July 19, 2026

"The Spirit of Jesus" (Acts 16:6-15)

Series: Acts: God's Vision For His Church Scripture: Acts 16:6–15

Hear now the word of the lord from Acts 16, verses 6 through 15.

And they went through the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia. And when they had come up to Mysia, they attempted to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them. So passing by Mysia, they went down to Troas, and a vision appeared to Paul in the night. A man from Macedonia was standing there, urging him and saying, come over to Macedonia and help us. And when Paul had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go on into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the Gospel to them.

So, setting sail from Troas, we made a direct voyage to Samothras, and the following day to Neapolis, and from there to Philippi, which is a leading city of the district of Macedonia and a Roman colony. We remained in this city some days. And on the Sabbath day we went outside the gate to the riverside, where we supposed there was a place of prayer. And we sat down and spoke to the women who had come together. One who heard us was a woman named Lydia from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple goods who was a worshipper of God.

The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul. And after she was baptized and her household as well, she urged us, saying, if you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay. And she prevailed upon us. This is the word of the Lord.

Please be seated. And as you're taking your seats, please join your hearts with me this morning in prayer. Gracious Heavenly Father, we pray that as we study this passage from your word, you would give us hearts to understand and eyes to see and ears to hear all that is contained in the good news of the Gospel of your Son here. As we see your Holy Spirit directing the early church in the way they should go to expand the gospel into new regions, we pray that you would continue to direct us by your Spirit today. And all that we should do and say both here and to the ends of the earth, we pray this in Jesus name, Amen.

Well, we have been studying since I got here. So for about a year, the story of the growth of the early church. In the Book of Acts, we've been considering God's vision for his church. And the text we have today gives us a fascinating glimpse into the ongoing leading of the Holy Spirit to direct the church, where they should go and where they should continue to preach the gospel. And I was thinking about this passage.

Just this morning as I finished walking my dogs and we got into our fenced backyard, and there was a small bird on the ground. And this bird was there yesterday. I hoped it would leave. We had a nest form on our back wall. There was sort of an area where there's a light.

And the bird. A bird made a nest there and had some eggs hatched there. And we were watching these birds. And this appears to be one of the birds who was in the nest and who has fallen out of the nest. Now I have two large.

I don't think they had had breakfast yet. Hungry dogs. And they see a bird that, as far as I can tell, is not yet capable of flight. There's this helpless chicken dinner just sitting there waiting for my dogs. Apparently, it's in grave danger now.

I sort of steered my dogs around it. They just didn't know what to do. They had never seen a snack present itself so. So freshly to them. And I led my dogs inside.

They were very curious, wanted to sniff it. And then I tried to get this bird out of my backyard. I wasn't going to touch the thing, but I tried to sort of shoo it. And at first it hopped one way, not out of the open gate. And I said, no, no, no, this way.

And then it hopped the other way, not out of the gate. And so I had to sort of really get creative to get this thing out of the yard. Now, this is a bird who kept going the wrong way until I could get it out of our backyard to some kind of safety. This bird could not understand all of the factors that went into my trying to get it out there. I don't know if it had seen quite such large dogs or understood how hungry and ferocious they could be.

And it was motivated by its own considerations. Fear, uncertainty. Never mind the dogs. What is this giant bald man trying to do for me? It was confused as to what it wants.

I don't speak bird very well and couldn't communicate very well with this bird what I wanted it to do. But eventually, as I was trying to shepherd this bird out of our backyard, it eventually did, and it got to safety and Godspeed to that bird and its ongoing travels wherever the spirit of Jesus may lead it from here on out. I think there's something of an illustration here in what we are seeing in this passage where we have the apostles and they are eager, hungry, to preach the gospel. But as they try to go into one area, the Holy Spirit forbids them. As they try to go into another area, the Spirit of Jesus does not permit them to go there.

They have their own motivations. They don't entirely at first understand the direction and leading of the Lord. And even then, when the Spirit makes it clear where they are to go, they get there. And frankly, it does not look like an opportune place for ministry. And yet the Spirit of Jesus builds Jesus Church.

Church. That's what we're seeing in this passage. The Spirit of Jesus builds Jesus church. That's our theme for this morning. And we're going to study this passage in two sections.

1. The Spirit of Jesus (Acts 16:6-10)

First, the Spirit of Jesus, particularly in leading the missionaries where they need to go. And second, Jesus Church, the growth and development of Jesus Church in this new area of Philippi, which breaks into the continent of Europe for the first time. So let's look first at the Spirit of Jesus in verses 6 through 10. In verses 6 through 10, we read about the missionaries, and they're going through the region of Phrygia and Galatia. But we read they were forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the Word in Asia.

Now, don't think of Asia, the giant continent with China and Japan and Korea and all that. We're talking about Asia Minor, we're talking about the region of Turkey, that sort of a region. They're not able. They're forbidden by the Holy Spirit from going there. Instead, they start turning westward.

And when they had come to Mysia, they attempted to go into Bithynia again, we read. But the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them. It's very interesting that Luke, who is writing this historical narrative, first calls the Holy Spirit by the name that he is frequently called in the. In the Scriptures, the Holy Spirit. But then, just and still speaking of the same person, the third Person of the Trinity calls the Spirit by a different name, the Spirit of Jesus.

Now, this does not mean that the Holy Spirit is the identical person to the second Person of the Trinity, to the Son. The Son is distinct in a real way from the third Person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit. And both the Son and the Spirit are distinct from the Father. There are three Persons, even while there is only one God. We do not have three gods.

We have one God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. One God in three persons. And the Spirit of Jesus is the third Person of the Trinity. But why then call him the Spirit of Jesus? This is in many ways a reminder of what we had talked about from the very first passage in our study of the Book of Acts.

In fact, the very first words in the Book of acts in Acts 1:1, Luke says that in the first book, he wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach, all that Jesus began to do and to teach. The clear implication being that Jesus is not done doing, he is not done teaching. Where does he continue his work of doing and teaching? Well, that's what we are reading in the Book of Acts. The Book of Acts.

Even though Jesus is absent in the body from the earth, after he ascends into heaven, he continues to minister and he continues to lead and guide his church though his body is in heaven. And he does so by the Holy Spirit that he pours out from heaven to fill his church and to lead his church and to guide his church. And though the Spirit is distinct from Jesus, yet this Holy Spirit is so united with the person of God's Son, with Jesus. Jesus is in a very real way leading his church by his own spirit, the Spirit of Jesus. Now, this is the Spirit of God.

We can call him the Spirit of the Son and the Spirit of Jesus. This is the Holy Spirit who carries forth this work of Jesus in the world. This is King Jesus own emissary from his throne in heaven. So the next question is, why then would the Holy Spirit forbid or not allow these missionaries into certain areas if the whole world needed evangelized, if the whole world needed to hear the preached gospel about Jesus Christ and him crucified, why were they not allowed to go into Phrygian, Galatia or into Asia? Why were they forbidden from trying to go into Bithynia but not allowed to go there?

Well, many have speculated about the cause. The commentaries give lots of different possible reasons for them, but ultimately we don't know. Ultimately, this is something that rests entirely and exclusively in the providential goodness and wisdom of God. And as Paul, who was a firsthand witness to what was happening here, wrote later in the Letter to the Romans, chapter 8, verse 33, he stops himself from trying to understand God's wisdom. And he instead says this.

Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways. We don't know why God did not permit the missionaries into certain parts of the world. But we do know one part of the reason in that the Holy Spirit then makes it clear where they are to go, not to go certain places so that they might go to other places. And that's what we read in verses 9 and 10.

We don't know exactly how the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Jesus, forbid the missionaries from going certain places, but we do know what happens to send them to Macedonia. In verse nine we read a vision appeared to Paul in the night and a man of Macedonia was standing there urging him and saying, come over to Macedonia and and help us. Now when this call comes again, the apostles and the missionaries, they've been eager, they've been chomping at the bit, they've been waiting to go preach the gospel. And now they finally have their marching orders. They go as soon as possible.

Notice in verse 10 that word immediately. And when Paul had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go on into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them. Certain areas they were not supposed to preach the gospel yet. Later Paul would go into Galatia. We know about the letter that he wrote to the Galatian Church.

But for now he was not supposed to go there into some other areas so that he might preach the gospel in a new area. Breaking ground in Europe for the first time in Macedonia, an area surrounding Greece. Notice also that we read here the word we. Immediately we sought to go on into Macedonia. Luke, the author of this book, silently, quietly, subtly drops himself into the narrative.

We don't know where Luke came from, we don't know how he got connected with them, but suddenly Luke is one of the passengers on this. Previously it was they did this, they did that, they went here, they went there. Now it's we until it's they again. And we'll see how that goes through the rest of this book. Now I want to stop and consider what we are seeing in the leadership of the Holy Spirit to guide these missionaries to Macedonia.

And I want to say, just personally speaking, this passage was something that I spent a lot of time considering and praying about when I considered whether to take the call to serve here. Previously I was at a good church. I was closer to most of my family. I was in the States where I had grown up. I was unaware of how to play Dutch bingo.

All of these things were just ignorance to me. And so I had to wrestle long and hard. Could I really leave what I had always known to come to immerse myself in a new place, with a new people, in a new culture. And as a part of trying to think through all of that, I used all the decision making tools that I knew how to use, certainly the way that anyone would consider any kind of a career change opportunity. Do I want to go there?

What's it like? What's the situation? What about the people? And all those seemed like good things. Much more then I also then sought the Lord in this I Prayed I decision trying to seek the Lord's leading.

I would have given anything for a vision in the Ninth, for a man from Lansing to stand up with some unpronounceable Dutch name to say, come over and help us. But I got stuck when I was trying to think, what was I really supposed to do? Did I want to leave? Was it the right thing to leave? Was the Lord calling me here?

And I made progress and con lists for staying and for going. And I just wasn't sure how to make the decision. I maybe felt something like that bird. I could sort of see and feel the Lord moving me in some direction, but I kept hopping one way from my own motivations and out of my fears and uncertainty and lack of clarity. And then I could see, okay, that wasn't it.

And so I get shuffled over to another direction until finally the Lord could shepherd me through the door that he wanted me to take. Maybe you're in a situation like that where you feel like you are hopping around like a flightless bird trying to escape the wolves in your midst, trying to figure out where you are to go next. For me in that process, as I was praying about it, thinking about it, talking to people, that process had surfaced specific questions that seemed seemed to weigh most heavily. And one of the biggest ones was from this passage, when this man from Macedonia says to Paul, come over to Macedonia and help us. One of the things that I had to consider was what I most needed here or there.

Now the Lord doesn't need me anywhere. I am not irreplaceable. God could strike me dead today, although I hope he doesn't, and everyone would move on and God would do great works. The Lord ever is burying his workmen and carrying on his work in the great words of the great Charles Wesley. But as I prayed about those issues, the Lord had a moment where he really clarified the situation.

I was able to see the situation for what it was. It became very clear to me that though I had loved that church and had done all that I could do there, the tasks that still remained undone would be best addressed by the next minister. I'd done all I could do and there was a freedom and a clarity to come to a new place, to come over and help a new group of people. Now, John Stott, writing on this passage, writes about how we all are to consider this sort of divine guidance in our own life. And Stott talks about God's use of a period of time, these decisions, although we wish they would just come to us in a moment in A dream.

They typically don't come quickly. The Lord uses time. The Lord uses circumstances, open and closed doors. The Lord uses our pondering over and thinking through the circumstances, the situation, what was taking place at the time. And the Lord uses seeking feedback from others in pursuit of a wider range of wisdom that we ourselves have, especially in the body of Christ.

2. Jesus' Church (Acts 16:11-15)

And all of these are employed here as the missionaries are trying to figure out where they are to go next. But once they get there, what then do they find? Well, this brings us to the second section, Jesus church, in verses 11 through 15. And it is fascinating just to look at this story and to see here they are ready to preach the gospel, ready to go wherever they can and tell people about Jesus. And when they arrive, they come to a place that is singularly not prepared for their arrival.

Look at this passage. It's fascinating. First of all, we read on the surface if sort of they were looking at this from a human perspective, which clearly they were not. But as they were looking at this from a human perspective, there were a lot of attractive things about going to Philippi. Philippi was a very wealthy city.

And we are told here that it was a powerful city. We're told even here in the text that this was a leading city of the district of Macedonia and a Roman colony. So wealthy and it was powerful. You know, back in the year 2011, I came actually to the Chicago area. There was a conference in downtown Chicago, Christian Conference.

And I remember we were actually in the season then of trying to discern whether we should plant a church, my wife and I. And I remember hearing someone in the midst of this, as I was trying to search for wisdom about how to go, what to do. And I remember someone saying, saying in one of the breakout sessions or something, and he says, I know all of you church planners here, looking around this beautiful city. We were in wealthy, powerful downtown Chicago. You're looking around at this beautiful city and want to plant here.

And it was true. I remember sort of fantasizing what would it be like? Chicago would be fun. I would love living in Chicago someday. Little did I know, but I was a small town kid in the big city looking at all these cool buildings and thinking about all the fun things there would be to do there, looking at the wealth, looking at the power.

But you know, last week when I was back in downtown Chicago doing street evangelism, it was astonishing, the corruption and the hardness of hearts that we encountered trying to scatter a few seeds of the gospel of Jesus. And I think what that illustrates Is if you look and judge according to outward appearances, you might see one thing. And if you then look with God's eyes and see the spiritual reality, you don't see what a fun place this would be to minister. You instead see what a great amount of need of people who need missionaries to come over and help. And this is what Paul finds.

Now, Paul normally, and this is where we see some of the gap here, normally goes first to the local synagogue. And we've seen all the dust that has been kicked up as he's gone to synagogues and preached to Jews and Gentiles, God fearers who were there worshiping in the synagogue about the long awaited Messiah who came, who was crucified and who was raised from the dead. Some believe and others reject and inevitably it splits the synagogue or splits the wider town. But here he arrives and you read that he does nothing. For a few days we remained in the city.

Some days doesn't say they were ministering, doesn't say they were preaching, they were trying to get their footing, trying to figure out where to go. And finally in verse 13, on the Sabbath day, we went outside the gate. Nothing was in the city worth going to, to the riverside where we suppose there was a place of prayer and we sat down and spoke to the women who had come together. Now if you understand first century Judaism, you understand the importance of these words because in those days for there to be a synagogue, there was required a quorum of 10 men. No amount of women could address the lack of even one lack of a man.

One commentator said you had to have 10 men and then you could have a synagogue. But we don't read about nine men, we don't read about eight men, we don't read about any men. We read only about women who are not in a synagogue because they couldn't form one. They were rather outside, outside the city because apparently the city would have been inhospitable to their prayers and they were praying together there. And so Paul finds these women who were seeking the Lord wherever they can find them.

And we sat down and spoke to them who would come together. And this is where we meet one of the great women of the Bible, this woman Lydia from the city of Thyatira. Now we know that she's wealthy and we know this from the fact that she is a seller of purple goods. These were luxury items. Normal people didn't buy purple goods.

The wealthy and the powerful did. And she was apparently in this trade. Perhaps her husband had the business and then he passed away and she Continued it in his stead, we don't know. But we know that she was a worshiper of God. She worshiped the Lord.

Now, as a worshiper of God, this sounds like she's not a Jew. That's a term for Gentile God fearers. But we read that as she's hearing the gospel preached. We read the Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul. Why did they come here?

Well, not because there was already a thriving ministry that they could continue on with, not because they were even Jews, a good number of Jews to preach the gospel among them, but in part because of this one woman who needed to hear the Gospel of Jesus. And the Lord opened her heart to pay attention and to believe in Jesus for her salvation. And so then in verse 15, we read after she was baptized and her household as well. Now, I mentioned this a moment ago in the infant baptism that we just had, and I mentioned this a couple of weeks ago in the sermon on why we baptize our covenant children. But I want to look and consider this particular phrase that the household was baptized.

I did not grow up in a household that baptized covenant children. So for me, I started off believing that you should not do that until the Scriptures persuaded me otherwise. But this is a passage that was not persuasive to me back when I did not believe in infant baptism. I looked at this passage and I said, well, this is inconclusive at best. We just don't know whether there was infant in that household.

So how can we draw from this to say that we should baptize infants in households? It's inconclusive at best. And worse, it's misleading. If there was no infant and they just baptized the adults in this household, how can we draw from that? That's misleading to think that infants had anything to do with it.

Inconclusive at best, misleading at worst. And I dismiss that fairly easily. What I did not sufficiently consider is that this is not the first place in the Bible where we talk about a covenant sign being given to households. This is the exact same language that you find in the Old Testament to describe how households should be circumcised. And so if households were circumcised, and we know exactly that, that included bringing the covenant sign upon every male eight days old and upward when exactly.

And the burden of proof is on showing when exactly infants had been excluded from these households. If infants had been circumcised by households, and now we read household baptisms, why shouldn't we read this in the Exact light. We don't do this with anything else. When we think about priests, Jesus as our great high priest, we don't exclude and ignore what happened from the Levitical priests. When we read about prophets, we don't ignore Old Testament prophets.

We say things have been changed in the New Testament, but we draw back forward that entire Old Testament heritage. And so should we hear in the same way that household circumcisions included infants? So now, praise God, household baptisms include infants, just like we saw a few minutes ago with the baptism of one of our newest members. And so here we see that this woman who was not a Jew, this woman who could not have been circumcised since she was female, we read here that she was baptized in her household as well. And we read immediately that the fruit of the Spirit is growing in her because we see this hospitality.

She says, if you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay. And she prevailed upon us. Now, again, here's a suggestion that she may have been very wealthy, wealthy enough to have a large house that could host these people. Now, what's interesting is to think beyond this. And some of the commentators brought up this idea.

I hadn't considered it, but if you read the letter to the Philippians, Paul is constantly commending the Philippian church for their great generosity, for partnering with him in the Gospel as no other church had done. Now, we don't know exactly the source of the generosity from the church at Philippi, but there's a really good likelihood that Lydia was one of the people who was writing a lot of the checks that supported Paul in his ministry and even supported him while he was in prison. We certainly see a glimpse of her generosity here, even though Paul doesn't fill in all of those details in the letter to the Philippians. So what shall we do with this passage? Well, when we saw the Holy Spirit directing Paul away from Asia and toward Macedonia, we might have expected that he would be headed directly into a huge harvest of people.

He just shows up, it's ready to go, he's ready to roll. He hits the ground running, and there's just thousands of people. That's kind of what we saw earlier in the Book of Acts. And that day, thousands were added. But there's no synagogue.

There are no Jewish men to speak of, only a small group of women. This area is hard soil that needs to be plowed. Now, again, there are places where the gospel exploded that did begin with synagogues, whether Jew or Gentile. But here there's just a small beginning. What's going to come of it.

So often I think we're tempted to doubt the Lord's providential goodness, either his wisdom. And again, like that little bird shepherding us one way and then maybe shepherding us another and wondering, what is this all for? Especially when we're frightened, especially when we don't know exactly what the Lord wants of us, especially when we show up to our Philippi and it seems like nothing is ready. Why am I here? What am I doing here?

Maybe you've made sacrifices or walked through seasons of pain and you have been wondering, what is this all for? Or you do the comparison game. You look at the roles and influences and families and jobs and the callings that others say, and you say, that looks really good. Why can't I have that situation instead of what I'm going through? But the Lord gives us exactly what, in his wisdom and kindness he wants us to have.

From the hand of the Lord comes the pleasant and the unpleasant. From the hand of the Lord comes good and disastrous. From the hand of the Lord comes small opportunities and big ones. He gives us what we can handle even when we do not realize that we can, because he gives us his spirit to walk us through whatever situation we find ourselves in. And then as he dumps us off the boat in Macedonia, he calls us to get to work for his glory.

Maybe you're in the middle of a parenting or a grandparenting challenge that other parents or grandparents don't seem to have. Maybe your job does not seem as nice as someone else's. Maybe you're in the middle and entrenched in conflict that you don't understand, or that doesn't seem to go away and you don't even know how to get out of it. Maybe the door that you so desperately wanted to open remains closed, or the door that you hoped would stay closed has in fact opened and you feel like you have to go out. Linsky, a commentator, writes, only a little group of women here.

Yet Paul did not despise this humble beginning. Let no preacher despise even the smallest audience and imagine that he need not do his best for so few. The very smallness of a group of hearers is sometimes fraught with special blessing for the few who are present. How is your heart to the providential kindness of God toward you and the small opportunities that you have?

But the final thing that we need to look at as we close our consideration this passage is to stand in awe of the opening of even one heart to believe in the Gospel of Jesus. Yes. And it's an extraordinary thing when 3,000 were added to the Lord on a single day. But it's no less a miracle for this woman's heart to be opened by the Lord to pay attention to the preaching of the Gospel that Paul was engaged in. At one level, it's astonishing that human beings would be so hard hearted because the Gospel is the best possible news.

That God Almighty, the righteous and holy God from heaven, looked down upon the sin and the mire and the corruption of this world. And rather than washing his hands of it and moving on, he so loved this world that he sent his only son into this world. His only son whom he sent to to take a human nature, to be born, to live a perfect life, to suffer in our place as though he had personally committed every one of our sins. But who then, on the third day after his death, rose from the dead? This story is of extraordinary love and mercy and grace and kindness.

And this he did for us. And the same miracle that changed Lydia's heart can change yours also. This morning the Spirit of Jesus is actively in the business of drawing sinners to faith in Christ for salvation. Not only in a way that will just simply bless you one day, someday in eternity, although it will do that. A funeral this week, and I'm reminded every time we all must come to that place of being, the one.

The casket lowered into the grave. Are you ready for that? But it's not just readiness for life beyond the grave, although it is that. It's also the recognition, the change of perspective, that what God gives you is not to hurt you. He is gently caring for you, leading you by his hand all the days of your life.

That goodness and mercy may follow you wherever you go, even when he leads you through difficulty and pain. It is the Spirit of Jesus who builds you up as he builds Jesus church. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we pray that you would by your spirit draw sinners, draw every one of us to Jesus Christ. This morning we pray that as we look to Christ for our salvation, that you would open hearts to believe the gospel.

That you would draw us to be strengthened in Christ for confidence now and forevermore. And Father, we pray all this in Jesus name. Amen.

other sermons in this series

Oct 4

2026

"Preparation and Fulfillment" (Acts 19:1-7)

Preacher: Rev. Jacob Gerber Scripture: Acts 19:1–7 Series: Acts: God's Vision For His Church

Sep 20

2026

"Many Gifts among Many Members" (Acts 18:18-28)

Preacher: Rev. Jacob Gerber Scripture: Acts 18:18–28 Series: Acts: God's Vision For His Church

Sep 13

2026

"My Grace Is Sufficient for You" (2 Corinthians 12: 1-10)

Preacher: Rev. Jacob Gerber Scripture: 2 Corinthians 12:1–10 Series: Acts: God's Vision For His Church