hey, I'm pouring my life into someone, but maybe you might think, well, it's just going to be a work that I have to do, and it'll be hard, but I know I'm supposed to, so I'll do it. But God actually uses those relationships for the benefit of the person who is discipling as well. So as you think about how you can live out the truths of this passage, look for people that you can pour your life into. People in this room, or people who are members but aren't in this room at this moment. Think about people that you can pour your life into. And if you feel like you're not ready to do that, don't hesitate to talk to someone who you think you see they look like they're walking with the Lord, I want to model my life in a way after their walk with the Lord, don't hesitate to ask them. It's fine to do that. It's actually a blessing for that person too, to be able to help you. And maybe they have a lot of people that they're reaching out to and they can't do it at that time, but you know, they can take you to someone else that they know might have some time to be able to disciple you. So don't hesitate to go up to someone and say, hey, I want to pour my life into you. I want to help you. Maybe don't use those words. Maybe just say, let's meet together. Let's encourage one another on a regular basis. That's been a great encouragement to me as I've had opportunities to meet with older men and talk with them about things that are going on in my life, and have them encourage me with Scripture, or ways to think about things in a biblical way. And so that is a major way that within the church body, we can work together as a team to make sure that no one is falling aside, no one is being dropped or not cared for, and as a team, as a church body, we can grow. And as we do that, people will see that, and God will use that to grow our church. And I think as that works, as that happens, that's God's plan, that as people are discipled, we have opportunity to go and disciple more people. And so that's something that we need to be doing on a regular basis, is pouring our lives into others and being poured into. Within the church body here, God has gifted each person to be doing one of those two things, and we can serve him as this passage teaches us. So then this kind of activity continues as we go through and see how God grows his church, expanding on the idea of just teamwork, but also through compassionate relationships. As we see what Peter is doing here, he goes ahead and ends up showing Christ's compassion for those who are suffering in verses 32-35. It says, Now as Peter went here and there among them all, I think that's very significant, that phrasing. He's going from person to person, seeing how they're doing. He came down also to the saints who lived at Lydda. So just as a geographical information, you have Jerusalem, and then as you go towards the coast, toward the Mediterranean Sea, you have the city of Lydda. It's kind of on the edge of Judea, and then you're going to see Joppa mentioned as well. It's pretty close, but it's also a little bit closer to the sea. So just to give you a little bit of an idea of how Peter's traveling, he's traveling east Sorry, he's traveling west. I'm thinking of the U.S. going toward the coast in South Carolina. He's going west toward the Mediterranean Sea, and that's the direction of those cities. So, as it says he's going here and there among them all, he's just going towards the coast and meeting with believers, encouraging them. And it says he came down also to the saints who lived at Lydda. There he found a man named Anais, bedridden for eight years, who was paralyzed. And Peter said to him, Anais, Jesus Christ heals you. Rise and make your bed. And immediately he rose. And all the residents of Lydda and Sharon saw him, and they turned to the Lord." So as he cared for this man, as he showed compassion for him, for this man who is suffering, many people saw that, not necessarily witnessed what he did, but they saw this man who used to be paralyzed and is now walking around, and they saw the compassion that Peter had for him in helping him through the power of the Holy Spirit to be able to get up and walk. Now you might have a question and say, why are you focusing on the compassion here? Because as Peter shows Christ's power, isn't it about the power of the Holy Spirit? And that's what convinces the people to follow Christ? And I think the answer would be that there's both. There's an aspect of both of these things going on. I guess maybe as an example, you could think of what we might experience now when we hear about someone being healed, or you think of it within a church context, people talking about being healed. You may have seen those kinds of things on television or video clips. Typically, that's done in a stadium with a lot of people around, and the intention is to attract a lot of attention to the people who are working there. A lot of times those things come out later that they're not real or that something odd has been going on. But the point that I want to make is that if all of the reason for doing this healing is in order for people to see the power that's going on and to attract attention, then Peter wouldn't be doing this in a side room without a bunch of people there. But he is very clearly in the next case, and it seems in this case that people saw the man later. It wasn't that he did it in the center of town for everyone to see. So I think part of the key here is not just the power that God is working, but also the fact that Peter is showing compassion. And we see that example from Christ as well. So just another note to clarify as I talk about healings going on in stadiums or things like that, I don't really believe that those are actually really based on the power of the Holy Spirit, just based on what I've seen, because they don't fit the model of Scripture and how God did that. So we'll get to that a little bit more as we go through the book of Acts, how that appears to have stopped the gifts of healing and those kinds of things as something that someone just comes up and says, I'm healing you in the power of Christ. Those things appear to have stopped as the scripture was finished. That was the end of those events happening. And so I think it's important for us as we look at a passage like this and say, well, why is it important for us to see this if God doesn't give that gift of healing to us anymore? And if we can't all go around healing people in order to attract people to Christ, What other principles are there here that we can follow, that we can emulate from the life of Peter, and how God used him, that will help us to show the love of Christ to others? And I think it has to do with the compassion that Peter showed for this man, and the care that he showed. I think as believers, we can do that within the body, and we can also do that outside of the body, show compassion to other people who are suffering, and that demonstrates the love of Christ. And I think it's very clear as we look at passages like Matthew 14, verses 13 through 21, that talk about Christ's compassion for those who are suffering, and why He did some of the miracles that He did. We know very clearly in the book of John that those miracles were for a purpose, to show that He was the Son of God. But he also demonstrated very clearly throughout those passages that he had compassion for those people, and he did them not just to show off and to show that he was the son of God, but to demonstrate that God, that he as God, was showing love to his people, and he cared for them. So this is what we find in Matthew 14, 13 through 21. It says, Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a desolate place by himself. So this is after he hears about the death of John the Baptist. But when the crowds heard it, talking about Christ leaving, they followed him on foot from the towns. When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them, and healed their sick." So think about this circumstance, if you were in a similar circumstance. You just heard something very devastating, it was difficult for you, and you went to go be alone, and then this huge crowd shows up with a bunch of needs. How would you respond to that? Well, think about how loving Christ was, how much he cared for them. It says it. It says he had compassion on them, and he healed their sick. He actually cared for their physical needs in the midst of his own difficulty because he had compassion and he loved them. And we see it even more. It says, now when it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, this is a desolate place and the day is now over. Send the crowds away to go into the villages and buy food for themselves. But Jesus said, they need not go away. You give them something to eat. And they said to him, we only have five loaves here and two fish. And he said, bring them here to me. Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass, and taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and said a blessing. Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And they all ate and were satisfied, and they took up twelve baskets full of the broken pieces left over. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children. And we see that Christ didn't stop with just healing some of the sick. Christ continued to meet their needs through providing food for them. And yes, it was a demonstration of power. It showed all of those people that He was God, there was no doubt. But He also did it in a way that showed love and compassion for them. And that's something that we can continue to emulate in the Church. And it doesn't stop there with what Peter is doing. The last few verses of this passage talk about how God used Peter to show Christ's compassion for those who are grieving. Look at these last few verses. Now, there was in Joppa a disciple named Tabitha, which translated means Dorcas. She was full of good works and acts of charity. I think it's interesting that that's pointed out as well in the midst of this. In those days, she became ill and died, And when they had washed her, they laid her in an upper room. Since Lydda was near Joppa, the disciples, hearing that Peter was there, sent two men to him, urging him, please come to us without delay. So Peter rose and went with them. And when he arrived, they took him to the upper room. All the widows stood beside him, weeping and showing tunics and other garments that Dorcas made while she was with them. But Peter put them all outside, and knelt down and prayed. And turning to the body, he said, Tabitha, arise. And she opened her eyes, and when she saw Peter, she sat up. And he gave her his hand and raised her up. Then calling the saints and widows, he presented her alive. And it became known throughout all Joppa, and many believed in the Lord. And he stayed in Joppa for many days with one Simon, a tanner. And again in this case, he's not seeking to attract a bunch of attention, he doesn't want to show everyone the power that he has. For all they know, he maybe just prayed and she rose up. He actually told her to, and that was part of the miracle, but no one else saw that. It wasn't to point the attention at Peter, or to show this great powerful thing just for the purpose of showing off. It was to show compassion and care for this person and for the people who were grieving. And we see that in another story as we think about Christ and what He did similar to this, in the story of Lazarus. In John 11, 17-44, notice how it talks over and over again about Christ's compassion and His care and how He wept for them. It says, Now when Jesus came, he found that Lazarus had been in the tomb four days. Bethany was near Jerusalem, about two miles off, and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother. So when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, but Mary remained seated in the house. Martha said to Jesus, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you. Jesus said to her, your brother will rise again. Martha said to him, I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day. And Jesus said to her, I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live. And everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this? And she said to him, yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world. When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary, saying in private, the teacher is here and is calling for you. And when she heard it, she rose quickly and went to him. Now Jesus had not yet come into the village, but was still in the place where Martha had met him. And when the Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary rise quickly and go out, they followed her, supposing that she was going to the tomb to weep there. Now when Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to him, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. And when Jesus saw her weeping and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. And he said, where have you laid him? And they said to him, Lord, come and see. And Jesus wept. So the Jews said, see how he loved him? But some of them said, could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man also have kept this man from dying? Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb. It was a cave and a stone lay against it. And Jesus said, take away the stone. Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days. And Jesus said to her, did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God? So they took away the stone, and Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this on account of the people standing around, that they may believe that you sent me. When he had said these things, he cried out with a loud voice, Lazarus, come out. The man who had died came out, and his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth. And Jesus said to them, Unbind him, and let him go. And so Christ has said to him, Christ weeps for these people, He's moved by these people. You see from the verses that the purpose of these healings, these miracles, was so that the people would see that He was God and they would believe in Him as the Son of God. But as He does these miracles, He is the resurrection and the life but he demonstrates God's love, his compassion, that he is not a God who just says, okay, I'll help you. But he loves these people. He cares about them. He cares about what they need. So God grows his church through compassionate relationships. God still uses that today. That as we love each other, Jesus said, how will men know that you are my disciples? By the love that you have for one another. And God uses that as a way to grow his church. We have an opportunity to show love to each other in the body as we pour out our lives in care for one another. that others can see that and say there's something different about those people. They love one another. They actually care about each other in a world that often we see doesn't. So we have an opportunity to show love to each other in that way. I recently, within the last few years, had an opportunity to read through a book called The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert. Some of you may have read that before. If you haven't, I would highly recommend that you read through it. It's about a lady named Rosaria Butterfield. She was a professor at Syracuse University, and she was living a lesbian lifestyle. She was very active in the activist community, advocating for people that live that kind of lifestyle, and as she did that, she encountered a pastor. who developed a relationship. He and his wife developed a relationship with her of care and connecting with her and showing love to her. And as they did that, as they showed compassion for her, she actually came to Christ. She accepted the gospel and lives a completely different life now as God is using her to minister. But here's an excerpt from her book. about how the compassion that this pastor and his wife showed for her helped her to come to the gospel and to come to Christ and realize that the gospel made a difference. She says, after I published in the local newspaper a critique of the promise keepers for their gender politics, she received a letter from this pastor. His name was Ken. and his wife was Floy. And he wrote to her and asked her several questions about what she had written, just asking about what she believed, why she believed it. He didn't come as attacking her. That was what she was used to, a lot of hatred and vitriol, but not asking questions, not seeking to understand what she was going through, what she was experiencing, and then bringing scripture to bear on that. And so he invited her over to have dinner with him and his wife, and even said if she wasn't comfortable having dinner at their home, they would meet her at a restaurant to talk with her. And so this is what she said about that first meeting. She said, our conversation was lively and fun. If Floy was a submissive wife, so she's talking about things she characterized as what Christians were like, and this is all that she had experienced. If she was a submissive wife, she was also gifted, smart, perceptive, well-read, and a great cook. If Ken was the Bible-thumping pastor, he was also a good listener, a balanced interpreter, a lover of good poetry, a reader of culture and politics, and a husband who clearly adored, relied upon, and valued highly his wife's counsel. These people simply didn't fit the stereotype, and I simply didn't know what to do with this. Like his letter, Ken would be filed away easily so that I could just go on with my life. Ken and Floyd did something at the meal that has a long Christian history, but has been functionally lost in too many Christian homes. Ken and Floyd invited the stranger in, not to scapegoat me, but to listen and to learn and to dialogue. Ken and Floyd have a vulnerable and transparent faith. We didn't debate worldview. We talked about our personal truth and about what made us tick. Ken and Floyd didn't identify with me. They listened to me and identified with Christ. They were willing to walk the long journey to me in Christian compassion. During our meal, they did not share the gospel with me. After our meal, they did not invite me to church. Because of these glaring omissions to the Christian script as I had come to know it, when the evening ended and Pastor Ken said he wanted to stay in touch, I knew that it was truly safe to accept his open hand. Before I ever set foot in a church, I spent two years meeting with Ken and Floyd and on and off studying scripture and my heart. If Ken and Floyd invited me to church at that first meal, I would have careened like a skateboard off a cliff and would have never come back. Ken, of course, knows the power of the word preached, but it seemed to me he also knew at that time that I couldn't come to church. It would have been too threatening, too weird, too much. So Ken was willing to bring the church to me. This gave me the room and the safety that I needed to match Ken and Floyd's vulnerability and transparency. And so I opened up to them. I let them know who I was and what I valued. I invited them into my home and into my world. They met my friends, came to my dinner parties, saw me function in my real life. They made themselves safe enough for me to do this. And so as the book continues, obviously Ken and Floyd do share the gospel with her, and as she comes to Christ, she does come to church with them. But they were careful to show love to her, and to help her to understand who Christ was, that His compassion was offered to her, that the gospel was not just about correcting or changing her life, but it was about a relationship with a God who loved her. and that it wasn't that she had to give up everything that she had experienced before of a community and love from others and then come to something that was not a community of loving people, but that God loved her and cared for her enough to put them in her life and to develop that relationship, show that compassion to her so that she could understand what it was like to know Christ. And so I would again encourage you, if you have the opportunity, to read through that book, The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert. But the key thing here is that as we have opportunities to show compassion to people within our church and to people outside of our church, God uses that to grow the church. God uses that compassion to share the gospel in an appropriate way, not hiding any aspect of it, not sweeping sin under the rug or avoiding the topic of sin, not avoiding the fact that Christ had to die a horrible death on the cross because of our sin, but admitting that we are all sinners. and that Christ came to pay for all of our sin as we accept the gift that He has given, that He has paid for that, and that no one is too far to be able to be accepted by Christ if we come with the right heart to repent of the things that we have done and to accept that gift. And so I think it's very clear as we look at this passage and even see at the very end how Peter stayed in Joppa for many days with a man to continue the ministry there, to disciple the people there, and for the people to be built up as one body working together to accomplish God's plan. That is God's plan for church growth. It's not a big program. It's not sending out flyers. None of those things are necessarily wrong. But God's plan for church growth is that each individual person in our body shows love and compassion and works together with each other to reach the community that we live in and to build up the body of Christ so that when people meet us and when people see us, they say, that's someone that I want to be a part of what they're a part of. I want to be a part of that. And of course, there will be people who reject the gospel, obviously. That's clear in this passage too. There were people that wanted to kill Saul because of what he was doing. I'm not saying that there won't be persecution or difficulty, but God does welcome people as the people in the body work together and as they show love to those in the body and outside of the body, God does grow his church through that. And so let's submit to God's plan. Let's listen to his plan for how we are to live so that we can reach the community around us and we can see our church grow both spiritually that each one of us is growing as we pour our lives into one another's lives, and also numerically as we have opportunity to reach people that are in our community, in our community at work, in our community that we live in, in our neighborhoods, as they see the love that Christ has put in our hearts, and as we reach out to them, they can see that and want to be a part of that. So let's pray for each other that we can accomplish these things, not one person, but everyone together working to do that, as the disciples in the early church did.