Acts 18:1-17 - Making Tents And Shaking Dust

Podcast Transcript (Auto-Transcribed by Apple Podcasts)

Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, whatever time of day it is for you. Welcome back to Tabernacle Talk, and we are in Acts 18 today. Over the past couple of days, we have journeyed with Paul and Silas and Timothy to Greece, to Macedonia.

I should say Paul has been to Greece. Silas and Timothy, last we left them, were still in Macedonia.

Paul went into some different cities of Greece, and he was most recently in Athens in the last episode, where he gave a sermon on Mars Hill, on the Areopagus, and tried to convince the Greeks that they too needed Jesus.

It wasn't just something for the Jews, it was something for everyone. And he was the God that in their pantheon of gods, they didn't realize that he was the one that actually deserved their worship, and adulation, and respect, and offerings.

And so we remarked last time how he didn't quite get the same response, the same acceptance of the gospel in Athens that he had in some other places.

We've seen over the past few days how he was beaten and imprisoned in Philippi, that there was a riot in Thessalonica. They were shuffled out of Berea as soon as the crowd from Thessalonica found out that Paul and the others were preaching in Berea.

They came there too, and then there was Athens. And so there's kind of been a bit more difficulty, it would seem, this trip than some of the last trip.

Obviously, with the big exception of Lystra, where Paul was stoned and then dragged outside the city because they thought he was dead. But this brings us to where we're at now in Acts 18 and verse number one.

It says this, after this, after the sermon, he left Athens and went to Corinth, where he found a few named, or sorry, where he found a Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontius, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius

had ordered all the Jews to leave Rome. So here's a Jewish couple, and they have recently come to Corinth, and so he joins up with them.

Paul came to them, and since they were of the same occupation, tent makers by trade, he stayed with them and worked. He reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath and tried to persuade both Jews and Greeks.

So Paul here, he joins up with them, and he's not afraid to get a job and to be able to work while he is preaching the Gospel many times. Paul highlights the fact, he actually mentions it in the Book of 1 Corinthians.

He says that those that live by the Gospel, those that preach the Gospel, should be able to live of the Gospel.

So he basically says, if someone's giving all of their time to feeding people spiritually and to leading them spiritually, then those that are benefiting from that spiritually have a responsibility to be able to help those that are preaching the

Gospel be able to live, because instead of working for themselves and for their own food and their own sustenance, they're working to help other people. And so, but Paul here, as he mentions elsewhere, he's not afraid of when times come where people

are unable to do that for him, unable to help him out in that way. He is not scared at all to work and he is a tent maker by trade. And so he joins up with them.

Verse number five, when Silas and Timothy arrived from Macedonia, Paul devoted himself to preaching the word and testified to the Jews that Jesus is the Messiah. And that's a great thing of devotion to be able to have.

He devotes himself to preaching the word and testifying to the Jews that Jesus is the Messiah. Verse number six, when they resisted and blasphemed, he shook out his clothes and told them, Your blood is on your own hands. I am innocent.

From now on, I will go to the Gentiles. So shaking off your clothes was kind of a thing of none of your dust is going to stay on me. Like this is all you guys, you have made this choice.

This kind of goes back to one of the discussions that Jesus had had with his disciples back when he was on earth where he sent them on a mission and said, Okay, I want you to go into these different cities, preach the gospel, preach the coming of the

kingdom. And if they refuse to hear you, shake off the dust from their city from Afia and go on to another city. And you are not responsible to personally save every single person. Your responsibility is to share.

And what people do with what is shared is up to them.

It's that freedom of conscience that was so dear to our Baptist forefathers back in the 1600s, when they kind of first became a group of people that as they saw many of the state run type churches and places, they had a heart that said, No, we see

from scripture that we can't force people into faith, it has to be a volitional choice. And so we can see Paul doing this here, he says, I have done what I could in declaring the gospel to you.

But since you don't want the gospel, since you are now blaspheming Jesus, you are wholesale rejecting him, even though I have told you the truth. It's okay. Like Paul didn't say you can't be saved now.

He just says, your blood is on your hands. If you want to continue on this path of destruction of not believing in Christ, that's on you. I can't make you change that, but I'm also not going to keep attempting to force feed it to you.

I'm going to go to someone that that will hear it. So he goes to the Gentiles. Verse number seven.

So he left there, the synagogue, and went to the house of a man named Tichius Justice, a worshiper of God whose house was next door to the synagogue. Crispus, the leader of the synagogue, believed in the Lord along with his whole household.

Many of the Corinthians, when they heard, believed and were baptized. And what a cool thing here that even though up until this point, there's been a lot of loss, there's been a lot of heartaches for Paul as he's gone through.

Now there's finally some fruit emerging, finally some joy. And many of the Corinthians, when they heard, believed and were baptized, what an encouragement that it wasn't just a secret faith to them, but they went in wholeheartedly.

They were publicly identified with Christ.

Verse number nine, the Lord said to Paul in a night vision, don't be afraid, but keep on speaking and don't be silent for I am with you and no one will lay a hand on you to hurt you because I have many people in this city.

I think this prayer or really this vision that God gives to Paul gives us some insight into what his heart was in that moment. He tells him, don't be afraid. You don't have to tell someone, don't be afraid if they're not afraid.

So we know that even as God was working, that Paul was fearful. What if I get stoned again? What if more riots happen?

What if I'm thrown in prison? What if I'm beaten? And God himself encourages Paul and says, hey, don't worry, don't be afraid.

Don't be silent. I am with you. And then he says, here's why you don't have to be afraid.

Why you shouldn't be silent? Because I have many people in the city who's going to be saved is not a mystery with God. He knows the end from the beginning.

He knows today who you are going to witness to that maybe one day, 15 years down the line is going to get saved.

He knows in your life, maybe someone that if you were to talk with them, maybe they might get saved in a couple of months, or maybe they might get saved this month, or today. We don't know. We don't know the end from the beginning.

But we know that God has his people in mind, and you don't know what seed you plant, God might bring to fruition. So continue to spread the seed of the gospel wherever you go.

So continue to share Jesus, him crucified for sin, buried, risen again, ascended into heaven, and coming again. Verse number 11. Paul stayed there a year and a half teaching the word of God among them.

Verse number 12. While Galio was pro-consul of Achaia, the Jews made a united attack against Paul and brought him to the tribunal. This man, they said, is persuading people to worship God in ways contrary to the law.

14. As Paul was about to open his mouth, Galio said to the Jews, if it were a matter of wrongdoing or of a serious crime, it would be reasonable for me to put up with you Jews.

But if these are questions about words, names, and your own law, see to it yourselves. I refuse to be a judge of such things. So he drove them from the tribunal.

17. They all seized Sosthenes, the leader of the synagogue, and beat him in front of the tribunal. But none of these things mattered to Galio.

It's kind of interesting at the end of all this, that there's now this proconsul that though attacks attempt to come against Paul, Galio kind of enforces a separation of church and state here that we see.

He says, okay, this isn't a matter of like actual crimes of people against people. He says, this is all just about your religious interpersonal fights.

And he says, I'm not going to get into that debate on, okay, he says this person's God and this person's not God. He says, I'm not dealing with it. And we can see there that Paul himself was delivered.

And we can see that that fulfilled promise from God that he made to him. He says, I'm with you. No one's going to lay a hand on you.

And even though they brought Paul in front of the proconsul to have him be judged or thrown in the prison or beaten or whatever it might have been, we can see that God protected him. And it was a different person, Sosthenes, than we saw earlier.

Oh, what was the initial person's name? Shep my Bible just a second too soon. It was Crispus, the leader of the synagogue prior.

So I don't know if he got kicked out from his position as leader of the synagogue because he was saved and then Sosthenes was the next one in, or Sosthenes might have been a different name for the same person, as we already saw with Paul and Saul,

sometimes with different languages, you had a person that was named different things, even Barnabas, his name was Joseph or Joseph, that you have people who are given nicknames sometimes, and so it might have been one of those situations. But we can

see that God was true to his promise to Paul. And can I tell you today, whatever promise that God makes to us, he's going to keep.

Now, we can't just assign random promises to ourselves, but the promises that he gives to all believers are the promises that we can hold to.

So like a Romans 8.28, we know that all things work together for good to those that love God, to those who are the called according to his purpose, for whom he did foreknow, he also predestinated to be conformed to the image of his dear son.

And what a wonderful promise that is, that no suffering that we go through, no hard times we endure, no good things that we go through come apart from our good God's hand.

I think of James 1 verse 17 where it says that every good gift and every perfect gift comes down from above, comes from the father of lights, with whom there is no variableness or shadow of turning.

That with God, all of his gifts that he gives, he doesn't take them back, and he gives them to us freely. He says that he gives wisdom to everyone that asks genuinely. Even if we have been foolish, if we ask for wisdom, God will give it to us.

I think of the fact that we are, Ephesians chapter 1, we are sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise until the day of salvation, that God has put his down payment on our life, the Holy Spirit, and he will not take the Holy Spirit back until the day

when he redeems us. What a wonderful truth that is, that we are his forever.

If we are truly saved, if we have genuinely turned to Christ alone for salvation, repenting of sin, repenting of our own way, and turning entirely to him, that he will never ever turn his back on us.

Think of that old hymn that says, the soul that on Jesus has leaned for repose, I will not desert to his foes. That soul though all hell should endeavor to shake, I'll never, no never, no never forsake.

And they're quoting from Hebrews chapter 13, where God says that we need to be content with such things as we have, because he has said, I will never leave you or forsake you. Can I tell you today, you have been given incredible riches in Christ.

You've been given a home in heaven. You've been given the Holy Spirit who is with you each and every day, the presence of God with you. God has given you a church that he has intended to be part of you growing and maturing.

God has given you his word so that you can know his mind and his will, know his heart, know the miracles that he is capable of, so that you would know his promise.

And if he's given us all of these things, if he's given us mission and purpose to be able to share the gospel, a mission and purpose to encourage and equip other believers for the work of the gospel, if we have all of those incredible promises, then

we can do the same thing that Paul did. That we don't have to be afraid. We don't have to stay silent.

We can go forward in faith knowing that God is with us and that he has people that he knows will be saved and that will be saved through the testimony, through the sharing of the gospel that we do as believers. I'd like to encourage you today.

Maybe it's the end of the day for you. Maybe it's the very beginning of the day. Don't hold back.

Don't be silent. Share God's love. Share God's story.

Share God's gospel. It is worth it. You don't know who God has for you to minister to, for you to share the gospel with.

It might be a seed planted today that will come to fruition 25 years from now. You might be the one that waters a seed that finally blossoms into faith in Christ that other people have been working on and praying for for many years.

So because we don't know when God is going to have that seed finally spring forth, a new life would encourage you to be faithful to keep on sharing. And don't be disheartened. Don't be discouraged.

God is with you. Because God is with you, there's nothing to fear and we can go forward in faith. Hope that would be an encouragement to you today.

Thanks for tuning in to Tabernacle Talk. Tomorrow, we continue our journey in Acts 18.