Let's take our Bibles then and look at Acts 16. I'll begin reading for you at verse four. We always remember when we pick up God's word that this is what it really is. It's God's word. It's not our words. It's not what man's words are about God. It's, in fact, what it really is, the truth of God, authoritative, inerrant and infallible because God can't lie to us. So it's always reliable when we read it together and understand its truth. Now, while they were passing through the cities, verse four, they were delivering the decrees which had been decided upon by the apostles and the elders who were in Jerusalem for them to observe. Now, you notice there's always been the fact that the church was a connectional church and that we're always a people under authority. The elders and the apostles had decided something about the gospel, and we'll talk about that in a few moments. And once they decided it, they passed it down to the churches, and it was for them to obey. So you see, we've always been a connectional church, and we've always been a church under authority, because we rest in the fact that God is over us, and that He places an authority structure even for the church on earth, and that we are to respond to that as those who are people under authority with submissive hearts. So it says, verse five, so the churches were strengthened in the faith and were increasing in number daily. And they passed through the Phrygian and Galatian region, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia. And after they came to Mysia, they were trying to go into Bithynia, and the spirit of Jesus did not permit them. And passing by Mysia, they came down to Troas. A vision appeared to Paul in the night. A man of Macedonia was standing and appealing to him and saying, come over to Macedonia and help us. And when he had seen the vision immediately, we sought to go into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them. So putting out to sea from Troas, we ran a straight course. to Samothrace, and on the day following to Neapolis, and from there to Philippi, which is the leading city of the district of Macedonia, a Roman colony. And we were staying in this city for some days. And on the Sabbath day, we went outside the gate to a riverside where we were supposing that there would be a place of prayer. And we sat down and began speaking to the women who had assembled. A woman named Lydia from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple fabrics, a worshipper of God, was listening. And the Lord opened her heart to respond to the things spoken by Paul. And when she and her household had been baptized, she urged us, saying, If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house and stay. And she prevailed upon us. This is God's word. Let's bow our heads and pray. Father, we are thankful that you've spoken to us and not left us in the dark about what you intend for us to do with our lives. You've given us your Holy Spirit to be our teacher. And so we we ask and plead today, Father, that that indeed you would have prepared our hearts already and that you would be opening our hearts even now so that we can hear and understand the things that you have for us to know this week. And those things that we are to live by and the ways that you want us to focus on your things for our lives and for our future. We pray that you guide us and teach us and lead us in every good way. And we pray now in the mighty name of that one who is Lord and Savior, even Jesus. Amen. I guess I could ask you what you think when you read Acts chapter 16 verse 5. I'll read it over for you again just so it'll be fresh in your mind. Acts 16 verse 5 says, So the churches were being strengthened in the faith and were increasing in number daily. Now, if you look back at Acts 15 verse 40, notice what it says. But Paul chose Silas and left being committed by the brethren to the grace of the Lord. And he was traveling through Syria and Cilicia, strengthening the churches. The Apostle Paul was telling us about what was happening on this missionary journey, and he says what they did was the churches were strengthened and growing in number each day. I don't know about you, but as I look around and the churches that I visit in my travels with Mission to the World, I often find that we don't see the churches growing daily as we would like. So what do we think about when we read these verses? Well, why were these churches strengthened in the faith and growing each day in numbers? I think that's the question we ask ourselves. If you look at what's taking place, the first thing I noticed was from Acts chapter 15, they got the gospel right. The early church got the gospel right. Now, think about the fact of what was going on in Acts chapter 15 and 16, and if you think about it, you'll remember that there was a question about what the gospel was. In Acts chapter 15, there were some people that came up, we give them a name, they were the very strongest of the Jews, we call them the Judaizers. And these people came and they said, what the gospel is, is this, you have to believe in Jesus, that's true, but you also have to keep the law of Moses. So what these very strict Jewish types were going to do was they were going to take all these Gentiles who were coming to faith in Christ left and right, and they were going to take them and say, what you've got to do now, if you're going to be a real Christian, is you're going to believe in Jesus, yes, but you have to keep the Jewish law, the Jewish ceremonies, and all these observances that we've been doing all along for thousands of years. Well, the apostle Paul, you know, got up in their face and said, no, that's not how it is. And they said, OK, let's settle this. So they said, here's what we're going to do. We're going to send you guys to Jerusalem. You're going to get together with the apostles and the elders of the church in Jerusalem, and you're going to sort this thing out and come bring us an answer about what the gospel really is. So the apostles and the elders got together in Jerusalem, they talked it over. You can read all about that in Acts 15. And then what they decided was this, that the Gentiles don't have to be strict law-keeping Jews. They didn't have to do all the ceremonies. They didn't have to keep the new moon feasts and all these other things that went on. What they needed to do was to trust in the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior and Redeemer. But they did have to be careful not to cause stumbling blocks to come for the Jews. Because the Jews that had been raised in all this very strict law-keeping environment, there were several things that really offended them. And one was, the Gentiles had to be very careful, who had come to faith, not to cause a stumbling block by eating meat that had been sacrificed to an idol. And you remember in the meat markets, many of the people who were the pagan, the Gentiles, had offered their meat and offered it in a prayer to their God. And of course, none of the Jewish people would eat that meat because it had been offered to an idol. So they said, number one, here's what you do. You don't eat meat sacrificed to an idol. Or eat meat with the blood still in it. That was a violation of those laws of both health and ceremonial laws that the Jews had. Then the third thing they said is, and you must not fall into sexual sin like the rest of the Gentile community. If you go back and read about Greece and Rome, and if you read about this time period in history, you remember exactly, and you'll be recalling exactly what they were doing. Their worship was very pagan, very sexual. You know that many of the temples, the Greek temples in Athens and places like that had temple prostitutes and sex was a part of their worship. The Apostle Paul says, stay away from meat offered to idols. This is what we don't want you to do to cause our Jewish brothers to stumble. Stay away from the meat that had still had the blood in it. That's a violation of their ceremonial laws and health. things, and they said, also, of course, stay away from sexual sin that's so rampant in the pagan community. And he said, aside from that, trusting in the Lord Jesus is what we're requiring of you. So you see, the early church understood that the essence of the gospel was the Lord Jesus Christ and not causing others to stumble. Remember the Apostle Paul said later, he said, I won't eat meat or drink wine or do anything that will cause my brother to sin. He said, if that's going to do it, he said, I won't do it because I won't do anything that causes my brother for whom Christ died to sin. So the early church understood what the essence of the gospel was. The early church understood that it was all about the Lord Jesus Christ. That's why those churches were strengthened and growing is because they kept the gospel focused on the Lord Jesus Christ himself. But what else can explain their strength and their growth? Well, as I looked at chapter 16 of Acts, I think it's clear that they grew because they depended upon the Holy Spirit. They grew because they really depended on the Holy Spirit. Look at Acts 16, verse six. They passed through the Phrygian and Galatian region, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia. And after they came to Messiah, verse 7, they were trying to go into Bithynia and the Spirit of Jesus did not permit them. One of the things that you notice here very clearly is the fact that the Holy Spirit was directing the show. He was directing where the apostles went. If you can get Turkey in your mind, if you can picture Turkey in your mind, that's where Paul is. And they were going along. And as Paul and Silas and Timothy were going along, they come into this one central region of Turkey. And the Holy Spirit says, no, don't stay here. Keep going. So they go north. They go up around the border, near the border of the Black Sea, where the Black Sea is in northern Turkey. And they go up there. And the Holy Spirit says, no, not here either. So they go on towards the coast. They go down towards the coast and they come to the city of Troas. And when they spend the night there at the city of Troas, you know what happened. The Apostle Paul has this dream. And in the dream, the Macedonian man is standing there and the Macedonian man says, come on over and help us. Now, so you see that the Holy Spirit was directing. It's the Holy Spirit that told them, don't stay in Asia. It's the Holy Spirit that told them, don't stay around the northern parts of Turkey near the Black Sea. Keep moving. It's the Holy Spirit that directed them to the city of Troas. It was the Holy Spirit that gave Paul that night that dream or vision that said, come across to Macedonia and help us. Now, I want you to see. Verse 10 of this chapter, Acts 16, verse 10. What does it say? It says, When he had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them. When you notice that verse, you'll see what it's saying. It says Paul told them what he had, the dream that he had, and they immediately concluded that God was calling them, all of them, to go into Macedonia and to preach the gospel there. They were going to be obedient to the Holy Spirit. Now, the other thing that I wanted you to notice was that word immediately. They immediately sought to go into Macedonia because we concluded that God had called us to evangelize. Immediate obedience. Now, I want to say this to y'all today about how we obey. How do we obey when we know what we're supposed to do? You know, a lot of times, do you know what we put as far as... I think we put a lot, as modern believers, we put a lot of emphasis on knowledge, don't we? I mean, we put a lot of emphasis on knowledge. We say, I want to know my Bible, and that's right, that's good. And I want to grow in the faith, that's good. But you notice what the Bible says these believers did. They knew what to do and they immediately did it. There's a lot of young Christians out there that don't know as much as you do. But, you know, sometimes they obey better than we do, we who have been believers for a while, because, you know, we get kind of used to not obeying, don't we? There are a lot of things that the scripture tells us to do. And do we do them right away? How do we make decisions in life? Do we fast and pray and decide and seek the Lord and decide? Or do we look around for some model around us of success that will kind of give us a clue as to what we ought to do next? Now, let me tell you what pastors do, so I can point the finger at us. A lot of pastors, you know what they do when they're seeking to expand the ministry of the church. What they'll do is they'll look at other successful models of ministry. And they'll say, who's got the most vital church in this city? Let's go look in them and see how they're doing. Or, who has the most vital ministry in our country? Who's doing the biggest things? Is it Saddleback Church out in California? Or is it Willow Creek in Chicago? Or is it Redeemer in New York City? Or is it Perimeter in Atlanta? Or Coral Ridge in Florida? We'll look at all these successful things and we'll say, how are they doing it? Now, maybe we hadn't spent ten minutes praying. But we spend a lot of time getting on the Internet, reading books and going to Christian bookstore and getting every successful model, plan, church growth, discipleship, whatever plan that's out there. And we read that and say, maybe this is it. Now, I want to say to you, these guys did not do that. Notice what they're doing is they're saying, what did the Holy Spirit say to us? Let's go do it. They didn't wait around. It says immediately they went concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to those people in Macedonia. So this characteristic that I noticed is that not only did they follow the Holy Spirit, but they did it immediately when he told them what to do. And I would say to you, this is the calling for believers. We're to obey instantly what we know is right. Some people say, well, I'm going to tithe after I've been a Christian for a while and I've gotten used to it. Well, the Bible doesn't say that. I'm going to go to church periodically, but I've got to, you know, I've got things I've got to do on Sundays. And the Lord says, forsake not the gathering of yourselves together as the habit of some is. See, there were some that were doing it then. How about forgiving others? My father-in-law, Dr. Sartell, wrote a pamphlet probably 40 years ago on forgiveness, because everywhere he would go, he would find that Christians would have real difficulty in forgiving those, being willing to forgive those that had hurt them. But doesn't the prayer that we just prayed a few minutes ago say, forgive us our debts as we forgive those Forgive others, Lord, as forgive me like I forgive others. You see, we got to do that forgiveness right away. It's got to be immediate. We can't put it off for 20 years when we feel better about that person, but we've got to forgive them now. Now is the calling to forgive. You see, believers are called to do what we know is right immediately, not to put it off. Well, there are all kinds of commands in the scriptures. When you see those commands in the scriptures, ask God, Lord, this is for me, isn't it? And I need to start doing that now. Will you help me now to be an obedient follower of yours? Now, we should also notice that their obedience, in their obedience, part of their obedience was that they spoke to the people that came in their path. They spoke to those people that were in their path. When Paul and Silas and Timothy went to Philippi, you remember what they did. Let me read to you verse 12. And from there to Philippi, which is a leading city of the district of Macedonia, a Roman colony. And we were staying in this city for some days. The apostles were staying in the in the city of Philippi there to check it out, weren't they? They were checking out the city of Philippi because they said, we've got to figure out why God sent us here. God said, come over to Macedonia and help us. And Philippi is the key city of Macedonia. It's the key Roman city. It's the big place that we ought to go to. So what has he sent us here to do? So they started looking around the city. And, you know, Paul's The way he always operated was he always went to the synagogue first. But you and I can read this and find out that there wasn't a synagogue there. There weren't 10 Jewish men there who started the synagogue. So they said, OK, God sent us here. We usually go to the synagogue first to witness the people who are already prepared by the Holy Spirit, because they have they've been reading the scriptures all their lives and looking for the Messiah. But those people aren't here. So what we need to do is we need to find the next best thing. And they figured it would be a place of prayer, and it would be a place of prayer outside the city, maybe by the river. So on the Sabbath day, they get up and they walk outside the city, they go outside the gate, and they look around on the riverside until they find this group of prayer. When they went out there, they found this prayer meeting, but it was a group of women because there weren't ten Jewish men there in the city. Now, do you remember how low the status of women was? Do you remember how low the status of women was in that society? Remember, a Jewish man would get up and every day he would pray a prayer like this, Lord, I thank you I'm not a woman, a slave, or a Gentile. That's what a Jewish man would pray in the day. So you can see how high the status of women was. Now, it's kind of like the Muslim world today, to be honest with you. You know that the standing of women is not great at all in the Muslim world. I was listening to the radio this summer. It was back in June, and I heard the news about something that was taking place in Saudi Arabia. Many women there were having a protest movement against the government. And do you know what their protest movement was? On a certain day, all the women of Saudi Arabia were encouraged to get out and to drive. Now you know why that was a protest move? Because they don't have the right to drive in Saudi Arabia. Women can't have a driver's license. They can't vote. They can't hold a job, they can't leave the country, get a passport, any of those things without male approval. They have no rights. So you think about the low status of women in biblical times, and we can see a parallel in the days in which we live just halfway across the world in the Muslim world. When Paul and the others got to this place of prayer, they found that there's a whole group of women there. Now, I want you to see their reaction. Did they say this? Well, we can't do anything here because the only thing here is just a bunch of women and children and slaves. Why would we preach the gospel to them? You think that's what Paul and Silas and Timothy said? We know it wasn't. Paul and Silas and Timothy preached the gospel to these women. We sat down and began speaking to the women who had assembled, it says in verse 13, a woman named Lydia from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple fabrics, a worshiper of God, was listening. And the Lord opened her heart to respond to the things spoken by Paul. When Paul and the others got to the place of prayer, they didn't say, oh, there's nothing to be gained from preaching the gospel to women, we can't start a church with them. They didn't say that at all. They preached the gospel there. They proclaimed Christ. And there was one lady there by the name of Lydia whose heart had really been opened and God had prepared her. The Holy Spirit had worked and she was open and she believed and trusted in Christ and was baptized. And she was so burdened for others when she came to Christ that she immediately said, you've got to go home with me and I want you to talk to everybody in my family. I want you to talk to my slaves, I want you to talk to my children, I want you to talk to these grandchildren, whoever was in the household. She wanted everybody to come to Christ. And that's exactly what Paul and Silas and Timothy did. They spoke to every member of the household and they led them to Christ. And they were baptized too. In the rest of the chapter, we see that he spoke to a slave girl. You remember the slave girl that followed him around and called out about, you know, these men are telling you a way of salvation? And also we know that when they were thrown in jail, they spoke to the people that were there in the jail. They spoke to all the other prisoners and eventually to the jailer who was there after the earthquake happened. So what do you see? One of the reasons that the churches were strong in those days is because those believers took very great care to speak to everybody they met about Jesus Christ. Now do you see why we're weak and they were strong? Because they're speaking to everybody they meet about the Lord Jesus Christ. We don't do that. That's why we're weaker than they are. That's why they were strong, and that's why they were growing daily, is because God was preparing hearts and they were speaking to people, and they trusted that God had already prepared hearts, and so they spoke to everybody they talked to. They didn't just look at some people and say, well, this person over here looks like somebody that has real potential, so I'll speak to them. But this guy over here, man, I won't talk to him because he's just a prisoner, a slave. He's just a second-class citizen. I won't talk to that person. You see, they didn't do that at all. They talked to everybody about the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. They depended on the Holy Spirit. They depended on the Holy Spirit to prepare hearts. Now, let me ask you this. If you discovered a cure for cancer. If you're a doctor or a researcher. And you discover a cure for cancer, for Alzheimer's or for any of the other major diseases of our time. Would you keep quiet about it? No. You'd be on Good Morning America. You'd be interviewed on NPR. You would be on every morning talk show you could get on. You would be writing for professional journals. You'd be writing articles and submitting them to your colleagues. You'd be speaking to the Rotary Club. You'd be speaking to every local person you could. You could say, listen, I found a cure for cancer. I found a cure for Alzheimer's. I found a cure. Now, you and I have something far greater than a cure for cancer or for Alzheimer's. We've got better news than that. We know what the cure is for eternal death. The cure for death and separation from God forever is trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ. Knowing Him who loved us and gave His life for us. Knowing the one that is life itself. Knowing that by trusting in this one, in Jesus Christ, the way, the truth and the life, we have all of those things. We have hope. We have joy. We have peace with God. There's therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. We know that God loves us and he sent Christ for us, that there's hope in this life and until the end of the end of the end, which is impossible because there is no end in heaven. You see, we have joy and peace and hope, and sometimes we just keep it to ourselves, don't we? We don't tell other people like we should. If we knew a cure for cancer or for Alzheimer's or for AIDS, we would be on every television show, in every journal, writing articles and speaking to every person we could possibly talk to, to tell them the hope that they could have to be delivered from those diseases. And we know something better. We know Christ has given us life. We who trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, we have life. And so we don't go to the grave sad, do we? For those that know Christ, we know that there is an eternity of joy and peace for them. The early believers saw the church being strong and growing every day. Paul and the others spoke to everybody that was around them. They spoke to women in this chapter. They spoke to women. They spoke to a slave girl and they spoke to a Gentile Roman who was probably a civil retired civil servant who was running the jail, the Philippian jail. And you remember those are the three segments of society that were despised by most Jews, women, slaves, and Gentiles. And in Acts 16, we see them speaking to every one of those types of people. They told them the gospel. They led them to Christ. They involved them in the church. And so the church was strong. We must not be people who are hesitant to share the gospel with anyone, whether it's going into the jails and talking to people there, going on the streets and talking to the people we meet there in the grocery store or in the White House. We're not going to be ashamed to tell about our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ to whomever we meet. We must not pick and choose based on who we like or who we don't like, because you see, it's not up to us. The gospel is for everyone. We must be those that trust that God wants us to sow the gospel seed everywhere, just like the parable of the sower. We're going to throw it everywhere on all the pieces of the ground. It's up to God to grow it from those places where it's so. God works. So what about you and me? Will you commit today? to talking to people in your life about Christ, your friends, your relatives, your neighbors, your co-workers, the person that God places next to you somewhere. Will you ask God to lead you to people who need to hear about the gospel of Christ? Will you ask God to lead you to people that He is drawing, that He is preparing? And will you depend upon the Holy Spirit to lead you to others so that you can grow together. And you know, the truth is that without God's help, we can't do anything, can we? Remember, John chapter 15, I am the vine, you are the branches. We depend upon the Spirit to help us as we go each day. I'd say to you, if you're not a Christian yet, I would encourage you to trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. Because he is the one who is life. We can't live the life. You can't live the Christian life without Christ in your heart. A lot of people used to try to say, I want to be a Christian. I want to live a godly life. I want to do good things. But they hadn't trusted Christ yet. They just wanted to be moral and good and right and acceptable. But you can't do that without Christ. Only he can change our hearts, if any person. is in Christ. He's a new creature. That's when you're new, not till then. Have you trusted Christ? Do you know him? Do you know that he's life and that he's your Savior and King? We need power to be believers in this day and time where we call upon the Lord Jesus Christ to help us with all of these things. Let's bow and pray. Father, we thank you that even though we can't do anything, we know you can do everything. You can use our feeble words. You can use our weak efforts and you can transform lives through the power of the Holy Spirit, using weak words to convert and to convict and to convince. And so we pray that you would indeed use us this week, that we'll be your instruments of righteousness. Help us, Father, we pray in the mighty name of our King and Savior, even Jesus. Amen.