Untitled Sermon (7)

I am a stickler when it comes to food and being out of date…..This drives Laura crazy but I am always looking at the expiration date on food, smelling it, looking at it,… I have never gotten food poisoning before either so I am not sure why this is so…..I remember not long ago opening up the freezer and freaking out at the site of a black looking rotten banana…..I mean rotten bananas are gross why in the world are we keeping them around, let alone freezing them..I mean are they to be used for boomerangs or what?…I am not a baker and I am embarrassed to admit…I didn’t know this is exactly how you want your bananas to make banana bread….Now you know banana bread is a small slice of heaven..its amazing special first cooked with some butter….

It’s crazy to me now when I notice Laura making banana bread…I come into the kitchen and I am grossed out by the sight of the nasty bananas but then hours later I am enjoying this delicious sweet piece of bread….Those bananas in there dark nasty state were transformed into something amazing…

Now I know thats a silly illustration but its one that kept coming to mind as I thought about this predicament that Paul and Silas found themselves in…God used their nasty dark situation and transforms it into a beautiful gospel encounter…..

My sermon in a sentences: God may use your current trials big or small to be an opportunity to advance the Gospel.

With the help of this text My goal is to empower you all to be ready for the trial, and turn the trails into an opportunity for worship and evangelism. Now I might have just lost many of you…You might be thinking Rem life is good I'm not really in the midst of a trial. Two response to the mind set: 1. We all have small trails that we go through: ran out milk, stuck in traffic, flat tires, forgot your wallet, wrecked my bike. 2. I have heard it said before that, “You are one of three persons, someone who just got out of a trail, about to go into one, or just got out of one.”

So don’t check out….

So lets dive into this passage:

First I want to give you some brief context of how Paul and Silas got locked up. We are in the part of the story of God where Jesus had died, was buried and rose again…and in the beginning of Acts Jesus tells the apostles to wait for the promise of the Spirit, the spirit comes and changes everything…Jesus was now counting his work as the his followers were now filled with the Spirit and now were sent out to to grow the church of Jesus Christ to the ends of the earth.

is toward the beginning of Pauls second missionary Journey: Paul and his missionary buddies( Silas and timothy) were bouncing all over the place in trying to speak in Asia minor but God kept saying don’t go to that place nope nope nope….then in a vision God simply tells Paul: It’s time to go to Europe go to Macedonia with the Gospel, so off they go. The first city Philippi( a popular now Roman colony that was untouched with the gospel). First day their Paul goes to a prayer meeting( because they have no synagogue)…meets a bunch of women and starts sharing the Gospel…one women named Lyda, who is a seller of purple good which means she is wealth wealthy( has a pint-house in new York) God opens her eyes to the gospel and she is saved….

Maybe a couple of days later…Paul and Silas are just walking to the place of prayer and and demon posed slave girl is chasing them around kinda mocking them…Paul is annoyed and casts the demon out..She is set free, well the owners don’t like that and now they drag Paul and Silas before the magistrates….they think they are disturbing the city and issue to have them striped, and beaten, and then thrown in jail!

they are in the inner prison as well..which would have been the lowest place in the prison which means all the human waste from cells above would have made its way down into that cell, their would little if no light at all, and worst of all the verse 24 explains how they were in stocks meaning—there feet would have been chain and even hung up in a way that their back where on the ground in one of the most uncomfortable positions imaginable.

Three ways to be empowered in you trial.

First way we can be empowered to be ready for the trail is this:

1. Know that our obedience to God might lead us into the trail

Paul and Silas were simple being faithful to the Gospel which lead them into prison, it wasn’t because of a sin they committed. Often if we are not carful when pain, trouble, or suffering that comes upon us we will run and think o know what sins have we committed—which of corse the bible does talk about how or sins can lead to suffering(just look at the Israelites in there continual disobedience which lead to the suffering)

But what if in the midst of pain we didn’t ask why God? But who are you now trying to reach in this pain?

From Paul and Silas perspective they probably thought what is going on…probably not how I would have planned it…One authors I was reading said look at from God’s perspective?……

God was sovereign in the midst of this all and we know that they trusted in his sovereign will for the advance in how they responded which leads

2. Worship.

When you first read that they are singing and praying….you are like really…..Isn’t this a perfect moment for Paul to be like What it the world…God thanks a lot! Here we are trying to spread the Gospel and at first it went great now we are here!!! Why God!! No…Paul would later right in ….4:4…

Worship is a way for us to take the eyes off what is around us and put them on God and his glory.

Have you ever felt beaten up and then on the car ride home that song comes on the radio and you just get lost in worship, Have you ever woken up and felt the stress and pressure of your job and then bowed your knee and started praying and you left those moments and maybe your circumstance didn’t change but change happened in you…How? Your eyes were shifted read the psalms( start with this pain, reflects on God’s character)…

Make it practical for you

Create a worship in midst of pain playlist or CD

We sing praises in the midst of trail as well because others are watching

( the text says listening but the greek word for listening but gives the GREEK interpretation of listening with pleasure)…..See we can either be a temperature gauge or a thermostat Christian…..What does a tempter-gage do? yes exactly it just reads the temperature of the room…o good its fifty degree in hear….but a thermostat sets the temperature of the room….See there are many christians go in pace with the world and hear the news, and step into the workplace and join right in with this negative voice that is in our world…they just read what is happing….but a temostate Christian will ignore those things but won’t join in with it…but set the tone to bring honor and praise to our God…And Paul and Silas didn’t just join in with the other prisons and think wow its cold, this stinks, the jailer is mean…but decided to think lets turn up the heat in this place, lets set the tone, They understand by being chained to them was an opportunity to help show them the hope they had…and thats exactly what happened….

which leads me to my final point….

3. Third way to be empowered in your trial is understand it could be used to share the hope you have in Jesus

What happens in response to their prayer—-an Earthquake, God is the one that is delvers them from the prison…but what is interesting is that we find that after the earthquake the jailor was about to kill himself( A roman jailer would have been a blue collard guy, who was a decorated Roman solider, in retirement) and the reason he was about to kill himself was because the plenty for loosing prisoners was executions. Paul and Silas just scream out Stop don’t harm yourself we are all hear(I would say the same thing to anyone here who might feel the weight)…Paul and Silas have their freedom! God has opened the doors, and they stay behind..couldn’t imagine what the guys would have thought who dug a mile long tunnel to rescue el chap from prison they bust up and he is like naw not today…no way of corse he sped out of there…..

But Paul and Silas stood their he decided not to leave because they knew this man was in desprate need of grace….the same man who probably had a hand in beating him, the same man that put them in the worst place in the prison…they knew God was after him…and

Paul and Silas offered grace…were grace wasn’t deserved…

we are still hear..”

Now notice the Jalior was still going to kill himself even after the earthquake..but it’s when he saw that Paul and Silas where still their he ask’s the most important question he could have ever asked at that moment

The Jailer wanted to know what they hadwhy would you be singing and praying and why would you guys till be hear?

Their answer is the shortest gospel presentation one could present, “Believe in the Lord Jesus!

……Their answer wasn’t well attend our church, do this or do that, but Believe in Jesus…..Ladies in gentles if you have come in here today, and you are on your last straw, and you are wondering what must you do to be saved…..hear the text believe in Jesus…turn to him….Paul and Silas are not talking about just believe—in the sort of just head knowledge but truly believe, as in your action will show what you believe….

One illustration I saw once…..

Paul and Silas explain the word to his whole family they have real belief and are baptized, wash their wounds, and invite them into their home for some food…..

Think about it…hours before this jailer had no hope…..he AND his family….God step in to the pain that Paul and Silas were facing and in the midst of their greatest heartache brought about the greatest highland possible for this family…and a church was born!!!! That would go on to be one of the greatest churches in Pauls eyeys

There is no greater illustration that God using pain and brining about light in the world then through Calvary

…imagine how the disciples would have felt…Their darkness hour was God’s plan all along to redeemed the world through His Son.

Who is watching you in your pain? People are looking on…instead saying this is just a rotten situation…just a rotten banana understand…yes hard we are here to walk together through pain…but God can create something beautiful through your pain…So praise Him…He hasn’t left you….turn your rotten banana into banana bread!