into the synagogue, that's the Apostle Paul, and he went into the synagogue and spake boldly for the space of three months, disappointing and persuading the things concerning the kingdom of God. But when divers or many were hardened and believed not, but spake evil of that way, the school of one pyramid. And this continued by the space of two years, so that all day which dwelt in Asia heard the word of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks. And the diseases departed from them, and the evil spirits went out of them. Now the devils go to imitate. Then certain now the vagabond Jews exorcists took upon them to call over them which had name of the Lord Jesus, saying, We adjure you by Jesus, whom Paul preached, and there were seven sons of one Siva, a Jew and chief of the priests, which did so. And the evil spirit answered and said, Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are ye? The man in whom the evil spirit was leaped on them and overcame them, and prevailed against them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded. And this was known to all the Jews and Greeks, also dwelling at Ephesus, and fear fell on them all, and the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified. And many that believed came and confessed and showed their deeds. Many of them also, which used curious art, brought their books together, and burned them before all men, And they counted the price of them and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver for about ten thousand dollars in our money today. So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed. After these things were ended, Paul purposed in the spirit when he had passed through Macedonia and Achaia to go to Jerusalem, saying, After I have been there, I must also see Rome. So he sent into Macedonia two of them that ministered unto him, Tumotius and Erastus, but he himself stayed in Asia for a season. At the same time there arose no small stir about that way. For a certain man named Demetrius, a silver smith, which made silver shrines for Diana, brought no small gain unto the craftsmen. whom he called together with the workmen of like occupation, and said, Sir, ye know that by this craft we have our wealth. Moreover, ye see and hear that not alone at Ephesus, but almost throughout all Asia. This Paul hath persuaded and turned away much people, saying that there be no gods which are made with hand. What a commendation for the Apostle Paul. territor. So that not only this our craft is in danger, to be said of not, but also that the temple of the great goddess Diana should be despised, and her magnificence should be destroyed, for all Asia and the world worshipeth. When they heard these saying, they were full of wrath and cried out, saying, Great is Diana of the Ephesians. And the whole city was filled with confusion. And having brought Gaius and Arsacus, men of Macedonia, Paul's companions in travel, they rushed with one accord into the theater. When Paul would have entered into the people or unto the people, the disciples suffered him not. And certain of the chief of Asia, which where his friends sent unto him desiringing that he would not adventure himself, some therefore pride one thing and some another, for the assembly was confused, and the more part knew not why or wherefore they were come together. That's usually the case when you have a mob demonstration. The issues are forgotten. And they drew Alexander out to the multitude, the Jews putting him forward, and Alexander beckoned with the hand and would have made But when they knew that he was a Jew, all with one voice about the space of two hours cried out, Great is Diana of the Ephesians. When the town's clerk had appeased the people, he said, Ye men of Ephesus, What man is there that knoweth not how the Pacifica of the Ephesians is a worshipper of the great goddess Diana, and of the image which fell down from Jupiter? Seeing then that these things cannot be spoken against, he ought to be quiet and to do nothing rationally. For ye have brought hither these men which are neither robbers of churches, nor yet blasphemers of your goddess. Wherefore if Demetrius and the craftsmen which are with him have a matter against any man, the law is open, and that our deputies let them and plead one another. But if ye inquire anything concerning other matters, it shall be determined in a lawful assembly, for we are in danger to be called in question for this day's uproar, there being no cause whereby we may give an account of this concourse. When he had thus spoken, he dismissed the assembly. Now we've come to Paul at Ephesus, and it's very interesting, when you read his activities at Ephesus. I was thinking while reading it this afternoon that you have Christianity indicated in these verses. In verse eight you find the apostle Paul and he's preaching and we know what his message was in preaching through the Ephesians. He gives it to us in second Ephesians in the epistle, the chapter two and verses eight and nine. By grace are ye saved through faith and that not of yourselves it is the gift of God, not of works lest any man should boast. And so we know what his preaching was. Not only do you have his preaching, but you have his activities met with perversity in verses nine and ten. You're always going to find opposition to the preaching of the gospel. You have distortion, unbelief, obstinacy, and wickedness. Then in verse ten you have Paul's persistency. He's not going to stop. He's going to keep preaching this wonderful message of the gospel. Then you have God's power in verses eleven to twelve, and also you have imitation of pretense, as we pointed out while reading. In other words, you have Satan, and he's going to try and imitate the gospel. Back in the Old Testament, you remember when Moses performed those miracles, In the land of Egypt, why? Pharaoh's magicians, they did the same thing. They could only go so far. And so the devil here, he's going to try and imitate or make fun of the preaching of the gospel and the miracles performed by the Apostle Paul. So you have Satan's imitation. You also have Satan's knowledge here. For the evil spirit or the demon in this one man, he says, Jesus, I know. And Paul I know, but who are you? And here these seven sons of one Siva, they're going to try and cast the demon out of this man, calling over him the name of the Lord Jesus. But the demon in this man looked at those seven sons of Siva and said, Jesus I know. And Paul I know. I wonder why he knew Paul. Paul was causing so much excitement. God was blessing the Apostle and so much was being done through the Apostle. The devil knew Paul all right. I wonder sometimes if he knows some of God's people. They're not causing any disturbance. They're not winning any souls to Christ. Their life is not outstanding. I wonder if the devil knows very much about them. He certainly doesn't fear them. But if you're doing something for God and on fire for Christ, and you're seeing something accomplished, the devil knows you all right. And he'll do his best to trick you up or to interfere with your activities. And so here's the knowledge of Satan and the demons of Satan. Jesus, I know, and Paul, I know, but who are you? And you know what happened. He leaped upon these seven sons of Stephen, and they fled from the house naked and wounded. So you have the trickery... trounced or the imitators punished because of their fraud. Then you have also the progress of Paul's activities in verses seventeen and twenty. And I thought that's wonderful when you stop to think of how much the Apostle Paul traveled, his tremendous activities. And this was known to all the Jews and Greeks also dwelling at Ephesus, and fear fell on them all in the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified. You see how steps themselves. God will make the wrathful plans of praise them, and the devil is going to try and imitate God's work on the work of the Spirit of God, and it ends up with the work just advancing that much more, and the Lord Jesus Christ is magnified at the close of verse seventeen. And many, because of what happened on that occasion, the devil really got started. by trying to imitate the Apostle and imitate the work of the Holy Spirit, he got this thing started. The outcome was in verse eighteen, and many that believed came and confessed and showed their deeds. Many of them also, with huge curious arms, brought their books together and burned them before all men, and they counted the price of them and found at fifty thousand pieces of silver. so you see how the work of God progressed even because of this bitter persecution engineered by Satan I think in this afternoon in reading these different P's nice to have a seventh one and I thought that the precious instructions Paul gave to this very same church you have his epistle six wonderful chapters and then you have The Epistle of John to the Ephesians in Revelation chapter two. When he lists all their works, their zeal, and ends up by saying, the Lord Jesus speaking, I have somewhat against it. Thou hast left thy first love. All your activity is mechanical. All your zeal is lacking in one thing. You're lacking love to Christ and true love for souls. It's very interesting if you read that letter to the Ephesians in Revelation chapter two. So you have the beginning of the work in Ephesus here, the Apostle Paul's activities. You have his epistle to them in the epistle of Ephesians. Then you have the best message of the Lord Jesus, the risen Christ, to the church at Ephesus in Revelation chapter two. Here are his precious instructions, advice and counsel. that we've mentioned. The Lord is in verse seventeen getting back to that. Fear fell upon them. There you have conviction. When a person begins to fear God and think about his sins, he gets under conviction. He thinks of how he has sinned against God and he's lost and he's not going to heaven. And I tell you, I spent many a sleep this night before I got saved. I feared God. I feared death. I feared covering judgment. And here you find them fearing. Fear fell upon them. There's their conviction in verse seventy. Many believed and came and confessed. There's their confession. They burned their books. Here you have their consecration. You know, Ephesus was the center of a lot of art. various kinds of magical arts and charms and things of that kind, little idols, little gods that were made in Ephesus. And a lot of professors we understand were in those colleges and they were teaching all this line of things. Incantation, books compiled by these professors, they were the books that were brought and burned on this occasion. And these people who accepted Christ, it says they brought their books and their burden. They're trying to think of some thoughts in connection with this act. In other words, they're going to break with the past. These are the things I've been reading. These books by these professors about all the arts and so on, the idolatry of Diana, God, and the Ephesians. When they accepted Christ, they brought these books. And there were many of them. And there must have been a tremendous heap of them. Ten thousand dollars were the books in those days. That would have been a big heap. But it simply meant this. I'm cutting with the pass. I'm not going to bury them. I'm going to burn them. You know, that's where Jacob made his mistake. He buried his idols under an oak. They turned up later. The thing God wants us to do is Burn them. Don't bury anything. You know, sometimes, well, I'll tell you what, Elizabeth just came into my mind now. When I got saved, I was playing hockey up in Canada for the Stratford Indians in the Ontario Hockey Association. And my number in my sweater was two, a big red, two on a white jersey. And, of course, I thought a lot, all that outfit. I got saved. I thought, well, that's the end of that. not going to play hockey anymore I'm going to be out for Christ I'm going to study the Bible and heal myself for Christ and I meant it but you know the next fall came around and papers started showing up the players that were going to be there and when the practice was going to stop we used to go down and run around the arena a few times before they put the ice on it and you know something in me inside me said now why don't you go and get your uniform out and go on down and practice a little bit. And I heard some news about some scouts being around. You know the old devil, he got the better of me, and I went and put it on. In other words, I should have just spoken to them when I got saved, but I put them away. I wanted to keep them as a little keepsake of remembrance of the past. So I put my uniform on, and I went down to the arena. and I don't know when I ever skated so fast as I did. Abe would outskate the other players and boy I tell you when I did that and I'm confident the devil put the speed into my feet. But my foreman in the shop was a Christian and he came up to me the next day in the shop he said, Lester, he said, I was surprised to see you out practicing last night. I thought you'd given up your honor. I said, I thought so too. Well, I thought, now that's the end of this situation. But you know, the next year, the old devil came around again. And oh, when I went to a barber shop and hear the fellas talking and some of the players are being there, I was grinding my teeth and all biting my tongue. In other words, I wanted to get the conversation. Believe it or not, I went and pulled out the old outfit. And as I pulled out the jersey, the moss had gone to work, and the thing was full of holes. I'd put my head through three or four holes in that jersey. I couldn't have worn it if I wanted to. The moss took care of that. You know, God says over in Hosea, he had sent the moss among you. And that was the end. Now, why didn't I bury all that out there when I first got saved? God says, I want a clean cut. I want a clean cut. And so they burned their books. That's it. A break with the past. They didn't bury them. They said, never to get them. Let's ask something else. Likely there was some sentiment attached to these books. Maybe a young man in those days might have said, Well, my father, he gave me these books. Although I don't know whether my father was saved or not. But he worshipped Diana, and I found the light, I found the gospel. And my father gave me these books, you know, they wouldn't like to burn them. I don't think my father would like me to do that. Oh, this thing called sentiments. But no, we bring these books out and on the fire they went, and up in smoke and flame. Someone might have said, well, now, you know, those books cost a lot of money, and undoubtedly they did. Those books were expensive. They cost a lot of money. Not like books today that are printed by the town. out by hand, manuscript form, whoops, they cost a lot of money. And this man might say, well, I'm saved now. I know there's nothing to Diana of Ephesians. I've gotten saved. I like them on my bookshelves. They give a good appearance. You know, whenever a young fellow turns out to be a lawyer, the first thing he does, he buys all shelves, covering one side of his office. He puts them all the finest books up there to give the impression, I know it. I know all that's in that library. He hardly knows anything about it. Give the impression of intelligence, of superiority. Yes, that's got to go on the fire, too, when you get Christ. There are a lot of things that have to go on the fire. They burn their books. They burn their books. Let's speak literally. There are a lot of books today that could be burned. I'd like to jump, dump the whole heap of them. You see, if these books stand on to a heap of books burning in the middle of the town. Chronography. Books that degrade human nature. books that are absolutely filthy. Not to mention books on cults and communism. Yes, there are a lot of books today that should be burned. Books on evolution. I wonder if we're making a clean cut. And getting rid of things, I've been some Christians home and seen some books and literature that I was ashamed to see there, that should have been on the fire. God wants us to make our clean break, as these did on this occasion. When they got saved, they burned all the books, everything that had any connection with idolatry, and the immorality that went along with idolatry. The greatest Diana of the Ephesians know, she has no place in my home or heart. They brought all those books, with all their wealth, And I trust God will help us to do the same thing. Then you come to verses twenty-one and nineteen and so on. Twenty-one, you have trade and politics coming into it. This is very interesting. A new kind of antagonism. Because these men used to make a lot of these, they had factories, and used to make a lot of these little idols and so on, and sell them. And it was quite a business, quite a trade. They made lots of money. And so they got together. You know, this is something. This man, Paul, has come around here. He started preaching. And because of his preaching, people have been getting up to the idols, destroying their idols, destroying their books. They'll buy no more idols. Our craft is in danger. We'll be out of work. The shop will have to close up because this man, Paul, has come around. You know what you have right here in the Acts of the Apostles. the first trade union demonstration. These trade union men, coupled with politics, and something else they had their religion to. For if you'll notice in one verse they're speaking about, they had a closed session about what Paul was doing. And then out in the open they came out with another angle, they talked about That was the appeal to the public. We're trying to depend our God, our religion, our traditional religion. Great is Diana of the Ephesians. Back behind it all, they were thinking about the jobs they were going to lose. That was it. Great is Diana of the Ephesians. You know they howl for two hours. It tells you that in verse thirty-four. And this was a new antagonism to the gospel. trade unions, politics, false religion. I was reading the other day in Unger's Bible Dictionary. If you've got it, well, you can read it yourself. Something about Diana of all the Ephesians. And this is what he seldom tells us. Diana, or Artemis, one of the seven wonders of the world, built in five-fifty before Christ. And he says it was made of pure white marble. a hundred and twenty-seven white marble pillars, each one given by a king at that time. And it was in the form of a many-breasted woman, indicating her emblematic of an abundance of nature, and believed to have fallen down from heaven now. Can you believe that? It fell down from Juniper. Did you imagine anything falling from heaven downward than being in one piece? Remember year or two after I was saved, the Irish family came to our hometown and they were poor. And this is, they can't think of her name right now, but she was saved. The white mother was saved, but the father wasn't. So one of our brethren said, we've got to help them, and so he had a kitchen stove. He said, I'm going to take this stove over to these people's place. I'd like you to come and help them. I said, all right, help me. So I went along. And we took that big snowboard and one of these stove, wood stove, coal stove, and we carried it in there into the kitchen. And of course, the lady of the house, you would delight. Oh, she says, praise God for this. Thank God for this. The Lord answered my prayer. After a while her husband came in, and he's not a one, a Christian, a kind of a sarcastic old Irishman. And she said, oh, John, she said, look what the Lord sent us. This came right from heaven, John. He said, I must have. It's got a crack across the top. Instead of being thankful, he was critical. Well, true enough, if it had come down from heaven, had more than a crack, it had been a thousand pieces. But here they believe, how suspicious could they be? This thing came down from heaven. Great is Diana of the Ephesians. This came down from Jupiter. And the people believed it, believed in such superstition as that. that silver models of the temple of the goddess were made and sold, and this was the deity of the Ephesians. Think of the images and relics sold today. Plenty of them. Idolatry. Cultism has them. Do I need to mention any? What about the mosque of Omar that represents Mohammedanism? What about Salt Lake City, the tabernacle, representing Mormonism, the center and heart of Mormonism? What about Vatican, the heart of Catholicism? But Jesus Christ and his church has no center or office on earth. The head of his body is in heaven itself. We wear no charms or anything of that nature. But think of the crosses that are worn today. Other relics. They have no place for the Christian. And these are the things that God would have us dispose of instead of wearing charms and relics and so on religiously. And even some of them almost worship these little relics. Think of there's something attached to them. God has no time to... So they cried out, Great is Diana of the Ephesians. Do you know cultism and mythism is returning to America? All you've got to do is keep your eyes open. And out in California alone, there are hundreds of new cults bringing up. And some of them are weird. Asiatic religions of many kinds are peeping in to the United States. We're breaking out in groups of practically all over this country and other countries. Nothing else but a lot of superstition, superstitious religions, with their various cults and also their myths. But I want to say we've got an answer to this great is the God of the Ephesians. Great is Diana, the goddess of the Ephesians. Well, I thought of that and made that the sound do nothing. Well, that him, how great thou art. We don't worship an idol. We don't worship some big center of a great movement. We don't worship a mosque. We worship a living God. Not great is Diana and the Ephesians, but great is our God. How great thou art. How great he is in his love. how great he is in his mercy, how great he is in his grace, how great he is in his power, how great he is and will be in his judgment. Thus you have compared man's religions with all their superstitions, their idolatry and the evil that goes along with idolatry. Here you have the reality, the living God, a living Christ, a living message, a living salvation. And yet today, to think of the millions of humanity, especially in these born countries, bowing down by the millions, the only thing that sustains them in these dreadful diamonds they have and all the wars that are sweeping these countries, the only strength they have and derive is from a little idol. For at a relic, something of that nature, a religion that has no mention or reference in the Word of God and the Word of God condemned. But anyone in these countries, in these circumstances, are referred to who know the Lord Jesus Christ. They've got reality. They've got a life to look forward to after death, and this life is horrible in many cases. They've got a living Christ. They anticipate being with them unlike them forever. But oh, these poor, deluded, deceived souls, who live on the strength of the possibility of a life after death. And, oh, what suspicion and what superstition associated with these religions. And so this will happen. For two hours they tried out, great is Diana of Ephesians. In other words, here you have the devil working. Now, God's been working. And here's this trade union. And they've been working. But what have they been doing? They've been making idols, relics, and so on, associated with this deficient deity. They certainly were working for the devil, those men. The Apostle Paul had been working for the true God. These other men have been making a living out of the idols, the devil's business. You find here how Alexander the Copper-Smith, and Paul speaks of him later on in his epistle. Paul had anything but complimentary remarks to say about Alexander the Copper-Smith, who did me much more. When you have contrasted in this incident, Christian zeals, as seen in Paul, along with idolatrous fanaticism. But by the way, there's a lot of fanaticism today. It's later nice to notice that the town clerk He got in touch with this, Demetrius, the leader of this strike for this demonstration. And he urged him to bring his case to court, for it's an easy thing to arouse. Our crowd and our mob, that's a lot easier than to have things settled and prove your point legally in a court. That's the exact thing that this man was urging. That wasn't done. It wasn't done. The town clerked. And you notice how he too was a worshipper of this goddess, Diana. And he says, you know, the world knows. And don't get excited. Don't get disturbed. Don't get upset about our losing our great God. The world knows how real our religion is. And how sincere we are. And all the world worships. Diana of the Ephesians. That was an overstatement. Not very much of the world, just those in Ephesus and possibly a few scattered in the area were worshippers of the great Dianus, the great God of Ephesus. Yet he says the whole world worships our God, our Goddess, trying to appease the crown, but it didn't work. Finally this crowd subsided and noise subsided. And he was able to send them all home, as you'll notice in the last verse or two. He got control of the situation, and the people dispersed him at home. But here you find the difference between zeal, Christian zeal, the zeal of the Apostle Paul and the happenings and the activities of these zealots. These panatics, and how they were trying to propagate their false religion and worship their God and trying to get others to worship their God, the great goddess of the Ephesians. The big difference between that kind of zeal and true zeal. In this case, this kind of zeal was hypocritical, and I already pointed out, they first of all began thinking of themselves and their jobs and losing their jobs and they fought it in time and then afterwards they brought it out to them the light but when they came out to the public they made the claim that they were trying to defend their goddess they wanted to get rid of this new religion because this new religion was going to destroy the religion of the ephesians and damage their goddess well as he was such a great goddess Why couldn't she defend herself? That's the one thing I've often wondered about these idolaters. They're supposed to have a God, and he's supposed to be a great God, a mighty God. Yet he never seems to come to the rescue of his worshipers. And if Diana is so great, if she came down from heaven, why doesn't she defend herself? Why doesn't she dispose of people like the Apostle Paul who were preaching something that destroys... her doctrine. Here you have the zeal of these misguided Satanists trying to defend their goddess. Our God defends us. But it's another thing when you see what the Apostle Paul stood for. What he stood for, his zeal was based on truth, not error. Paul says... I am not mad, most noble Fester, but speak, Festus, later on speaking to Festus. I am not mad, most noble Festus, but I speak forth the words of truth and soberness. What a contrast to what this fellow was saying about the great God of Zion. Paul said, I'm on more solid ground than that. And I'm not mad. You think I'm a fanatic, Festus. You think I'm mad. I'm not. My zeal is genuine. I know whereof I speak. And I would that you believe the truth. I speak forth the words of truth and soberness. Paul says, I've got a foundation for my faith. I've got a real foundation for my zeal. I'm not beating the air. I know whereof I speak. I'm standing on solid ground. My God is not an idol. My God is the living God. Big difference today between true zeal and false zeal. I want to say this, a lot of these cults, with their false zeal or their zeal in something that's false, it might be better to put it that way. They put real Christians to shame, do you know that? They have the right method, but the wrong message. We've got the right message, but the wrong method. These people and these cults, they don't mind going from house to house. They don't mind being persecuted. They don't mind being laughed at. Oh, no. Misguided zeal, just like the worshippers of the great goddess Diane. They were willing to suffer and fight for what they believed. True Christians, hard to do anything by comparison. with those who have a false foundation, nothing solid but dependable. But Paul, he knew, were off he stood. Another thing, true Christian zeal, its motive is love, but not hatred. Love to preach the gospel. This is the zeal God wants. Such a zeal is reasonable and courageous. Paul would have gone into that place where the mob was, and they were shouting and howling for two hours, and he was restrained by some of his party. Don't you go in, Paul? And some of the chiefs, in Asia, men of high authority, sent word for Paul not to go in there. He had likely been pulled apart. But he wasn't afraid. The Apostle Paul was bold. He had plenty of zeal. But you do seize them. Real common sense being used here to keep Paul out of that place. Wonderful to have zeal for something that's genuine, that you're sold on, that you love. And if Paul had got in there, what would he have done? He'd have preached the gospel. He'd have told them of the love of God. Love would have motivated him. But what motivated these other people with this false religion? Hatred. I want to tell you this, throughout the Acts and the history of the Church, it's always been the Christians, the born-again Christians, who were persecuted and not doing the persecuting. Now remember that. When you go out with the Gospel, you know Christ, you believe in salvation by grace, and you don't believe that salvation is obtainable by a good life. but obtainable only through the Lord Jesus. You preach that kind of doctrine, and live it, and you'll be persecuted. When you talk about we get to heaven by works, we get to heaven by being good, we get to heaven by being liberal, we get to heaven by being a member of the church, you won't have any persecution. You'll get by. But you say, no, salvation is not by any of those. Salvation is absolutely and altogether in Christ. It's what Christ did for me, not what I do for him. His blood tingeth from sin, and I'm saved by grace through faith. Not of myself. This is the gift of God. Not of works. I can't boast. And I'll tell you, you'll get persecuted. It's always the legalists that persecute the one that has the liberty. That happens Back in Paul's day, all through the axiom was the Jews, the infuriated Jews, who stood for Moses and the law. They were the ones who were persecuting the Christians. The enemies of the cross are motivated by hatred, but the lovers of the cross are motivated by love. Let them hate me because I know Christ. Let them hate me because I stand for all that's in the Bible, and all the fundamentals of the Word of God, giving Christ all the glory for my salvation, and all the glory for anything I've been able to do since I've been saved by His help and grace. But let me not hate. My place is to love my enemy. It's the ones who are on a false basis, who believe in legalism, or human merit, or work to take them to heaven. They're the ones that take the truth. And that just the old age-long battle of truth against error, right against wrong, holiness against sin, and Christ against the devil. And you stand for the truth, and you'll be persecuted, but you won't persecute. You trade for the others, but they'll get their eyes open. They'll get to understand the truth and come into the light. No Christian has a right to hate those who persecute him. You should love him. His zeal is motivated by love. At times it's pretty hard. But that was true of the Apostle in the early church, and all through the Acts, all the persecution down the ages, has been against the Christian. and kind and treating, and that's the way it should be. They said concerning the Lord Jesus Christ, a way with this man will not have him to reign over us. He says, Father, forgive them. They know not what they do. Christ says, Marve, not that the world hates you. It hated me before it hated you. Love your enemies. Pray for them. Do good to them that despitefully treats you. that's the Christian attitude, is seen as motivated by love. Those who are embracing and held by a wrong religion, and all religion in the true sense is wrong because Christianity is different from a religion. Christianity embodies Christ, but the religions of men do not. And so the story is that that which is real and genuine And all our investment for time and eternities in Jesus Christ. And if you love Him, you'll love souls. You'll love others. But you won't hate your enemy. And if you're persecuted for righteousness' sake, happy are you? For great is your reward in heaven. Now this is what the Word of God teaches along this line. So here's truth. and it will always triumph, every time. The truth will triumph. True zeal is tempered by discretion, and truth will triumph in the end. And in this incident you have the case of politics and religion. Getting together to fight the gospel, and those who preached the gospel, the Apostle Paul, in my mind, couldn't help it. But going back to what you've got in Daniel, You've got politics in chapter two, the big colossus, the four world powers seen in the four metals of that image. That's chapter two, that's politics. Chapter three, the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar says you've got to worship before you die. There you have the two politics and religion together. And the same thing is true in the future. Revelation chapter thirteen, the beast, the political monster that's coming up. Revelation chapter seventeen and eighteen, the scarlet woman religion, and the scarlet woman rides the beat. Politics and religion together to fight the truth of God. And here you've got it in this chapter. Trade human unions, the working man, the politicians, and they're against Paul and the message he preaches, and they speak about their great religion, their great traditions, their great laws. the gospel and those who preach it and those who hurt. So I trust that these things, we have helped to us. We've got a message to proclaim. God helped us to have the courage to give it up. We've got the right message. Are we going to use the right method to witness for Christ at every opportunity? Give out Christ and do it in love. If you do, you'll succeed if you don't. You won't succeed. It's just that simple. And I trust we will, those of us who know Christ seek to manifest a little of that same love for others who are lost. Without the Savior, sincere as many are in their false cults, in their false religions, very sincere but sincerity will not save. Only Christ can save. If we Christians who are born again and have the sincerity that some of these other people have, who've got a false religion, There'll be a whole lot done in Albany, Georgia. We need some of this kind of zeal. We don't want their message. We don't want their air. But we'd like to have some of that zeal and that sincerity to get us what we believe. We have a living Christ. We have a living Word, and we're going through a place, a living place. God and his people will dwell forever these other souls know nothing of what's going to be after death. Some think their spirits will enter into dogs. They'll be reincarnated into something they know not one. And yet they're so sincere in trying to get others to believe what they have believed. And if they do, they make themselves too full-born, the child of hell. They make the ones that they've deceived. The one they work so hard they win to their religion. The Lord Jesus says, Why, you've got that much zeal, you'll come for sea and land to make one convert or one proselyte. When you've made him, you've made him two more, two-fold more, the child of hell than you are. That's zeal for you. Accomposing sea and land to get one new follower. Are we that anxious to get one new member to the body of Christ? To see a soul saved by the grace of God. I don't care who the man is. He can be a Chinaman. He can be a colored man. But I'd take just as much time with him right at the front to point him to Christ if he ever came back to the chapel again or not. I want him to be saved and go to heaven. And it would shock you if you knew some of the things that are carried on in some of these campaigns up in North Carolina. Jackie Burris was helping a big campaign. He preached the gospel. He asked some of the preachers to come up and point these souls to Christ. I heard one preacher. He spoke to this young girl who was sitting there crying. He said, young lady, where do you live? And she gave the city, and where she lived, about fifty, sixty miles away. He passed on by and went to someone else. He found that lived entirely. He had to come and join his church. No time to spend with her because she's not going to be able to join. souls. Friend, we want to see you saved, whether we get the chance to help you afterwards or not. We'd love to have the chance to help you. But we want to see you saved, and in heaven, whether we ever see you again on earth. Shall we pray? Our Father, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, we come before thee. We thank thee for the apostles. The marvelous example he set of untiring labor, of undaunted courage, and his love for Christ, and his love for souls, and the sons of men. Oh, that we might have a little of his zeal, a little father of his love for precious souls.