Five Neglected Gospel Truths - 3

Well, two weeks ago, we began our study, the first Thessalonian Epistle of Paul, as we engaged in an introduction to that book. And last week, we considered an examination, an overview, really, of chapter one, a short chapter of ten verses. But nevertheless, that enabled us to move directly into the contents of the book, which we did last Lord's Day, and I trust that was profitable to you. And in the course of that, we were required to examine the Bible doctrine of election, because that is prominent in chapter one, and is specifically mentioned in verse four, and there is material about that in the surrounding verses, as we saw last week. Now today, we want to return to chapter one to examine some additional details that we didn't have time for last Lord's Day. And as I typed up my notes, I realized that we may not have time for all of the details that I have hoped to engage our minds in today, but we shall see.

I'm going to try to move quickly so that we can finish our examination of chapter one today and move into chapter two. But there's a lot here that needs to be considered by the people of God. Chapter one, as much as anything, is about the entrance of the gospel into the city of Thessalonica. And Paul giving thanks to God for the success of his missionary labors, that his preaching of the gospel found entrance into the hearts of the people there.

And he talks about that with great joy, and he gives us some important information about the process by which the gospel finds lodging in hearts and lives. Today, I want us to take up what I've called five neglected gospel truths that are scattered throughout this chapter. And I don't mean that every one of these truths are neglected by every Christian, but all of them are neglected by some Christians, and therefore all of them need to be emphasized and placed before us from time to time so that we do not become guilty of neglecting them. Five neglected gospel truths.

What are they? Number one, the gospel requires proclamation. The gospel requires proclamation, and that's not a truth that is widely neglected, but there are some who do neglect that, I suppose you know. Sometimes they are identified as hyper-Calvinists who emphasize so much the sovereignty of God that they not only neglect the responsibility of man in proclaiming the gospel, but even deny the necessity of that.

We've had to deal with some people of that persuasion along the way in our own church ministry here, and there are folks like that who can't seem to embrace two truths, both taught in God's Word, if they can't understand in every detail how to reconcile them. And so the majority of Christians, I think, embrace the responsibility of man in preaching the gospel and the responsibility of man in believing the gospel to the neglect of the greater truth of the sovereignty of God and salvation, but it can go the other way as well. And sometimes we can so embrace the sovereignty of God and salvation that we shrug our shoulders and say, well, if God's going to do it, God's going to do it, so I don't have to worry about it, so I'll go play golf.

Nothing wrong with golf, you understand, but I'll just spend my life playing golf and I won't worry about proclaiming the gospel. Well, that's not the indication that we find in 1 Thessalonians 1 or anywhere throughout the New Testament Scriptures. But let's be reminded of God's method of evangelism, which is gospel proclamation by human messengers. Think of Romans chapter 10, a great chapter on the necessity of people going forth with the gospel, and we're told there when we come to verse 17 that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God, and it's clear from that context that the hearing of the Word of God is the word of God that comes to people by human messengers.

How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the glad tidings of God's peace. And so it is necessary that human beings, Christians of course, who else would do it, it is necessary that Christians proclaim the message which God is going to use to save men's souls. God's method of evangelism is through human messengers, which tells us that this message does not come to men's minds directly by heavenly communication.

It could. God could have chosen to speak to each of his elect children individually at the proper time and just bring the message directly from heaven into their hearts and to save them without any human agency. But that isn't the way that God has chosen to do it. Nor has God chosen to proclaim his gospel through angelic messengers.

And again, he could have done that. They undoubtedly would have been more faithful. They undoubtedly would have done a better job than we do in our Adamic sinfulness and weakness and failure. But nevertheless, God, according to his plan and wisdom, did not ordain that angels should proclaim the gospel to the world. Angels were involved in the proclamation of the Mosaic regulations, the Mosaic law.

We read about that, that it came to the people of God in the Old Testament through the ministry of angels. But when it comes to the gospel of Jesus Christ, it comes to people by the proclamation of human messengers such as you and I. We are the ones who proclaim that message. So that brings me to consider the people that God uses. And of course, I've already mentioned it's Christians of all kinds. But here, Paul specifically mentions three members of the missionary team that brought the gospel to Thessalonica. Here in these opening verses when he says Paul and Silvanus and Timothy. And he goes on to write more, but that calls our attention to these three men and causes us to at least think about how did they involve themselves in the life of this church in Thessalonica to whom this epistle is now being written. And it doesn't take us much exploration in the book of Acts to realize that these were the men that God used to come to Thessalonica and to preach the gospel that God used to save men's souls. Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy.

We don't need to say much about Paul. He's a very familiar person to us, or at least to most Christians. We know a great deal about his Hebrew background, his Pharisee background. We also know about his remarkable conversion on the Damascus Road and about his commission by Jesus Christ to become an apostle to the Gentiles.

And so that is fairly well known. Silvanus is probably not quite as well known to us, and so it might be helpful to at least review how he entered into this picture in Thessalonica. Silvanus, as he's called by Paul, Silas, as he's always called by Luke when he writes about him in the book of Acts. The first mention of Silas, as he's called by Luke, is in Acts chapter 15. And he was one of two men who were chosen by the church at Jerusalem, by the leaders of the church there, to go with Paul. And Barnabas, who had been Paul's partner in his first missionary journey, to take the declaration of the Jerusalem Council back to the Gentile churches. They come together in Acts 15 to discuss this matter about where does circumcision and the keeping of the Mosaic law figure into the gospel, into what is to be imposed upon Gentile believers, and that being settled.

And a letter having been written that made it very clear that the gospel does not include circumcision, it does not include the law of Moses, and these are not requirements for Gentile believers, that letter needed to be circulated among the Gentile churches. And so the church appointed two men, Silas and Judas, to go with Paul and Barnabas on that task. And so they are called chosen men in Acts 15, 22, and leading men in Acts 15, 22. And in verse 32 of that chapter, they are both called, or at least Silas, I don't remember if Judas is or not, I think he is, but Silas at least is called a prophet, which tells us a little bit more about him. He was certainly one of the leaders of the church, he was one of the preachers of the church. He had the prophetic gift, that is, God at times spoke directly to him to declare God's word to the people.

That's what a prophet is, and Silas was a prophet. When they delivered this message, the church at Antioch, and Antioch greatly rejoiced at receiving this information, after completing their assignment, Judas went back to Jerusalem, but Silas chose to stay on in Antioch, Syria, to minister there. He saw a great need, and he no doubt was invited to do that by Paul and Barnabas and the other leaders of the church.

And so he stayed in Antioch and continued his ministry in that location. And when there was that well-known division, I started to say unfortunate division, between Paul and Barnabas, and in many ways it was unfortunate, and yet again we can see in the hand of God how God used it for blessing to the ministry of the gospel across the Roman world, but when that split took place between Paul and Barnabas, Barnabas took John Mark and went his way. Paul, we're told, chose Silas to be his new partner, to replace Barnabas, and started that on his second missionary journey. And you can trace all of that in the book of Acts, but we find that Silas is with Paul in Troas, when Paul received that Macedonian vision, come over, come over, come over into Macedonia and help us. And Silas is with Paul when he is ministering along with Timothy that he picked up along the way, we'll see that in a moment. Silas is with Paul when he ministered in Philippi.

In fact, there were more than two members of that missionary team in Philippi, but only two of them landed in jail. It was Paul and Silas that we read about in Acts chapter 16, who sang praises to God in prison, and God released them from that prison. Silas continues to be with Paul as he left Philippi and went down to Thessalonica, the place that we're considering now, and was with Paul when he went to Berea, and eventually caught up with Paul. He wasn't with him all the way, but he caught up with Paul when Paul was ministering in Corinth, and most scholars believe that the first Thessalonian epistle was penned in Corinth, and clearly Silas is there at that time. That's why Paul says Paul and Silvanus and Timothy unto the church of Thessalonica. Silas is with Paul in Corinth, and one last mention that can very easily be overlooked, and that is, according to 1 Peter 5-12, Silas was Peter's, I love this long word, I just love to say it, his amanuensis.

Don't you love that? His secretary. His amanuensis, who took his dictation and wrote down Peter's first epistle, and if he served in that capacity for Peter, then it's likely, though we're not told this directly, but it's likely that he also served in a similar capacity for Paul, which means that there's a very strong reason why Paul, in writing this epistle, includes two others along as the authors, Paul and Silvanus, which doesn't mean that he provided any of the contents of the message, but it probably means that he wrote every word down on paper.

He was very much involved. And so he was one of the gospel messengers that God used to bring the gospel to Thessalonica. The third, of course, was Timothy. Interesting.

Interesting. Paul uses Silas' long name, Silvanus, and Luke uses his short name, Silas. When it comes to Timothy, it's just the opposite. Paul uses his short name, Timothy. Luke uses his long name, Timotheus. If you've got an explanation for that, I'd love to hear it. I have no idea.

Except it just reminds me that you can see the humanity, you can see the reality throughout the gospel accounts. We do the same thing. Sometimes one person will refer to another individual by their full name, their long name, their formal name that was given to them perhaps at birth, and somebody else will refer to them by their nickname, their shortened form. That happened with all of our girls. Most of you that have been around for a long time know our oldest daughter as who? Jodie. She hasn't been called Jodie for a couple of decades now because when she went off to college, she became Jordana. And all of her college friends and all of her acquaintances since then call her by her formal name Jordana, but it's hard to break the habit. What do you call her, Tommy? Of course.

Of course. That's just so common, and you can see that kind of human situation here in the New Testament. Paul calls him Silvanus. Luke calls him Silas. Paul calls him Timothy.

Luke calls him Timotheus, but we don't have any difficulty figuring out who is who. And when it comes to Timothy, his first mention is in Acts chapter 15 where Paul came back to the churches of Galatia on his second missionary journey, and there he found this young man. Apparently he hadn't really paid much attention to him on his first journey.

We assume that he was there. Whether he was saved at that point or not, we do not know. But now he finds him, a follower of Jesus Christ, an exemplary follower, a gifted leader in the church, though young, and one who is commended by the church, and Paul takes him along on his missionary team and utilizes him in the gospel. And so this man who was young, relatively speaking, and shy, as the scriptures indicate for us, and somewhat sickly. Paul told him to take a little wine for his often infirmities, his stomach steak and his often infirmities. Now, sickly is a relative term, and he couldn't have been too sickly and done all the work that the Bible describes for him doing. So he wasn't an invalid, and he wasn't in bed most of the time.

He wasn't inactive. He wasn't that kind of sickly. But he wasn't the most robust of young men, and yet God used him so greatly. And Paul tells us exactly why that's so, how that can be so, because it was similar in Paul's own life who had so many infirmities, so many trials, so many injuries, including that mysterious thorn in the flesh, and he says that really is the secret of my power because when I asked for that to be removed, God said, No, I'm going to give you power in the place of health.

And so Paul said, Most gladly will I therefore rather glory in my infirmity that the power of Christ may rest upon me. And Paul makes it clear that he was more powerful spiritually because he was weaker physically, and I'm sure the same thing must have been true of Timothy. He was more powerful spiritually because he was weaker physically, and he was devoted to the Apostle Paul and greatly used of God, and before the whole New Testament is completed, we find Timothy overseeing the church in Ephesus, probably the third largest church in the New Testament world, greatly used of God, more like Paul than anyone else. Paul valued him.

Paul trusted him. Paul told others that there was nobody of all of his partners, there was nobody who was more like-minded to the Apostle Paul than Timothy. And yet, and this is interesting and important, just a little side issue, but there's no indication that Timothy ever replaced Paul as an apostle. He's never called the Apostle Timothy. He's never called an apostle in training. For those of you who are looking for the perpetuation of apostleship that is passed down from generation to generation and continues on and that there are apostles even in the churches of the Lord Jesus Christ today, I would suggest to you if there's anybody in all the New Testament who would seem to be a major contender for the office of apostle, a more likely candidate for the office of apostle I can't find than young Timothy, but he was not an apostle.

What was he? He was an evangelist. And that takes us into another area to define what a biblical evangelist is, somewhat different from our modern concept of evangelist, but Timothy was an evangelist, which is basically an apostle minus the same miraculous powers, the signs of an apostle, and probably minus the gift of prophecy that was on the lives of all of the apostles, but in the respect of traveling and preaching the gospel and establishing churches and even more obvious in the ministry of Timothy, staying with young churches and helping them develop and become strong until they're fully able to stand on their own. That was the work which Timothy did. He was an evangelist, and that's why Paul says in 2 Timothy, a verse that is often misunderstood, I think, that's why Paul said unto him, Timothy, do the work of an evangelist, which is usually interpreted to mean along with pastoring, don't forget to evangelize, but probably, I think undoubtedly, what that really means is do what you are called to do. Fulfill your office. You're an evangelist.

Do it. Do the work of an evangelist because that's the job that God gave to you. But the main point is this, that the gospel requires human proclamation by God's design, and the church is commanded to engage in gospel proclamation by God's command, and we must not appeal to God's sovereignty in order to neglect this responsibility. If we are going to be Bible-believing Christians, we must believe in the sovereignty of God in salvation.

I say we must if we're going to be Bible-believing Christians all the way, not picking and choosing and rejecting those things that we don't like or can't understand. If we're going to be Bible-believing Christians, we must believe in the sovereignty of God in salvation, and if we're going to be Bible-believing Christians, we must believe in the necessity of gospel proclamation. We must be involved in missions. We must be involved in evangelism because we are commanded to do that as well. The gospel requires proclamation. Number two, the gospel needs illumination. Human proclamation is not enough, and that's why Paul says in verse 5, For our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power and the Holy Spirit and much assurance, as you know what kind of men we were among you for your sake. More than human proclamation is needed. If it had come to them in word only, that is in human proclamation only, then how many would have been saved in Thessalonica? And I can tell you it would have been that many.

Zero. Because the gospel coming in word only by human messengers does not produce conversions. It did not come to you, Paul says, in word only. The word was surely, as we know, reading the account in Acts, we know that in Thessalonica the word was proclaimed by human messengers to more people than believed it, but God called his chosen people from the many who heard. There were many who heard the word. Some heard it in word only. Others heard it in power and in the Holy Spirit and in much assurance, as we read in verse 5. But the question that I didn't have time to get into last week about power and the Holy Spirit and assurance, a word that also means conviction, the question is, do these words indicate the exercise of sign gifts? Because some people think that's what's being spoken of here. Paul, when you came to Thessalonica, you preached the gospel, attended with power, the Holy Spirit, sign gifts, healings, perhaps other things, speaking in tongues and so forth.

And how do I answer that question in this way? Those sign gifts were probably exercised in Thessalonica. I would say sign gifts were almost certainly exercised in Thessalonica. We don't read that, but they seem to have attended Paul wherever he went. I have no difficulty believing that Paul did heal people in Thessalonica. He did perform sign gifts in Thessalonica. However, I'm also convinced that that's not the meaning of the words here.

Why do I say that? Well, because you can see this in the ministry of Jesus. There were many who saw his amazing signs, his amazing miracles, who did not believe. Far more saw the signs than believed his word. Many saw the signs and heard his word but did not believe. A smaller number saw the signs, heard his word, and believed.

Now, you have the same thing here. No doubt Paul did do sign gifts in Thessalonica, but we read of those back in the book of Acts that did not believe, that refused to believe the message of the gospel as preached by Paul and Silas and Timothy. So what am I saying? Because there were many more who saw the sign gifts than those who believed, that's not what this passage is speaking about. This passage is talking about what brought people to faith. Our gospel did not come to you in word only but also in power. This distinguished the way the gospel came to you from the way the gospel came to others. This distinguishes how the gospel came to you than how it came to those who heard it and didn't believe it. It came to them in word only, it came to you in word and power and in the Holy Spirit and in much assurance. And therefore, I am forced to understand this power to mean unusual force, a resting power, divine power that attended the preaching of the word. I am forced to understand the activity of the Holy Spirit as an inward change wrought by the Spirit of God, light that comes into a darkened soul, life that comes into one who is spiritually dead, faith that is created in the lives of those who of themselves have no faith in God, and assurance or conviction that this message is true, that it must be believed. And that's what is required for the human proclamation of the gospel to become a converting power in the lives of those who hear it. It requires divine illumination. To do a saving work, the gospel requires divine activity.

That part of the equation is often neglected by many. So, the gospel requires proclamation, the gospel requires illumination. And three, the gospel engenders tribulation, verse six. And you became followers of us and of the Lord having received the word in much affliction with joy of the Holy Spirit. And anyone who studies the New Testament with their eyes open has to come to the inescapable reality that suffering is the expected lot of the disciples of Jesus Christ.

That's expected. That's part of discipleship. Jesus taught this the most, and I jotted down a number of references.

Let me just read in John 1 and John 16, 33. These things I have spoken to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world, you will have tribulation.

He doesn't even say you may have. You will have tribulation. But be of good cheer, I have overcome the world. Now, I can multiply many fold the text where Jesus tells his followers, you are going to have trouble. You are going to suffer for my name's sake. You are going to be ill-treated like I was. That's to be expected.

That's the norm. That's part of becoming a disciple of Jesus Christ. Paul taught that as well. He teaches it here in Thessalonians.

He taught it elsewhere. Listen to these words through the apostle Paul in Philippians 1, verse 29. For to you it has been granted on behalf of Christ not only to believe in him. There's another sovereign grace text.

You can't get away from it. It has been granted to you. It has been given to you to believe in Jesus Christ.

You didn't come up with that on your own. But something else has been given to you also. For to you it has been granted on behalf of Christ not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for his sake.

How about that? We don't usually mind talking about the gift of eternal life, the gift of faith, the gift of salvation. What a wonderful gift. We're not quite as eager to talk about the gift of suffering, the gift of tribulation, the gift of difficulty that also is a gift of God given to all of those to whom the gift of faith is given. And sure enough, that's true in Thessalonica.

That's a Thessalonian reality. Our gospel did not come to you, verse 5, in word only, but also in power and the Holy Spirit and much assurance, as you know, and, verse 6, you became followers of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction with joy of the Holy Spirit. I think that is a very missing message in the gospel today. Suffering is expected. Suffering is the norm.

Tribulation is what disciples of Jesus Christ are appointed to face. But think for a moment about the American reality. In America, we have a long history of religious freedom, and because of that, we sometimes don't realize how unusual that is, how exceptional that is. You want to talk about what is really at the heart of American exceptionalism? We hear that bandied about a bit in political circles, and usually people are talking about freedom to make money, the American dream and so forth. That's what people think that's all about.

That's only an outgrowth of it. The real element that was exceptional in America in the beginning is this freedom of religion. It really wasn't known anyplace else. Every place else, you are expected to follow the religion of your political leaders, whatever that may be. And people came to these shores several centuries ago, and they said, We're going to carve out a place where we can worship God according to the dictates of our conscience and not to have government impose that upon us. And because we have inherited that, here we are 300 years later, we've had this long history of religious freedom, we don't realize how unusual that is in the history of the world. And that is coupled with a long history of respected Christianity. Since the religion that was the free religion that our forefathers came to protect and to guard was Christianity in their case, then Christianity for the most part of our nation's history has been not only something that we can freely engage in, but something that has been expected.

It has been more or less the cultural religion of America, even though not everybody was a true Christian. Therefore, it's not surprising that many American Christians consider this to be the norm throughout the world, throughout history, but it's not. And American Christians can very easily come to believe that freedom from persecution is our right. And that's not either if we're talking about our right as Christians. Now, here we have to distinguish between our political right and our religious right, and it is true that as American citizens we have this freedom that is enshrined in the Constitution, and so it is our political right as American citizens.

But we should realize it is not our right as Christians, as most of our brothers and sisters in Christ have lived down through the centuries, and many are living in countries today in places where persecution is the norm. And it's also easy for us, therefore, to think that the warfare to defend religious freedom is primarily political when we need to understand that it is primarily spiritual. There's a political element, to be sure, and we do have the right to defend the Constitution and to use our citizenship rights and privileges to try to persuade our government to elect people that understand and believe things the way we do in regard to the Constitution of the United States and how it is to be protected and how it is to be interpreted. But when we get things upside down and think that the protection of our religious freedom is primarily a political battle, then we're going to lose the battle because, as Paul tells us, the weapons of our warfare are not carnal. That's human, that's earthly, but spiritual to the tearing down of strongholds. The only reason that we have the kind of Constitution we have is because of men who were spiritually minded in the beginning, the work of the Spirit of God in their hearts that brought them to convictions, that brought them to a certain level of godliness, that brought them to understand the importance of religious freedom.

It was a spiritual foundation that produced all of this, and if it's going to ever be protected and understood and extended and become firmly entrenched in American society again, even as we see it being shipped away at this time, if that's ever going to be substantially reversed, it's going to have to come about through spiritual revival, spiritual renewal, a work of the Spirit of God in hearts and lives. And if we don't see that, we're going to lose the battle. We can't win it politically. We can't win it at the ballot box, though I think we should use the ballot box. I firmly believe that. But if God will hear our prayers, we perhaps can win it on our knees. And, of course, we know God always hears our prayers, but I mean hears them favorably and chooses to answer them according to our desires. We might win this battle on our knees.

That's the only place it could ever be actually won. And so, as American Christians, we need to use legal freedoms to protect our American heritage, but with the right attitude. We need to be careful that we don't get this angry combative. If you don't believe what I believe, you're my enemy attitude. They're the folks we're supposed to be evangelizing. How can we evangelize them when we're swatting them over the head in anger? That's not the Spirit of Christ.

We need to keep our attitudes right. We need to know that our weapons are spiritual, not carnal. And, and, and we need to start preparing for persecution, recognizing that's the norm. I don't like that any more than you do, but that's what I learned from listening to my Savior. That's what I learned by reading my Bible. Tribulation, persecution, affliction is an expected part of Christian discipleship. We better prepare for that.

We don't realize how blessed we have been to not have had the norm in any great degree all of these years. But if things just return to normal as far as this world is concerned, then we are going to be facing persecution like Jesus did, like the apostles did, like the early Christians did, like the Thessalonians did. And you became followers of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction with joy of the Holy Spirit. Question, how do you know your faith is genuine until it's tested by affliction and you respond with joy? How do you know your faith is genuine until it is tested by affliction and you, like the Thessalonians, respond with joy? This is one of the marks of their genuine conversion. This was one of the evidences of their election. They're being chosen by God that they became followers of Jesus Christ with much affliction, knowing that that was bringing persecution.

They did it anyway. They became followers of Christ. And in doing that, because they were the true children of God and had the Holy Spirit within them, they faced this persecution with great joy. There's evidence of a genuine saving faith. How do you know your faith is genuine if it is never tested by affliction and in response to that test you respond with joy? If you don't respond that way to affliction, you really need to examine your heart before the Lord to see if you have the real thing. And then number four, the gospel produces transformation. I think this is the only one I'll have time for.

I won't have time for number five. But in verses six, seven, and eight, I just read verse six, you became followers of us and of the Lord, having received the word and much affliction with joy of the Holy Spirit, so that you became examples to all Macedonians and Achaia who believe. For from you the word of the Lord has sounded forth not only in Macedonian Achaia, but also in every place your faith toward God has gone out so that we do not need to say anything for they themselves declare concerning us what manner of entry we had to you and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God. The account of the transformation is before us in verses six and seven.

We've already talked about it. They became followers of Christ first by watching the example of Paul and Silas and Timothy, that led them on to become followers of Christ. And they accepted their affliction as the expected result of being a follower of Jesus Christ. They understood that. They accepted that.

They did not complain about that. In fact, they experienced joy in the midst of their affliction. And that's what made them so exemplary. They became examples to those in Achaia and Macedonia and Achaia. And the report of their transformation was widespread. We read, far beyond Macedonia and Achaia, it spread. Now, my question is, how did it spread?

And that really is a good question to think about. Verse eight, from you the word of the Lord has sounded forth, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place your faith toward God has gone, so that we do not need to say anything, for they themselves declare concerning us what manner of entry we had to you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God. Now, how did this report spread? We're tempted to say, well, because they were so active in their gospel proclamation.

That probably doesn't explain it. That probably isn't what Paul has in mind here. How did it spread? Did it spread through the general population of the Roman world of that time? No, that's not what Paul is saying, because that concept doesn't fit verse nine. Could we say the pagan Gentiles declare concerning us what manner of entry we had to you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God?

I don't think Gentiles are likely to speak in language like that. So that doesn't really explain the wording of verse nine. Well, where did it spread? Did it spread among Christian churches?

It probably did, but the problem with that is there weren't all that many at this time. That's hard to account for the widespread example, the widespread influence of the Thessalonian believers that is being described here. Of the churches we actually know about, there were two others in Macedonia, Philippi and Berea. And at the time Paul was writing this, he is just now establishing the church in Corinth, so that makes three. And if you add the churches in Galatia, we only know of four. I'm not saying there weren't any more than that.

We only know of four, Lystra, Derbe, Iconium, and Antioch, Pisidia. It wouldn't surprise me at all if the report of this had not gone to them, that there was great rejoicing, but that doesn't really sound like worldwide impact, does it? Or international impact beyond Achaea and Macedonia and so forth. So where was this spreading? And this is just supposition, but I think it's most likely that the spreading that Paul is talking about here is spreading among the Jewish synagogues that were scattered all throughout the Roman world. In every center where there was a sizable population of any kind, most everywhere that Paul went, he found a Jewish synagogue that had been in operation for a long time, and there were many more that he never got to, and they were beyond Achaea and Macedonia. They were throughout the whole Roman world and beyond. And that fits into what we read about in the book of Acts, because it's clear that the Jews were watching Paul and his ministry like hawks, trying to stop him every chance they could, and they were reporting on his activities to other Jews.

Watch out for this fellow. And they were also, whenever they could, reporting on his activity to the Gentile authorities. This fellow is preaching against Caesar. He's preaching another king but Caesar. They tried to bring down persecution on Paul from Gentile authorities and in some cases succeeded.

They were very actively watching what was going on, and I think this probably best explains what Paul is talking about here. Your testimony was so clear. Your change of life was so amazing. Your conversion was so unquestionable that a great number of you believed the gospel and left your pagan idolatry, turned to the Lord Jesus Christ, turned to the living and true God, and the report of that was widely spread so that there are other people who talked about it, and I didn't even have to say anything. It almost sounds like when I got to Berea, they'd already heard about you.

When I got to Corinth, they'd already heard about you. The point is that their reception of the gospel produced widespread interest, especially among, and here's the word I'm going to use to help explain what I'm getting at, especially among apostates. An apostate is someone who knows the truth but departs from it, and I don't think it's wrong to consider unbelieving Jews as apostates. They had the word of God delivered to them. They had the promises of the Messiah delivered to them. They had evidence that Jesus was the long-promised Messiah. They didn't want to believe it.

They refused to believe it. They chose not to believe it, and what did that make them that made them apostates? They were unbelievers of the word of God that had been given to them. They were religious apostates, and among those, they were watching the spread of the gospel with great interest, and I think there's a modern-day application. The question is, how are religious apostates in our day, and who would that be? That would be Christians of what we call mainline denominations who've departed from the faith. There was a time when, not too many decades ago, when the movement that is broadly known as evangelicalism created a great deal of interest and even concern among apostates because it was growing, growing, growing when they were shrinking, shrinking, shrinking. But I get the impression that things have turned a bit and I'm not too concerned about what's going on in the world of evangelicalism today because evangelicalism has become so watered down.

Evangelicalism has become so weak, and yes, in some cases, evangelicalism is beginning to become apostate, that it's more like the apostate churches than it is true biblical Christianity. The way you make an impact upon the world, the way you make an impact upon false religion is by practicing carefully the Word of God as it is given to us and not compromising it. When you do that, you have great impact upon others. When you fail to do that, you lose your influence among others in the world. Well, there's four neglected truths in regard to the Gospel, and we shall look at others perhaps next Lord's Day, shall we pray. Father, thank you for your Word. Show us your ways, teach us your paths, I pray. Amen.