Through The Bible - Acts 16 - Part 1

Brett Meador: As we go through this story of Acts chapter 16, particularly, Paul's going through adversity. And the Lord can use adverse conditions to help steer our lives, not only to manifest His greatness by the troubles that we go through, but also to steer us. He'll use adverse situations to guide us.
Guest (Male): Pastor Brett Meador assures, the Lord is working everything together for the good.
Brett Meador: We're going to see how the Lord's going to use adversity to get Paul where he needs to go and what he needs to do.
Guest (Male): Has Paul and Silas set out on their missionary journey, they found themselves rerouted from their intended course and ended up being beaten and imprisoned. Yet, despite these seeming setbacks, they continued to rejoice and share the gospel, leading to salvation for many, adding to the church in Philippi in the end. More from the book of Acts in today's word with Pastor Brett Meador. One of the questions people ask all the time is, why do bad things happen to good people? If God is love, then why do bad things happen in the world and stuff like that? Well, people sometimes have a hard time answering that because they see it as a hard question. There's one answer that may seem uncaring and unfeeling, but it's still true, and that is, the real answer is, why do bad things happen to good people, is because there are no good people. We think there's good people, but God says in His Word, there's no one righteous, not even one. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. And bad things happened once man brought sin into the world, the world is now in a fallen state. Death, disease, all of the things that people cry out to God, "Why do bad things happen?" Man, humanity, we brought that upon ourselves. Now, that's kind of the quick and easy answer, but people don't like that one. It's still for sure true, but but there's another thing that you might understand, and that is, bad things can happen to us to bring God glory or to make manifest. There's a biblical word. God's will in our lives. You know, the disciples would look at a guy who's blind and say, "Was he blind from his birth because of his his sin or his mother and father's sin? Which one?" And Jesus said, "Nope, neither." But the reason the guy was blind was God was going to do a great work in him through that hardship, through that difficulty. And even the way the Lord would heal him. And nobody really knew that God had a real plan for that. Job and his friends for 37 chapters pontificated and hypothesized why Job was going through all the horrible things he was going through. And then in chapter 38, God jumps in and says, "You're all wrong, and what a waste of breath." "Were you there when I created the heaven and earth? Do you have a clue?" And basically the rhetorical question, "No, we don't have a clue." And what we know is, God had a whole reason Job was going through that. It had to do with this great cosmic battle in the universe between Satan and God philosophically about Job and the treatment of Job. It's an amazing thing. Little did Job know the universe ramifications of what was going on in his life. Do you think Mr. Job is sitting in heaven right now going, "Man, I wish that I didn't go through such a bad time." "Man, I shouldn't have married that wife who said, 'Curse God and die.'" "I shouldn't have," Do you think he's all about? No. I think Job is probably blessed as can be as he suffered on earth and was faithful to the Lord. I believe he has great rewards in eternity. But with Romans chapter 5, Paul the Apostle, who knew about trouble, difficulty, adversity. We've already seen him stoned to death. At least they left him for dead, but he got up afterwards and went back into the city. Whipped and beaten. Paul had already experienced all kinds of difficulty. But how did Paul look at it? Did he sit around whining and moaning and complaining? No. This is what he says in Romans 5 verse 3. He says, "Not only so, but we glory in tribulations also, knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope: and hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us." "For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly." What an amazing declaration. You know, we rejoice. Paul was at a mature spiritual Christian level to say, "I rejoice when tribulation comes my way." How are you? Are you one who rejoices, "Lord, I understand that you use tribulations and all these troubles for your purpose and for your glory?" Do you rejoice? I think some Christians are at the mature level, "Well, I'm not going to be mad at God at least." No, you got to get to the level of rejoicing. What? I'm going through adversity and, you know, I got fired today. Praise the Lord. I'm rejoicing because the Lord is doing something great in my life. He's going to build hope and patience and experience. This is the attitude of Paul the Apostle. And I bet a lot of us have a lot of work to do to get to where he was at in his spiritual maturity. But what an important thing to kind of remember as we go through this story of Acts and Acts chapter 16, particularly, because Paul is going through adversity, and the Lord can use adverse conditions to help steer our lives, not only to manifest His greatness by the troubles that we go through, but also to steer us. He'll use adverse situations to guide us. That's why Paul would write in Romans 8:28. "And we know," at least we should. "We all know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose." The Lord is working everything together for the good. When everything seems bad, you have to remind yourself that it could be for a reason that might be something like keeping you from something that's worse or keeping you from going somewhere you shouldn't go. We're going to see some language that might seem a little weird, like the Holy Spirit is resisting Paul. What does that mean? We're going to see the context of that and how the Lord's going to use adversity to get Paul where he needs to go and what he needs to do. So that's important. Well, in Acts chapter 16, Paul had an interesting series of events that brings him to the place God ultimately wants him to be. So let's pick it up right there in verse 1 of chapter 16. It says, "Then came he to Derbe and Lystra: And, behold, a certain disciple was there, named Timotheus, or Timothy, the son of a certain woman, which was a Jewess, and believed; but his father was a Greek." Okay, this is where we're introduced to Timothy or Timotheus, as he's called here. But we come, you know, I've been sort of tracking if you remember our our journeys that we're we're getting ready to kick off Paul's second missionary journey. In fact, in Acts chapter 15 verse 30, if we back up there, "So when they were dismissed, they came to Antioch; and when they had gathered the multitude together, they delivered the epistle." So, you know, this idea of the journeys of Paul, we we kind of started, you know, and this is the Roman Empire, basically, Northern Africa, the Mediterranean Sea, and then Europe, Spain, Israel, Turkey, all those, Greece, they're all there. But Paul's journey, if we kind of track it again, he was in Jerusalem because remember they went to the council at Jerusalem that we saw in chapter 15. And then it says in verse 30 of chapter 15, he went back up to Antioch. And if you recall, Antioch was the place where really Christianity was thriving. Maybe even you might argue more than even in Jerusalem, because tons of Gentiles were being saved in Antioch. Now remember, this is Antioch of Syria. There's another Antioch of Turkey, or you know, modern-day Turkey is what we'd call it. But so they went from Antioch and from there, Barnabas and John Mark. Remember, they left in a different direction. But Paul and Silas, now, we don't track Barnabas and John Mark's journeys, we're still sticking with Paul, and now he's with Silas. And he's going to go northwest, and we ended with this last week in chapter 15 verse 41, where it says he went through Syria and Cilicia, confirming the churches. So Paul travels through Cilicia, which includes the city of Tarsus to Derbe and Lystra, Laodicea area, which you that know your geography, you can kind of track those places. So from Antioch over to Lystra is kind of where he is now in verse one of chapter 16. So he's already on his second missionary journey. But Paul's headed to bring the Gospel, and he doesn't know it yet, but he's going to bring the Gospel to Europe. Paul's intention, most scholars agree, was to go back to the other places he was at in his first missionary journey and sort of help them. And he is going to do some of that. But God's going to redirect them. Have you ever felt a redirection in your life where you kind of, "I'm going to go this way. I'm going to go that way. I'm going to do this, or I'm going to do that." James warns us, don't say I'm going to go do this or that. But we're supposed to say, "Well, if the Lord will, then I'm going to go do this or I'm going to go do that." Paul has to learn that, you know, that he he says, "I'm going to go, you know, back to those churches where I was before." But another thing you should note, in these travels, we have a new group forming. And we know that Paul and Silas left for this missionary journey, but it's here in Lystra, this is where Timothy lived. And that's why they pick up Timothy now. So now it's Paul, Silas, and Timothy. And then we're going to see later where Luke is going to join them as well. Remember, Luke is the author of the book of Acts. Don't forget that. Doctor Luke wrote the book of Acts. One of the things we're going to see here in this chapter that's kind of interesting is, we think we know about when Luke joins the party because the narrative goes from, they went here, and then they went there, and then they went the other place. But in the middle of our chapter, it's going to go, "And so we went there, and we went the other place." And it's because scholars believe Luke jumps in on the team. So it's Paul, Silas, Timothy, and Luke, and we'll I'll bring that up when we get there. So, his plan, head to Asia Minor where they'd gone before, but to do this, they're going to cross the Dardanelles. You say, "Well, what's the Dardanelles?" Well, the Dardanelles is a narrow natural straight, a significant international waterway that kind of is in northwest Turkey that forms part of the continental boundary between Asia and Europe. That is Asia Minor and Europe. So, we'll show you that as we get there. But here in the story enters Timothy. In verse one, he's the son of a certain woman, which was a Jewess, but his father was a Greek. That's interesting. So, was Timothy Jewish? Yes or no? Yes, because the Jews used the mother, right? It's the the mother is their lineage that they go through, not the father, which is kind of unique. So if your mother was Jewish, you're Jewish, but he's got a a Greek dad. And we're going to see that there's kind of a problem that comes up here because of that. Probably not a believer. But if you recall when Paul was writing there in 2 Timothy chapter 1 verse 5, do you remember? He said, "When I call to remembrance," as Paul said, "the unfeigned, the unfake, the unfeigned faith that was in thee, Timothy, which first dwelt in your grandmother, whose name was Lois, and your mother, whose name was Eunice; and I am persuaded that it's also in you also." So Timothy became a believer or a Christian that was because his mom and his grandma, not because of his dad. His dad was probably not a Christian. And this is an interesting problem for Timothy later on in the story. We'll talk about that. I'm thankful to my mom for leading me to Christ. I was five years old. I think she perceived I was old enough to get it or something, but she, you know, she'd been saved since I was I was born. And you know, I went to Sunday school, I heard stories and stuff, but I'd never really accepted Christ. So when I was five years old, my mom made some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches just the way I like them, you know, lots of peanut butter and tons of jelly. If it's not gooey over the bread, you're not making them right. But she made these peanut butter jelly sandwiches and I sat down and I was eating the sandwiches, she explained to me the gospel message and that I needed to repent of my sins and accept Jesus Christ as my savior. And it wasn't hard to convince me that I was a sinner because by five I was already pretty much a little rascal. But I knew I was a sinner, so I I repented of my sin and I accepted Christ and my mom led me in a prayer of faith. And, you know, I'm so thankful for that, you know, that I got saved at a very young age and I'm really appreciative of that. I used to not always appreciate that because I always wished that I had a better testimony. You know, in the 70s, all these hippies were coming to Christ and I was on LSD and and I killed people and I was in a gang. And they'd go to churches and share their testimonies, you know. And I grew up hearing these stories and and I think, "Man, I'm such a squeaky clean little Christian man," you know. But I I realized later how much the Lord had protected me from, not that I was without sin or anything, I was a sinner just like everybody else, but I did avoid a lot of the pitfalls of a lot of teenagers and college-aged students that went through some other things that were not so pleasant because of sin. But I'm I'm thankful. But I love that, the prayers of a mother and a grandmother. That's where Timothy. And Timothy's going to be kind of a big deal. He's going to grow to be the the pastor of the church at Ephesus. Ephesus was a it was like the New York City of the day. It was a huge city and Timothy was in charge leading the church there in Ephesus. So, and Paul looked at him as a son. In fact, in 1 Timothy chapter 1 verse 2, Paul says, "Unto Timothy, my own son in the faith: Grace, mercy, and peace, from God our Father and Lord Jesus Christ." So, this is where Timothy enters in and he Paul considers himself a a young protege that he's mentoring and considers him a son. So there we go. And verse 2. Which says, "Was well reported of," Timothy had a good reputation, "by the brethren that were in Lystra and Iconium." Verse 3. "Him, Paul would have have to go forth with him; and took and circumcised him because of the Jews which were in those quarters: for they knew all that his father was a Greek." You say, "What? More on circumcision, Brett? Do we have to talk about that again?" We as Americans have no appreciation of what a big deal this idea of circumcision was. So Paul in Acts 15, at the Council of Jerusalem. Paul was the chiefest of the arguer saying, "You know, no, we shouldn't be circumcising Gentiles. Why would we do that?" And uh, you know, and Peter argued, "You know, we why would we put those burdens on those Gentiles that we couldn't even do," you know. And Paul would say, "I would those that are telling these Gentiles they need to be circumcised, I would that they be castrated." Remember Paul said that? Paul's really hot about this issue. And then all of a sudden, here in chapter 16, Paul's like, "Timothy, "You're like, "What? What's going on? Is Paul a hypocrite?" No. This is an interesting thing because Timothy is what they would have viewed in those days as an apostate Jew. Now, why would? Remember, I already told you he's a Jew because he had a Jewish mother. But why is he an apostate Jew? Because he's uncircumcised. Why do you suppose Timothy was uncircumcised? Anybody want to guess? Because he had a Greek dad. And his dad was probably like, "Yeah, I don't I don't go for the circumcision stuff with my son." And so Timothy was uncircumcised. So, why did Paul, after giving that big argument, and Peter as well, and they deciding that Gentiles don't have to be circumcised, why did they circumcise him? Well, some would say because he was a Jew, and he needed to be circumcised. But that even kind of goes against the council because even Peter said, "Man, we aren't even able to keep these laws and rules. So we're just like they are," Peter said. So why would he do this? Well, most scholars want to note that Timothy was circumcised not for salvation. Some have tried to use this verse to say you need to be circumcised to be saved. Even to this day there's churches that claim that. Even though Acts 15, they didn't read Acts 15, they just read Acts 16. That's the problem when you start reading just bits and pieces of the Bible. You can you can take a verse like this out of context. "See Paul circumcised Timothy, so, drop your drawers, brothers." You know, that's the way some churches even roll today. But it's not for salvation, but it was really to prepare Timothy for his time in ministry. In the places they were about to go, the Jews would never listen to an uncircumcised Greek. Let alone an uncircumcised apostate Jew. That'd be like the last person on the planet the Jews would ever want to hear from some guy that's a uncircumcised, technically Jew, but was raised as a Greek under his dad and was uncircumcised. The Lord is going to have Timothy be in a very different place and and for him to be relatable and usable, nothing hindering the Jews from listening. There was this idea of circumcising him so that he would have a voice. And that's a different kind of thing. There's a relatability that Timothy needed in order for him to be effective in the role that God had for him. Interesting, I do wonder if the Lord has equipped you with a certain relatability to various people groups and things. Some of you have different experiences. They'd never let a guy like me. I already told you, I was saved at five. I never did drugs, never, you know, drank alcohol, never did any of those typical sins, didn't have sex outside of marriage, you know. All that stuff. And so in some circles, they would kind of say, "Man, what a what a goody two shoes," which I'm not. I'm just being a sinner, just like everybody else. But there's kind of an unrelatability where some of you guys have been through some heavy stuff in the past, and you can go places. Some of you ladies have some experience to life where you can talk to people that I wouldn't even be able to get to. You know, it's it's kind of interesting. Some of you are in the business world and you can talk spreadsheets and graphs and charts and fiscal responsibility and stuff like that. I don't talk that language at all. But you can get into those places because that's where the way you roll and you can talk to people that would never set foot in a church like this. And I think that relatability is kind of an important thing. By the way, this is one of the reasons, does Pastor Brett have any tattoos? And the answer is no. And the question is, well, why? Why would Pastor Brett not have any tattoos? Let me just say something, I can appreciate a really nice fancy tattoo. Well, some will say Brett spiritually, well, it's Leviticus, right? 19 where it says, "Do not mark your body." The reason you can't quote that, mom, dad, grandma, grandpa, is because that's the law of Moses. We're not under the law. Right under where it says, "Don't mark your body," it says also, "Don't cut the corners of your beard." In other words, why do the Jews have the spit curls that go down like this right here? Because they're following the law of Moses to not cut this part of your hair. So if you're going to pull the old "Thou shalt not get a tattoo" from Leviticus 19, you better be sporting some pretty honking spit curls as well. Do you understand what I'm saying there? And if you miss one point of the law, you're guilty of the whole law. So the whole, you know, using the Old Testament law for why your kids should or shouldn't do stuff, that's full of holes. I'm sorry. That doesn't work. But there is something that I would argue and this was the spiritual reason why because the Lord just revealed to me, "Brett, you're going to be used in a circumstances where a tattoo is not going to be helpful for you. It might even hinder some of the people that you might be able to reach." For me, the Lord made that clear. And so uh, I've noticed in the church world today, uh it's it's and it's been this way for the last 10 or 20 years where it's tattoos are cool and worship leaders like to praise the Lord to make sure that the guys see their their BC days, you know, their tattoos, you know, it's like, oh, praise the Lord. Oh yeah, he must have a past. What I've found, most of those people were part of the youth group and they weren't in the world at all, but they got the tats because they thought it looked cool. But it's just a kind of funny thing. Now, here's the thing. I know guys that are all tatted up, and they do have a story and they have a personality that God uses them in a different setting, in a different way. And I think God can do that. Like I have buddies that minister in biker gangs, like literally join up with the the worst of the worst biker gangs for the the purpose of missionary work to share the Gospel of Christ and they sort of look the part. If I showed up, you know, with no tats and just kind of, "Hey," on a dirt bike or whatever, they'd say, "Get out of here." But uh, there's different ways the Lord uses different people. I believe that the circumcision of Timothy was really to for the purpose of saying, "Timothy, the Lord's going to use you in a certain group of people. It's not to be fit to be saved, but he was being circumcised to be fit to serve and minister to Jews in the synagogues." Timothy wouldn't even have been able to be allowed into the synagogue where Paul would preach if he wasn't circumcised. So it was a decision that Timothy probably agreed to. I'm pretty sure Paul didn't, you know, chain him up and say, "Sorry, you know, you got to travel with me." No, that's not what happened. I think Timothy was a willing participant in this said, "I want to be used and I don't want anything to get between me and my ability to serve the Lord." And so it's for that reason he was circumcised. F.F. Bruce in his commentary said, "By Jewish law, Timothy was a Jew because he was the son of a Jewish mother. But because he was uncircumcised, he was technically an apostate Jew. If Paul wished to maintain his links with the synagogue, he could not be seen to countenance apostasy." Like it not only would hurt Timothy's ability, but even Paul's ability, which I think is kind of important. Have you ever wondered if there's people that you hang out with, and they might even be fairly nice people. But God has things He wants you to do, but with that group of friends that you have, you're not going to be able to do what God wants you to do as long as you're hanging out with those friends. Paul kind of has to make a decision, "Is Timothy going to stick with me? Well, if he's going to stick with me, he's got to make a tough decision to be circumcised." And so he willingly went through that.
Guest (Male): Pastor Brett Meador reminding us how we can expect God to use different people for different purposes as with the life and ministry of Timothy as we read in Acts chapter 16 in today's word. And I invite you to stay right there as Pastor Brett will join me here in a moment for some ministry advice for Christians. Today's Word is the radio ministry of Athey Creek Church in the Portland, Oregon area where Pastor Brett Meador is the senior pastor. Each day, Pastor Brett will dive deep into God's word with a verse by verse look into scripture. We invite you to find out more by going to todayswordradio.com. If you missed any portion of this study, you'll find all of his messages online at todayswordradio.com. Well, Pastor Brett is with me now. You know, the topic of evangelism is something that is not always easy for Christians. But Brett, maybe the best way to share our faith is just telling someone our own personal testimony, right?
Brett Meador: Yeah, I think that's something we are all authorities on. We we know our own story. And you can't deny a story of a person. There's people that will try to argue with you intellectually or academically. And you may not be able to hang with people when it comes to some of the heavy doctrines of the Bible. But that's not what's required of us. What's required of us is to know Jesus Christ and him crucified. You know, Paul the Apostle came to the Corinthian Church and said, "I have determined to know nothing save Jesus Christ and him crucified." And I love that message because Paul was an academic and he could debate the big thinkers, but he actually realized that's not where the power was. The power is in that testimony of how Jesus Christ dying on the cross for our sins and him crucified is the answer that we all need. And that's a testimony that I can share about my life. I was once lost, but now I'm found. I was blind, but now I see. That's my testimony and that's what I can say and nobody can say anything against it.
Guest (Male): That's such great advice, Pastor Brett. Thank you for reminding us about our personal testimony of what Christ has done in our own life. And that probably really is the best way for evangelism. Well, one last time, I want to mention that if you'd like more information about Pastor Brett or today's word, you can just go to our website at todayswordradio.com. And that's all the time we have. Next time, Pastor Brett will share another verse by verse study series of Acts and emphasize not just how, but why people's hearts were open to the gospel. Today's Word with Pastor Brett Meador is an outreach of Athey Creek Church in West Linn, Oregon.