Responding to the Gospel

Discipleship is a continual response to the Gospel.  It is how we daily, moment by moment, respond to the claims and call of the Gospel.  And so, discipleship is development.  Discipleship is a process over time.  Our faith, as we grow in it, deepens and expands.  Our relationship to God develops as we live in Christ.  Therefore, our experiences in discipleship change.  We see this in our passage: Acts 16:6-40.  We see it in the experiences of new disciples, the three converts in Philippi (Lydia, the slave girl and the jailer).  We also see the experiences of mature disciples in the apostle Paul and his ministry partner Silas.

On his second missionary journey, Paul, Silas and Timothy traveled across what is now Turkey to the coastal city of Troas.  There. Paul received a vision and the call to go to Macedonia.  And so, Paul, Silas, Timothy and Luke (who apparently joined them at Troas) went to Philippi and there they shared the good news of the Gospel which was, as it usually is, met with both receptivity and hostility.

The first person to receive the Good News in Philippi (and consequently the first recorded convert in Europe) was a woman by the name of Lydia.  Lydia was a businesswoman from Thyatira, who was a seller of purple cloth (an expensive commodity in that day).  Evidently Philippi did not have the quorum of 10 men necessary to establish a synagogue and so Lydia, along with other women, gathered at the River to pray and worship the Lord.  That Sabbath day, Paul joined them and told them about Jesus and Lydia responded to the message with faith.  The text focuses on her heart.  It says that, “The Lord opened her heart to respond to Paul’s message.”  And so we see that Lydia had an open heart.

Ü She had a heart for God.  She was a God-fearer; a worshiper of the Lord.  She sought the Lord in worship and prayer.

Ü And she had a God-opened heart.  Ultimately we do not choose God, He chooses us.  He calls us and unless god opens our hearts they will remain closed.  In an act of grace, God opened Lydia’s heart so that she could receive the Good News of Jesus Christ and be saved.

Ü Lydia’s heart was transformed by Jesus and therefore she gained a heart for others.  Salvation was not an individualistic, private transaction for her.  Rather, she and her entire household were baptized.  And notice that Lydia’s heart for others went past her own household.  She immediately showed hospitality and invited Paul and his companions to stay at her house.  And so Lydia became the first recorded convert and church-planter in Europe, as the church at Philippi began to meet in her house. 

The next convert in Philippi was an unnamed slave girl who was possessed by an evil spirit.  Through this spirit, the girl could predict the future and so she made a lot of money for her owners by being a fortune teller.  For some reason, this girl would follow after Paul and his companions on their way to the place of prayer, shouting day after day, “These men are servants of the Most High God who are telling you the way to be saved!”  And her repetition of this statement was distracting and annoying.  And so finally Paul turned toward her and said, “In the name of Jesus Christ I command you to come out of her!”  And at that moment, the spirit left her.  She was delivered from bondage.  Though still a slave, she had been freed from a greater slavery to evil and sin.  We do not know what became of her, but from similar stories of deliverance, we can infer that her life was transformed.  Most likely she was among those believers who met at Lydia’s house.

The owners of the girl were not particularly pleased by turn of events since it took away her fortune-telling abilities and their money making scheme.  So they dragged Paul and Silas before the magistrates who ordered Paul and Silas to be stripped and publically beaten.  They were then thrown in prison with their feet placed in stocks.  However, in prison, Paul and Silas would meet the third convert – the very jailer who was guarding them. 

At midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing when a violent earthquake shook the prison and the prison doors were opened and everyone’s chains came lose.  The jailer, thinking they had all escaped was about to kill himself when Paul stopped him: “Don’t harm yourself we are all here!”  The jailer ran to Paul and Silas, brought them out and asked them, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”  Perhaps he had heard what the slave girl had shouted and seen what had happened to her; perhaps he heard Paul and Silas’ singing and praying; he most certainly felt the earthquake and saw the miraculous deliverance provided for them.  And so, like Lydia, his heart was opened and what we see in him is faith, repentance and joy.  He showed faith by believing in the Lord and being baptized with his whole family.  He showed repentance in that he took Paul and Silas to his house, washed their wounds and fed them.  He showed joy in that he was filled with the joy of the Lord. He had found the way of salvation.  The jailer had been set free.

Those were the experiences of the three converts in Philippi as they came into contact with the Gospel.  But there is one more example of responding to the Gospel – that of Paul and Silas.  We see their response in three ways.

Ü First of all, the Gospel called them to be guided by the Holy Spirit (read vv. 6-8).  Paul and Silas had their plans of what they wanted to do and where they wanted to go, but the Holy Spirit changed their plans.  In response, they didn’t kick and scream or pout, rather, they kept in step with the Spirit, discerning His leading. 

Ü Secondly, the Gospel called them to rejoice in suffering.  Paul could write in his letter to the Romans about rejoicing in suffering because he had done it.  Having been unjustly accused, beaten and imprisoned, Paul and Silas could have complained, been angry and felt sorry for themselves, but instead they prayed and sang hymns and witnessed to the other prisoners and the jailer.  They were willing to suffer – they rejoiced in suffering - because they believed that Jesus was worth it.

Ü Thirdly, the Gospel called them to stand up for what is right.  When the magistrates, knowing they were wrong, tried to quietly get Paul and Silas out of town, Paul called them on it.  What they did was wrong and illegal and though Paul was willing to undergo wrong doing, he nonetheless stood up for what is right.  Because he was willing to suffer didn’t make him a doormat.  He did not shy away from facing persecution, but he also refused to ignore injustice.  He stood for what is right.

Discipleship is a continual response to the Gospel.  It is that initial response at conversion and it is our ongoing, moment-by-moment, situation-by situation response throughout life.  We’ve seen Lydia’s open heart to the Lord and toward others; we’ve seen the slave girl’s deliverance from bondage; we’ve seen the jailer’s faith, repentance and joy; and we’ve seen Paul and Silas’ willingness to be guided by the Holy Spirit, to rejoice in suffering and to stand up for what is right.

What is your response to the Gospel of Jesus Christ?

Ü Is God working on your heart so that it is opened to Him and opened to others?  Have you received the grace of God offered in Jesus Christ?  Are you sharing that grace with those around you?

Ü Has God delivered you from bondage or is He currently in the process of setting you free from that which binds you (an addiction, a begrudging attitude, selfishness, pride, doubt, hatred, lust, greed – sin)?

Ü Have you turned to the Lord in faith and with repentance so as to experience the joy of the lord in your life?

Ü Are you following the leading of the Holy Spirit in your life or are you fighting for your own way – your own agenda?

Ü Are you able to rejoice in suffering – to see, as Paul writes, that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us?  Can you sing in the midst of suffering?  Can you turn hurts and discomforts and disappointments into prayer and praise?  Are you a witness to others, even in the midst of suffering, of the hope that you have?

Ü Are you willing to suffer while at the same time be courageous enough to stand up for what is right?  Do you ignore injustice and sidestep conflict and wrongdoing or do you stand for truth?

Our lives are a continual response to the claims and calling of the Gospel.  Are we people, as Mark Driscoll (pastor of Mars Hill Church in Seattle) puts it, who do “Gospel things in Gospel ways for Gospel reasons because we want the Gospel to win” or are we people who do “unGospel things in unGospel ways for unGospel reasons because WE want to win”?  If we live that way we will lose.  The only way of life is the way of discipleship – the way of following Jesus.

The cloud of witnesses surrounds us.  May we, with our eyes fixed on Jesus, follow their examples.  May we, like them, respond to the Gospel by placing our lives, our hopes and dreams, our families and future in the hands of Jesus.  May we be people who do Gospel things in Gospel ways for Gospel reasons because we want, with all of our heart, for the Gospel to win!