Living Waters of Grace 11.10.25

This is Living Waters of Grace, the teaching ministry of Clark

Wofford, senior pastor of Calvary Chapel of Westmoreland,

County of Greensburg, PA. Now here's Pastor Clark as he

continues teaching through God's Word.

Paul was known for not wanting to ever build on another man's

foundation. Paul wouldn't be interested in

going back to Jerusalem at the time because the church was

everywhere in Jerusalem, but he was always interested in going

to the regions beyond. Matter of fact, it tells us in

Romans that he did not want to build on another man's

foundation. He always wanted to see a fresh

new work of the Holy Spirit where people would come to

Christ who never even heard of Jesus Christ.

They're all kinds of people get into missions, work, whether

they're going in to support an existing project or going to

start a new community of believers at a place that has

never heard the gospel. In today's message, Pastor Clark

teaches you about the apostle Paul as he relied on God's

guidance to know where to go next in his missionary journeys.

There are also unreached people in your own community, people

who are desperately seeking the kind of hope that only Jesus can

provide. Now here's Pastor Clark in the

book of Acts Chapter 16 with today's edition of Living Waters

Acts 16 · chapter mention

of Grace. We are in the book of Acts

today, Acts chapter 16. We studied about the falling out

Acts 16 · chapter mention

that Paul and Barnabas had in regards to their ministry

relationship of so many years together.

Very sad. And yet the Lord's work

continues regardless of who continues on with you or with me

or with the church or whatever. When we're called to do what

we're called to do, we keep going on no matter what happens,

what the opposition is, what the slander is, what the setbacks

are. We keep standing on what it is

that God's called us to do, and perseverance in the midst of

challenge and difficulty in ministry is something we're all

called to. Perseverance in situations of

challenges, whether they are in marriage or family or home or

work or whatever. We don't give up.

We just keep doing what it is we're called to do and what we

believe the Bible teaches us to do.

And this is what we see occurring in this 16th chapter

of Acts. I'm sure Paul had a sad heart

after all this happened. Nonetheless, he was called to go

with others to follow up on the churches that had heard the

gospel where people had become believers.

And this is five years after the first missionary journey and we

see in the this 16th chapter, verse one.

Then he came to Derby and Lystra and behold, a certain disciple

was there named Timothy, the son of a certain Jewish woman who

believed that his father was Greek.

He was well spoken of by the brethren who were at Lystra on

Iconium, and so Paul wanted to have him go with him.

This is very interesting when you study these cities and he'd

take a couple of minutes to find out where these places are.

What's fascinating here is that most of these areas we're

reading about in chapter 16 are in the country of Turkey and

Turkey today is the most godless nation.

It's primarily Islam, Muslim. And you wonder how in the world

did the Christian Church, you know, become so weak in this

particular region of the world today, primarily through

persecution and martyrdom. This is what occurred and Islam

became a very, very prominent religion in that region and

still is today, is a very small section of modern Turkey today

that is Christian, primarily Eastern Orthodox, where the

patriarch of Constantinople lives.

And they used to have all this ground and now it's relegated to

a very small footprint with fences around that.

It's just a very, very sad. But anyway, Derby and Lystra

Lifestar was a place where Paul and Barnabas preached, and they

had miracles occurring and people were becoming believers,

and they started idolizing these guys and setting them up as

though they were like Greek gods.

So they got out of town quick whenever that crazy stuff

started happening. So Pauls running into the sky,

Timothy, years ago, Paul was in that area and he was getting

stoned and having all kind of problems with people persecuting

him and wanting to get him out of town, shut him up from

preaching the gospel. Eunice and Lois was Timothy's

mother and grandmother, and they discipled Timothy and the ways

of Judaism at the time, and they were devout believers in the God

of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Well, when Paul came and

preached the gospel there in that region, grandmother and

mother became believers, and then eventually Timothy did too.

So Timothy probably remembered the tremendous testimony of Paul

and his ability to preach and the influence he had in that

region where many people became believers at the time.

Timothy's mother was a Hellenistic Jew.

His father was Greek. So there's a complication here

because even though Timothy isn't perhaps committed to

Judaism, he is going to begin to be someone who influences Jews.

And so Paul had to do something very interesting here.

Now, if you remember last week and the week before, we were

studying about the council they had in Jerusalem.

It was the first ecumenical council where they apostles had

to sit down and discuss what was the key necessary ingredients

for someone to become a true believer.

And the Galatian people and the Judaizers, these are legalistic

Jews, were telling Gentile Christians that they had to be

circumcised in order to be saved.

Well, this is totally untrue. And so it was a heresy.

And so the leaders of the Church of Time, and of course Paul and

Barnabas, they went up to Jerusalem to meet with the

leaders and they sat and they prayed and they discussed.

They had some contentious arguments with some of these

legalistic Jews, Jewish people, and finally they came to the

realization that there was nothing that anybody had to do

to be saved but to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and be

saved. And then when they were

believers and they became baptized, but it was faith alone

in Christ, alone by grace alone that caused people to become

born again. And so now we see something

interesting here. Paul saw the credibility of

Timothy. Now, Timothy's a young man, he's

got good influence among the body of Christ in this region.

At the time, it says he was well spoken of by the brethren who

were at Lystra and Iconium. So Paul wanted to use Timothy

now as a partner in the ministry to raise, raise him up.

Like we noticed certain young guys that come into this church

here and they become part of it. We see the potential they have.

And Pastor Lewis and myself, we won't be here forever.

There's got to be someone down the road that begins to lead and

take this church over when we're no longer on the scene.

And so you constantly they got to be open and looking for

people that God is raising up that are strong young Christians

and have a desire to live for Christ.

And so in order for Paul to have Timothy go with him, it says he

took him and circumcised him because of the Jews who were in

that region, for they all knew that his father was Greek.

It just stops there. You might say, well, they had to

go around Paul and Silas now to all these different churches and

explain to everybody that this need for circumcision is

counterproductive. There's no purpose in it.

It doesn't accomplish anything. And yet Paul understood this

idea of becoming all things to all men.

This wasn't a thing about salvation.

Or Timothy wasn't qualified because he wasn't circumcised,

but in order to go into the synagogue and be able to preach,

which Paul was able to go in many times and accepted because

he was born a Jew, he was a Pharisee, he had been

circumcised, and he did all that religious stuff of Judaism.

So even though they knew Paul was different now in regards to

the things he believed, he was still respected in the

synagogues and accepted. And so as a result of that, he

had now to make sure that Timothy had this covering, so to

speak, this endorsement. So when he brought Timothy into

the synagogues around the Jewish people, they wouldn't just stop

listening because, quote, he wasn't circumcised.

So that was the reason Paul did this.

It wasn't compromising the message that they had received

from the council in Jerusalem with the elders there.

So he took him and and circumcised him because of the

Jews who were in that region for they all knew that his father

was Greek. Something that's interesting.

I don't want to gross you out or anything, but you know,

circumcision, you guys know what it is.

Paul circumcised him. I don't know if Doctor Luke was

arrived at the time and he said Luke, who wrote Acts, could you

take care of this for me? There's no way I wouldn't

circumcise myself, let alone anyone else.

I mean, that's dangerous. What if they bleed to death or

something? But anyway, that's just a

sideline in my own mind. And so as they went through the

cities, they delivered to them the decrees to keep, which were

determined by the apostles and elders of Jerusalem.

So they went out and visited the church.

We got good news, guys, you don't have to be circumcised as

Gentiles. Your salvation, your faith in

Christ is enough. Enjoy your life and the Lord and

just keep following him. So they were spreading this good

news about the decree and they also were looking at the

churches in regard to what they needed.

It says in verse five. So the churches were

strengthened and the faith and increase number daily.

And so the purpose of this ministry of Paul and Silas, and

now Timothy going with him, was to go in the places and visit

the churches and to speak to them and encourage the elders

about the things of God so that the church would get stronger

and stronger. And as it became stronger and

stronger, it became more influential in the city, in the

culture, in the society, and it grew and more and more believers

were coming into the church. And then it continues in verse

6, the Macedonian call. Now when they had gone through

the Phrygia and the region of Galatia, they were forbidden by

the Holy Spirit to preach the word in Asia.

This is interesting. Paul the really the first time

in the book of the Acts that he was prevented and forbidden to

do something that he believed he was supposed to do.

He had a heart, Paul, always to go to places where the gospel

had never been preached, to go and tell people who never heard

about what it is that we know is Christians.

And Asia is one of the most populous places in the known

world at the time and even today.

And so if you were going to go preach, you would want to preach

in the places that had the most people to be able to potentially

hear the truth. But for whatever reason, he was

prevented from doing this at this time.

After they'd come to Mycia, they tried to go into Bithynia, but

the spirit did not permit them. Again, this is northern regions

of Turkey. And so passing by Mycia, they

came down to Troas, and a vision appeared to Paul.

In the night. A man of Macedonia stood and

pleaded with him, saying, come over to Macedonia and help us.

Now after he had seen the vision, immediately we sought to

go to Macedonia, concluding that the Lord had called us to preach

the gospel to them. We see here in this section of

Scripture that the will of God overcomes the will of man.

Many times we think we should do something and we want to do it,

and we justify it in our minds and we think it's right because

we believe maybe the Lord spoke to us or gave us a word or we

have some kind of insight or some kind of direction that what

we're going to do is from the Lord.

But when it isn't from the Lord, God speaks to us, and He speaks

to us primarily through the Scriptures, sometimes through

other people that might challenge you about something

you're thinking of doing or possibly considering.

The Holy Spirit himself can give you a dream or a vision that's

obviously potentially available at times as well.

But in this instance, we have someone who was an apostle that

God told him no. And we think while the apostles,

they never miss God, they always did everything that was right

and they never made mistakes. Well, there was mistakes made as

I'd spoke in regard to that relationship that Paul and

Barnabas had together. It was a bad falling out.

It wasn't a good mark on Paul's history of his ministry, nor

Barnabas. It's a black mark on their

history. And nonetheless, God allowed it.

And so now Paul is having this struggle.

Now I think we should go to to Asia and we should preach the

gospel there. And he probably had all the

plans, everybody on board, everybody's ready to go.

And then this vision happens and now the Holy Spirit is

forbidding him to go there and now he's got to go to Macedonia.

So people might say to him and his leadership, but what are you

double minded? Don't you hear from God?

Are you not sure about what you're supposed to do?

Why is it that you were so focused on Asia and now you're

not going to go? What's this idea of a vision?

How do you know it was from God? How do you, you know, all those

kind of thought processes in our human minds would probably occur

at that time as well, and maybe people questioning what this was

all about. Fortunately, there wasn't a lot

of people in this committee. There was Timothy, Paul and

Silas at this point in time. So Paul had seen this vision and

immediately they sought to go to Macedonia.

Macedonia is in Greece, not too far from Thessaloniki, and we

have missionaries we support there, the Jacksons, and we just

love them and love the work they do there.

They're primarily ministering to communities, are influenced by

Islam, very, very challenging ministry.

And but This is why they did it. They concluded that the Lord had

called us to preach the gospel to them.

When you look at the world today and the number of places that

still are without the gospel missionaries, when they're in

candidate school and their training to plan where they

might possibly want to be missionaries, they pray.

They usually have a big map, a world map, and they'll look at

the people groups and they'll look at the percentages of

unreached people who have never heard the gospel or areas where

it's really difficult to get the gospel in.

Most missionaries are a different breed of people and

they are adventures. They're pioneers.

They're not afraid of challenges.

A matter of fact, they enjoy challenge and they look for

opportunities to go to places that no one else goes to.

And Paul was known for not wanting to ever build on another

man's foundation. Paul wouldn't be interested in

going back to Jerusalem at the time because the church was

everywhere in Jerusalem, but he was always interested in going

to the regions beyond. Matter of fact, it tells us in

Romans that he did not want to build on another man's

foundation. He always wanted to see a fresh

new work of the Holy Spirit where people would come to

Christ who never even heard of Jesus Christ.

Cindy and I were with an organization when we were first

married and it's called Ethos 360 now, but they specialize in

reaching unreached people groups in in tribal areas.

And so there was all kind of places that they were working

in. And I sort of had a hidden

agenda. I wanted to find a climate like

Hawaii. If I was going to be a

missionary, I wanted to go to a place that would be nice.

I didn't want to go to the Sepi River basin and and New Guinea

and get malaria and all those other things, get eaten up by

crocodiles and all kind of other weird animals and insects and

die. So I looked on the map and I

thought, wow, Indonesia, that's very similar to like Hawaii

weather. So, but nonetheless, I, I never

even got to Indonesia because I didn't know how to build a

jungle Hut or kill any animal or, you know, do any kind of

building. When you're a tribal missionary

like the Dawsons that we support in Venezuela, they had to go and

as babies, they grew up in that field and they're still there

now. Their parents are with the Lord,

but they went there in the 50s. Everything is, you know, brand

new all the time. Like, how do we reach these

people up the river that have never heard the gospel?

Got to get in a boat and figure out how to get up there and get

up there safely, missing the piranhas and the crocodiles and

the poisonous arrows at the tribal.

People try to shoot at you because they think you're going

to take advantage of them. But these missionaries are

pioneers, and they go and they sacrifice.

And many times they sacrifice their laws as Jim Elliott did.

Jim Elliott, he was the guy that said he has no fool to lose, but

he cannot keep to gain, but he cannot lose.

But it's interesting. A week before he was going to go

reach those AKA Indians, him and his friends, he was tempted to

not go. He was afraid.

He thought about his family and he is this really worth it?

But he ended up going and he ended up being martyred, him and

the rest of the guys. When you think about Paul and

Barnabas and Timothy and Paul was eventually martyred.

We get like this inside. Look at what it was like to live

as these pioneers. We get to read it and

participate in it and for reflect on it and meditate on it

and perhaps somehow living in a small way in the areas that we

live and where we come from, because there's unreached people

group right in Greensburg, PA, There's people, believe it or

not, that know nothing about Jesus Christ.

And you might say, well, how in America could you be here and

not know anything about the gospel?

What's because of where we are today as a nation, people and

these young people. When I grew up as a Pagan, at

least I knew that there was a God.

I believed that there was a Jesus.

I believe that the Bible was true, but I wasn't born again

yet, but I had that basic worldview.

Now you talk to young people. Do you know anything about Jesus

Christ or the Bible or God or the Trinity or the the cross or

the resurrection? They look at you like deer in

the headlight. They have no idea what you're

talking about. So you're starting back to

square 1. And it can be dangerous,

especially now if you aggressively proclaim the

gospel. There's beginning to be

persecution in our country and Canada.

Pastors that preach out against abortion, our same sex marriages

are being in prison. How soon will that be here in

our country? This is all involved in this

missionary vision. So Paul is going to go to

Macedonia now. And we continue in verse 11,

this woman by the name of Lydia, she's baptized at Philippi.

Philippi is a a wonderful region, opportunity for a new

church. Not a whole lot of Jewish

people. There was no synagogue there

because you needed ten men who were part of the synagogue in

order to have a legitimate synagogue.

So you'll see, it's interesting here that there is no synagogue.

They're meeting down by the river.

So therefore, sailing from Troas, we ran a straight course

as some Moth, and the next day came to Indianapolis and there

to Philippi, which is the former city of that part of Macedonia,

a colony. So they're in Greece now.

And we were staying in that city for some days, and on the

Sabbath day we went out of the city to the Riverside.

Now, normally in the Sabbath day, Paul and Silas and Timothy

would have gone into the synagogue to preach, but there

was no synagogue there. So they went out of the city to

the Riverside, where prayer was customarily made, and we sat

down and spoke to the women who met there.

Now, the rabbi said, it's better to have the law burn than to

deliver the Torah to women. That's how discriminating and

discussing the culture was toward women at the time,

especially in Judaism and the rabbi's.

There was a low level of esteem for women, which Paul certainly

doesn't have here. And now a certain woman named

Lydia heard us. She was a seller of purple from

the city of Thyrotyra, who worship God.

Thyrotyra is this community, the city that's known for

development of purple and dyed material, garments and clothing.

And so she's probably got an office down here now in

Philippi, following up that she's a very successful

businesswoman. And they're down there

worshiping God, but they're not worshiping the truth about God

yet because they don't know it. But they're there in their

religious form of trying to develop this encounter with the

living God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

And then it says the Lord opened her heart to heed the things

spoken by Paul. So Paul's preaching the gospel,

and all of a sudden she's recognizing that there's

something missing in her understanding of God.

And her heart became convicted, and she began to become drawn to

the gospel. And the Lord opened her heart to

heed, to obey, to follow the things spoken by Paul.

And it's like anywhere you go here today, your home, your

community, your workplace, you share the Lord with people as

you have opportunity to. Lord opens doors for you.

You can't make anybody believe. You can't force anybody to

understand the truth. You have to have patience and

you have to understand that only the Lord can open the heart for

people to believe. That's our job.

We're to pray and pray, Lord, open the hearts of those who

come here to hear your voice, to believe Your word, to follow

you. And the Lord will do that.

His word is not without power. It's sharper than any 2 edged

sword. It's able to divide us under the

soul and the spirit, and is very discerner of the thoughts and

intents of the heart. Even today, your mind might be

drifting. You're thinking about all kinds

of things, but God will take something from His Word and

Pierce your heart with it, convict you, challenge you, make

you think about Him more. Thank you for listening to this

edition of Living Waters of Grace.

Pastor Clark is teaching us about the book of Acts in this

series. Acts is a powerful and unique

part of Scripture, not just because it records the spread of

the gospel geographically from Jerusalem to the ends of the

earth, but also culturally. Acts shows us how the message of

Jesus moved beyond its Jewish roots and began to reach the

Gentile world. What started with Peter leading

a small group in the upper room became a global movement, with

Paul taking the gospel to cities, synagogues, and

marketplaces across the Roman Empire.

Acts captures this vital transition and reminds us that

the good news of Jesus is for all people in every place.

May we be inspired to carry that same gospel boldly into our

world today. Living Waters of Grace comes to

you from Calvary Chapel, Westmoreland.

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