Well again, church, let me just say a good morning from all of the couches around the West Cobb, the pawing, the Georgia area, we hate that we have to be in this like this, but this is where we are. So listen, I'm giving you full permission to, if somebody beside you starts to nod off this morning to give them the elbow and tell 'em to wake up, listen, it's great to be back with you. I wasn't with you last week, Melissa and I were celebrating our 25th wedding anniversary, and I'm telling you, I used to look at those kinds of people and say, how old are they? But it is changed Now. It's great to be back with you. But on the other end, boy, was it a great morning last week hearing from Pastor Chip. Walk us through yet another chapter in our study of Acts.

He was in Acts chapter 17 last week. It was Paul. He was in Athens. He was walking in this incredible metropolis of the Greek culture, looking out over the area and saying these words of, you guys are worshiping all of these things, but you're missing the one that you need to worship in. His name is Jesus. And he challenged us last week, chip did. And this idea that wherever we are and whatever we're doing, we should be standing for the gospel. In fact, in verse 28, it says for him, Jesus, this is the goal of our life. For him. We live and move and have our being, and it's Him alone that we should worship. Last week in Athens, there were some that gave their lives to Jesus, but there were some that didn't give their lives to Jesus. It was an amazing, amazing account.

You should go back and watch it on the streaming platforms. But here's the great part about Athens. Paul was really only there for a couple of days, but he had a huge impact. So listen guys, never underestimate the little bit of time that you can have in a place to go to do well for the gospel at your home or at school, or short term missions. God, even in a week, Paul showed us last week in Athens can really and truly move well, that was Acts chapter 17 last last week. But I want us to move straight this week into Acts chapter 18. We're gonna join Paul. We're gonna rejoin him again, and we're gonna watch God do something in Paul that we have never seen before. In fact, it is so applicable to our lives. It's so rich for us today on so many levels because God does something right here in Paul's life that he hasn't had to do so far.

And we really don't get a chance to see it that often in scripture. And God actually has to come in and comfort Paul, encourage Paul to calm Paul's fears. Even the great apostle Paul at times in his life needed God to wrap his arms around Paul and just give him comfort. And it's so applicable for us today because God is the God of comfort, the God of encouragement, and God is the God that wants to calm our fears on so many levels. In fact, see if this sounds familiar, Paul, in this passage we're about to look at just he, he gets discouraged. He, he's discouraged at his lack of impact. He's discouraged that the heart's around him. He's discouraged at his own fears that he's having internally. He even gets discouraged at how it seems like every side of the culture, whether it's government or the people in all of them, it seems like everybody was against him in letting him down.

Does that sound familiar to anybody? Well, that's exactly where we join the apostle Paul today. And it's where God just shows us even yet again, his faithfulness and his loving kindness. Even in catch this, our Corinth moments. So here we go. We're gonna see how God reaches out to us and in every season, acts chapter 18, starting in verse one. This is what the word says. It says, after this, Paul left Athens and he went to Corinth. Now, let me stop there and just mention a couple of things, because a couple of the weeks in his acts studies, we've seen over and over and again that that, that the Bible mentioned so many different city names. But in today's text, what we're gonna actually see is that all of today's text happens in Corinth. And actually today's text is a little bit of a spotlight into so many different people in scripture.

There's so many ties to so many different books in the New Testament and so many lives, and it's actually an incredible proof of the fact that the Bible is a trustworthy text. It's a reliable text because what we're seeing today lines up with Roman history, lines up with Greek history. And you can actually trace so many of these names in your homework back to scripture and history in this. Second thing I wanna talk about really quickly is this idea of the city of Corinth here for a minute. Because one of the objections that I hear many times about people not sharing their faith is the idea of, well, Matt, it it was just easier back then. That's why people don't do it today. Well, this idea of what we're about to see in the city of Corinth really and truly blows that level of thinking up.

And it really just dispels all of those. Why? Because Corinth, Corinth was one of the largest, if not the largest city in Greece, but it was known for two different things. Now listen to this. First of all, Corinth was known for its commercial businesses and its trade. It had two ports. It had a, it had a way between the two ports. They would place the ships on a wooden dolly and take them back and forth so they didn't have to sail all the way around the isthmus going from the, the far east back over towards Italy. So it had a incredible wealth about it had so much trade in it and commerce. But the second thing Corinth was known for was really and truly is that it was really just a sin city, if you know what I mean. It was known for its immorality.

There was wealth, there were sailors in and out. There was this temple to the goddess Aphrodite that was in the middle of the city center up on a huge hill. There was thousands of female prostitute priestesses that were looking for men that would, if you know what I mean, worship with them. It was an evil place. In fact, the city of Corinth was so bad. And the people that lived there, the word Corinth became not only a noun, but a verb in all of the Roman empire to be called a Corinthian, meant to be called someone that was completely immoral. A person that lived in absolute immorality. The term and the word described that. Now, that's bad. That's bad actually. It's so bad that later when Paul was writing his two letters to the Corinthians, much of it has to do and say about sin and purity and immorality.

So when you look at this idea of Corinth, it was no worse than anything you can imagine. Actually, it was probably worse than what you can imagine, which actually hit a principle in my mind this week. Write this down in your notes or or in the worship guide today. Here's the Princip first principle this morning. No city or no person is too far to hear and be transformed by the gospel. Oh, boy, do we see this in Corinth? Why? Because they were rough. They were known as immoral by name and by nature. But you know what God has shown us through just showing us Corinth this week? He's shown us, don't give up on people. Don't give up on your teammate. Don't give up on your workplace. Don't give up on your family. Don't give up on that guy at work or that girl in your class or that neighbor that you don't think even likes you.

Why? Because God can move in them. God can bridge any gap. God can move any mountain and God can save anyone. If he can move in Corinth, I can promise you, he can move in you. He can move in. You keep going in the scripture and watch God does. 'cause after Paul leaves Athens and moves into Corinth, look at verse two. It says this. There he met a new, a Jew named Aquila, a native Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife, Priscilla, because Claudius, that's the Em empire of, or emperor of Rome, had ordained all the Jews to leave Rome. Now, Paul wanted to see them, and because he was a tent, he wanted to see them. And because he was a tent maker as they were, he stayed. Paul stayed with them and worked with them every Sabbath he reasoned in the synagogue trying to persuade the Jews and the Greeks.

Now, let's pause there for a minute and show you what's happening. Paul. He leaves Athens, he travels the 45 miles kind of over to Corinth north, Northwest over to Corinth. He heads straight into the city. He goes to a place called the Agora. That's a, that's the word for marketplace. And he meets with these believers, this believing family named Aquila and Priscilla, and, and he sees them. He's the same trait as them. He's the same nationality of them. He gets the sense that they're believers and Paul starts working with them. That's his job. Did you know that Paul was a tent maker? Well, wait a minute, Matt. I thought, I thought Paul was a missionary. Yes, he was. But he was a working missionary. I mean, you gotta eat right. It's how he supports himself, right? In fact, I like this principle. It's really actually some straight talk for some of us that are dealing with what God is doing in our lives.

Write this one down. Just because you're not a so-called full-time professional Christian, doesn't mean that you are not called to be a missionary. Paul actually shows us this right here. He shows us with his life that he was working, he was working, he was working, but then on the weekend he was sacrificing and he was teaching and sharing in the synagogue. I love his approach that he's going to work. He's sharing, he's speaking, he's living out the gospel. He's living the gospel in his vocations. And he's saying that on top of that, I will live and I will speak on the weekends. I will live in my local church and I'll give my time and I'll give my talents. And then Paul's like, Hey, if God wants me to break from it, to do church ministry, 100%, then he'll provide the way.

So listen, for many of you, what an example that Paul's given us here to live the gospel in our workplace. And then if God so chooses to call us out of that and provide a way for us, and our time runs out and we see the fruit of God mounting in our lives, and we just can't do our workplace anymore, maybe it's then God is calling us into something else as our influence grows. So he's working, he's sharing. But then look at verse five. It says this, when Silas and Timothy came from Macedonia, Paul devoted himself excessively or completely, you could use that word to preaching, testifying to the Jews that the Jesus was the Messiah. But when they opposed Paul and became abusive, he shook out his clothes in protest and said to them, your blood be on your own heads. I'm innocent of it.

And from now on, Paul said, I will go to the Gentiles. Oh, there's two things that really just jumped off the pages right here for me. And we actually, we miss 'em. Unless we do what we're doing right now, we just slow down in scripture. They're great reminders for us. They're so simple but true. In fact, write these principles down. Here's the first one. The first principle is this. No matter how strong we think we are, Paul shows us right here, we all need people to walk with us. We all need people to walk with us. I say this all the time. Christianity is not a solo event. It's not a solo journey. We all need community to lift us up. It's important. We all need accountability. We all need fellowship. We all need brothers and sisters doing ministry with us. It's so important. Men listen to me.

You can't do it on your own. Notice what Paul has. Paul walks into the city automatically. He finds Aquila and Priscilla. They're with him automatically. Who comes into town? Silas and Timothy, the intern boys, right? They walk into town and he serves with these brothers and sisters. We're about to see some other people he serves with. And what do they do? They encourage, they walk with, they speak into his life. Church, this is why life groups are so important. Say it every week. We love worship, but you've also gotta jump into a life group. We all need people. So the interns, what do we seen in scripture? They come into town. They, they probably bring a gift from Macedonia is what it says. They probably from Lydia from a couple of weeks ago. And, and, and Paul even more so now is able to preach the gospel.

But the Jews, they're strongly opposed to them. The Jews, they act so harshly against Paul to the point where Paul finally in frustration after he is done, everything he can do after he is served them in every single way. Write the second principle down from this part of the text. We gotta remember this as we share Jesus, here's the principle. You can't save anyone, but every person is personally responsible for responding to Jesus. This is what Paul just showed us. Is it not over and over in Paul's ministry in the New Testament, Paul speaks the word and speaks the word and speaks the word, but he can't save anyone. You realize that, right? He's just a vessel. He's just a mouthpiece. And here's the deal, church. So are we. So are we. That's that's all we are. And we're, we're just the mouthpiece. And here's the deal.

And then every individual person is now left to respond, right? It's God that does the saving. Don't ever put that on yourself. Do you know why? 'cause if you see yourself as the one that is gonna save anyone, you will never share the gospel because you are afraid of failure. You can't save people. God saves people. In fact, that's why Paul finally, after doing all that he can do, he just shakes out his clothes as a symbol and he says, Hey, you are the ones that rejected the message. And I, I, I love how Paul's like, I loved you. I shared with you, I did my part, and it's strong language. But watch what he says next. He says this, your blood is on your hands. In other words, you made the decision. I shared Jesus. I showed you who he was, but you made the decision to say no to Jesus and it's on you.

This is hard stuff, right? Paul just gets fed up with the Jews, and then he shifts over to the Gentiles. You can see how this is beginning to be frustrating for Paul, but watch what it says in verse seven. It says, when Paul left the synagogue and went next door to the house of teu, Judas, a worshiper of God. In other words, this guy loved God. He was a believer in Jesus. Watch this in verse eight, Christmas, I told you there's a lot of names. Crispus, the synagogue leader and his entire household, they believed in the Lord. And many of the Corinthians, in other words, those people that were in the house who had heard, Paul believed and were baptized, oh, are you seeing what's happening here? Let me explain it, Paul. He, he preaches in the synagogue every weekend, preaches, preaches, preaches, preaches. But the Jews are so harsh, the Jews are so much against him.

The Jews finally kinda run him outta the synagogue. He shakes off his clothes and says, Hey, you've rejected Jesus, all that I can handle. And he's like, I'm going over here. I'm gonna join the Gentiles. So then what does he do? He moves over next door to the synagogue, to the house of this man, a gentile believer named, tedious, right? There he is. Articia. There he is. So what is he doing? Now, this guy has opened up his home for a church. And this is risky business right here. This is risky business. He's risking his family, he's risking his reputation. He's risking his his house. Oh, but keep this principle in mind. You can write it down this morning. Keep sharing Jesus. That's the principle, right? 'cause God has a plan and God will be faithful. He'll be faithful. That's what we're seeing in the text, right?

Is it gonna be easy? No. Will it be the way that you think is supposed to go? Probably not. But God is faithful and God always moves. And no matter how discouraging it gets, listen to me, church, God will move, he'll move. God will move. Why? How do we know that? Because we've read the end of the book and we know that God wins. We know that God's people win. Now, if you stopped at this verse in the scripture, you're almost getting this feeling that, hey, all of Corinth, they're on fire for God. They're all meeting God. And if that's where you're thinking, you would be absolutely wrong, because actually, this is just one little synagogue, one little house over in one little section of a town that probably had about 750,000 pagan people living in it. It's one small place. You put that along with the idea that the Jews intensely hated Paul.

And you can kind of start to see why this is actually beginning to weigh on the apostle Paul's life. You can see why Paul is beginning to get discouraged. And actually it's one of the very few times in the whole Bible that we see Paul get so down, so defeated, so conflicted in his own soul that the Bible even says later on in one Corinthians chapter two, verse three, Paul says this, writing back to them, he says, I came to you in weakness with great fear and with trembling. You know what this means? That even the great apostle Paul, and this should encourage us, that even the great apostle Paul, even all the rest of the heroes of the faith had days where they just struggled. They had days where they just needed God to pick them up. They had days where they just did not know what to do.

They struggle. They got down. So watch what God does though. Why? Because God is faithful. Watch what God does when we're down. Watch what God does. When the apostle Paul was ready to give up, watch what God does at this most intense point where he was ready to throw in the towel and probably quit. Watch what he does for Paul and watch what he promises to do for us. Look at this verse. Look at this next verse, verse nine. It says, one night, it says, sometime later, it says, one night the Lord spoke to Paul in a vision. He said, do not be afraid and keep on speaking and do not be silent. Oh, watch what God says next. For I am with you, and no one is gonna attack and harm you because I have many people in this city. Oh, look at this.

Verse 11. So Paul, he stayed in Corinth for a year and a half teaching them the word of God. Oh man. Have you seen this? Paul has already been encouraged by these new friends, right? Aquila and Priscilla. He's already been encouraged by his old friends coming, Silas and Timothy. He's already been encouraged by the support of the Macedonians that they sent him. And all of these are gifts from God. But now God shows us that at our deepest moment, at our hardest moment, at the moments that we want to throw in the towel, not only do we have the family of faith around us, but write this principle down. God is personally concerned and involved with the life of every one of his servants. Oh, I love how God reaches into Paul's soul at this point. He says, I know you're hurting, and I know you're struggling.

I know you got some stuff going on, and I know you don't think it's going to make a difference what you're doing. But Paul, what did he say? What did he say? He said, God. But Paul, I'm, I'm with you. God said one of the greatest phrases in the whole Bible. What else did he say? He, not only is he with him, but he says, Hey, listen, Paul, don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. It's like 150 times in scripture. The Bible says, don't be afraid. Now, some of the country preachers growing up would say it's 365 times in the Bible. This is God says, don't be. Don't be scared, right? Don't be afraid, right? Just so you got one for every day of the week, that's probably an overstretch, right? But it is about 150 times God says, one of the biggest encouragement, one of the biggest givers of grace and gifts of grace that we have, one of the biggest reminders that we need is God looks at you and looks at me and says, when you're down, when you're hurting, when you're scared, when you're out, God looks at you in me and says, don't be afraid.

Don't be afraid. Do you know why God says that? Because we're afraid. That's why he says it. God says, don't be afraid. Keep speaking. Don't just be silent. Why? There's two reasons that Paul gives Paul and us that we don't need to be afraid. Number one is because God is with Paul is God, listen to me closely is with you. If you have given your life to Jesus, if he's redeemed you and saved you and planted himself in you, then you don't have to be afraid. You don't have to be afraid. Now, obviously, Paul gets the extra blessing right here where God says, you ain't even gonna be hurt. But listen, as a believer in Jesus, there's nothing that anyone can do to your soul. You don't have to be afraid. But secondly, we don't have to be afraid. 'cause God literally looks at Paul right here and says, Hey, listen, I've got people in this city.

I got people in this city. Now what does that even mean? Right? It means this. Hey Paul, you don't have to be afraid because I'm still gonna do a work in you and through you, and I'm gonna save people. God is saying in this city, oh, church, I love this. Why? 'cause Paul's scared. Paul's cowering away. Paul doesn't know what to do. Paul is had a message from God that said, Hey, I am with you. I am for you. I'm walking with you, and I still have a journey for you to walk. And God is saying, I still got people in this city that are going to trust me, and you are going to be my vessel. Church. Lemme say this. We too can claim both of these promises. Why? 'cause God is with us. And two, 'cause God has promised us that when we share his name, his word never returns void.

And God has called us to speak for him and to produce fruit that he has already created from the beginning of time. Paul gets this message from God. He gets this message from God, and it is a kick in the tail. It is an encouragement for Paul. And what does he do? The Bible just told us he keeps pushing. He keeps moving. He keeps sharing. He keeps standing for Jesus for 18 months. The Bible just said He is in Corin. He was only in Athens for like a week at best. But now let's keep reading. Let's watch what happens after Paul's encouraged as he's living in the protection, as he is living in the strength of God. Look at verse 12. 'cause the Jews are hating it. Watch what happens. It says, when Galeo. Now Galeo was a famous, famous, famous official in this area.

He was over the whole region. His brother was actually the private tutor of neuro, and you can see his name inscribed in Roman literature. It's kind of cool how it connects the Bible in here. When Galeo was the proco of Caja and the Jews of Corinth made a united attack on Paul and brought him before the place of judgment. That's the bema seed. If you've ever studied this text, they said this, this man they charged is persuading the people to worship God in ways contrary to the law. Just as Paul was about to speak, Galeo said to them, if you Jews were making a complaint about some misdemeanor or some serious crime, it would be reasonable for me to listen to you. But since it involves questions about words and names in your own law, listen to what this Roman official says. Settle this matter for yourselves, and I will not be a judge of such things.

Verse 16, this one's gonna throw you off. So he drove them off. Keep watching. Then the crowd turned to ene. So ese and the synagogue leader and beat him in front of the pro council. And Galileo showed no concern, whatever. Now, there's a whole lot here, but let me just kind of bring you into what's happening in the Texas. See if we can kind of pull it apart a little bit. Galeo says, he's not breaking any Roman law. He's actually just doing what all the rest of you Jews are doing, and that's talking about God. And he throws 'em all out of the court without even making Paul have to give a defense. God steps in and has it handled. And then watch this in verse 18, and it says this, and Paul stayed in cor for some time. Oh, are you seeing this? God is faithful.

God protected him. God saves Paul in this moment. In fact is what God does, right? He steps in when there's no other option. He steps in when nobody thinks we can get out of this. And God always fulfills his promises. Now, Paul is safe, right? And watch this last little detail. What did we just read? This says, the crowd after Paul was saved or being run out, they actually turn on their own synagogue leader, SOEs. And what do they do? It says they beat him. Do you know why? 'cause crowds are fickle. Culture is fickle. Culture's always looking for somebody to take the fall. Culture always changes on itself. They beat their own synagogue leader, I guess because his offense or his case failed against Paul and they got mad. But I want you to pay attention what happens next and then we're done. I promise.

Here's what I want you to see. 'cause I love how God works. If you really remember right in verse six, Crispus the old synagogue leader, he actually gets saved. Remember in the neighbor's house, he gets saved. He gives his life to Jesus. His whole family gives his life to Jesus. But then, but then at this point, at some point after this, listen to this, our brother right here, the new synagogue leader, SESE, he actually also meets Jesus. You gotta say yes, it's because God loves him. Yes, because God moves in his life. But you've also gotta say, because Paul had a part in standing with him and looking at him and said, Hey, listen, I know exactly where you are. I've been beat. I know exactly where you are. My people have all turned against me. I know exactly where you are. I've brought things up and been run out of town.

He meets Jesus. How do we know? Verse Corinthians one verse one. Watch the intro. Paul says this, Paul called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God and our brother, SESE. Oh, do you see it? Evidently, SESE was one of those that in verse 10, where God said, Hey, there are people in this town that I'm about to save. Evidently he was one of those guys, listen to me. Listen, listen, listen. He became a leader with Paul. He became a leader with Paul. Do you see the impact? Do you see what happens when even when we're down, when God steps into our lives of how we can stand? Do you see the impact of what happens when we live for the kingdom, when we live for God's grace, when God moves in our lives, always, always, always. What happens? People are saved.

We're encouraged. So listen to me. My last challenge is here they are. Stay in your calling. Stay in your calling. Stop writing people off. You never know who the Christmases are. You never know who the the neighbors are. You never know who the sese are. It could be your coworker, it could be your family member. It could be your co teammate. It could be a people in your workplace or that neighbor. Our role is just to, our role is to speak. Our role is to receive the gr, the blessings and the hope and the promise and the love of Jesus, and to speak into people's life. Listen, listen, listen. Our current opponents are not permanent enemies. They're people that we can look at that need Jesus. So stay in your calling. Stop writing people off. Pray. Who is the sese in my life this week?

And let's just trust God. Let's trust God. As we look out into our neighborhoods today, let's trust God with the promise that he's looking at us and he's looking at our neighborhoods saying, I have many more people in this community to save. Listen, Paul came to Corinth where many of us are weak, afraid, trembling, and ready to quit. But he leaned in and God met him right where he was and said, Hey, don't be afraid. Keep speaking. I am with you. And then he says this to us, you and me. God looks at you and he looks at me and says, Hey, listen, you can claim that promise too. So I'm gonna ask you this. I know today it's one of those inclement weather days, but really and truly is today. Your Corinth day is today. Maybe you injured today, hurting, beat down, depressed. 'cause it just doesn't seem like anybody is for you. Is today the day? Here it is. Listen, that you just need to lean in and receive the gift of God, that you don't have to be afraid. 'cause God is with you. He's with you. Do you need to ask God today, say, Jesus, move in me, or, or, or, or is today the day or maybe the first time that you've ever realized that you need Jesus and it's today the day that you just need to say, Hey, Lord Jesus, here I am. Save me. Save me.