I'll Be There

Intro - One of the areas I’ve grown to love & hate is the point of exhaustion when you’ve come to the end of yourself…this seems to be the place that the Lord most powerfully arrives...

TR: We first see how that happens here with the Lord arranging a meeting between Paul and the husband/wife team of Aquila and Priscilla...

Companions

Paul has left Athens and finds himself in Corinth.

Corinth is a major city in the Roman Empire, considered by many to be the sports capital of the empire.

It is also a notable city in how wild it was. It was notorious for its extravagances, excessive culture, sexual promiscuity, etc.

Paul is in this city for the moment alone, awaiting Timothy and Silas.

We can tell that Paul was desirous for fellowship based on the wording that he “found” a Jew named Aquila and his wife Priscilla.

The idea is that Paul was searching out and went to a familiar source of companionship…his jewish heritage.

This husband and wife team would become some of Paul’s greatest companions and friends during a desperate time.

Listen family, there are moments in our lives where the Lord has sent people in to walk alongside us and we must thank God for them.

There is a prevailing belief that somehow you can make it alone…that we can walk away from fellowship and be strong.

We live in such an individualistic culture. We have missed our interconnectedness to one another…our culture teaches us that we can survive without one another.

In a book called Political Illusions & Illustrations that examines different views and how they are insufficient in and of themselves in light of scripture, David Koyzis writes regarding liberalism “the first and most basic principle of liberalism runs as follows: everyone possesses property in their own person and must therefore be free to govern themselves in accordance with their own choices, provided that these choices do not infringe on the equal right of others to do the same.”

Yet that is fundamentally the flaw is it not…what one person does or DOES NOT do will ALWAYS impact another!

Imagine what this world would be if we withheld our love from one another…I guess we don’t have to imagine do we?

Let me be honest…there have been plenty of times when I have given all that I have and if it weren’t for the strength of you all I would not have made it.

It may be a well timed text or an encouraging word…but the overwhelming blanket of isolation that attempts to suffocate you into depression

Ecclesiastes 4:9–10 ESV

Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!

Be that for one another! Lift each other up!

Just by happenstance while Aquila and Priscilla were exiled from Italy by Emperor Claudius, they came across Paul and a relationship that would change their lives forever.

Never underestimate the encouragement that you can have in someone’s life. What may be your exile and discomfort might drive you to be exactly what someone else needs to carry on.

I reflected while writing this sermon on how much people have helped me. During times of loneliness, homelessness, and tears. To celebrate with me and to pick me up…my goal in life is to be that for someone else.

Paul, Priscilla and Aquila hit it off first by being Jews and then by sharing a common trade in being tentmakers

It was common for even Jewish rabbis and scribes to know a trade because they often did their teaching for free.

So here Paul is, originally alone, now empowered by new friends and the arrival of familiar ones and with a gift from the Macedonians

TR: Now that Paul has been sent new companions he once again faces familiar contenders...

Contenders

Now that Paul is not only accompanied by Priscilla and Aquila but also Timothy and Silas, it says that he occupied himself with reasoning with the Jews and Greeks in the synagogue every Sabbath.

He was consistently conversing with them about the truth that Jesus was the Messiah.

This was a constant passion of Paul because the person that they had been waiting for as a nation for generations, that they had imagined, and tried to form from the scriptures was finally here.

Yet they were unwilling to listen.

This is a great lesson for us to learn from…be careful that we don’t confuse the God of the Scriptures with the God formed by this culture.

I fear that many believers have fallen victim to that and while not losing salvation have rendered themselves ineffective for the kingdom.

And yet, when the Lord of the Scriptures is preached we might find ourselves no longer contending against sin but being duped into contending against God.

That is the great deception that has gripped this nation. A magnificent sleight of hand that has replaced truth with tribalism

Yet, Paul is here again reasoning with his fellow countrymen, and once again he is rejected. Not just rejected but apparently reviled and blasphemed.

The term “revile” is literally to “array yourself in formation” like an army. They organized to oppose him…this is familiar territory for Paul.

Paul shakes out his garments, a modern day equivalent of cutting someone off, and states that from now on he’ll go to the Gentiles.

This was customary for Jews who would shake off the dust from their sandals when they exited Gentile lands as a way of not bringing “unclean dirt” to their homeland.

Here Paul uses the display against them, in effect symbolizing that he is free from being responsible for their spiritual well-being.

There is a responsibility that we must take for other individuals and then there is a responsibility that people must take for themselves.

I remember there was a conflict I watched years ago where a lady really wanted to divorce her husband. She offered every reason she could find but mainly that “she wasn’t happy”. After being shown text after text that there was no grounds for her divorce she appealed to her counselor’s words of “she’s suffering ‘trauma’ by withholding her happiness…eventually the pastor had to let her go her own way and it destroyed her family to this day.

I want to be careful to say that in our culture we cut people off too quickly but the opposite can also be true…there are some people that you have to let go of.

You might be in a relationship like that now where no matter how much you reason, plead, and talk to them from the scriptures they won’t listen.

This is not a display of Paul participating in cancel culture, where he was personally offended and therefore washed his hands of them.

Because in the very next chapter, 19:8, he’s back in the synagogue reasoning with the Jews!

Yet when they array in battle against you…it might be time for you to wash your hands of being responsible for them.

Paul may have stormed out of the synagogue at this point....and went right next door.

Imagine the infruriating display that now this man that you have reviled and hated is now there…every…single…day…preaching the Gospel as you arrive to worship.

Ya’ll ever have that person asking for money at the light and you try to avoid eye contact? You know who you are lol

And just as before, notable people are coming to faith chiefly Crispus who was the leader of the synagogue and his family, along with many others.

We’ve seen this story before right…what do you think happens next? Persecution! Adversity!

TR: Yet in the midst of adversity there is always one that is a comforter...

Comforter

At this point the Jews would’ve been in a fever pitch about the success of the Gospel.

Please family be aware…as you go about this journey that you will face emotional, spiritual, and sometimes physical attack for what is true!

You will doubt yourself, question your path, and fear what lies ahead!

YOU ARE NOT ALONE!

If the people around you aren’t comforting enough then take joy in these next words that were spoke to Paul.

Lord spoke directly to Paul some of the most comforting words we’ll find in all of scripture.

Acts 18:9–10 (ESV)

And the Lord said to Paul one night in a vision, “Do not be afraid, but go on speaking and do not be silent, for I am with you, and no one will attack you to harm you, for I have many in this city who are my people.”

“don’t be afraid”

In the midst of the adversity, when the Jews without doubt were forming to persecute as they had at other times the Lord stills Paul’s heart.

Without question he had grown weary by this point and possibly contemplated abandoning the city prematurely.

Listen family there is rest for you, not from labor but from FEAR!

ONE OF THE GREATEST ADVERSARIES OF BELIEVERS IS FEAR!!!

I have no doubt that the Lord is calling us to not be afraid anymore!

Instead we are to “go on speaking and don’t be silent”

Not only was his fear soothed but a command was given. The reason to not fear is not because you will alter your behavior.

Matter of fact you will continue to do as I have requested. There is deliverance in faithfulness.

There are too many times when we live “edited” lives. We go around being fragments of ourselves for FEAR that we will suffer.

I’m not saying to be rude and not to have tact but if you haven’t been displaying who the Lord has called you to be and what He’s called you to do then STOP!

SPEAK THE TRUTH…DON’T BE SILENT!!

Truth is silent in this world…there are a lot of voices, even loud ones, yet we need to speak!

LAND IT LOUD

“for I am with you”

Why can Paul be sure of this…because the Lord was with him!

This is one of the most beautiful statements I have ever heard as a believer!

When I have been alone, abandoned, and fear for what may come next the Lord has spoken and said “I am with you”!!!

Listen I don’t care about anything else…IF THE LORD IS WITH US THEN WHO CAN BE AGAINST US???

Let us stop chasing the companionship of this world and instead let us encourage one another with the truth that the LORD IS WITH US!!!

Don’t be silent! People need to hear truth!! Go preach the Gospel! That Jesus died for people like US, fools, fornicators, liars, and thieves, self-righteous goody two shoes, and idol worshippers!

“no one will attach you to harm, for I have many in this city who are my people”

He was promised relief from the physical harm and success with his time in Corinth.

The most rewarding thing we should be able to hear in this life is to preach because God has many in this city who are HIS PEOPLE!!

THERE ARE MANY PEOPLE IN KC WHO ARE GOD’S PEOPLE!!! WHAT ARE WE DOING TO REACH THEM?

I can tell you now that there are going to be some changes that we’ll be doing here at KBC coming up in the near future and I pray that the Lord is preparing your hearts now.

We will be a body focused on SPEAKING RATHER THAN BEING SILENT! BEING COURAGEOUS WHEN FEAR GRIPS US BECAUSE THE LORD IS WITH US!

TAKE HEART FAMILY…ENCOURAGE ONE ANOTHER AND KNOW THAT YOU ARE NEVER FORGOTTEN!!!