City 2 City

Welcome again to Cornerstone. Once a month, if you don't know, we have a thing called the mix. It's where we, slightly mix things up, we step out of our normal, series of bible teaching, and, basically, we we we call this sort of adult talks in sort of, by, small chunks. And we sing in between. We read a bit of the scripture.

We pray in between and so forth. But we sort of break break this up, the mix. And we're going through, the acts of the apostles. Now little things should work. It's really, Paul's, missions that we're looking at.

We're looking at 3 his 3 big missions And, we're actually halfway through the second journey that Paul spent around Europe and Asia minor taking the message of Jesus out. So that that's what we've been, what we've been looking at. And it really is a great demonstration of the words of Jesus to the disciples. Paul became a Christian after Jesus had died and risen again. And then he became 1 of the main men, really, the apostles.

And, this is a demonstration, Paul, going out of what the church is about and what, Jesus wanted the church to be about. Jesus said at the end of Matthews's gospel, he said all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me, therefore, go and make disciples of all nations. So this isn't just a a little message for a small group of people but for all nations, a message for all nations, baptizing them in the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit, teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you, and surely, I am with you always to the ends of the age. That was Jesus's great commission for the church to do that. And Paul had become a follower of Jesus after that And he had his own commission, if you like.

He had his own, great commission. If you know the story, Paul was a terrorist He was a terrorist killing Christians, and a very brutal and violent religious man. I mean, he was totally sincere about what he was doing, but he was a terrorist, and on the way to actually kill more people on the road, where he was gonna get more plans to to mow down more people on the road in front of him. He, He actually met with the lord Jesus and had this experience of Jesus and the good news of Jesus. And in that, Jesus said this, as part of, what he should do.

I am Jesus whom you are persecuting, the lord replied, now get up and stand on your feet I have appeared to you to appoint you as a servant and as a witness of what, you have seen and will see of me. I will rescue you from your own people and from the gentiles. I am sending you to them, and here's his commission. To open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light from the Paris satan to god that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me. That's his mission.

It's the mission Jesus gave the whole church now particularly to Paul. It's a mission, and it's a wonderful thing. There is a message that is so good news that when you know it, it's like coming from darkness to light. Imagine that. Blind to sight darkness to light, and that's the message Paul's got.

This message that's gonna go out to all types of people all nations, all people groups, not just 1 type, from darkness to light, from the power of satan. He's a liar. Sated is a liar. He lies about everything to the truthful, wonderful god to come into this truth so that we may be forgiven of whatever we've done, whatever we've done before god, all of the wrongs taken away forgiven, dealt with, and that we would have a place in god's people. We'd be called the children of the living god.

And that's the revolution that's going on. That's that's this message that is so, counter cultural but so powerful for all kinds of cultures and people groups. And that's what Paul is sent to this ex terrorist to go and bring people life, not death, not to kill them, not to explode around them, but to bring them life into god's kingdom. Now last month, Andy took us all the way to Antioch. I'm not sure whether Andy's thing works on us.

If it does, from Antioch to Filipi. Yes. Well, there it goes. But if did you do you wanna see that again? I do.

It's it's like a little snake. Here we go. Really? Then over to Philip. So that's Andy's graphic for you.

Thank you, Andy. And, this is his second missionary journey, and he's done all of those places, and we've stopped off. And Andy brought us to, Philip and he dropped us off there. Philip is is is a a very important Roman city. It's called a Roman colony, actually.

In Macedonia. And that's where we're going to stay. We're just gonna stay in Philippines. For a for a this time because we don't wanna move on because there's some precious things. So Andy got us there.

And now we're by the way, just to show you, these are real places, this is the ruins of where Paul would have come. This is a this was the Roman colony of Filipi, and there it is. It's still standing sort of. And you can go and see these ruins. But these are real places.

This isn't fantasy. This isn't, pretend world. These are absolutely real historical faces, and Paul went there. Now the great thing is that when Paul and his mate silas left the sil city of Philipp He left a church. Now a church is not a building, but a group of people that have come to know the lord Jesus Christ, that have come from darkness into light, that have come from the lies of Satan to the truths of god, that have come to become people of god.

They've come to know the risen living savior, the lord Jesus Christ. That's what a church is. If you're new to church, say you've come in here and you're fairly new to Cornerstone, I guess a lot of you, when you look around at us, think, well, you know, they're a really nice, educated religious group of people and they've probably always been like that. Now there are nice, educated, religious people here that have always been a bit like that, But not all of us are like that. Not all of us have been nice or religious, or very educated.

And the church, funny enough, if you start asking people's stories, you'll start finding out that my goodness, There is a different bunch of people here that have come together, but they're so united that it looks like they're all the same sort of people but actually when you know their background, you'll see that's amazing. Now when Paul left Paul and silas left Philip, he left a church that was full of all sorts of very different people. So let's let's knock on the door of this church let's let's go into the church. Now we've got no idea where the original group of followers of Jesus met Perhaps they met in Lydia's house. We'll see more about her in a minute.

She was a rich lady. Perhaps they met in her house. Perhaps they met where Lydia herself became a follower of Jesus, which is down by the riverside. Perhaps they met there out in the open air. We don't know.

But if you went through the door, you know, this is sort of, you know, pretend there is a door, and we went you went into the door, and you looked around at the church at Philip you're going to see something that might surprise you as you see these different sorts of people. So, let's just go inside. Let's say you go inside, you've opened the door, you've gone in, and the first person you might see is a very finely dressed woman. She loves purple, clearly. She's into purple, which is a very expensive, like, royal stuffed away.

Not anyone could wear purple. But she's very neat. She's very fashionable. And, she could actually mix with royalty. She's got that much sort of a go about her.

She's from, you know, the highest etiquette. She is a quite a well- to do woman. You can see it by her makeup, by the way she dresses, by the way her hair is done. But the strange thing is As you look around, you might see her talking to this woman. Now this woman is completely different at the other end of the social scale.

She's, not got a classy upbringing. In fact, she's a a slave girl. She's covered in tattoos. All over. Actually, tattoos of Greek gods, which weren't very pleasant, and pythons, snakes, tattooed all over her.

And so you have Lydia talking to her. And then as you look around, you might see this bloke. He's clearly a working working man. He's, a Roman soldier. He has discipline.

He's an older man probably rich hired from front line Roman soldiering, but he's bending down and he's cleaning the knee of 1 of the little children that clearly looks like they're from the household of Lydia just by the way they're dressed. And then he's got, you know, some of his household, young blokes jumping on his back. He's a big man. Big muscles. Big working class scarred hands.

He's there. He's in this church. What I want to try to say is the church is a m amazing place. And if only you just start asking questions, you'll find lots of different people there with different stories about how they became followers of Jesus. It truly is a remarkable place.

These people had nothing in common other than they lived in Filipi, they had nothing in common other than they'd come to know the lord Jesus Christ. All of them were changed. By him. 1 commentator, John Stott, who writes on, acts, writes this. I I thought this was terrific.

I hope you can see it. I don't know whether you can. But he says that radically socially and psychologically, these 3 people were world worlds apart. Yet all 3 were changed by the same gospel. That's a good news of Jesus, and were welcomed into the same church.

And then he sort of breaks it up. Radically, Lydia was a foreigner from Asian Asia Minor. The slave girl, probably a native Greek, And the jailer, spelled like the American way, unfortunately, was probably a Roman. Socially, Lydia was wealthy. The slave girl was, a non person socially.

She was a slave. She wasn't really didn't have a personhood. The jailer was a working class civil servant. Psychologically, mentally, Lydia was very wise. She was a pulled together sort of woman, The slave girl was deranged, as we'll see in a minute.

She had serious, psychological and mental issues, and, the the jailer was a family working class man. So there's the church that Paul left He comes in with a great commission to bring people from darkness to light, and he does just that with his mate silas. And it's a wonderful thing. Church is an amazing thing. It gets a lot of bad press.

There's lots of people say all kinds of things against it. But once you into some of that we're like Cornerstone, you start hearing the stories and it is amazing. It's amazing. Now we're gonna look in detail at those 3, a little more, but, first, we're gonna sing our next song. Come people.

Of the risen king who delight to bring him praise, and I hope we do. Let's stand and sing this song together. So we've gone into the church. Let's just have a chat with, some of these, these people of the church at Philipi, the ones that we're shown. Here's Lydia, as I as I said, she's a well together girl, woman, She was a businesswoman from Thire Taira.

She was a a dealer in in purple cloth. So she was a woman. She had her own house, her own business. She was dealing in stuff that was really only for royalty or very special powerful emperors. Purple cloth.

So she was a well-to-do aristocracy sort of, type woman. We're told, actually, she was a religious person. So she was a, presumably well educated, well connected, religious person. She was a worshipper of god. We're told.

But she didn't know the lord as we were seeing last time with Andy. She didn't know the lord, but the lord opened her heart She heard Paul, Paul went to the river where she was meeting, with people. This good woman with other worshipers of god, and Paul went down by the riverside where these women were meeting and he spoke the message of the lord Jesus Christ and it clicked She understood that Jesus was the savior. It's not just her worshiping god, but it's actually god coming into her heart, into her life. There is something real, something hot about this.

It's not just an intellectual thing. It's not just knowing the truth about god. But it's actually a relationship god breaking in to the heart and the soul of this woman. The lord opened her heart. We're told.

And we know that because she did change. Everything about her was warm towards Paul and silas and warm towards the Christian message. We're told she was baptized along with her household, her servants. They were all baptized because they believe this message they weren't just baptized because she believed, but they believed they believed and were baptized, this message. And then she opened up her house to Paul and silas and said, come, please stay with me.

She pleaded to serve this rather rich educated woman to serve the Christian message and those servants that were to preach the gospel. It's a wonderful, wonderful picture of someone hearing the promises of god, Jesus is your savior. He's paid the price for you. You don't have to do lots of religion to get right with god. He's done it for you.

Come to him. And she comes and the lord opens her heart. It's a lovely expression. He doesn't smash in. Did you notice that?

Now we're gonna see the lord opens hearts in different ways, but he and he does smash things. We'll see that in a minute. But he doesn't smash into the heart. He doesn't smash the heart. He might smash things around in order to get the attention of the heart.

But he comes into the heart. Some people I don't know why, but there are some people that don't like that expression, the lord opened her heart. It's a very odd thing. It's as if it's a nasty thing. They're saying, oh, yeah, well, didn't she have a choice?

I love spurgeon on this. I think he says it really well. He's away. Good on almost everything. He's an old Victorian preacher.

He says this, when you see a casket wrenched open, the hinges torn off, the clasp destroyed, then you discern at once the hand of the thief. But when you observe the casket, deftly and smoothly opened with a master key, you discern the hand of the owner. And that's what's going on with Lydia, with all her money, with all her big house, with all her importance and belief in god and her morality perhaps, her heart hadn't been opened. But the lord through the messengers of Paul and silas took the key and opened the heart And she became a follower of the lord Jesus Christ. It's a beautiful thing.

The cosmic lover has the key to your heart. Wonderful to open it up so that you would know him that god isn't just that powerful being that we ought to fall down by the riverside and worship, but it's that powerful being that has the key to your heart that wants to come into your heart, your life, with relationship, real stuff. See, Christianity is not just a form of words or some kind of tradition, or just a set of teachings. I mean, it is that, but it's so much more. It's god.

Opening your heart. I wonder if that's ever happened to you. I wonder if that's ever happened to you. This week, I met the man that led me to the lord. It was an amazing experience.

I had not seen him for the 41 years I've been a Christian. I've not seen him since he led me to the lord. There are all kinds of reasons why. He's 83 now. I mean, it's hard to sort of think of it like that because I was 19 and he was he was whatever he was.

And 40 something, and he led us to the lord a whole bunch of wild young people. And I met him with another friend who came to know the lord at the same time. And it was such a joy, and he spoke to us. And when it where he said this, he he said, he said, did you know, Pete, that when you'd come to know the lord and your group tend to know the lord, there was a real buzz in Windsor where I was born amongst the adults because they knew that you hadn't just got religion, but something happened. Now he talked about stuff that I'm not gonna say because it sounds slightly odd, but he said it was it was seeable.

It was sealable because you walked with the lord, you knew you knew the love of god in your heart. It was it was a lovely thing. And I remember him unlocking my heart with the key. In my mate's bedroom, Vic, he led us to the lord. He put the key in, the gospel key, and it opened our heart.

Has that ever happened to you? You ever had your heart opened? By this message. If not, then say lord, open my heart, open my heart, that I may know you, not just about you, but know you. So there's the first lady.

We saw something you've heard last last time as well, but I want you just to see these 3 together. Here's the next 1. Here's the slave girl. Just listen to this story. Once, when we now, this is Luke writing.

So Luke's now joined Paul and silas. Once, when we were going, to the place of prayer, that's where he met Lydia, we were met by a female slave who had a spirit by which she predicted the future. She earned a great deal of money for her owners by fortune telling. She followed Paul and the rest of us shouting these men are servants of the most high god who are telling you the way to be saved. It's interesting, isn't it?

Because she's actually speaking truth, and she's shouting it out constantly following Paul. She kept this up for many days. Finally, Paul became so annoyed. Now it's not a grumpy bloke. We'll go into this in a minute perhaps.

But finally, Paul became so annoyed that he turned around and said to the spirit, in the name of Jesus Christ, I command you to come out of her. At that moment, the spirit left her. When her owners realized that their hope of making money was gone. They seized Paul and silas and dragged them into the marketplace to face the authorities. They brought them before the magistrates and said, these men are Jews, and they are throwing our city into uproar by advocating customs unlawful for us Romans to accept and to practice.

So you see what happens. Whenever the gospel comes, people's hearts are warmed and opened up, but there's often opposition. People don't like it, particularly when people's money has got something to do with it, and that's what actually happened here. See, this slave girl is so different to Lydia. Lydia's got money by our own means.

This girl makes money. For other people. She's a slave. She doesn't keep it herself. It's quite interesting because the translation that I've just read there when it says that she had a spirit where she predicts the future.

Actually, the original that this was written in, the Greek that this was written in, says that she had a spirit of Python. Now why that why our translations don't put that in? I don't know. Probably because we don't know what Python and a Python S is. But this this girl was known in those days as a Python S.

She was someone that was possessed by the spirit of a snake. That was the whole thing. And therefore, she would have had snake tattoos, all all over her body as she worshiped the false gods at the temple and so forth. But she was also known these Pythonesses as ventriloquists. It's where the word comes from.

So that they they spoke uncontrollably. They were possessed and spoke in in other languages and with tongues, and they were prophesying and shouting out in strange voices and foreign voices. These Pifinases were well sought after. Politicians went to them to find out the future. Miners would go to them to find out where the gold is in the mountains so that they could dig properly.

Salers would go to them to find out what the what their seas are gonna be like, whether they should sail or not sail. There was a lot of money passed. She was a slave girl possessed of this Python spirit with this clairvoyancy and this this, valid uh-uh, ventriloquism where she made these voices. And she's following Paul and she's shouting. Now she's shouting truth.

She but Paul doesn't need her to back up his truth. It's interesting, isn't it? That even though she is supposed to be possessed of of satan and has this Python spirit and people should listen to her, it's interesting how the how the, owners of her didn't listen to her, isn't it? I remember once, when Bob Dillon was professing to be a, a believer of of the lord Jesus Christ. I went to a concert of Bob Dylan's where he was he used to preach to his audience.

There was a bloke next to me because they used to call Bob Dylan the Messiah Yeah. And he had Dylan is the Messiah, written on his t shirt. He sat next to me. And when Bob Dillon, who is supposed to be the Messiah, started talking about the messiah. This bloke booed and shouted.

And I turned to him and said, you've got a t shirt on that says he's the messiah. Well, listen to him, mate. He wasn't happy. He was a very angry sort of bloke. Actually, I anyway, I didn't know the matter.

But, this is the sort of thing. Here's the woman that's supposed to have a spirit that tells the future and she is in fact telling the truth here There's something about her gift, if you call it, or her possession, that he's just speaking the truth, but Paul says stop this, and he stops her. And the men that are exploiting her don't wanna know about truth. They're angry because now they're gonna lose money, money, revenue. She is an abused woman who they don't care about.

They just wanna use her for money. Now let me say here. Sometimes we look out at people like this, and we think are people so far gone that the gospel can't touch them? Are they so far gone? Perhaps it's the alcoholic you look down, and he's just, po completely just taken over with his alcohol, and he doesn't know even where he is or what time of day it is or what his asking for.

Can god reach them? Or perhaps it's It's someone you know. A family member denies Christ hates god perhaps they're an atheist. They're always blogging on atheism mocking god. Are they too hard for god to break in and open their heart is has has god not got the master key?

Perhaps it's a terrorist. Perhaps it's a pedophile. God open the pedophile's heart. Someone that's done atrocious things to other people could god open that heart? Has god got a master key to open a heart of a pedophile?

Or a terrorist. It's interesting, isn't it? See, Paul had this message to bring people from what? Darkness to light, from darkness, to light, from the power of satan. People that do awful, wicked things, that even in a world where almost anything goes, we stand back and say, that is disgraceful.

That is a disgrace who are these people. They're so evil. They're so possessed. There must be evil. But Paul says there's a message that can bring people from Satan to god from evil to truth.

Isn't that amazing that message? That's the message that can change the world, and Paul believed it and did it. I like this picture. Just have a look at it. See it?

Jesus saves. He does, he saves. He saves all sorts all sorts of people, and he did in Philippines, all sorts of people. Did you notice that he saves rich, well-to-do educated religious people, religious in the sense that they're believing in the 1 god, and he saves wicked, possessed with snake, slave girls. That are poor and abused by men.

It's interesting, isn't it? That the Bible actually often shows women as safe. That wasn't the convention of the day. Let's get that right. The convention of the day was that largely women and even Lydia to some degree were substandard people.

There was massive sexism going on, but not in the church. Church was altogether different in how it treats women. It doesn't treat them now as just things that are to be kept as perpetual virgins or things just to be lusted at or things just to be goggled over or slave girls to be treated so that we could have our fun and our sexual titillation as we gaze upon and goggle at women. The church comes and changes that. So these girls won't be abused and used for money and for men.

It's amazing. The church becomes such a radically different thing. Paul writes to 1 of the churches that he goes to. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male or female. You are all 1 in Christ Jesus.

It's extraordinary the church. Isn't it? There isn't a hierarchy in that sense. There are different roles that people play in different gifts that people have, but actually no one's better than anybody else, and the male isn't better than the female. There isn't a sexism that comes into the church.

Right in the first century, the church was bringing women to god abused women and educated and religious women were coming together. And they were substantial workers in the church that cared and loved and used their wealth and their background and their testimonies for the lord Jesus Christ. When Lydia became converted, we're told that, she asked her she was baptized So she was a follower of the lord Jesus. And her household were baptized. She told her household about the lord Jesus, and she asked Paul and silas to stay in the house.

And we're told she served them. She served them. She served them. Paul, it was it's just a beautiful picture of people and what the church is really like, a beautiful, beautiful picture. I wonder whether you have been taken over and controlled by the lover of the universe, the lover of the lord Jesus Christ.

I wonder whether you just speak out words, but you have you ever been taken over? So the Python is removed. All the abuse that you've had in your life no longer now dominates you. You're not dominated by the abuses anymore. You're dominated by a man that never abuses.

Who has the master key to your heart, whether you're a slave girl or whether you're a Lydia. Isn't that wonderful? Is that a wonderful picture of what the church is? So this Jesus saves. I I love this, and you you'll know this first I'm pressing the wrong thing here.

You'll know this verse. It's 1 of the most famous verses in the entire world, out of any sentence that's known in the world. This is 1 of the most famous sentences, such a wonderful sentence for god so loved the world that he gave his 1 and only son, that's Jesus. That look at those words. Whoever believes in him.

It's that 1 word whoever Isn't that an amazing word? Whoever, Lydia, slave girl. Whoever, believes in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. Life. Life with god.

In the family of god, god becomes our father. Jesus, our brother and savior. Life, with god, whoever, whoever believes in him. And it's a very, very beautiful picture Well, before we go on and see the next convert, we're gonna sing again, and it's called We are We we are god's people once dead in our sins and now raised with Christ in heaven. There you are.

There's a summary. Let's stand and sing that song together. Back to the story in Philip and, this is what happens. The crowd short joined in the attack, so there was, the the the people were upset that the this slave girl had been rescued. The crowd joined in the attack against Paul and silas, and the magistrates ordered them to be stripped and beaten with rods.

After they had been severely flogged, they were thrown into prison, and the jailer was commanded to guard them carefully. When he received these orders, he put them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in the stocks. About midnight, Paul and silas were praying and singing hymns to god And the other prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly, there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken at once. All of prison doors flew open, and everyone's chains came loose.

There's a picture, by the way, of what people some people think. There's a lot of argument over it, but some people think that actually is the prison that Paul and silas, silas were in, but it would have been something like that. Let's carry on. The jailer woke up, and when he saw the prison doors open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself because he thought the prisoners had escaped. But Paul shouted, don't harm yourself.

We're all here. The jailer called for lights, and rushed in and fell trembling before Paul and silas. He then brought them out and asked, sir, What must I do to be saved? They replied, believe in the lord Jesus, and you'll be saved, you and your household Then they spoke the word of the lord to him and all the others in his house. At that hour of night, the jailer took them and washed their wounds and immediately he and his household were baptized.

The jailer brought them into his house and he set a meal before them, and he was filled with joy because he had come to believe in god. He and his whole household. It's, it's a wonderful, wonderful story, and it's a wonderful story of a game god breaking in or rather having the master key to open the jailer's heart. Now there's a lot of violence going on here. There's a lot of earthquakes stuff going on and doors opening and foundations being crumbled.

But Jesus has the master key, has the master key to Lydia's heart, He had the master key to the slave girl's heart, and now he has the master key to this bloke, very different bloke, this this jailer's heart. And it starts with Paul and silas. Paul and silas have been beaten up then done anything wrong and it just shows you, doesn't it? That actually bringing good, bringing light to people people can treat light as darkness. They're so dark.

They won't believe in it. They're so blinded. They won't see the truth, and so they beat Paul and silas even though he'd only bring good, even though he'd only set free, a girl that was abused by men. This isn't good enough because they want the money, you see. So it shows their world up and it shows what they're really like.

Shows their heart. But when Paul and silas had been severely beaten, remember they're severely beaten, they're put in an inner cell and then they're in stock. So this is pretty tough stuff. Now, you might say, well, aren't they amazing? They're at midnight.

They're they're awake praising god. Why weren't they? Well, I doubt they could have slept. So let's, you know, because their back was whipped up. It would have been pretty uncomfortable.

They were severely beaten. We're told. That's a Roman beating. Going on there. This was not nice stuff.

So probably they couldn't sleep. But nevertheless, their life showed the good news was true, didn't it? See, any idiot can sing songs in the daylight when the sun is on your back and you're feeling good. Anyone can sing then. Everybody's happy then, aren't they?

But at midnight, when your back has been whipped up, when you can't move because you're in stocks and you're in the dark in a cell, Only gospel people can sing, and they were singing, and they were praising god. It's amazing thing. Anyone can sing in the day, but when things go wrong, when it's tough, What do you build your life on? What are the foundations you're building on? Well, they had something bigger than their circumstances.

Bigger than their physical bodies, bigger than how they felt, bigger than their illnesses and sicknesses and whatever it is that was going on, you know, in in their bleeding backs, whatever diseases were creeping in. They had a message that was so good They knew they were right with god. And so the first thing god does is cause god's people to go through bad circumstances that is then a witness to the world that these people are like people of the day, even at midnight. They're like people of the sun, even in the darkness. Yeah?

People of god, even when actually evil has been get done against them. And that's a demonstration that this message is really radical and is fantastic and fresh and alive. But then god demonstrates his power by rocking the foundations. There's an earthquake that goes on. Sent by god, obviously, in this case, an earthquake goes on.

But the power is not just that the doors fling open and the and the foundations of the of the jail are broken up. Is that none of the the the criminals run off That's a pretty powerful thing, isn't it? I mean, their chains had come off. The doors were opened. What would you expect them to do?

This is death row for many of them. So what would you expect to do? I don't know. I think if I was Paul and silas, I'd say, Thanks god. Let's go.

Run. Run. Come on, silas. Catch me up. But they were concerned for others because their job was to bring not comfort to themselves but good news to other people.

So let's have a look, see what happens to the jailer again. This is spelled in the English way. Unfortunately, we have to take on the American spelling. The jailer, spelled wrongly, underline that and spell in the English way. The jailer woke up And when he saw the prison doors open, he drew his sword.

Do you see what's happened? He's now on death row himself. He swapped places. See, if he lets according to Roman law, the prisoner, particularly Paul and silas, who was he was told to carefully keep If he lets them go, the law was that your life for the prisoner that is let go. So he might as well kill himself.

He doesn't wanna be killed publicly. So he drew his sword and was about to kill himself because he thought the prisoners had escaped, but Paul shouted Paul is concerned. Paul is a lover. Don't harm yourself. Now you gotta remember that this bloke probably beat Paul, probably was heavy handed and shoved him in the stocks in the inner cell.

Don't harm yourself, even though you harm me, don't harm yourself. We're all here. We're all here. The jailer called for lights rushed in and fell trembling before Paul and silas. So it's pitch black.

And he brought them out and asked, sir, what must I do to be saved? What an amazing situation this is? But what I want you to get is that the jailer woke up. Now that physically he did wake up, but there's a lot of stuff going on here that teaches what's going on. The jailer woke up.

All his life he'd been asleep, and now he's awake, the foundations of his whole world were now smashed up He now has swapped places. He is in death row. The jailer needed to wake up to his real situation was that that he was gonna die 1 day. And now suddenly, that's the day. Suddenly, he faces the day of his own death.

He's on death row. And all his foundations for retirement, for money, for power over people in his prison, Whatever it was he had in his life, all those foundations that he trusted in for security for pension, for payment, for power, for identifying as a man that has at least some power over some people All of those foundations are smashed and suddenly he's faced with his frailty, his poorness, his brokenness, He's on death row. There is no hope for him. And the jailer has a stay of execution right at that moment, right when he's at the bottom, right when he sees that there isn't any point to anything He has a state of execution, execution. Let's have a look.

They replied, believe in the lord Jesus, and you'll be saved you in your household. And they spoke the word of the lord to him and all, the others in his house. The hour of of at that hour of the night, the jailer took them and washed their wounds, and then immediately he and all his household were baptized. The jailer brought them into his house He sat a meal before them. He was filled with joy because he had come to believe in god.

He and his whole household. Do you see what happened? God broke the foundations quite violently In order to have the master key to this man's heart, brought the man right to rock bottom, suicide. In order to open the man's heart with the good news of the gospel, he believed in the lord Jesus Christ He believed in what Jesus had done. He believed that Jesus was lord, not him, Not some emperor in Rome.

Jesus is lord. That is radical for a Roman soldier to believe because there's only really 1 lord in the Roman empire, and that is the emperor, the Caesar. But Jesus is lord. He believed Jesus is lord. You're the lord.

I'm not lord. You're lord. And he believed and was saved from the penalty of death. Actually, in his situation, real death, he was saved to life, but actually in his own life. He was saved from the judgment of god, the death that god would bring him to life.

And he believed, and his whole household believed they saw the difference. They were baptized. They became servants They they ministered and fed and and healed the wounds. They became people with with life about them instead of death and putting people in dungeons. They came about people about bringing them into their house and opening up their house and offering life and healing wounds and feeding people instead of being people that were small minded and had a little house and kept people out and put them in prison were about death themselves.

They now became about life. Their whole life changed. This is the grace of god. This is the church at Philip. Do you see the 3 different people?

Let's sing again before we just apply it a little bit more. We're gonna sing another song by his grace. We we were dead in our path. This is the Christian experience. We were sinful sons of Roth following a crooked road.

We were lost and wondering souls. That's the Roman jailer, and he came to know the lord Jesus Christ. Let's stand and sing this song together. Okay. Over to you.

Over to you. You've heard 3 stories. You've heard what the church is about. It's a wonderful thing church. Have you had your heart opened like like Lydia?

Have you? Then if not, why not ask the Lord now? Why don't you ask him? Have you ever done that? Have you ever done that?

You ever asked the lover of your soul Would you come into my life? Would you be my lord? Would you be my savior? Have you ever done that? If not, why wouldn't you do that?

Why wouldn't you do that today? Why? Why not now? Ask him? Ask him.

Have you been freed from whatever enslaves you? Like the slave girl, you've been enslaved. All kinds of things. Have you? Look at people around you.

Many, many of us have been enslaved to terrible things, actually, terrible things. There are people around you. That have known what it is to be enslaved to things that they haven't even really liked or enslaved to an abuser. And they're free. They've been free from Christ.

They're battling. There's battles. There's battles to work out stuff. You know, and realize that we are free. And sometimes we go back to old habits, of course.

But actually, there's a freedom there. How's has have you ever asked Scott to to help you. Stop. Stop. Have you believed on and in the lord Jesus?

Like the jailer? Have you believed him? Have you realized that actually you've because what is it you're trusting in? What is it you're trusting in? What are the foundations?

They're gonna be broken up at death, aren't they? Everything that you've put your hope in, everything you've trusted in. Death, of course. Just breaks that up. You know, what is it?

What are are you putting your trust in? Have you have you believed? And have you been baptized? If not, why not? Why wouldn't you be baptized?

It's what everybody in the new testament does? Have you been baptized? It's a public declaration. So they were baptized before their household. The house they were saying, look, we are followers of Jesus.

Jesus, in part of the great commission is to go into all the world and teach them and baptize them as part of the great commission, to be baptized, to baptize them. And it's it's it's it's it's the sign of really joining god's people, baptism. Joining the church, be baptized. Join the church. Join god's people.

You believe, and you're baptized. That's what it is. Have have you been? It's saying I I'm the lord's. I'm with you.

I'm with you group. I'm with you group of believers. So have you opened your heart? Has your heart been opened? Have you asked the lord to do that?

Are you freed? Do you believe have you been baptized? Why not today? Great opportunity, isn't it? In this simple service to be 1 of the family of the living god.

Why not close your eyes and perhaps bow your heads and you could pray Lord, Jesus, you know every single person here. You know every heart, and you have the master key to each 1. And whichever story gets our attention. We pray, please, that your kindness would unlock our hearts that we may know you We're sorry that we've lived a life without you as lord. Help us to believe in you as lord.

We thank you that you've dealt with death. You rose again. You're the living savior. We thank you that you dealt with sin. All the things that the mistakes we've made and the things that we haven't done that we should have done and the things we have done that we shouldn't done and our apathy to love and to you and our taking of the gifts that you give us without saying thank you.

So many things, and yet Jesus is our savior. He's the 1 that comes into our hearts brings forgiveness brings us from light from darkness to light from satan to god, brings the forgiveness of sin. Help us, please, to know this in Jesus' name we pray, amen. We're gonna close with a lovely song. I heard the voice of Jesus say come under me and rest.

Have you heard that? I hope you have. I've tried I've tried to say it in lots of different ways. I heard the voice of Jesus say, can we saying to you? Come Come under me and rest.

Lay down there weary 1, lay down our head upon my breast. So if you're hearing that, come to him right now. Let's stand and sing this song together.