Now will you turn with me? in your Bibles to the book of Acts chapter 23 as we continue the lengthy New Testament reading to the end of chapter 23. Acts chapter 23 from verse 12 to the end of the passage. If you are a visitor we encourage you to follow this Bible reading and to keep your Bible open during the preaching of God's Word that you may follow the sequence of the exposition of God's Word. Verse 12 of chapter 23. The next morning the Jews formed a conspiracy and bound themselves with an oath not to eat or drink until they had killed Paul. More than 40 men were involved in this plot. They went to the chief priests and elders and said we have taken a solemn oath not to eat anything until we have killed Paul. Now then, you and the Sanhedrin petition the commander to bring him before you on the pretext of wanting more accurate information about his case. We are ready to kill him before he gets there. But when the son of Paul's sister heard of this plot, he went into the barracks and told Paul. Then Paul called one of the centurions and said, take this young man to the commander. He has something to tell him. So he took him to the commander. The centurion said, Paul the prisoner sent for me and asked me to bring this young man to you because he has something to tell you. The commander took the young man by the hand drew him aside and said, what is it you want to tell me? He said, the Jews have agreed to ask you to bring Paul before the Sanhedrin tomorrow on the pretext of wanting more accurate information about him. Don't give in to them. because more than 40 of them are waiting in ambush for him. They have taken an oath not to eat or drink until they have killed him. They are ready now, waiting for your consent to their request. The commander dismissed the young man and cautioned him, don't tell anyone what you have reported, that you have reported this to me. Then he called two of the centurions and ordered them, get ready a detachment of two hundred soldiers, seventy horsemen and two hundred spearmen to go to Caesarea at nine tonight. Provide mounts for Paul so that he may be taken safely to Governor Felix. He wrote a letter as follows, Claudius Lysias to his excellency governor Felix, greetings. This man was seized by the Jews and they were about to kill him but I came with my troops and rescued him for I had learned that he is a Roman citizen. I wanted to know why they were accusing him so I brought him to their Sanhedrin. I found that the accusation had to do with questions about their law. But there was no charge against him that deserved death or imprisonment. When I was informed of a plot to be carried out against the man, I sent him to you at once. I also ordered his accusers to present to you their case against him. So the soldiers carrying out their orders took Paul with them during the night and brought him as far as Antipatris. The next day they let the cavalry go on with him while they returned to the barracks. When the cavalry arrived in Caesarea they delivered the letter to the governor and handed Paul over to him. The governor read the letter and asked what province he was from. Learning that he was from Cilicia he said, I will hear your case when your accusers get here. Then he ordered that Paul be kept under guard in Herod's palace. thus reads the living and abiding word of God, thanks be to his great name. Now we have had a very long reading, an unusually long reading in the book of Acts this morning and you may well ask the question, why so? And the answer very simply is that throughout the long reading taken by our pastoral intern and myself this morning, throughout the several separate and fascinating incidents of Paul's life there in Jerusalem, there is one consistent theme running through all. I wonder if you've seen it and spotted it from your reading of the biblical text this morning as the Apostle is caught up in the cost of real spiritual warfare for the kingdom of heaven as he's almost done to death by the Jewish mob and narrowly escapes a cruel Roman scourging and is delivered from the scheming of the Sanhedrin and more so from the devious plots of the zealots in Jerusalem who are determined also to do him to death there is one consistent theme running through all of these varied and diverse events that stands out from the sacred text before us and the theme quite simply is God's delivering power for his faithful and dedicated servant. And you must surely have noticed as you've read these variegated events what is really happening throughout all of them. Paul being delivered by the divine providence and almighty power of God his Saviour. And that's why in so many ways our passage for all its length this morning is reminiscent I think to many of us of the experience of Job where you remember in the first chapter of Job Satan standing in the presence of God says I cannot touch this man because you have put a hedge about him and protected him from all that I can do against him. And I want to say to you beloved as we come to this passage this morning in all of the book of Acts there is scarcely a clearer demonstration of God's loving care in the most amazing and detailed and sovereign fashion over this his servant, whose life has so clearly been laid on the altar of God's service. And God is never a debtor to such a life. Now as we look at this passage this morning and draw this lesson from its separate incident, it has something to say to each one of us. Because, you know, there may be some of us here this morning who are tempted to take our lives out of God's control and begin to manage them ourselves. Because you've said, the trials that I'm facing, the difficulties that I'm having, whether it's to find work in this particular time when work is so hard to come by. Whether it's a spiritual problem you're wrestling with without great success. Whether it's something in your family that you can't solve. Whatever it might be, you have the temptation to take your life out of God's sovereign control and begin to manage it yourself. And if this passage says anything to you this morning, it says that you must not and you must never do that. because there is only one life to live and only one way to go. If you are a true servant of God and like Paul have laid your life in a real sense on the altar of sacrifice for him, you must keep that life of yours in spite of all that comes against it in his hands and never in yours. There is a hedge above this man protecting him. And you notice that that hedge then comes before us in two ways. One of them a lengthy way and I'm going to spend most of my time on it this morning. in the providential and diverse circumstances through which God safely led his servant. And secondly and much more briefly, the powerful and divine confirmation that Paul received in the vision of the night in verse 11 of chapter 23. Now let's look at these two ways together this morning spending as I say most of our time upon the first because of the five incidents that are recorded in this particular passage. Now we've seen so much evidence in our long studies through the book of Acts of Paul's consecration to God's will but I don't need to take time this morning to remind you of it. A life, as I said a moment ago, that was so clearly laid on the altar of sacrifice for the glory of God and the spread of the gospel. A man who stands before us as a man who is obedient to the heavenly vision and consecrated to the high calling that God has given him. And the point of what we are about to see beloved in these providential and diverse circumstances through which he passes is that God is able and willing to keep that which Paul has committed to him against the great day of his appearing before the Lord himself. In other words, God is never a debtor to such a life. And in incident after incident it seems as though the Lord comes to Paul and says to him, don't be afraid, just watch how I demonstrate my love and care for you. and God does it all for his cause and his kingdom and his servants. You know if you ever wanted a living illustration of the Shorter Catechism's question number 11, what are God's works of providence, you have it in this passage. God's works of providence, you recall the answer goes, are his most holy, wise and powerful preserving and governing all his creatures and all their actions. And you may recall the words of Isaac Watts, paraphrase of one of the Psalms, when he says in versification, Thy providence is kind and large, both man and beast thy bounty share, the whole creation is thy charge, but saints are thy peculiar care. and what comfort there is in that for all of us here this morning. Now how precisely does God do this? Well in five tremendous perils and dangers Paul is rescued and his life is preserved. Amazing lessons in God's providence and it's amazing how in a number of these instances God takes certain strands of the apostles life and experience and uses them in his providence to deliver him out of the greatest peril and danger. Now let's look at these five incidents, some of them quite quickly and some of them in greater detail. First of all I want you to notice in verse 23 of chapter 22 that Paul is delivered from a Jewish stoning. Do you remember that the crowd had become very excited and were evidencing mob violence even before Paul spoke to them in that marvelous defense, his apologia that we studied together in Acts 22 last Sunday morning. But when he came to that point in his speech when he mentioned the Gentiles, the nations to whom he had been divinely commissioned to take the gospel they could listen no more. Rid the earth of him they called out. He is not fit to live. Now that was the danger in which Paul again stood in our passage. And one of you quite perceptively asked me between last Sunday and this morning what did it mean When the text says that they were so infuriated that they cast dust into the air and took off their clothes and the answer quite certainly is that they were preparing to do to Paul what they had earlier done to Stephen. And as F.F. Bruce says in his fine commentary upon this passage it is as well for Paul and his captors that loose stones were not lying about the temple court but only dust. Because certainly there would have been a brutal stoning and the end of Paul's life unless he had been rescued by the soldiers. Oh in passing note again beloved I want you to note this it's very important that the effect of God's word ministered in power by the Holy Spirit is not always reception We live in days when so many in the church think that if the Word of God ministered in power does anything it will only do good in the sense of bringing men and women to faith in Christ. But do you notice in this incident that when the Word of God is preached under the power of the Holy Spirit that apart from God's grace accompanying it and softening unregenerate hearts it disturbs and inflames and enrages to the point where the mob in Jerusalem were ready to stone the preacher and if they had only realized and responded as they should instead of casting dust up into the air and thickening the atmosphere they would have laid themselves down in the dust of the ground as a people who knew themselves guilty and in no place to question God's purposes and ways in sending his word to the Gentiles. But what you see is resistance to God's word. They stop listening. And as I said to you last Sunday morning, when do you stop listening? when do you set bounds to what God may say to you and you become unteachable and you have an unreachable will and that can happen you know under God the preaching of God's word and make no mistake that constitutes in a Christian congregation every bit as much casting dust up into the air as it did in this instance And the very kingdom of darkness lies behind those kind of attitudes. But coming back to this theme of God's providence, do you notice there in verse 23 I think it is, that the commander ordered that he be taken into the barracks for his safety. And you have to remember the commander did not know the Aramaic language and had no idea what was inflaming the mob as they were ready to stone both Paul and the soldiers protecting him and perhaps thought that he was guilty of some enormous crime. But he was God's instrument. Roman justice that would not allow the death of a man who had not been lawfully tried and justly condemned. Roman justice. was the first instrument through which the life of God's servant was preserved. Now do you notice the second incident follows very quickly in verses 24 through 29 of chapter 22 and Paul's life is imperiled here not through a Jewish stoning but through a Roman scourging by the very people who had been his deliverers and his saviors only a few minutes before And in verse 24 we read that the commander directed that he be flogged and questioned. And you know the word questioned there is really a euphemism. A word that is a nice word to express something that is rather nasty usually. And what it really means is that they were intent on putting him into the torture chamber in order that they might elicit from him the information but it seemed they could come by by no other way that would condemn him by revealing the crime he had committed. Now we've little realization beloved today of what it meant to be flogged in Roman times. He would have been led down through the stone passages of the castle of Antonio there in Jerusalem, the Roman barracks, to a lower room that was really the torture chamber, if we use a factual term. and he would have been stripped and his feet bound to a bar on the floor and his wrists would have been roughly bound by long ropes that were thrown over a beam above him and slightly ahead of him and his arms would have been stretched out and fastened tight so that he was leaning in a forward position every nerve of his body tense and strained. And a slave would be standing there with a firm stout pole to which were attached leather thongs and in the leather thongs were embedded pieces of metal and zinc and bone. And the man would be lacerated by every stroke that fell upon his arched back. Many didn't survive that cruel scourging. some went out of their minds most were crippled for life and if Paul had undergone this beloved he never would have preached again even if he had lived Now Paul had previously been beaten, remember, with rods of Philippi and by the Jews on more than one occasion, forty lashes save one, but never, never had the cruel and murderous savagery of the Roman scourge been applied to the Apostle's body. And what he now did has been much criticized and I want to say to you that I believe there is no ground for criticism. As he was stretched out there and the centurion stood by to see that everything was done in due order. And the man stood near the Apostle's mouth to catch the confession of his guilt amid the screams of agony that would have issued from his mouth. Paul said two words, Romana sum, I am a Roman citizen. And I believe beloved that what we are seeing here is the almighty providence of God again protecting this man by giving to him as Jesus promised would be given the very words which he was to speak when he would be brought before kings and rulers and governors. And Roman citizenship in those days, you see, was a great privilege. It was difficult to acquire it. You could buy it by a bribe, as evidently Claudius Lysias had bought his with a great sum, he said. I obtained my citizenship. But Paul came by it through birth. His parents were Roman citizens. We don't know how they became Roman citizens. Probably by some outstanding service to the Roman Empire. and it was an inheritance passed down by birth. But do you see, beloved, what is happening here? Paul's background is being used as God's instrument to save him from almost certain death. Now listen, do you ever consider your background, my friend in Christ? Do you ever ask why? Did I have the education that God gave me or the lack of education? Do you ever consider the family that God brought you up in and the influences that surrounded your growth in early days? Do you ever consider the work that God has called you to do for so many years of your life as a mechanic or a teacher or a university professor? Your background and the disciplines that you have learned there and the sorrowful ways that he has called you to walk in and the privileges that he has given you and do you see your background that has powerful purposes ripening within it for you as God may and often will use your background mightily in the advance of his kingdom You see there's a lesson there, isn't there? That God's providence, beloved, doesn't come like a lightning flash from heaven and suddenly all is solved. But he uses many instruments and many ways as we'll continue to see this morning in that almighty working of his providence by which he preserves all his creatures and all their actions. from a Jewish stoning, from a cruel Roman scourging Paul is saved. Now thirdly, do you notice from the Sanhedrin scheming he is saved. From verse 30 of chapter 2 through verse 10 of chapter 22 through verse 10 of chapter 23. Now you will remember that the Jewish Sanhedrin was the highest council of the Jewish religious order. and Jesus had stood before the Sanhedrin although its constitution may have been somewhat different thirty years previous to Paul standing before the same body and Stephen had stood before this body immediately prior to his death by stoning and this is Claudius Lysias' third attempt to get at the reason for the mob's tumult and their attempt to do Paul to death Remember he'd asked the crowd, the mob, what has this man done and got such confusing answers that he didn't know. And then in the castle through the process of torture or scourging he had endeavoured to find out what was the crime this man had committed. Now is the third occasion, the third attempt to find out what is going on. And evidently by virtue of the power he had as the military governor of Jerusalem he could summon an emergency meeting of the Jewish Sanhedrin. And incidentally if it were an emergency meeting it may explain why Paul in these verses didn't recognize the high priest who may not have been there in his official robes and mitre but dressed like the other Jews the members of the Sanhedrin and this great council was comprised in its fullness of 71 men we don't know if they were all there on this occasion normally the high priest would be the chairman of the group But in that group, you notice, there were Sadducees and Pharisees. And the Sadducees, predominated, hard, unprincipled men, motivated by greed and cruelty and a lust for power, who unashamedly stole the tithes of the temple that were given to the priests and took them for themselves and their leading representative was Ananias the high priest of this time. And the Pharisees were the minority party in the Sanhedrin and alas their moral character was little different at this time. They were not men of kindness and love and mercy and generosity and justice. We have the picture that Jesus paints of them in the Gospels as imposing burdens upon others that they refuse to keep themselves, loving the praise of men, craving positions of honor and prestige, making long prayers in the streets for pretence, and secretly stealing the wealth of widows and orphans and apportioning it for themselves, models of hypocrisy. But with this difference note you, that the origin of the Pharisees was a noble one. They protested the corruption of the age into which later they themselves were to fall and moreover they did believe in the supernatural, in angels and spirit and above all the resurrection of the dead which the Sadducees denied. and overlooking the clash between Paul and the high priest, because it's not in our theme this morning, the important thing I want you to grasp is this, beloved, here is Paul alone in this great council that had condemned both his Lord and the martyr Stephen. because Claudius Lysias his protector would have led him into the council chamber and then as a Gentile would have had to retire and waited around the door which was providential as we will see for the Apostle Paul and Paul is delivered alone into the scheming designs of the Sanhedrin and again what happens beloved has been criticized by so many who write upon this passage Jesus went through the mock trial and suffered it and died. Should not Paul have been obedient to that example of his master some say? But I sat before you but this is God's almighty providence again putting into the Apostle's mouth the very words that he needs in this different and dangerous situation. And you see what he does, summing up in an instance the fact that he cannot get a fair trial there. He boldly claims the protection of his own class and privilege. I am a Pharisee born of Pharisees and it is for the occasion of the resurrection of the dead he says. But I am called in question this day and in the ensuing term while his life is saved. Now isn't it amazing again how God takes another strand out of the Apostles life and background and uses it not citizenship in the Roman Empire this time but membership of the sect of the Pharisees and Paul is delivered out of the scheming designs of the Sanhedrin now do you notice the third one quickly I'm sorry the fourth one quickly the Lord now brings in a little boy to save Paul. He's delivered fourthly then from the subterfuge of the zealots. In chapter 23, 12 through 22. Now it's the fourth time that the Apostle's life is imperiled and in many ways this is the most serious threat that he has ever faced in his whole life. The threat by secret and determined assassination. Now I want you to grasp what's happening here because you see it's equivalent in many ways to the terrorist activities of our own time. There's really nothing new is there in the world. These men more than 40 who are elsewhere called in scripture zealots, the extreme element among the Jewish people who were determined to rid Palestine of the Romans and give the land back to its rightful owners. These were the terrorists of the time and their devices included violence and deception and intrigue and acts of terrorism and sabotage and assassination as necessary. Men who would stick at nothing and who believed in their heart they were doing God's service by murdering the Apostle Paul. And all in connivance you notice with the members of the Sanhedrin themselves. Now it's the most serious danger of all the four that Paul has encountered and it seems as though nothing can save Paul's life. The Romans know nothing of this. And Paul will doubtless be dung to death as he's taken in the midst of a few Roman soldiers down some dark alleyway on his journey to the council chamber of the Sanhedrin. And it's a measure of the violence and determination of these men that they must have known that Paul would be protected. And in the ensuing scuffle Romans would be killed as well as Paul. and there would be repercussions and retaliation and it seems as though nothing can save Paul now but we are forgetting one thing look back in verse 11 the vision that we are to touch upon in a moment as you have testified about me in Jerusalem says the Lord who stood by Paul that night you must testify of me in Rome, as thou hast, thou must. And nothing, beloved, nothing shall thwart or change God's purposes, not even the most determined and diabolical cutthroats of Jerusalem. And so the trap is sprung. And you see how it sprung, almost nonchalantly, casually, Paul's young nephew appears on the scene. And in the nick of time he acts promptly and courageously on behalf of his uncle, and Paul is warned, and the boy is taken by the centurion to the commander, and the commander in that loving gesture takes his little hand and draws him aside, as an evidence of the confidence that he poses in this young boy and says to him, do you have something to tell me? And God blessed this young man's efforts to the saving of the Apostle's life. Paul's little nephew is the instrument of God's almighty providence. Now beloved what does it say to us this morning but that God has his agents everywhere. He uses this means from the Apostles life and that means from his background and he brings in a little boy and uses him to save the Apostle from the most murderous intent upon his life. And how little that little boy knew that he was making history at that moment. How little he realized that his act of courage and bravery would be read about by millions in the Christian church through generations now and yet to come. And I want to say to you boys and girls in the service, and there are a number of you here this morning, God is still looking for such to be his instruments. Are you listening? He's looking for boys and girls with quickness and courage to seize the opportunity to serve him. To become a link in the chain of his glorious purpose to advance his work of the gospel and build his church. Do you know that little boy had no idea that through saving Paul's life and Paul's later imprisonment all those lovely letters to the Colossians and the Ephesians and the Philippians had been given as a priceless heritage to Christ Church and Paul would stand one day before the Roman Emperor himself and testify to the Lord Jesus Christ and that little boy if he had known could have said by God's grace I had a part in bringing that about And I want to ask you this morning, as a little boy or girl, or a young man or woman, are you in that position where you are quick and ready to offer your life on the altar of sacrifice? Even in great danger, this boy went and saved his uncle's life. And you do this, you know, by praying for God's work. Do you pray for your pastor and elder? that the gospel may advance in this place and in this community? And for your deacon, are you an obedient child at home? Have you thought that someone may come into that home and say, I have never seen an example like this before of loving obedience and respect to parents that I see in this child, in these children. And it can be a link in the chain to lead a non-Christian, an unbeliever to salvation in Christ. Are you ready to open your lips and witness to your friends with whom you play at school and in the streets and around your home? Are you ready to do acts of service in the church that may seem ever so humble? but may have everlasting and eternal consequences for good. God has his servants everywhere, even little children. And do you notice the fifth danger, and I must be very quick on this, is that Paul escapes from certain slaying. Verses 23 to 35. from a Jewish stoning and a Roman scourging and the Sanhedrin scheming and the Zealot's substitute and now from certain slain. And you know the picture is remarkable in chapter 23 verses 23 to 35 as you see Paul riding in the midst of a vast army Look at it! Linger over it, beloved! 200 foot soldiers, 200 spearmen, or as we would say today, artillerymen, and 70 cavalry, all to protect one man. And what we learn here, my dear friends, is but God is seeing to it that Paul will get to Rome in safety. Now you know the lessons from this passage as we've looked at it this morning and from this section of it are so clear, aren't they? Many of us need these lessons, you know. That the afflictions of the righteous are many. God doesn't guarantee to protect us or rather to deliver us. Let me check my language here. God does not guarantee that we will not pass through afflictions and troubles. But you may be tempted to take your life out of his hands and say I can manage it better than he can. Now think for a moment, do you really think in the light of what we've seen this morning you can do a better job than God? And the great lesson from this passage is that God is able to take his servant and enfold him in the arms of Christ's love and protect him in the midst of the most horrendous dangers and cause him to lead in triumph his way to Rome. That's the great lesson. The almighty, loving, detailed, sovereign providence of a God who honours the obedience of his servants. Now in just a few words, the second thing that is in this passage, is not only the providential and diverse circumstances, but the powerful divine confirmation of all that Paul is going through. Do you see it in verse 11? The following night the Lord stood near Paul and said take courage as you have borne witness to me in Jerusalem so you shall bear witness to me in Rome also. And as we finish this morning you know we've left the best till the last haven't we? But this must have been the darkest hour of Paul's life between the schemes and plots that had preceded the night vision and the schemes and plots that followed it. And he must have thought that night in his prison cell that I've failed to win my own people to the Lord in Jerusalem. and my desire to be in Rome seems as though it will never be realized and more than that death is now staring me in the face, in the face as a certainty. It's unavoidable. And in that time of great need, when every refuge that is human fails a man, the refuge is the one in which he is able to confide. As the popular proverb says, when gold is in the fire, the goldsmith is never far away. Do you believe that this morning? Take courage from that truth my dear friend. Every refuge may fail but the one true refuge will not. The Lord Jesus appears. And to his much tried servant he says, well done. What grace is in this appearance. What encouragement for the Apostle Paul because it says to him, your life is not over. and as you have served me well for I appreciate the Lord is saying to him in effect all that you are doing in witnessing for me in Jerusalem before the mob from the castle steps to the Roman commander before the Sanhedrin as you have witnessed to me in Jerusalem so that witness will be repeated in Rome itself that it may reverberate from there throughout the empire where all the Gentiles should hear Now listen as I finish this morning, when a man has the honour of the gospel at his heart, I want to tell you that the battle is never his own, but God's. Is Paul sorely tried and tested? God, the Lord, the Lord Jesus comes to him and says, peace Paul, everything is under control. Now as you look at these providential divine circumstances and powerful divine confirmation, remember that when you are in the fire, Christ himself is near. The same yesterday, today and forever. And what if men condemn your work and misunderstand your purpose? It's better to be in a prison with Christ's presence than in a palace without it. And in all our afflictions, beloved, we are to learn to rest upon the word of God alone, assured by his word that he will always love and care for his own. And that should put to flight every care and anxiety of ours and assure us that in spite of what is happening to us, we are still a vessel neat for the Master's use, a weapon polished and ready and not set aside. And this same Lord indeed may bring these encouragements to us in the darkest hour. We may, we can