from God's Word, we're in the 16th chapter of the book of Acts. And we're starting at verse number one. We ended up the last class in basically how to get along, personality conflicts, and how to give your fellow man the right to believe even if he's wrong. And we don't have that in America today at this moment. We don't have rights, freedom of speech or anything. This is a very terrible time. And we need to learn how to get along and to allow each other our views of opinion. And now we're going to go into another really strange period of time. We're going to say, why in the world did he do that? Why in the world Did he do that? That's the title of this message. Why in the world did he do that? Acts 16. and translated into English this is, and he came down to Derbe. He came down also to Derbe and unto Lystra. And behold, a disciple, a certain disciple was kept on being actually there. That word there, ain, that means he kept on being there. And his name, or by name, or in the name of Timotheus. Do you remember what Timotheus means? Timotheus means honorable to God. Honorable to God. Honorable to God. All right, honorable to God. Timo means to honor, and Theos is God, of course. Honorable to God. An honorable man, honorable to God, and then it says a Hwios. The word Hwios here, we translate it son, but that really isn't what it is, is it? It's son, all right, but it means the firstborn son. Firstborn son. The heir. The firstborn son of a Genakos, a woman that is Jewish. and a faithful woman that is Jewish, but a father that is Hellenos, Greek. His father is Greek, his mother is Jewish. Now, in Jewish society and in Jewish history, if your mother is Jewish, you are Jewish. Because the lineage goes through the woman, doesn't it? Well, that's right. And all the way down through history, if your mother is Jewish, then you're Jewish. So, we have a boy here, a man, a certain man, a certain disciple, Matheites, this is a devout disciple, and his mother was a faithful mother, a faithful woman, a faithful Jewish woman, and the father of him was Greek. 16 and verse 2 now, Hos ematorito, Hippo, Tone, and Lystriois, Kai, Ikono, Adelphoi. Adelpho. And this boy kept on being a witness by the Wands and Lystra and Iconia brothers. Let's go back and look at this in the Amplified Bible for just a moment, the last two verses. And I failed to read them. in the last, but I think we understood that well. 16 and verse 1, and Paul went down to Derbe and also to Lystra. A disciple named Timothy kept on being there, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer, that as she had become convinced, that is, that Jesus is the Messiah and the author of eternal salvation, and yielded obedience to him, but Timothy's father was a Greek. He, Timothy, had a good reputation among all the brethren of Lystra and Iconia. Now, let's see what Paul does here. He comes upon the scene, and what in the world is Paul going to do? Unusual action is taken here. Tuto etelison ho paulo sine auto ex elthane chi lombon perietemen Now you can put in here, in the middle of that, Elaine ho pater a tu heperekin. Also, some of it leaves out the father of him. This one, and here we have the word thelo, that means to wish. But this one Paul with him to go forth, he wanted him to go forth with him. And having received, and this is crazy here. Remember what we just went back in the Jerusalem Council? Let's go back over here in the Jerusalem Council. You don't get this. I mean why in the world did he do this? What in the world is going on here? And let's go back and read over here in the 15th chapter. but some of the men came down to Judea and were instructing the brethren unless you are circumcised in accordance with a Mosaic custom you cannot be saved and Then we go on down to verse number 11 But we believe that we are saved through the grace and the unsuffered favor and mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ as they are and Then the whole assembly remained silent and they listened attentively as Barnabas and Paul rehearsed what signs and wonders God had performed through them among the Gentiles. When he had finished talking, James replied, Brethren, listen to me. Simon Peter has rehearsed how God first visited the Gentiles to take out among them a people to hear and honor his name. And with the predictions of the prophets agree as it is written, now he quotes from the Septuagint, he quotes Amos 11, or 9 in verse 11 that is. After this I will come back and I will rebuild the house of David which is fallen and I will rebuild its ruins and I will set it up again and so as the rest of the men may seek the Lord and all the Gentiles upon my name has been invoked, says the Lord. who has been making these things known from the beginning of the world. Genesis 9.27 said the Gentiles will dwell in the tents of Shem. In other words, they will take over the gospel. And he said, now let's don't. Therefore it is my opinion that we do not put obstacles in the way and annoy and disturb those, the Gentiles, who turn to God. But we should send word to them in writing to abstain from and avoid anything that has been polluted by being offered to idols, and sexual impurity, and meat of animals that have been strangled, and tasting of blood. And from the ancient generations, Moses has had in every town his preachers, for he is read aloud every Sabbath in synagogues. Now, did it say that they were supposed to be circumcising people? What's going on here? He was Jewish, but his mother's Jewish, but he's a believer. Why in the world were the Jewish believers supposed to be circumcised? What in the world is going on here? James and Peter and Paul and all of these, they look at this and they say, now let's look at 16 and verse 3. Now where was Timothy going to go with Paul? Where was Timothy going to go with Paul? Okay, let's read. Paul desired Timothy to go with him as a missionary. And he took him and he circumcised him because of the Jews that were in those places and all of whom knew that his father was Greek. Why in the world would Paul circumcise Timothy that was half Greek and half Jewish? Let's look and see what the custom was. It's a whole lot different than our customs, I guarantee you. This would be real radical today. When you went into a Jewish synagogue, if you said that you were a Jew and you were in the covenant of God, you had to pull your pants down and prove it. as simple as that. Now that sounds really, yeah, well, how did Abraham, how did, how did, Eliezer, how did Eliezer swear on Abraham's seed? You remember that, yes, in the book of Genesis. He put his hand on his reproductive organs and swore. that he would uphold and go and get a wife for Isaac. Now this is, today in our culture, this is really weird. But they did this back then. Now, why would Paul force Timothy to be circumcised? He's actually a grown man. Because he's gonna go in the synagogue and they may check him out. He may be half Greek, all right, but are you really Jewish? You can't come in the synagogue unless you're circumcised. You can't preach in the synagogue unless you're circumcised. Because, first of all, they are not converts to Christianity yet. And so they're going to check you out. Now this sounds really radical, but this is what they did at this time. The Jews were a very racist, a very bigoted, and a separatist people. So, Timothy had a good reputation among the brethren in Lystra and Iconia, and Paul desired Timothy to go with him as a missionary, and they're gonna go preach in the synagogues, aren't they? First place they're gonna preach is in synagogues. And he took him and he circumcised him because of the Jews that were in those places, and all of whom knew that his father was a Greek. We're gonna turn him into a Jew now so he can preach in the synagogues. That's why he did it. He didn't have to do that. Timothy didn't have to be circumcised to be saved, did he? But to get around these bigoted Jews, he had to be circumcised. Paul kept on wishing to take Timothy with him as a missionary, so he circumcised him. Because of the Jews, the ones being in the places that they were going to go because they knew that all of these knew that the father of him was a Greek. The father of him was a Greek. He kept existing as a Greek. Actually, what he says, he kept on existing. His father kept on existing as a Greek. In other words, It says that he kept on being a Greek. He kept on being what he was. Now, I don't know whether Timothy's father was a believer or not, but on his mother's side, they were. Maybe we'll find out a little bit about it later, but right here, he said he kept on being a Greek. His father was a Greek. His mother was a Jewish, but before Timothy could get in the synagogues, he had to be circumcised as a Jew. And he's half Jewish, so they considered him a Jew, didn't they? So he could preach in the synagogues. If he'd have gone in there as a Greek, they wouldn't let him walk through the shadow of the door. No way. Verse number four now. Why in the world did he do this? So he could reach the Jews with the word of God, even though most of them wouldn't hear. Hos de diaporonto tas poleis paradidoson altois philosen ta dogmata ta che crimina hippo ton apostolon chi presbuteron ton in Jerusalemois. Now let's go on a little further. And they kept on going through the cities. And they kept on delivering and handing over to him, or to them that is, he kept handing over to them to guard, to keep under lock and key the dogmas, the decrees of the things having been decided on by the apostles and the elders of the ones in the It says in the Jerusalem's, in all area of Jerusalem's. That church covered the whole area of Jerusalem. It's Jerusalem Moes here, Jerusalem Moes. The whole area of Jerusalem. And all the areas around Jerusalem. They kept on preaching that you don't have to be circumcised to be saved. But now, so Timothy would have an open door to the synagogues, he had to be circumcised. had to be circumcised. Verse number five, He man un ecclesiae esterontesto te pistei cae eperisogion to arithmo cathemera. It said, and indeed therefore the churches They kept on being strengthened. They kept on being strengthened. We get our word steroid from this. Marilyn had a cousin that took steroids from the time he was very young, and he was about six foot eight, and he weighed about 375 pounds, a real hulk. Muscles all over. Well, this word here, he took steroids from the time he was young, and here's the word steroid. Here we get our word steroid from and they kept on being strong and strengthened. The steroids they were taking was the word of God and the truth of God's word. In the faith, in the faith, and they kept on increasing their number every day. These churches kept on growing every day. I remember a long time ago, I was pastoring church east of Bakersfield a little bit. It was called New Hope Missionary Baptist Church. Same one I pastored in Tehachapi. It had moved up there, actually. And this little old church had about seven, eight, nine people in it when I came there. They had a part-time pastor, actually, and he preached and everything. When I took over there, I preached and I preached and I preached. I preached on Sunday morning two times and Sunday afternoon two times. I preached on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday when I was there. And the Word of God just absolutely went out and it saturated people's lives and they came back. They wanted to learn. They were absolutely ravenous for God's Word. Ravenous for God's Word. They were starving for it. I had a whole lot of people coming out of Catholicism and the charismatic movement. I had all these people coming from everywhere and coming from other churches because they wanted to hear the Word of God preached and I was doing it. I was preaching the Word of God. I was going to the seminary and I was preaching God's Word. I was preaching in the seminary and preaching in the churches. Everywhere. People, you want to build churches, preach the Word. Dr. Hoy Chastain says, if you want to build churches, preach, preach, preach, preach the Word. That's how you do it. You build churches by preaching the Word. Within a couple of years, there was like 300 people. There was hardly any room to sit down. They'd have to go out there in the little area behind the Baptist tree and listen in there. Well, that full church, because of the preaching of God's Word, the Word of God takes care of it all. I was giving every one of them. I taught church history. I taught western civilization, political science, the history of the world. I was teaching everything. I was getting that seminary right there in that church. And we were having seminary extension classes in that church. It was just growing leaps and bounds. Growing leaps and bounds because of the preaching of the Word. Because of the preaching of God's Word. Verse number six now. I remember when I first began to preach in the early 1970s. The late 1960s. I was a very shy person. I could hardly communicate between person and person. I had had my ham radio license and I didn't talk on the radio. I just couldn't do it. I would go to churches and I'd preach and I would just stand up and I'd just start preaching, preaching, preaching, preaching. And the pastors would announce to the church, well, this guy is very shy. Brother Jim is very, very shy, but he will preach the Word of God. And I did that. I mean, I was embarrassed. I would be red-faced. I would be very shy, looking down all the time. As Marilyn used to say when we met, I didn't look at her. I looked down at the ground in the mirror. Isn't that right? I was shy. But I knew the Word of God and I preached the Word of God. And I'd get up and I'd preach and they said, man, this is something else. I read the Bible from cover to cover. I studied everything, the Bible in Greek and Hebrew. I was doing all these kind of things. I had plenty to say. When I got up, I said it. And they really enjoyed it. And people enjoyed it all over. They would come from other churches. We would have people sometimes, maybe once a month, we'd have a family from another church join the church. They just wanted to hear the preaching of God's Word. I hardly knew anything but the Bible when I was started. So I just preached the Bible. And I always knew one thing. Brother Chastain says, if you run out of something today, just brag on Jesus. And I've tried to brag on Jesus all the time. Preaching God's Word builds churches. And Paul was preaching God's Word here. The El Thon, how it begins. And they went through Virgion and through Galatia in the country. and having been prevented by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia. They wanted to go to Asia, but didn't know, don't go there. Don't go there. Don't go to Asia. Just do what you're doing. They had a job to do here. God knew the people that would be saved, and he wanted to get the word of God to them. Elthontes de caratain mosion. Mesion, that is. You people out there listening, that Marilyn is real close to that camera. You can hear her reading Greek. That girl can read Greek. I always told my students that If you'll just stay in my classes for three years, just come to these classes, you'll be able to read Greek. And about three years after you've been in my classes, we go into class one day and Marilyn was so excited and she said, I can read the whole lesson in Greek. Can I do it? I said, I got up there and I said, Marilyn wants to read this to you in Greek. So she did. And she's still doing it. I'm proud of her. Then it says here, but having come against Mysia, they kept on attempting to go on to Bithynia, and not allowed them the Spirit. Not the Spirit, not He allowed them. The Spirit didn't want them to go there. They had a job to do someplace else. Sometimes, You go to a church, or you go someplace, and you try to preach, and it doesn't work, huh? It doesn't work. Well, sometimes we have to figure this out for ourselves today, don't we? But back then, they had the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit said, those people aren't going to listen to you over there. Go over here, because I got people over there that are going to hear. 16 and verse 8. parel thontes de te mision cara beson es trodea. And having passed through and beside Misia, they came down unto Troas. They came down unto Troas. Cai orama dia tes nictos. And now we have a harama, a harama. And a harama, a vision, through the night. Paul had a vision through the night now. The Holy Spirit is sending him a vision all night long and was caused to appear unto him a man of Macedonia or Macedonia. And this certain one kept on standing, kept on, this certain one kept on standing, or actually having stood, and beseeching him, and saying, having crossed unto Macedonia Boetheson, Boetheson, the Boetheson is a cry for help. It comes from Boeth, Boetho, Boethio. It says, it means to cry out to God for help. They're crying out to God for help. Now this Macedonian man that kept on appearing to Paul, he kept on crying out for help. Crying out for help to God. Verse number 10. Hos de to orama aden euthios, exe te samen, exelethane es machedonion, sine bi bosontos, hote prose cleite, himos, ho, theos, eonga, lisoste, altus. And the vision he saw immediately. We sought out zealously to go forth unto Macedonia, concluding He had been called forth, God had called us for Himself forth to evangelize them. Now let's go back and read this in the Amplified Bible up here. So the churches were strengthened, in verse number 5, and made firm in the faith. They increased in number day by day, day by day, day according to day. And Paul and Silas passed through the territory of Phrygia and Galatia. We have the Galatian church, don't we? We have a letter, the Galatian letter, to Phrygia and Galatia, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to proclaim the word in the province of Asia. And when they had come opportunity, or opposite Mesia, they tried to go into Bithya, but the Spirit of Jesus did not permit them. Actually, the Holy Spirit did not permit them. Verse number nine now. There a vision appeared to Paul during the night. A man from Macedonia stood pleading with him, saying, come over to Macedonia and help us. Please, God, help us, is what he said. And when he had seen the vision, we went at once, endeavoring to go into Macedonia, confidently inferring that God had called us to proclaim the glad tidings of the gospel to them. Verse number 11 now. Anak thanthes de apo trodas yuth dra me samen eis sama thraken te de epi usanthi Ace Neon Polin. And having a place to sail, is what it says. And from Troas, we ran a straight course to Samothecia. And end the next day, during the next day, unto Neapolis. Neapolis means new city. And now we're going to go to Philippi. And from there to Philippi. The Philippian letter, the Philippian church, remember that? Which is the first part of Macedonia. A Macedonian city. And then it says a kolonia. The kolonia there, that's where we get the word colony from. And it means a free city. A kolonia is a free city. And we kept on being in this city, killing time, rubbing out time for several days, for some days, for quite a few days. Kept on rubbing out time for several days. Now in verse number 13, we have the reason why the Holy Spirit called Paul and Silas unto this area. Ti, or te ti hamera, ton sabaton, ex el thomen, exo tes files para patomon, hu eno mi zomen, prosyuchen, ene kai kathisantes elo lomen, tes sin el theusios, genexen. It says, both in that day and the Sabbaths, during the Sabbaths, we went out, outside of the city gate, basically, beside the river, the Potomac. The word Potomac comes from this word Potomac. It means river. The Potomac River is the River River, by the way. Where? The River River, okay. The Ptolemies, The Greek people that went down into Egypt were the Ptolemies. And the Ptolemies were the river people, and down in Egypt has got what river? The Nile River. And whether you know it or not, Cleopatra was not Egyptian, she was Greek. She was a Ptolemy. She was a Greek. And where they kept on being customarily, a place of prayer along this river. And having sat down, we kept on speaking to the women that had come together. Women had come together to this river. Now, in the river is where people used to wash their clothes, when the women washed the clothes on the river bank. the lip of the river, on the riverbank, people would wash their clothes. Indian people, even people in Europe, if they washed their clothes at all, they went down to the river and they washed their clothes. And now we have a certain woman there. Now this woman is very, very wealthy. She deals in very expensive, high-grade purple dye, and she dyes cloth purple. which is a royal color. I remember a long time ago when I was in school, I believe, I think I was in Fairfax School at that time. I moved from here, Fish Lake Valley, went to Fairfax School. And they had a movie there in that school. And they were showing us the Middle East. And some of these wealthy Arab tribes wore purple clothes. Purple clothes. And the people's skin, they wore all these purple garments, and their skin had turned purple from the dye in the garments. They were purple people. Purple people, and then about that time, a purple people leader song came out. But these were purple people. Yeah, these people, under their clothes, they were purple. Because of all the purple clothes. And here we have Lydia, a seller of purple. And a certain woman by the name of Lydia, a dealer of royal dye for royal garments. Of the city of Thyatira, Thyatira, Polyos Thyatira, and a certain woman by the name of Lydia, a seller of royal dye for royal garments, and she was of the city, belonged to the city of Thyatira, And she was worshiping the God. And she kept on hearing of whom the Lord, and He opened wide the heart, her heart, to receive the things being spoken by Paul. So God opened wide her heart to receive the things being spoken by Paul. We'll read one more verse here and we'll go back and read it in the amplified. And when she was baptized, she was dipped. She's out here by the river and she's going to get dipped in the river now. And all of her entire household believed. And she begged them, saying, since you have decided, or since you have decided that I am faithful to the Lord, to be, having entered into the house, my house, you remain there. And she urged us. She kept on pressing them until they surrendered to stay in her house. Going back here now in verse number 16. And on the Sabbath day, they went outside of the city gate to the bank of the river, where we suppose there were, as a custom, a place of prayer. A lot of people go out by the river and get under the shade trees and stay there if it's warm. And the river, it makes things a little cooler. I remember when I was young, we would go up here on these creeks If it was hot in the summertime, we'd go up here on these creeks and sit there and have picnics and things under the shade trees along the creeks up here. And when we were down in the Bakersfield area, we'd go out there to the Kern River, and we'd go fishing, and we'd have a picnic out there underneath the big old cottonwood trees. It was cooler, and it was hot in Bakersfield. It was sometimes 120 degrees there. You're out on that river, and you're going to drop 20 degrees. That river's cooler, coming out of those high Sierra mountains, coming down out of Mount Whitney snow. And on the Sabbath day, we went outside of the city gate to the bank of the river, to the lip of the river, where we were supposed there was an accustomed place of prayer, and we sat down and dressed the women who had assembled there. And one of those who listened to us was a woman named Lydia. from the city of Thyatira, a dealer of fabrics dyed in purple, and she was already a worshiper of God, and the Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was being said by Paul." Now, she was already religious. She was already religious. Now, Marilyn, when I met her, she was very interested in God, besides me. She had prayed to God that God would send a guy to her that would protect her. She wanted an Indian, too, so she got that. And she wanted to learn a lot about the Bible. And she had spent her whole life being in servitude, and now she was free and she wanted to be happy. And she needed somebody to protect her from her family. This is all you prayed, wasn't it, Marilyn? You prayed all those things. And then here I came, unsuspecting. She said, I need somebody to protect me. And I said, from what? In about a month or two, I figured that one out, that you really needed to be protected. We had real problems from there on, from till this very day, actually. But she got her, you got your wish, didn't you? Did you? Did you learn more about the Bible? A lot more. A whole lot. And you loved it. She was very happy. It says, and when she was baptized, now, she, if she was a Jew, if she believed like a Jew, she had to be baptized every month, didn't she? Yeah. Now, she was baptized, and this word is arist, one time. And she was baptized along with her whole household. And she earnestly entreated us saying, if in your opinion I am one really convinced that Jesus is the Messiah and the author of salvation and that I will be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay. And she induced them and she insisted for them to do it. Here we have a disciple that has believed. She was religious already, wasn't she? But now she found a better way. She found the truth. I, in my ministry, I preach the word of God. That's what I do. And that's all I know to do. Because that's, preaching the gospel and preaching the word of God is how people get saved. And I've seen many families saved. I can go back and delineate about some of these. Many of those that came to me and heard me preach were Catholics. Some were Charismatics. Some were Catholic Charismatics. And they came and they heard the Word of God and they said, we never heard it like this before. Months ago, we were having services here, and an aged Catholic man came with a lady that had been a Catholic, and she had been saved for more than 20 years. And I preached the Word of God, I preached from this chart, and I preached the plan of salvation as straight as I could preach it. I told God's plan of the ages and how he had dealt with mankind and how that he sent his son and how that believing in Jesus Christ and him alone would save your soul. At the end of that message, which was more than an hour long, it was God's eternal purpose, the name of it, he jumped up right there where Marilyn's sitting right now, and he said, I never heard anything like this in my life. I've been a Catholic all of my life, and today I heard the words of life. I heard how I can come directly to God. He got down on his knees right there and asked the Lord to forgive him and save his soul. And one thing he continues to repeat afterwards, he said, I am so glad I don't have to go to a priest to confess my sins and pray anymore. I know God and I know Him personally and I love Him and I appreciate Him. And that man, life, mind changed at that time. This woman was religious already, but when Paul told her about Jesus to send them away once and for all, and she was baptized once and for all, she was happy. She was happy. And she begged them to stay and teach her more about God's Word. Marilyn, do you have a question or share any one of you? Okay, how about you, Marilyn? You got a question? She's a woman! Girls, did you hear that? And she's gonna be a leader. You got it? Yes. The woman is wealthy. When she believes, her whole household believes, and they were all baptized. They've all been hearing the Word of God, but now they all believe. Here is the freedom in Christ. Here we can be saved once and for all. Not something we have to continue every day, every day, every day, every day, begging for forgiveness every day, but we ask the Lord to forgive us once and for all. And we're saved. And then they were excited about God's Word. They were so excited about God's Word, they wanted these missionaries to come and tell us more. If you count us faithful, Stay here and teach us more." So he established a church there, didn't he? He established a church there. And it started with her. All with her. Well, let's have a word of prayer. Father, we send this message out. And I ask You to touch people's hearts with Your Word and let them see the freedom in Christ. The freedom to walk off from religion that is wrong and accept and to cling on to the real word of God and real salvation. Father, I pray for my cousin Gary Yak's family. I am so disappointed that he died yesterday evening of coronavirus. His wife is elderly, 13 years older than him, I think, in her 90s. And I pray that you watch over her and over his family. Father, I know he's with you. He's a great believer and trusted you and loved you in every way. And Father, I just pray that you will touch all of their hearts and give them hope in this time of hour of grief. And Father, use the message to Send it forth throughout the world that people may believe and trust in You. In Jesus' name we pray.