God's Deliverance - Part 2

Moore's Corner Church

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God's Deliverance Part 3

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Thank you for listening to this message from the ministry of Morse Corner Church in Leverett, Massachusetts.

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Morse Corner is a non -denominational church that is committed to the preaching and teaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

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Our church was founded in 1896 by two students of the famous evangelist

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D .L. Moody. We seek to encourage and edify the body of Christ through the proclamation of God's word through the ministries of the local church.

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If you'd like more information, visit our website, morsecornerchurch .com. We hope you enjoy the message.

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Well, before Christianity was Christianity, what was it called? The Way.

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And before Christians were called Christians or believers, they were called followers of the way.

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Why is that? Remember John 14, verse 6, what did Jesus say? I am the way, the truth, and the life.

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In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way that leads to life.

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So Christians were called followers of the way. So they were speaking evil of the

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Christian faith is what is going on. So says Paul departed from them and withdrew the disciples and verse 10.

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And this continued for two years so that all who dwell in Asia heard the word of the

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Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks. Isn't that an amazing statement?

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So that all who dwelt in Asia heard. That's a that's a large territory.

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So Paul was making some serious headway in Ephesus and the ministry was just expanding at an amazing rate.

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So Paul had the ability to preach. He was preaching the gospel. He had the freedom to do that.

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There was a miraculous outpouring of the Holy Spirit. We didn't read about that.

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Also, the next section of Acts 19 talks about strange or unusual miracles that were done by the

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Apostle Paul. And this got everybody's attention. So Paul had an amazing opportunity.

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God had given them this ministry. And do you remember what he wrote in 1 Corinthians 16?

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The end of 1 Corinthians, he made reference to this where he tells the church that a great and effective door had opened to him.

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But you remember what he said after that? But there are many adversaries.

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And this is what happens when people see and when the devil sees the word of God being proclaimed with power, when he sees the kingdom of God expanding.

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There's nothing Satan hates more. So what does he do? He stirs up his followers to oppose the gospel ministry.

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And that's certainly what happened with Paul. So the devil stirred up his followers.

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This brings us to Acts 19, verse 18. So after the name of the

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Lord Jesus was magnified, it says, And many who had believed came confessing and telling their deeds.

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Also, many of those who had practiced magic brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all.

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And they counted up the value of them and it totaled 50 ,000 pieces of silver.

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So the word of the Lord grew mightily and prevailed.

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So the heathens were converting on mass. Just large multitudes of people getting saved.

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And you know they were sincere. How do you know they were sincere? Well, he says they were practicing magic.

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So it would have been like sorcery or witchcraft. They probably had a large collection of books and scrolls that contained their teachings and I don't know spells and all their men.

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And what did they do? This stuff was worth a lot of money. What did they do? Yeah, they didn't go say, hey, this stuff is valuable.

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Let's have a tag sale and cash in so we can spread this false doctrine to someone else. Whoever buys it.

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They didn't say, hey, let's sell it on eBay so we can make. No, they burned it. They lost out a lot of money.

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And when someone comes to Christ and they do something where they're losing money, you know they're sincere.

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Christians have often done this when a person comes to faith. They were mixed up in something else.

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I've heard people saying that when they came to Jesus, they took all their albums and their CDs.

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I don't know today how you would burn MP3s, but they would torch them.

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Well, this is what happened. They burned all their books. And it says verse 23.

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And about that time, there arose a great commotion about the way for a certain man named

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Demetrius, a silversmith who made silver shrines of Diana.

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He brought no small profit to the craftsman. So Diana, who is

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Diana? She is a pagan goddess. And they would use silver to make these small little idols that the people would worship.

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Verse 25, so Demetrius, he called them together with the workers of similar occupation and said, men, you know that we have our prosperity by this trade.

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Moreover, you see and hear that not only at Ephesus, but throughout almost all

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Asia. This Paul, you know, this Paul has persuaded and turned away many people saying that they are not gods which are made with hands.

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Think about that statement. This Paul has the audacity to say that this little silver figurine is not a god.

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Yeah, no kidding. Verse 27, so not only is this trade of ours in danger of falling into disrepute, but also the temple of the great goddess

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Diana may be despised and her magnificence destroyed whom all

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Asia and the world worship. And I'm tempted to go off on this point that Paul, he got into some serious hot water for doing what?

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Pointing out the obvious. Have you ever felt like this? You look around and like nobody wants to state the obvious.

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You know, the emperor has no clothes. This really isn't what people are saying it is. This isn't really what's going on and nobody's speaking up.

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Well, when you do speak up and simply point out the obvious, what happens?

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People get mad. Well, Paul was filled with the Holy Spirit. He wasn't afraid to do that.

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So this is the concern that this trade, this business might suffer loss.

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Now Demetrius and the silversmiths, they make it out to be like they care about the religion.

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And this was a cultural thing because in order to keep a culture together, you need a common religion or at least a worldview to keep the culture together.

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I mean, that's the problem we're going through. You know, Christianity is being attacked and there's very little holding us together.

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But that was important to have the religion holding the culture together. But did Demetrius really care about Diana?

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Did he really care about this religion? No, he was concerned that the apostle

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Paul was hurting his bottom line. That was the real issue. So Paul was costing them money and something had to be done about it.

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And this is just a good point to remember. When you see a large crowd coming together to fight for some cause, the reason that is put forth is usually not the real reason.

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There's usually something else going on and that's exactly what we see here. And you remember what

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Paul would later tell Timothy, that it is the root, the love of money is the root of all evil.

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So this was about Diana? No, this was about dollars or denarii or whatever they had in that area.

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So the loss of revenue is what they were worried about. And who's Demetrius?

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Well, he's the ringleader. He's the one who's getting everybody together and stirring them up.

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And he's making it out to be like this is an attack on your religion. Look at verse 28.

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Now, when they heard this, the people, they were filled with wrath and cried out saying, great is

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Diana of the Ephesians. So the whole city was filled with confusion and rushed into the theater with one accord, having seized

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Gaius and Aristarchus. They were Macedonians, Paul's travel companions.

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And when Paul wanted to go into the people, the disciples would not allow him.

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Why do you think they didn't allow Paul? Paul was the leader. He wanted to go in and address the mob.

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Why don't you think they wanted Paul to go in? What? For safety, right?

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What would have happened? This would be like taking president Trump and putting him in the middle of a black lives matter riot.

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Okay. What do you think would happen? Paul could have been torn limb from limb.

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The people were not just angry. They were filled with wrath.

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But also, what does it say? They're also filled with what? Confusion.

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And this is so true. Look at verse 32. Some therefore cried one thing and some another for the assembly was confused.

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And most of them did not know why they had come together. This is unbelievable.

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They're in the street. They're ready to tear people and buildings and everything else apart.

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They didn't know why they were mad. They didn't know why they were there. So this is the attitude of the apostle

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Paul. He said, let me in. Let me go in to address the crowd. Paul is not a stupid man.

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He knew the danger. But he was willing to go in there. And he would have preached to them. What does that tell you about Paul?

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Well, he was fearless. You know, he wasn't concerned of what might happen.

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The people, they wanted to shut down the gospel ministry. Paul said, I'll preach anytime, anywhere.

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Now, thankfully, the city had somewhat of a reasonable leader.

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The city clerk, which is basically like the mayor. Look at verse 35. And when the city clerk had quieted the crowd, he said, men of Ephesus, what man is there who does not know that the city of the

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Ephesians is temple guardian of the great goddess Diana and of the image which fell down from Zeus?

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This is probably a meteorite, most likely, that they worshiped. Therefore, since these things cannot be denied, you ought to be quiet and do nothing rashly.

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For you have brought these men here who are neither robbers or robbers of temples or blasphemers of your goddess.

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So he's saying these men, Paul really hasn't done anything wrong. He has not committed any crime.

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He hasn't stolen anything. He's not even speaking against Diana.

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Verse 38, therefore, if Demetrius and his fellow craftsmen have a case against anyone, what should they do?

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The courts. The courts are open and there are pro -councils.

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See, we could learn something today from this. Even a heathen back then knew this.

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Let them bring charges against one another. But if you have any other inquiry to make, it shall be determined in the lawful assembly.

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For we are in danger of being called in question for today's uproar.

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There being no reason which we may give to account for this disorderly gathering.

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And when he had said these things, he dismissed the assembly. Now the mayor, he knew he could get in trouble with the

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Romans if his city was falling apart. So he was covering his own tail.

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That's true. But he had this sense of reason to him. He did not want mob rule.

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And notice he blamed the riots on who? Paul? No, he blamed the riots on the rioters.

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So he calmed down the city. And this resulted most likely in the saving of the apostle

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Paul's life. You think about it, Paul, really, he was this close from being ripped to shreds.

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So now that we know all of this, we know what Paul went through. Let's go back to second

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Corinthians chapter one. Because this was no doubt a traumatic experience.

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And maybe there's a few of you, maybe you were in the military. Maybe it was some other situation where you were right at the brink of death.

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You were this close. There are people who have come very close to death.

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Maybe it was an illness that you recovered from. You know, that type of thing can take its toll psychologically.

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And if you're not careful, it can take its toll spiritually. Thanks for listening.

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I'm Pastor Michael Grant from Morris Cornick Church. If you'd like to listen to the complete message or if you'd like more information about the ministry, visit our website,

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MorrisCornickChurch .com. And we'd love to have you join us some Sunday morning here in Leverett.