All right. Last week, Paul finished his second missionary journey and started his third journey, and the notes have a little chart from the NIV study Bible of the third journey. And we got Paul from Antioch back through the Galatian churches and over to Ephesus last week, which is where he's going to spend the bulk of the third journey is actually in Ephesus. And then I kind of stumbled into the topic of whether it's possible for someone who's never heard the gospel to be saved. And I wanted to hit that a little bit just in case someone wasn't here last week. Maybe I can offend them too. Or maybe I can clear up any questions I created. One thing I didn't do last week was to give you kind of context for this issue. I think the way it plays out is this. All evangelicals would agree I think that during the Old Testament. Believers did not know the name Jesus and that you could be redeemed and will meet Old Testament believers in heaven who had no conscious belief in Jesus because they didn't know who he was. I think they understood clearly that God would forgive their sins and that forgiveness would be based on grace and not them. And you know the great example of that in the Old Testament is deliverance from Egypt. That was done purely out of God's grace and not because of anything the nation of Israel had done. I think the nation understood that applied on an individual level to that they were saved by grace through faith. But they didn't know that that was going to the means of that salvation was going to be through Jesus. And I think if you read the Gospels, even though they understood there was supposed to be a Messiah, clearly most of them didn't understand he was going to die for them and that his death was going to be the means of their salvation. So everyone agreed in the Old Testament era, you could be a believer without having heard about the name of Jesus. I had some professors in seminary that believed the moment Jesus died, we entered a new era, the New Testament era. And in effect, a switch flipped. And at that moment, everyone in the world from that point on needed to know the name Jesus and have conscious faith in Jesus Christ to be saved. And the reaction I had as a seminary student, I think the reaction some people you may encounter who've heard of Christianity have, is that's not very fair to the guy who lives in Alaska. Why, you know, that's great for the people who live in Jerusalem, but what about the guy in Alaska who can't possibly hear the gospel before he dies? Why should his salvation depend on sort of the random circumstance of geography? There are other professors I had that would have disagreed with that and said, you know, we don't really know what happens to someone who's never heard the gospel. Scripture doesn't directly believe that. And we stumbled into a passage last week that I think suggests that what you have to believe may not depend on the time that you live. It may also depend on the revelation that you've encountered. And the reason for that was we encountered a few people last week who, even though they lived after Jesus had died and other believers had received the Holy Spirit, had not heard about the baptism of Christ and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. And so they hadn't experienced that. And they didn't experience that until Paul explained it to them. passage isn't directly on point but it suggests that perhaps what God expects of you depends on what God has revealed to you. Now I make it clear I'm not arguing that I think everyone who hasn't heard the gospel is safe not arguing for universalism at all. All I'm arguing for is that we as Christians can answer the question, is it possible for someone who's never heard the gospel to be saved? Yes, or I don't know. It seems possible. That's the argument. One topic I wanted to address that someone brought up is that one idea that floats around is that, well, if you take that view, Are you actually putting people in a worse position by sharing the gospel with them because you're giving them revelation and making them more accountable. And you know I think first it's important to acknowledge the position has some logic to it. When you hand someone the gospel, in effect, you're giving them a coin. And on one side of the coin is opportunity and benefit to have a better relationship with God. But the other side of the coin is you're sharing more revelation for which they're accountable to God. So the position has some logic to it. The problem with the position is that it flies directly in the face of clear scripture. We were told in the Great Commission that our job was to go out and to baptize all people in the name of Christ and to teach them to obey everything that Christ taught us. So it's not enough for us to believe it's possible for a guy in Alaska who's never heard the gospel to be in heaven. That doesn't mean we cancel our mission program because we believe that's possible because our mission is to get to Alaska to plant churches there and to teach them to obey everything that Christ has taught us. And it acts you know the same thing. We were told to be witnesses for Christ to the ends of the earth. So whenever logic and scripture kind of run into each other, we go with clear scripture and its direction. So we're told by God not to worry about the consequences for the people. We're told to share the gospel and to teach them to obey everything that God said. And I also think we can get to the same idea by reasoning, though. If you take election seriously, I don't think there's anything you can do to prevent someone from being saved who would otherwise be saved, right? If God has decided before time began that an individual will believe, God is going to make sure that person believes and you are not going to stop God. So I don't think you have to worry that if you share the gospel with someone you are putting them in a worse position than they would otherwise be. But I also think if that doesn't make sense to you you can fall back on that issue is above my pay grade. I was told to share the gospel. I was given these wonderful gold coins and I was told to pass them out. And you know what. I think a parable you can fall back on is the parable of the servants that were given the money by their master. And the one guy that got in trouble was the guy that said, well, I didn't want to lose it, so I just buried it in my backyard. You know, that's that's the bad thing. We were told to share the gospel. So if nothing else, we fall back on that. We share it and we let the chips fall where they may. Okay, questions about that topic? Comments? Concerns? Accusations of heresy? I'll take them all. Yes? Right. You know, the question is, what do we do with passages in Romans that make it clear that everyone is captive to sin? They're born that way and then they willingly participate in the sin afterwards and that we're told no one seeks after God on their own. I agree with all that. I think if you're evangelical you have to accept that principle. So we start with the idea that the guy in Alaska who's never heard the gospel is dependent on God's grace and that he is captive to sin. Anyone else. And so if he somehow appeals to God for grace. It is only because God's Holy Spirit was working on him and drew him to the point where he could do that. And so his salvation to me is the exact same as all of us. It's completely dependent on God and God's Holy Spirit drawing him to him. The only difference is that somehow he's acknowledging his need for grace without knowing the name of Christ, that specific name. But everything else would be the same. And since we're in Romans, you know, the passage that the professors that I had relied on the most is actually Romans 10. And verse 14 was the one that they cited the most. or for 10 14. How then can they call on the one they have not believed in and how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard and how can they hear without someone preaching to them and how can they preach unless they are sent as it is written how beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news. And so and read in isolation you know that's a pretty good Proof text. The problem is that if you keep reading the context of this passage, Paul is arguing that's a false argument. Verse 18. But I ask, did they not hear? Of course they did. Their voice has gone out into all the earth, their words to the end of the world. Again I ask did Israel not understand. First Moses says I will make you envious by those who are not a nation. I will make you angry by a nation that has no understanding. And then you drop down to verse 21 but concerning Israel he says all day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and obstinate people. So if you read that passage in context, the argument that they haven't heard is actually, in Paul's mind, a false argument. It's an excuse an Israelite might use, and Paul demolishes it by saying, any Israelite has heard this message. And so you cannot use an Israel I cannot use the argument I haven't heard as an excuse because God has reached out to the nation of Israel for years and years in many different ways. And so to me at best Romans 10 isn't it's an indirect argument on the guy in Alaska who's never heard. So I think as evangelicals we can say there's not a scripture directly on the issue of people who've never heard the gospel. And I think the reason for that is that if you're reading scripture you're not in that category. And scripture was written to specific readers. And so the Bible doesn't try to really address this issue. And that's why I think we should be really cautious when we talk about it. All right, questions about what I just did to Romans 10? Accusations of heresy? All right. There are a lot of different viewpoints on this issue, so I'm not saying if you disagree with me, you're anathema or anything, we're not trying to do that here. But it's an issue that I think was raised by the passage in Acts we studied last week, so I wanted to talk about it. All right. Let's push on an axe then. We're in Acts 19. Let's pick up in verse eight, we've gotten Paul into Ephesus in Acts 19, and we're going to see him doing the exact same thing he's done in other cities. Verse 8 tells us, Paul entered the synagogue and spoke boldly there for three months. So as far as synagogues go, that's pretty good, given him three months, arguing persuasively about the kingdom of God. But some of them became obstinate, they refused to believe and publicly maligned the way. So same thing that happens. Some people in the synagogue like what Paul has to say. Some don't and eventually get tired of hearing Paul say it and start to attack him. So Paul left them. He took the disciples with him. So again some of the people respond and had discussions daily in the lecture hall of Tyrannus. We don't know really anything about Tyrannus. He's a Greek who evidently has a lecture hall that Paul is able to use. Some people think back then they wouldn't have had air conditioning, so the popular times to use this lecture hall would have been in the morning or the evening, and that he let Paul use it during the afternoon when it otherwise would have been empty. Don't know that for sure. This went on for two years. So Ephesus is a little unusual and part of the reason for that may be that it's so big that to some extent Paul is under the radar screen. And so he's able to minister there for two solid years. So really important because Ephesus is such a big city and an important city and such a strategic distribution point for the gospel. And Luke tells us all the Jews and Greeks who lived in the province of Asia heard the word of the Lord. And this is probably one of those moments where all doesn't literally mean 100 percent that every single individual in that whole province literally heard Paul just means it was enough that you could say the whole province heard the word of the Lord. We've talked about that. before that all is a bit of a slippery word. All right. Then. Luke goes back and he focuses on certain specific incidents during the fusion ministry and he tells us God did extraordinary miracles through Paul so that even handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched him were taken to the sick. and their illnesses were cured and the evil spirits left them. So. You know, Paul, God confirms Paul's ministry to such an extent that if you just have a hanky that Paul has used, you can take the hanky and a hanky can perform miracles. All right. That's pretty incredible. I mean, you can understand why, you know, the whole province hears the word of the Lord through this, if this kind of stuff is going on. And this sets up the next. Passage. Some Jews who went around driving out evil spirits tried to invoke the name of Lord Jesus over those who were demon possessed, they would say in the name of Jesus, whom Paul preaches, I command you to come out. And this kind of has some logic to it. I mean, if you can use a hanky that Paul has touched, kind of like a spiritual tool to drive out a demon, why couldn't you just invoke the name of Paul like a verbal hanky, right? Well, we find out it doesn't work quite like that. We don't know whether they were ever able to do this successfully. Luke just tells us about one time when it didn't work. And that may have been the only time they tried it. We're not sure. Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, were doing this. One day, the evil spirit answered them, Jesus I know, and I know about Paul, but who are you? So we find out that the name of Jesus isn't just something like a spiritual screwdriver. You can just use like a tool. You need an actual connection to it. And the demon says, well, I know about these guys, but you don't have any connection to them. Then the man who had the evil spirit jumped on them and overpowered them all. So he beats up these seven men. He gave them such a beating that they ran out of the house naked and bleeding. And if you You know I've been following Randy through the gospel you know demon possessed people sometimes have unnatural strength and cause all kinds of trouble and this is one of those instances where he's able to beat up seven men. So. We find out that you. You are messing with something dangerous when you get involved when you dabble in spirituality. Jesus is powerful. We believe all power has been delegated to him. Demons are powerful, too, less powerful than Jesus, but not something to be trifled with. And if you have no connection to Jesus, you don't need to be messing with them. And not surprisingly, when this became known to the Jews and Greeks living in Ephesus, they were all seized with fear and the name of the Lord Jesus was held in high honor. And we find this prompt some reform in the church. Many of those who believed. So these are believers now came and openly confess their evil deeds. So people in Ephesus were just like us. They'd become Christians but they hadn't necessarily left behind all their sinful practices and we're going to find out a lot of them were dabbling in sorcery and syncretism. A number who had practiced sorcery brought their scrolls together and burned them publicly. When they calculated the value of the scrolls, the total came to 50,000 drachmas. We think that's a coin that's basically the equivalent of one day's worth of manual labor. So this is the equivalent scrolls having the value of 50,000 workdays. So I don't know what that would be exactly in today's dollars but it's a lot. So these scrolls had tremendous value. They could have taken them to the Greek equivalent of eBay and probably sold them for a lot of money. But they're so convicted that these things are bad that they burn them. So that's a pretty big testament that they've taken a big step forward in their faith walk that they're willing to do that. And that. has an effect to in this way the word of the Lord spread widely and grew in power. OK. So that's kind of specific incidents that give us a snapshot into the effectiveness of Paul's ministry in Ephesus and because of that to the whole province of Asia. Questions about that. All right. Let's press forward. Then as always happens when the gospel has success there's pushback. After all this had happened Paul decided to go to Jerusalem passing through Macedonia and Achaia. So he comes up with this plan that from Ephesus he wants to go through Macedonia and then Greece and then back to Jerusalem. Then after I have been there, he said, I must visit Rome also. So he wants to get to Rome. And in preparation for that, he sent two of his helpers, Timothy and Erastus. Don't know much about Erastus except for he gets mentioned in one of the later epistles, appears to have been a guy that stuck with Paul and the church and eventually ends up in Corinth. So he's going to send two of his trusted helpers to Macedonia while he stayed in the province of Asia a little longer. But that plan gets cut short because about that time there arose a great disturbance about the way. So Luke is still referring to Christianity as the way. And then he tells us what that disturbance was. The silversmith named Demetrius who made silver shrines of Artemis. And one of the things I don't know if I've mentioned it yet that's important about Ephesus is it has this incredible temple to Artemis. Not much of it is left. I think they said only one column is left, but supposedly, you know, the temple enclosed an area that was even bigger than a football field, had these massive, spectacular marble columns. It was considered one of the wonders of the ancient world and no small source of tourism for the city. And because of that, no small source of income because you could sell shrines and different trinkets just like we do today at tourist traps to the people coming there. So here's Demetrius, a guy who's dependent on that trade. He called them together. So he calls together all the craftsmen along with the workmen in related trades and said, men, you know we receive a good income from this business. And you see and hear how this fellow Paul has convinced and led astray large numbers of people here in Ephesus and in practically the whole world of Asia. So we see the trend and the trend isn't good for us. He says that man-made gods are no gods at all. There is danger. Not only that our trade will lose its good name but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis will be discredited and the goddess herself who is worshipped throughout the province of Asia and the world will be robbed of her divine majesty. So he gets them all worked up and you know. I think that's what he said, but I think Luke wants us to see if it's that easy to rob Artemis, how divine is she? Right? I mean, if Artemis needs her followers to do this, then she isn't much of a goddess. I think Luke doesn't want us to miss that. But the speech gets the craftsmen pretty fired up. They see what's going on too. When they heard this, they were furious and began shouting, great is Artemis of the Ephesians. Soon the whole city was in an uproar. The people seized Gaius and Aristarchus, Paul's traveling companions from Macedonia, and rushed as one man into the theater. So we get one of these mobs that we've seen before in Acts. Paul wanted to appear before the crowd but the disciples would not let him. So the disciples kind of saved Paul from himself. Even some of the officials of the province, friends of Paul, sent him a message begging him not to venture into the theater. And the theater still kind of exists, and so I saw pictures of it while I was studying for it, and it is a big theater, okay? You could call it an arena. So this could have been a very, very large mob, thousands of people, all right? So very dangerous situation. So even the officials don't want to mess with it right away. And we find out it's a true mob. I mean a lot of people in it don't even know what's going on. We're told the assembly was in confusion. Some were shouting one thing some another. Most of the people did not even know why they were there. This is interesting. Evidently the Jewish community wanted to distinguish itself from Paul. So that's what we think is happening next. The Jews pushed Alexander to the front. So we have no reason to believe this Alexander's a believer. And his goal seems to be to make it clear to this mob. We're not with them. You know, if you're mad at him, trash his house, not mine. And the mob doesn't want to listen to him. He motioned for silence in order to make a defense before the people. But when they realized he was a Jew, they all shouted in unison for about two hours. Great is Artemis of the Ephesians. So they're in no mood to get into a discussion about the finer points of Jewish theology. They're mad at everyone who's not a devoted follower of Artemis. And so for two hours they chant in this kind of rage, great is Artemis of the Ephesians. And if you've ever been in a football game, it's not easy to yell for two hours straight. And, you know, at this point, they're probably burned out a little bit. And then the city clerk shows up and he does something really shrewd. Verse thirty five, the city clerk quieted the crowd and said, men of Ephesus, doesn't all the world know that the city of Ephesus is the guardian of the temple of the great Artemis and of her image, which fell from heaven? So he starts by making statements he knows the mob will like, which is pretty shrewd given how the mob has treated everyone else. He starts by saying, look, everyone knows Artemis is great, you know. Therefore, since these facts are undeniable, you ought to be quiet and not do anything rash. So you don't need to riot. If everyone can agree that Artemis is great, why do we need to riot in order to defend her honor? In verse thirty seven. You brought these men here though they've neither robbed temples nor blasphemed our goddess. If then Demetrius and his fellow craftsmen have a grievance against anybody the courts are open and there are pro councils they can press charges. So the second point he makes is these people haven't directly attacked Artemis or what we're trying to do, our trade. And if they had, you could press charges against them in our courts. So again, his point is there's no need to riot. If there's anything further you want to bring up, it must be settled in a legal assembly. As it is, we are in danger with being charged with rioting because of today's events. In that case, we would not be able to account for this commotion since there is no reason for it. Rioting is a really serious offense in the Roman Empire. Rome didn't like that. And it could have really serious consequences for the Ephesians. Ephesus is not a Roman colony. It's what's called a free city, which means it's entitled to some economic privileges, not as much as if it were a full Roman colony. But those privileges could easily be lost. And if free cities in the Roman Empire did stuff Rome didn't like, Rome was perfectly willing to go in there, kill all the leadership, and start over. So, rioting is a very dangerous thing, and the clerk says, you've got no basis that Rome would see as justification for carrying on in this way. So, if Rome comes in and investigates this, you're going to get blamed for it, not Paul. And finally, that sinks in on the crowd, and so we're told, after he had said this, he dismissed the assembly. And so the crowd finally disperses. And so, as we see so often in Acts, Luke shows that it's the opponents of Christianity who are actually the bad citizens. They're the ones who are rioting. They're the ones who aren't thinking straight. It's Christians who are actually good law-abiding citizens. And Paul will make this point in his epistles when he's advising Christians, to the extent you can, you ought to be good law-abiding citizens. And when outsiders look on Christians, They should see that you are good citizens. And so if you get persecuted, the only reason you should be persecuted is because you believe in Christ and they don't like that. So one of the takeaways from this passage is that we, to the extent we can, should be good citizens of the United States. People should be able to look at us and say, look, these are productive, valuable members of our community. Questions, comments, concerns about that? All right, let's keep going. Paul does see this as a sign, it's time to get out of Dodge. When the uproar had ended, Paul sent for the disciples and after encouraging them, said goodbye and set out for Macedonia. finally leaves Ephesus but it appears he spent probably two plus years in Ephesus and established the Ephesian church which becomes very important. He traveled through that area speaking many words of encouragement to the people and finally arrived in Greece where he stayed three months. So he goes over to Macedonia to the churches that were established in the second journey and strengthens them which again shows Paul understands the full commission. He's not just interested in walking around sharing the gospel and then never returning. He wants to build disciples and churches up. And so he repeatedly goes back to areas he's been before. We don't know how long he spent in Macedonia. We think he may have gone actually even north of Macedonia to a province called Illyricum which is north of the province north of Macedonia because he mentions going to Illyricum in some of his epistles and this seems like the best opportunity for him to have done that. But Luke doesn't bother to mention that. Also backtracking a little bit we think that while Paul is in Ephesus he writes first Corinthians which would make first Corinthians the third book of the New Testament after Galatians and first and second Thessalonians. We also think he has to make a short and what he calls in second Corinthians painful visit to Corinth because bad things are happening in the Church of Corinth. And that he writes a letter about that while he's in Ephesus that we no longer have. And that's all talked about in 2 Corinthians. And then he writes 2 Corinthians during this journey through Macedonia. So we think it's likely the first five books of the New Testament are first Galatians and first and second Thessalonians and first and second Corinthians. And that gets us up to about 57 A.D. At this point we have to be cautious because we don't know exactly when the Gospels are written. The majority view is that Mark is the first gospel written, and there's kind of a big range for when Mark could have been written, but it starts probably in the late 50s. Some people think Matthew was the first gospel written. So at some point, you know, from now, to a number of years later, the Gospels start being written and so the church has not just Paul's writings but also the Gospels. But we don't know exactly when the Gospels were written and so when they fit in with Paul's epistles. All right. Comments, questions about that? All right. Let's keep going. So he ends up in Greece and we think that means Corinth where he stays three months because the Jews made a plot against him just as he was about to sail for Syria. And I think that means that's part of his plan to get to Jerusalem. Remember he decided to go back through Macedonia. We don't know why. One thing people posit is that we know from the epistles, one of the things he's doing in Macedonia and in Greece is collecting money to take to Jerusalem. And so some people think, well, maybe Paul's worried about losing this money. Other people think maybe the Jews feel like if they know what court he'll be leaving from, we aren't entirely sure, but he hears about some plot that makes him think he wants to go over land through Macedonia rather than trying to leave from a port in Greece. And we're told he was accompanied by Sopater, son of Pyrrhus from Berea, Aristarchus and Secundus from Thessalonica, Gaius from Derbe, Timothy also. Timothy's from Lystra, which is generally associated with Derbe. They're from the same region. Antiochus and Trophimus from the province of Asia. And part of the reason we think Luke tells us about all these people from the different churches is that they're sort of going along as ambassadors because they're delivering money from all these churches to Jerusalem. I mean, that's their goal. These men went on ahead and waited for us at Troas. And Troas is on that northwestern corner of Turkey. So they go kind of in a big crescent up Greece through Macedonia to Troas. But we, and we think that means that Luke is part of this journey, sailed from Philippi after the Feast of Unleavened Bread and five days later joined the others at Troas where we stayed seven days. So this band of ambassadors taking this money to Jerusalem finally all meets up at Troas and they stay there for a week. And there we get another interesting incident. On the first day of the week we came together to break bread. Paul spoke to the people. Oh and we think that means a Sunday. And we also think it probably means they had a full meal kind of a big church potluck. probably celebrated communion as part of that. Paul spoke to the people and because he intended to leave the next day, kept on talking until midnight. And as we read further on this journey, we learn it's not just that he's leaving the next day that's so critical. Paul kind of views this as his farewell trip. He thinks it's likely he's not going to get another chance to come back to these cities. And we'll learn more about why he believes this as he goes on. But that's the urgency. He's leaving the next day and he thinks there's a good chance he may never get back here. So everything he wants to say to this church he wants to get out that night because he's worried. So he kept on talking until midnight. There were many lamps in the upstairs room where we were meeting. So there's lots of people. There are these smoky lamps. It's warm. You can understand how not a good atmosphere to try to stay awake. Seated in a window was a young man named Eutychus who was sinking into a deep sleep as Paul talked on and on. Seminary students always think that's funny. Paul talking on and on and boring his audience. When he was found asleep, so this poor guy found asleep, yeah, you may identify with that right now. I understand. I don't take offense. He fell to the ground from the third story and was picked up dead. So they're in this upper room and the guy falls and the fall kills him. Paul went down, threw his arms on the young man and put his arms around him. Don't be alarmed, he said, he's alive. So Paul goes down and miraculously raises him from the dead. And as you can imagine, that wakes the crowd up, all that. So he goes upstairs again, breaks bread, eats, and talks until daylight. So they have an all-niner, you know, with the miracle in the middle. And, you know, that would be a great way to make an impact on your Sunday school class, would be to raise someone from the dead in the middle of it. I think you would listen to what I said the rest of the class. Right. This is and this is kind of the role of confirming miracles. They make you listen to the message. And this is you know it's amazing the way this plays out. And so we're told the next morning the people took the young man home alive and were greatly comforted. I mean the comfort isn't just that the guy is alive. It's if that means everything Paul says is true. And so the entire message of the gospel that anyone who believes in Jesus will be redeemed and will spend eternity with God is true. That's that's the purpose of the miracles is to encourage you by believing everything in the Bible is true. And as you can imagine that has a big impact. All right. Questions comments concerns about that little incident. All right. We'll keep going. We can keep going. We're going to talk all night. All right. When we went on ahead to the ship and sailed for Assos where we were going to take Paul aboard, so the band for some reason gets on a ship and Paul tracks the ship but overland. I have no clue why he does this. He had made this arrangement because he was going there on foot. When he met us at Assos, we took him aboard and went on to Mytilene. The next day, we set sail from there and arrived off Chios. The day after that, we crossed over to Samos and on the following day, arrived at Miletus. What Luke is telling us is that if you look at the map, they are making their way down the coast, the western coast of Turkey. And historians tell us that is exactly what we'd expect for people making a journey by ship in this region. That the Greek ships at that time were pretty small. They didn't like to venture out into the middle of the sea if they could help it. So their strategy would be to kind of hug the coast and make little short trips from island to island if possible. Not always possible, but in this region it is. Then surprisingly, we're told, Paul had decided to sail past Ephesus to avoid spending time in the province of Asia, for he was in a hurry to reach Jerusalem, if possible, by the day of Pentecost. So this tells us Paul is very interested in arriving in Jerusalem by the day of Pentecost suggests it's important to Paul to celebrate Pentecost. He may have also been important to him to deliver the gift by that time. And yet another reason it may be important to Paul is that he may want to take another crack at preaching in Jerusalem. And if you're going to do that, a good time to do that is Pentecost when there's tons of people gathered there. So if you're going to testify in Jerusalem, Pentecost is a good time to do it, you know, probably next to Passover. Passover would be even better, but it's too late for Paul to do that. One thing that the commentators have noticed, and I think they're right, is that It's interesting how much what Paul is doing here parallels the end of the Gospels, where we're told that Jesus sets his face toward Jerusalem and heads toward it, knowing what's awaiting him there. And Luke seems to be showing that Paul very much is following in Jesus' footsteps here. We sort of have the meeting in the upper room in Troas with the disciples. We're going to later say Paul says he's hearing from the Holy Spirit, the trial and tribulation awaits him in Jerusalem, and yet Paul heads straight for the eye of the hurricane, so to speak, because his mission is to do what God wants and to testify to Jesus, if not to preserve himself. And we'll hear more about that next week. Paul will make that clear when he meets with the Ephesian elders and explains himself to them. All right. Questions, comments, concerns about anything we touched on today? We already talked about one of our applications. I think another one that's important to remember is I did a selection of ambassadors from all the different churches. shows how Paul was very interested in keeping the church unified. You know, after every journey, Paul goes back to Jerusalem. And here we see him taking representatives from churches with him, and we see them contributing money to Jerusalem. The church's goal was not to be fragmented. It was to be one unified movement testifying to Jesus Christ. And to the extent we can, I think we should continue that. I mean, to the extent we have common ground with people in other churches and other denominations, I think we should work with them and affirm the areas where we're unified as much as possible. I think that's important. All right. I've probably taken enough time. I'll be up here if you've got questions. Thanks for listening and not falling out of your chair. Oh, and remember, we are supposed to roll out those tables. So if you put your chairs away and some of you could help with the tables, that'd be great. Okay, gotcha. Did you hear that? We just need the chairs. enough room to get the tables out.