Just try to make things a lot simpler. There's a lot in there so instead of going through reading it all and then coming back and recounting, we're just going to read one account, look at it, read another account, look at it, and read another account, look at it. Tonight what we're talking about, we're talking about the Apostle Paul on his second missionary journey and three people that he has been introduced to. This is something that we're teaching in our youth class, so I think if it's good enough for the lambs, it's good enough for the sheep, right? If it's good enough for the sheep, it's good enough for the lambs. I think they can eat out of the same trough. We just, on our Sunday mornings class, we're going through a study. I like telling y'all what we're doing in our youth. I think it's good for y'all to know what I'm teaching our kids. So in our Sunday morning class, we're going through a series of denying ourselves and taking up our cross. So learning that and pairing it with this on our Wednesday night class, it really gives a good dynamic on our calling to go and spread forth the gospel. But first, you gotta deny yourself. So it kinda goes hand in hand. It works out really well for us. All right, Acts chapter 16, starting at verse 11. Now I apologize for some of these words. English is not that good on pronouncing some of this stuff. Therefore, sailing from Tros, we ran a straight course to Samothrace, and the next day came to Nepalis, and from there to Philippi, which is the foremost city of the part of Macedonia, a colony. And we were staying in that city for some days, and on the Sabbath day, we went out to the city, to the riverside, where prayer was customarily made, and we sat down and we spoke to the women who met there. And now a certain woman named Lydia heard us. She was a seller of purple from the city of Thyatira, who worshiped God. And the Lord opened her heart to heed the things spoken by Paul. And when she was in our household, And when she and her household were baptized, she begged us saying, if you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay. So she persuaded us. This is the first person we're going to be talking about. It's this woman, Lydia. Keep in mind here, Paul's not alone, he's also with Timothy and Silas during this time. So when they come into, what we see first is that they go to the city, but yet they go outside the city to sit down with the women where they were praying. What's going on in the city at this time, there was like this prohibition or some kind of rule that they couldn't have any kind of false or foreign religion inside the city, so everybody would go outside to pray. Those who worship God, they'd go outside the city and pray down by the river. And so that's where Paul goes in the Temptation of Silas. They go down to the river and they speak to these women, and that's where they meet Lydia. And here it says in the scriptures that she was a sailor of purple. So we see that this woman was a businesswoman and we see that because she was a seller of the purple, the linens, that is a very high expensive item in this time. Most of the time when you see purple being sold, you're seeing it sold to people of a noble family or some kind of kingdom or rulers or maybe the Roman rulers. So she's a very wealthy woman to be able to do this, and I would say that she has no husband. I think she, just by looking at the scriptures here, and we'll get into it a little bit more why I think that here in just a little bit, but I would say that she has no husband, but she is a woman of wealth, and they find her down at the river praying. and they end up meeting her and they talk to her and the Lord opened her heart to heed the things spoken by Paul. Now this is what I really want us to grasp, that's what I want us to see here in this moment is I don't think there's any coincidence that they ran into this woman down there at the river. She was down at the river doing what? What does scripture say? praying, worshiping God. And then they show up on the scene and it says, the scripture says that the Lord had opened her heart. So prior to the apostle Paul coming and talking to this woman, the Lord was already there, has already been working with her and have already talked to her. dealing with her, the Spirit of God has been talking with her and that's something we need to remember is when we're out there and we're evangelizing where we're telling people about Christ is we get fearful sometimes especially when I was talking to the kids because we're gonna be doing this here soon when we get done with our evangelism studies going out and talking to the to the city is there's no reason to be fearful because if God has put it in our heart like he did Paul to go and talk to somebody he's already been there He's just using you as a tool to do the rest of the work, to plant that seed, to go and be obedient to his word, do the work of the Lord. He's already been there. We see that in the scripture, did we not? So why should we be fearful about something that Lord's already working on? Right? There's no reason to fear. There's no reason to be have that doubt or that negative. Oh, I might get rejected. You may do it, but guess what? If you're getting rejected, Lord's getting rejected because he's already been there for you. He's never going to tell you to go somewhere where he has not been. OK, he's going to prepare you, he gives you the spirit and in the spirit, he's preparing you, but also on that other end, just like this woman. He's already talked to her and she's down there and she's searching. That's why she's there. Okay, she could take her stuff, she could take her linen and she could go inside the city and she could sell it and make all kinds of money. That's where I would be if I was wanting to make some money. I would be inside the city. I wouldn't be outside by the river with a bunch of people praying. Their focus is not on the material things out there. She was there because she was searching for something. She started worshiping God there. And then Paul shows up. And the Bible says that Paul spoke the words of the Lord to her. And that, and when, and it says right there in verse 15 that she and her house were baptized and she begged them to, and begged them to stay. So not only did that, the connection between Paul and this woman, him teaching her the rest of what God wanted her to learn, not only did it save her, it saved her family, her kids, whatever, her servants. See, when we go and we go talk to one person, we don't just talk to one person. When we talk to that person and that the Lord's in it and he's dealing with this person, it spreads. It's not just that one person. it goes we may never see what happens on this earth with that first seed that we do but it does spread and we will see that again on the third person too. So my advice what we could take from this lady right here is know what we we can find power and strength in the Lord that he is he's given us to go forth and tell the people of him because he's already been there he's just wanting us to be obedient to go and talk to him to make that connection bring everything full circle. All right, now let's get into that second person that we're gonna be talking about. Verse 16. Now it happened as we went to prayer that a certain slave girl possessed with a spirit of divination. I can hear that word a thousand times and I'll never say it right. This evil spirit met us, who brought her masters much profit by fortune telling. This girl followed Paul and us and cried out saying, these men are the servants of the most high God who proclaim to us the way of salvation. But in this she did for many days. But Paul, greatly annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, I command you, in the name of Jesus Christ, come out of her. And he came out of her that very hour. But when her master saw that the hope of the prophet was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace to the authorities. And they brought them to the magistrates and said, these men, being Jews, exceedingly trouble our city. They teach custom which are not lawful for us, being Romans, to receive and observe. And the multitude rose up together against them and beat them against, yeah, together against them. And the magistration tore off their clothes and commanded them to be beaten with rods. And they laid hands and many stripes on them. They threw them into prison, commanding the jailer to keep them securely. Having received such charge, he put them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in stocks. Okay now let's go back up to the top of that. We see that they come into the city and they meet this evil spirit, this spirit of fortune telling and it's really sad because you see these men that actually have this young girl that can do this and is manipulating the city with this in a sense of he's making profit on on her ability. I'm not saying it's a good ability but regardless they're making profit of it. So when Paul and Dumb they come into the city and they're being followed by this girl and yes this girl is indwelt with an evil spirit we see that the scripture says that what he what the girl is saying is not false. Keep that in mind. The Spirit is calling them out saying that these men are from the Most High God who proclaim to us the way of salvation. That is the truth. But I think what's the matter here is the manner of what they were saying it. I think that this evil spirit was saying it in such a way that is more of a mockery to Paul and Silas and Timothy. kind of like how the Roman soldiers mocked Christ, you know, by putting the thorns on him, putting the robe around him and kneeling down before him, kind of, and that kind of sense of mockery. I think that's what was going on here, is that this girl was following them and kind of calling them out, but what she was actually doing, she was bringing attention to them, which was a good thing, because we know that God uses evil things to, he can use the bad things and the evil things to give him more honor and glory, and so it does. So this girl follows him for many days and it says that Paul got greatly annoyed and turned and said to the spirit, I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her. And that same hour it left. And then the master saw that their hope of prophet was gone and they seized Paul. I want to step off to the side a little bit here and I want you to look at the masters. It's quite interesting to me because I don't live in this culture, I wasn't raised in this culture, none of us here are or was. They knew that there was something wrong with that girl. They knew that there was some kind of evil presence in her. It's very common these days to have such a these fortune tellers, these fortune tellers Well, look at the signs of this and that or whatnot. It's very common. They found profit in this evil thing to make them money. And it goes with the scripture says that the root of all evil, the love of money is the root of all evil, not money in itself, but the root of it. And we see that plain as day here. These men took this girl that was possessed and made money off her. But they recognized it as something that was already wrong. They recognized that there was an evil spirit there. Very common then. Now remember, I'm just taking a side note, I don't want to spend too much time here, because the next time I preach, I really want to dive in deep on the spiritual warfare and what it looks like today. But, just take for a moment, this was normal to them, to have this such a thing, to see these type of things, it was normal. To us, we don't see these things per se. We're not looking for these things. We see things as a worldly aspect, not so much as a spiritual aspect. And that is to our demise, I think, that we don't think things as spiritually as much as what we ought to, that we see things through the world. And that's what I want to talk about next in my preach, is those things. But even though she was telling the truth, what we see is Paul turns and says, I'm done with you, get away from me. Yes, was she telling the truth? Yes, but he called out the wrong, that she had been an evil spirit, and he did not want to be associated with that. He said, be gone, I'm done with you, to the evil spirit. So imagine the testimony of those who knew this girl, and knew what she was able to do, and all of a sudden, she was not able to do it no more. And she's probably done it several times. What a testimony that was, right? Why or how? Because Paul turned around and he called out the wrong that was there. He called out the evil spirit and said, this is wrong. Get out of her. And he went on his way. Now, imagine if we were out there telling the world that things were wrong, what kind of turnout we would have. If we'd be like Paul, not necessarily would go around and Every person that you don't like or agree with, you're like, get away from me, you evil spirit, get away from me, you evil spirit. I don't want to see nobody, I don't want to see our kids going through school saying, you're demon possessed, get out of here, you're demon possessed, get out of here, just because you don't like the guy or girl, right? But imagine what it'd be like if we, as Christians, would not be so meek and so quiet, and we would actually step up to the plate, and we would start calling out the wrongs of this world, even within our church or within our city. What kind of change that would be for our city? I think it'd be huge. The problem is, it's us. We're not willing to do that. Well, I might step on somebody's toes. We gotta get over that. That's what's got us in the world we're in today is we offend everybody. Who cares? People's gonna be offended. Let them get offended. That's their fault. If I'm speaking truth, that's their fault, right? That's not my fault. I'm preaching God's word. I'm teaching God's word. That just means I've gotta know God's word. All right. So let's go on and see what happens. So we see that the apostle Paul because of what they've done and because these masters was not getting their money they thought they sought to get rid of Paul and Silas and I'm not sure if Timothy is with them at this specific moment but they put them in change and they put them on the innermost part of the jail and scripture says that They were beaten with rods in verse 23, and they had laid many stripes on them, and they threw them into prison, commanding the jailer to keep them securely. Having received such a charge, now when he says that they were commanded the jailer to keep them securely, I'm sure that that was a very strong command. I'm sure that was not like, hey, just put them in the corner, make sure they don't go nowhere. The priest, they're like, you bound them, you chain them, you don't let these people out, and you wash them day and night type charge. And we'll see why here in just a little bit. So having received such a charge, he put them in the innermost prison and fastened their feet in the stocks. Verse 25, by midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God. And the prisoners were listening to them. And suddenly there was a great earthquake so that the foundation of the prison were shaken. And immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's chains were loosed. And the keeper of the prison, awakening from sleep and seeing the prison doors open, supposing that the prisoners had fled, drew his sword and was about to kill himself. But Paul called with a loud voice saying, do yourself no harm. we're all here. Then he called for a lot and he ran in and he fell down trembling before Paul and Silas and he brought them out and said, sirs what must I do to be saved? So they said, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. You and your household. And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. And he took the same and he and he took them the same hour of the night and washed their stripes. And immediately he and all his family were baptized. Now, when he had brought them into the house, he set food before them and he rejoiced, having believed in God with all his household. So, let's go back up to the top of this, the third section here. We see that we have Paul and Silas beaten, chained, in stocks. When I read that in stocks, so, you know that movie A Knight's Tale? Have you all ever seen that or seen some kind of knight in village type movie? where you see the guy his head is in this piece of wood and they bring and his hands are right here and his feet are bound they bring this thing on top of him so it's kind of like this position here that's kind of how I picture what's going on here is that they were in the stalks and that their feet were bound or shackled and that there was this great command given to the jailer to keep them secured but in verse 25 it says but at midnight Paul and Silas praying and singing hymns to God. And the prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was a great earthquake so that the foundations of the prison were shaken. And immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's chains were loosed. And the keeper of the prison, waking from his sleep and seeing the prison doors open, supposing the prisoners had fled, drew his sword and was about to kill himself. So I'm sure through that night with Paul and Silas singing hymns and praying to God it says that the prisoners were able to hear this and I'm sure the jailer also was able to hear this so I'm sure some of that he was hearing but wasn't probably paying any attention to it because he's a Roman soldier right? But something happened. A great earthquake happened. And I can picture that jailer just going in a panic, going down there. And he looks down the aisle, and he sees all the doors open. But it's probably so dark in there, he can't see if the prisoners are there or not. He just assumes that they're all gone. And he draws his sword, getting ready to thrust himself on his sword, because he knows there's going to be a great punishment that awaits him, because the prisoners were loose. And he hears this word, whoa, stop. Don't do that. We're still here. You know, sometimes when we think about going forth and preaching the gospel to the people, we have the message, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. And that is the best message that this world could ever hear. But that's not what Paul says here. He didn't call out and start reading out God's word right off the bat. He said, whoa, don't do that. We're here. To me, that's a sign of compassion. That's a sign that he has a love or compassion, not just for a prisoner or this jailer, but for people in general. And I think that's something we can learn from too, is because if I was in that prison and somebody beat me with a rod and I was shackled and I was loosened, he would have no trouble about throwing that sword at himself because I would do it for him, okay? That's just the type of guy that I am. I know I should work on that. But seriously, I mean, Put yourself in that position, in your paused position. Would you say, hey, don't do that? Would you do that? Or would you not say anything and flee? Me, being weak, I probably wouldn't say anything and I would flee after he'd done his business. But that's not what we're called to do. We should be out there in a passion and have passion for people regardless our state. Paul was beaten and thrown into prison. And I'm sure this man was not easy bounding him in chains. He was not like, here, let me be easy with you. Let me put you in the stocks. I'm sure he was rough. This was a Roman soldier. They were tough. He was not easy. And he'd done this to Paul and he'd done this to Silas. But Paul and Silas have the heart of Christ. He said, whoa, don't do that. a message of hope and compassion. Sometimes before we go out and we start preaching the gospel to people, we gotta have this prerequisite, we have to have that compassion before we ever go out. Another one of the words that's hard for me to say. If you don't have the compassion of Christ, I don't think we're gonna be as effective as what we ought to be. Sometimes we can do the work of the Lord, and then there's times we can do the work for the Lord. And I think there's a huge difference. And compassion might be one of them. If we don't have compassion for the people, that's what fuels us and drives us to do it for the Lord for the people, right? If we don't have that, they're going to know. People are going to know if you're real or phony. You know, if you knock on that door and you just give this fake smile and just like this, I don't want to be here attitude, but I'm doing it because I'm supposed to, they're going to know, right? I would know. We see it from time to time when we get some other people come and knock on our door. I'm like, but the difference is, I'm like, hey, come on in. Let's talk a little bit. We've got to have that. If we don't have that love for the people, then we've got to check ourselves. We've got to make sure our heart is right before we go. And so that goes into like our big study of denying ourselves and taking up our cross on our Sunday mornings for our youth kids is make sure that we are in the position where we can go forth and spread the gospel with passion, with compassion, just like Christ has. Christ has shown me so much compassion in my life, so much. And I think because of that, I should show others. Do I struggle at times? To be honest, I struggle a lot at times, a lot of times. More so lately than not. But that's something I've got to work on. So we see these different people in these different aspects of Paul, you know, how he, the Lord was there before they went. And we see how the Lord used Paul to call out the things that were wrong. And we see how the Lord used Paul to show compassion. These are all great things that we should have, that we should learn to do when we're out there evangelizing. that we should know and have the strength and the power that's already in us given to us by the Holy Spirit to know that the Lord's already been there and that we should be able to step up and go out and teach everybody the gospel and that we should know that we should call out those things that are wrong. You know when we When we talk to a school board or whatever the place may be, if they're saying something that's wrong, you'd be like, hey man, that doesn't jive. You've got to call out the wrong things. Because if not, what are we gaining? How are they going to know that they are in need? How are they going to know that they're in sin if you don't call what they're doing is wrong and call it sin? How are they going to know if you don't say something? We've got to do it. We are instructed to do it. And it's more than just going out and saying, hey, my name's Ronald Paul. I want you to come visit us at West Park Baptist Church. That's putting somebody else, putting your job on somebody else. Now, should we invite them to church? Yes. First and foremost, we should teach them about Jesus before the church. You teach them about Jesus, and then you tell them, hey, I go to West Park Baptist Church. I'd like to see you someday. What do y'all think? Okay. Well, like I said, I just had those three points. I think we can learn from them. I think we can grow from them. And they're definitely, each one of these is definitely applicable to our lives. It's just, are you willing to step up to the plate and make that change in your life? Are you willing to be compassionate and put yourself aside? Are you willing to deny yourself and take up your cross? So therefore you can go forth with compassion and teach people of Christ. All right, let's pray. Most gracious Heavenly Father, Lord I thank you for the message you've given us. I thank you for the examples you've given us with Paul and Silas and Timothy. I pray Lord that you help me deny myself and get myself out of the way so that way people can hear your word. Let us be a tool for you, Father. Let us go forth and preach your gospel and teach your gospel and start winning souls for you, Father. It has nothing to do with us. I pray that they don't see Ronald Qualls at all. I pray that they see Jesus Christ. Lord, we love you. In Jesus' name, amen.