Then: Long hair      Now: Longing for hair As the circumstances in our life changes, so do our responses to what goes on in our lives. Our response is conditioned by our circumstances. While that is true in many aspects of our life, that pattern does not hold up when it comes to the gospel. Whether a person accepts Christ or rejects him is not based on just time of life issues, but is dependent upon God’s gracious opening of a heart. Unfortunately, we often forget this important aspect, so that when people are open to the gospel or closed, we may be surprised, never expecting one person to accept and another to reject. Our passage this morning reminds us that if a person responds positively to the gospel, they do so only by God’s graciously opening their hearts to his Word. What is more, a response to God’s grace in the gospel will accompany a response to God’s people.  READ Acts 16:11-25

Acts 16 begins Paul’s second missionary journey. Paul and his new partner, Silas, revisit the churches begun years before by Paul and Barnabas in Asia Minor. As they travel, God’s guidance is obvious as they were propelled into new territory. God provided guidance during this journey first in providing a new helper, Timothy. God also provided guidance in the form of closed doors and open doors.

As we saw last week, while God may guide us by closing doors, limiting our options, not giving us what we desire, such guidance should be welcomed. While we are not given all the details, God funneled Paul and Silas to a specific area. Areas they thought it would be wise to begin new churches were closed to them and soon they found themselves standing on the beach of the Aegean Seas, at the port of Troas. All doors seemed closed, but it was then God redirected them.

It is a cliché that when God closes a door he sometimes opens a window. While trying to figure out where to go next, after all options seemed shut to them, God directed Paul by way of a vision one night. A man of Macedonia, the land to the west, called for Paul to come and help them.

The next morning, Paul and his companions were in agreement that God wanted them to head west. But this door that God seemed to open led them on a journey which was not at all like they would expect. While we may think a vision from God would give clear guidance, what Paul saw and what Paul experienced were not the same. When Paul and Silas arrived in Macedonia, they weren’t welcomed with open arms by the Jewish community as they had in the past. In fact, there wasn’t even a Jewish community in the city. But they did find some Gentile women who had a desire to worship God outside the city. Paul found that man from Macedonia was in fact a woman from Asia. But Paul was not dissuaded, for he knew that guidance from God’s Word was all he needed; God was still leading.

The city to which God lead them was Philippi, named by Philip of Macedon in the 4th century BC and established as a commercial center for grain from the fields and gold from the mountains. A hundred years before Paul arrived; Philippi became a Roman colony after the decisive naval battle of Actium guaranteed the defeat of Mark Anthony and the ascendancy of Octavius, or Caesar Augustus.

Bearing witness in Philippi was the closest thing to preaching in Rome without actually being there. It was in this city that we will see two responses to the gospel.

A positive response to the gospel results in a positive reception to God’s people

The first person we meet in Philippi is a person we may least expect to respond to the gospel.

Lydia was an uncommon woman. Luke gives us some interesting facts about her which may have caused us to ignore her, thinking she is unlikely to respond positively to the gospel.

While she is called a worshiper of God in v14 and among those women who had gathered outside the city to pray, she was not your typical Macedonian housewife. She is from Thyatira, a city across the Aegean Sea in modern day Turkey. In an age when few people traveled more than a few miles from home, for a woman to be this far was relatively rare. In a culture where women are rarely identified without their husbands, she was independent. Her self-reliance in a culture of male dominance is partially explained by her trade. She sold purple goods.

Purple was, for millennia, the color of kings, as its color is derived at great expense. To sell this material implies she has the capital to invest and travel as few would in the ancient world. This entrepreneurial leader probably would not be the one we think would pay attention to what Paul had to say. That she did is explained in v14. 

Where does this positive response come from?

A positive response to God’s grace comes only as God opens the heart. The reason that God must open the heart is simple, apart from God’s grace, no one, not any of us, would ever seriously consider what God the Father has done for us in his Son, Jesus Christ. It takes the Holy Spirit, in conjunction with the Word of God (here, she heard what Paul said) for a heart to change. For there to be faith in Christ, repentance of sin, first God must make a person willing to believe.

It is not natural for us to understand, to believe. Faith is a gift of God’s grace. Luke describes God’s grace at work among the disciples in Lk 24:45 in much the same way. While Jesus had taught them for years while he was with them, only after the resurrection did he “open their minds to understand the Scriptures.”

That we respond positively by God’s grace is further described by Jesus in John 6:37-40 where we see the positive statement that all those the Father gives to the Son will come to the Son. None will be lost. What is more in v44 it is the Father that draws each and every one of us to him.

This truth keeps us from ever imagining that we have contributed anything to God and forces us to never forget that all the benefits we have in Christ are all of his grace. We are Christians not because we are smarter than others, not more moral, or had a superior upbringing. Rather our positive response to the gospel is only due to God opening our hearts at the right time.

That God breaks into our lives is hard to grasp for some. People may have that unfortunate Sunday School painting etched in their mind. It is the one of Jesus standing outside the cottage door, looking typically effeminate, gently knocking, and patiently waiting. The painting, based on Revelation 3:20, behold I stand at the door and knock, communicates regeneration is a matter of personal choice as opposed to God’s sovereign grace.

Jesus does knock, but he also changes the lock, disarms the alarm system, kicks the door down if need be and by gracious force makes us what we are not to be what he wants us to be.

What does a positive response look like? What is the evidence a person’s mind is opened?

There is identification with God’s through baptism

When the gospel grabs a person’s heart, it unites them with others of like heart. The person who knows Christ wants to be known as a Christian. Baptism, the sign and seal of God’s covenant of grace, is that visible marking of an invisible work of grace.

While it is certainly true that we do not belong to the Lord because we are baptized, but are baptized because we belong to the Lord already, it remains a fact that baptism is the point at which the church, in the name of the Lord, recognizes what God has done and will do for the person receiving baptism. Baptism is not what we do to join the church; it is what the church does to seal what God has done in his everlasting mercy in Jesus Christ.

There is identification with God’s people through hospitality

Lydia threw herself and her resources into the work of the gospel, without reserve and without delay. As her heart is now open, so is her home. That she is able to provide in this fashion is testimony to God’s grace in her salvation as well as in her business, for to care for the missionaries in this way implies she is a woman of means.

Nevertheless, what we see in her life should be practiced by Christians irrespective of their means. Unfortunately, hospitality is sorely lacking in many of our lives. Our reasons rarely deal with material resources, but more often time. Our lives are so busy, that we ignore hospitality, a key component of what the early church was all about.

Hospitality begins by the simplest of steps, by being friendly and welcoming. As Cornerstone grows, it will be tempting to think others can be hospitable or that you just don’t know people. It rests with each of you to welcome each other, to reach out to the new face, whether it is new this week or new to your but has been here for years.

The next step is to invite people over, to spend time over a meal, to let their kids trash your basement, to not worry over the dust on the cabinet, but instead see the connection here of faithfulness to the Lord to warmly receive others.

A negative response to the gospel results in a negative reception to God’s people

But what happened to Paul in Philippi is not all pleasant. The vision of the Macedonian man is in reality an Asian woman now open to the gospel, but next is very negative. While en-route to the place of prayer, they are met with an odd reception. A girl enslaved on all levels.

The girl has a spirit of divination. While the idea may seem foreign to many in our day and age, in the ancient world no one would have batted an eye. What controlled her was a specific kind of spirit. The term Luke uses is exact: pnuema puth?na, a python spirit.

Near Philippi was Mount Parnassus where the oracle of Delphi was found. There the temple of Apollo was said to have been guarded by a snake, which Apollo killed, but who lived on in those who could predict the future. For this reason, those possessing the ability to foresee the future were referred to as a python, hence the British comedy troupe in the late sixties who saw themselves as a satirical prophet in the fullest sense of the word, called themselves Monty Python.

The spirit of the python supposedly seized control of the individual's vocal cords and then spoke through them; much like a ventriloquist does through a hand-held puppet. And so this slave girl was regarded by the local populace as a the voice-box for the spirit of the Python, which would have been familiar to all living in the region, and which accounts for the fact that her prophetic abilities were in such great demand.

But this girl is twice bound, spiritually and economically, for her masters are making quite a profit by exploiting her occult powers. Like a child prostitute, her unfortunate circumstances make her a valued commodity to the community. Her tragedy is a source of gain for callous men

It was her response to the gospel that attracted the attention of Paul and the others. When we first read v17 and see how Paul becomes annoyed, we may wonder why Paul was so bent out of shape. She speaks the truth, its great advertising. The old saying that no publicity is the worst publicity should remind him that this could help his cause. But that this girl was enslaved to misperceptions forced Paul to respond as he did.

While what she says has a biblical ring to it, the populace of Philippi would have heard something very different. The Most High God for many of those in the city was Zeus or the mother-god Isis. This generic term lacked the specific and necessary information about the God who graciously sent his Son to redeem those that are His own. The Roman world was full of saviors, even Augustus adopted this title. To a people with a plethora of potentates, so what if Jesus is just one more to add to the pantheon.

For Paul to accept her testimony while she did not personally respond to the gospel herself, would lead to numerous misunderstandings and re-explanation by Paul and Silas.

Paul could not let her attach herself to his mission. He could not say, as many might today, “Yes, she has problems in her theology and in her life, but she is telling people the truth in this instance, and we can use the extra publicity for the gospel.

But his response of annoyance was not to do her harm, but free her from the bondage she was under, commanding that the spirit that laid claim to her life would be gone. But that act of compassion was not well received. It is here we see how those hearts are closed to the gospel respond when confronted by the gospel.

We should not be surprised when the gospel upsets the status quo.

People will tolerate just about anything until it hits them in the wallet. Luke, using a play on words, equates the casting out of the spirit to the casting out of the men’s profit. They were enraged not because of competing philosophical views of the nature of God, the presence of sin and the possibility of salvation. They were furious that their prophet could not profit them.

A few years back when Harvie Conn, a professor from Westminster Theological Seminary died, I read about his life before he entered the classroom. Through the 1960’s Dr. Conn was a Presbyterian missionary in Korea who reached out to those unlikely to hear the gospel: the prostitutes in Seoul. At first their pimps did not mind this strange American, for they felt his presence would ensure a more tranquil trade, as the young girls would work harder as Christian prostitutes. But as their lives were changed, they responded to the gospel with a stronger desire to leave behind the slavery they were in. Dr. Conn aided not only in their resolve to be released from bondage, but helped them escape from the control of wicked men. He did so at a great cost. When it was apparent that Dr. Conn cost these men their livelihood they soon tracked him down and beat him till they thought he was dead.

The response of the men in Philippi was no different.

They took Paul and Silas to the court. Their argument was simple.

First, these men are Jews. While that was not a crime in the empire, as Judaism was a recognized religion, they played the on the people’s bigotry.

Second they accused them of disturbing the city, a nebulous charge that they did not help with the good running of their town, a charge which would attract the attention of the magistrates who were responsible for the law and order of the city.

Finally, they pulled out the big guns: advocating customs unlawful for Romans. Their complaint with Christianity was that it upset the good working order of society, it was not content to leave well enough alone, but dared to change lives for the better.

In the Roman Republic the cult of Apollo centered on healing and prophecy, and under Augustus a magnificent temple to Apollo was erected on the Palatine. Preaching salvation in Christ alone, in whose name the "spirit Python," inspired by Apollo, was cast out, would be viewed as advocating unlawful customs. (Larkin, 240)

The response to the gospel was predictable. Without the perspective of God’s saving grace, the crowds rioted. The magistrates joined in, calling on the guards.

Roman local administration of civil and criminal cases was the responsibility of two magistrates, each of whom was assigned two lictors, police escorts who carried the fasces et secures, the symbol of their authority, a bundle of rods bound together with thongs and often accompanied by an ax, the symbol adopted by Mussolini, keeping the term we know as fascists. The rods were the disciplinary tools of the lictors, from which we get our expression: getting your licks. From there they were thrown in prison. But as we will see next week, that is far from the end of the story. But we leave them there, suffering in agony, singing hymns to God. 

This negative response to the gospel is one we rarely see, for we rarely challenge our culture. We find it so difficult to see where our patriotism ends and our faith begins, so that no one would dare accuse us of disturbing our city, of advocating unlawful customs. This is not to saw we should be curmudgeons for the sake of being nasty. But we must recognize that this world is not our home.

When those around us do not receive the gospel with open arms, we must, with Paul in 2 Corinthians 4, refuse to try to peddle the gospel like a slick gimmick. We must recognize that no matter how hard we try to make it appealing, if God is not at work in their hearts, no matter what we say, no matter what we do, they will remain unresponsive. Meanwhile, we can remain positive that God is still at work, not giving up hope, not crushed by their rejection.

On a balmy October afternoon in 1982, Badger Stadium in Madison, Wisconsin, was packed. More than 60,000 die-hard University of Wisconsin supporters were watching their football team take on the Michigan State Spartans. It soon became obvious that MSU had the better team. What seemed odd, however, as the score became more lopsided, were the bursts of applause and shouts of joy from the Wisconsin fans. How could they cheer when their team was losing? It turns out that seventy miles away the Milwaukee Brewers were beating the St. Louis Cardinals in game three of the 1982 World Series. Many of the fans in the stands were listening to portable radios--and responding to something other than their immediate circumstances. Paul encourages us to fix our eyes not on what is seen but what is unseen (2 Corinthians 4:18). When we do, we can rejoice even in hardships because we see Christ's larger victory. (Asimakoupoulos, Leadership, 15.4)