The Gospel in Vanity Fair, Part 3

Acts 18:11-18

     This morning we come to, again, our study of Acts 18: 1-18, and I would encourage you to turn in your Bible and prepare your heart for what the Spirit would teach you through the Word.  This is the story of the arrival of the Apostle Paul and with him the Gospel in the city of Corinth.

     We might subtitle this whole passage, at least from the perspective we're looking at it, "Encouraging the Discouraged," because as we approach the passage, we are seeing the Apostle Paul at the low ebb.  He had lows as well as highs.  At this point he is discouraged, as we have seen very clearly--and I don't want to belabor the point.  Through the circumstances at Corinth, God really sets about to encourage His discouraged apostle.

     We read the Psalm earlier together that indicates that Christian is going to have trouble, that the child of God is going to have trouble, but God is going to see him through it.  God is going to encourage him, and that's exactly what we find here.  In fact, out of his experience at Corinth, Paul wrote back to the Corinthians and said, "God is the God all comfort."

     So God sets about to comfort the apostle through a series of circumstances that we find in the founding of the church at Corinth.  Psalm 27:14 says, "Wait on the Lord," and that's good advice.  That's always difficult.  We want what we want now and sometimes cannot allow for God to put us through deep water, through trying times, with the patience to wait and see what He's going to do.  The psalmist said, "Wait on the Lord, be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thy heart.  Wait I say on the Lord."  In response to that, Isaiah said, "They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.  They shall mount up with wings as eagles.  They shall walk and not be weary.  They shall run and not faint."  If we learn to wait on the Lord, we'll find ourselves encouraged.  God is a God of comfort.

     We saw that as Paul arrived in Corinth on his second missionary journey--verse one says that having departed from Athens he came to Corinth--that he was discouraged.  In 1 Corinthians 2:3, he wrote, "I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling."  He arrived with some real problems in his own heart and mind, and then when he faced the city of Corinth, that only increased his problem.  The very threat of the city itself, with its sinfulness, must have caused his trembling to increase.

     God moves hastily to comfort him and to encourage him.  We showed you that there are four ways that God encourages him.  We've been through the first two.  Simply to remind you, God encouraged him with companionship.  God encouraged him with some very dear friends whom he was to meet.  We find in verse two, "He found a certain Jew named Aquila born in Pontus, lately come from Italy with his wife, Priscilla.  They came because Claudius commanded all Jews to depart from Rome.  And he came unto them, and because he was of the same craft, he abode with them and worked, for they were by occupations tentmakers or leatherworkers."

     The apostle is introduced to two people who become lifelong fast friends and co-laborers in the Gospel.  God encouraged him immediately in his loneliness and in his discouragement and in the tremendous task that was at his feet, the task of evangelizing this sinful city.  He encourages him with two friends and coworkers.

     Then on top of that, He allowed him the ministry on the Sabbath, working the rest of the week.  Verse 4 says that, "He reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, persuaded the Jews and the Greeks."  Soon God even encouraged him further with his friends, two old friends.  New friends were good.  Old friends were better.  When Silas and Timothy were come from Macedonia, and we found out from the other writings of Paul that they came bearing good news and bearing money so that he didn't have to make tents anymore, but he could fulfill his apostleship, and he could spend all his time preaching.

     Paul was encouraged by his friends.  Certainly all of us can relate to that.  Very often in times of discouragement, God sends along someone we love very deeply to minister to us in comfort and encouragement.

     Secondly, he was encouraged by his apostleship as well as his companionship.  We found in verses 5-8 that when he was freed up by the offering of the Macedonian Christians brought to him by Silas, that he then began to preach.  As he began to really give himself to preaching, things really began to pop.  If he was encouraged by friends, he was doubly encouraged by converts.  People started getting saved, and his heart became thrilled.  We find in verse 5 that it says, "Paul was then" --and it says in the authorized "pressed in the spirit."  What it should say is, "Paul was then totally given over to the Word, or the ministry of the Word."  Freed up from doing anything else because of the offering of the saints.

     He then testified to the Jews that Jesus was Messiah.  He began immediately his apostolic work among the Jews, but they organized opposition.  Verse 6, "They opposed themselves, blasphemed, and he shook his raiment."  That is, he released himself from responsibility by that gesture.  He said, "Your blood is on your own heads.  I'm clean."  In other words, "I've delivered the Gospel.  I've done my part.  It's up to you.  You're responsible.  From now on, I will go to the Gentiles."

     Then he began his ministry among the Gentiles.  He departed from there, entered a certain man's house named Titus Justus.  We found that that probably is the Gaius mentioned in 1 Corinthians 1:14 whom Paul baptized and mentioned also in Romans 16:23.  His name may be Gaius Titus Justus.

     He went into this man's house.  This man was one who worshipped God--that is, a Gentile who attached to the synagogue.  His house was next door to the synagogue.  He had his first convert, apparently, if this be Gaius.

     The second one was in verse 8.  "And Crispus, the chief ruler of the synagogue, believed on the Lord in all his house."  That must've been a fantastic story.  I wondered often to myself as I've gone over this, "Why doesn't it say more about how in the world Crispus, the chief of the synagogue, got saved?"  It must've been bad enough for the Jews to have to endure the salvation of the man who lived next door without having to see their own leader saved.  On top of that, his whole house.  "And many of the Corinthians hearing were believing and were being baptized."  All imperfect tense Greek verbs, which means they were continuously occurring, continuous action.  Day by day, people were hearing.  Day by day, were believing, and day by day were being baptized.  Not all at once.

     God began to fulfill his apostleship.  People became believers.  What an exciting time.  Just that little phrase, "many of the Corinthians believed," has in it a volume of testimony that we wouldn't even begin to describe.  The Bible doesn't say.  We heard about a person who was saved out of this and saved out of that.  We hear the testimony of some guy says, "I used to be this.  I used to be that.  God transformed me."  We get excited about that. 

     We read something in the Bible, like "many of the Corinthians believed," and we say, "Oh."  It doesn't have anything.  It doesn't say anything exciting.  We think, "Let me give you something exciting to put alongside it."

     Paul wrote back to the Corinthians.  This is what he said in 1 Corinthians 6:9.  He said, "Know you not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the Kingdom of God.  Be not deceived.  Neither fornicators"--sex sin--"nor idolators nor adulterers"--people who fool around outside their marriage--"nor effeminates, nor abusers of themselves of mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners shall inherit the Kingdom of God."  You say, "Man, what a list of lousy, corrupt people."  The next verse says, "And such were some of you."

     Every one of those little names that are included in verse 8 of Acts 18, the word "many," there is a volume of testimony that the Spirit of God didn't tell us.  Someday when we get to heaven we can hear all about it.  God was doing miracle after miracle after miracle in the salvation of souls.

     What happened?  First of all, he must've been encouraged by his friends that he met and secondly, by his converts.  Can you imagine the thrill in his heart when he started seeing God just pull these people out of the Corinthian society one at a time?  What a fantastic thing was going on.

     Thirdly, and this is the point at which we stopped last time, he was encouraged not only by companionship and apostleship but by fellowship.  He was encouraged by his friends, his converts, and thirdly by his God, the God of all comfort. 

     In 1 Samuel 30 David was distressed, David was discouraged, and it said, "He comforted himself in his God."  I mean, if my friends are encouraging, and converts are encouraging, God is more encouraging in His own personal presence in my life.  That's really what happens in verses 9-11.

     You can imagine that when Titus Justus got saved, as the Bible says--there may have been a guy saved before him.  There may have been others saved.  We don't know for sure.  It's possible that others were saved.  Maybe even Stephanas and his house.  Let's assume for this particular passage when Titus Justus, or Gaius Tutus Justus was saved, you can imagine the irritation of the Jews.  You see, he was attached to the synagogue, as is indicated by "he worshipped God" in verse 7.

     Then on top of that, when Crispus, the chief ruler of the synagogue was saved, that must've really infuriated them.  Then in addition, many were believing and being saved.  Of course, by this time, they were tremendously antagonistic toward the apostle, whom they already had been antagonistic toward before anything happened back in verse 6.

     To give you a little idea, Paul wrote to the Thessalonians at this time.  It was right at this time that he wrote the letter.  He wrote in 1 Thessalonians 2:15-16 these words, "The Jews who both killed the Lord Jesus and their own prophets"--there are people who would exonerate the Jews from killing the Lord Jesus, but Paul did not.  That does not mean that they are totally guilty, but they did do that.  They killed the Lord Jesus.  They were in on it, and their own prophets, and have persecuted us, and they please not God and are contrary to all men.

     He says, "The same ones who killed Christ and their own prophets are persecuting us."  Verse 16: "They are forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved."  Apparently, after this thing began to happen, and some Gentiles started getting saved, the Jews got uptight, and the persecution started.  They were trying to stop Paul from preaching.  It was really intense. 

     Over in II Thessalonians, he wrote them another letter, and he told them essentially a similar thing.  II Thessalonians 3:1.  He says, "Finally, brethren, pray for us that the Word of the Lord may have free course."  In other words, there was the bottling up threat that there was going to be a stoppage to their ministry.  Verse 2: "And that we may be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men."

     He was really being threatened at that time.  The Gospel was about to come to a grinding halt.  Unreasonable and wicked men were threatening and persecuting, so it was a tough go.  At that point, even after his friends and his converts, he needed super encouragement, so God Himself comes.  I just love verse 9: "Then spoke the Lord to Paul."  Boy, that's good, isn't it?  The personal touch.

     God is personally involved with His servants.  How exciting it is to know that.  So many times when we serve Jesus Christ, we get the idea that we're merely a piece of the organization.  We're just a drop in the bucket.  We're just one little piece of what God's doing, and He's really not interested in us.  He's sort of a great, big controller of a great, big machine.  He just pushes all the buttons, and you may be a little bearing somewhere, and God never touches that.  He just punches buttons and everything makes you--

     That isn't it at all.  God is personally, actively involved in the life of every servant.  "And then the Lord spoke to Paul."  He did so in the night in a vision.  I told you last time that Paul had these visions from God--special times when he came to special crises and he didn't know which way to go.  Here he was at a time of discouragement--tremendous pressure, tremendous persecution.  You know something?  It's amazing to think about as we went and prayed earlier, he said, "God, help us to have the same kind of boldness that Paul had."  As you go to the Book of Acts you don't very often see Paul running out of that, but here you do.

     Paul right here was at the point of stopping his preaching.  It was so difficult.  That's when he was saying to the Thessalonians, "Pray for us that the Gospel might have free course."  He was at the point of quitting right here.  You say, "How do you know that?"  Because the Lord came to him and said, "Be not afraid"--verse 9-"but speak and hold not your peace."  Which implies that Paul was really thinking about stopping his preaching.

     You say, "Well, for him to do that, man, it must've been really intense."  It was.  The Lord says, "Don't stop.  You just keep preaching.  Don't lose your peace."

     The reaction of Paul was, "Well, I mean, don't just leave me there.  I mean, why should I keep doing it?  For what reason?  What guarantees do I have?"  The Lord gives him three, and they're in verse 10.  I want you to get them.  They're three promises that a Christian can apply in his own life.

     No. 1--"Keep preaching, Paul, for I am with thee."  Oh, what a powerful statement.  In the Greek it's an emphatic.  "I Myself am with thee."  The emphasis is on God's very presence.  That's the promise of power.  I don't know how to get the message across.  I don't even know how to get it across to myself, but I don't really think any of us understand what that means.  I don't think any of us can fathom the power of God.  Maybe you can understand the fact that once there was nothing and the next instant there was everything, you'll understand something of His power.

     That a God Who could speak everything into existence must have some kind of power.  I often think of God generating things through space at the unbelievable speeds that He does.  Think of the kind of fuel that it must take to drive things at that rate.  God has power, unbelievable power.

     The Bible says in Ephesians 3:20 that, "Because we are filled with all the fullness of God, we can do what we can't even dream."  It actually simply says, "We can do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or--"  What?  Or think.  According to the power that works in us.

     I say that, and I urge you to believe that, and yet I'm not even sure myself that I understand that.  I mean, I look at myself and I say, "Man, are you ever playing around in the sandbox.&nbs