that our brother Mr. William Barr is not very well today, yesterday. He's got terrific pain in his leg, which he suffers a lot from arthritis, but he's got really a bad attack, so pray for Brother Barr and many others to pray for. Dr. Milton Weir is in He keeps bright, but he's in bad shape. We need to pay for Brother Rear and for Mrs. Lear. Now, shall we turn, please, to the thirteenth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles? Now, for those of you that are visiting, I might mention that for some while now, whenever I have been speaking on Sunday morning, I've been speaking from the Acts of the Apostles, and we're gradually, slowly going through the Acts of the Apostles verse by verse, and we're somewhere in the thirteenth chapter, the last time I spoke. So we're going to read this morning from the thirteenth chapter and verse forty-four, the end of the chapter, verse forty-four. And the next Sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God. But when the Jews saw the multitude, they were filled with envy and spake against those things which were spoken by Paul, contradicting and blaspheming. Then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold and said, It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you. to the Jews in the synagogue at Antioch in Pisidia. It was necessary that the Word of God should first have been spoken to you, but seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth. And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord, and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed. And the word of the Lord was published throughout all the regions. But the Jews stirred up the devout and honorable women and the chief men of the city and raised persecution against Paul and Barnabas and expelled them out of their coast. But they shook off the dust from their feet against them and came unto Iconia. And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Ghost. May God bless that portion of his work. Shall we pray? Blessed Lord, we thank thee for the Apostle Paul and for his wonderful zeal for thee. We thank thee from the hour of his conversion. He was devoted to thee, one hundred percent that served thee. And we thank you for the great work he did in evangelizing the peoples of the Roman Empire in that far away day. We thank thee. Thy word is the same today as ever. and there's just as much power in the word of God. The gospel is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes. So we pray that you'll bless thy word among us today. As we seek to learn more of thy ways, we seek thy blessings in the precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Now what we have been saying here over the while we've been speaking on the Acts, is that we're seeking to look upon the Acts of the Apostles as a pattern which God has given us, which the Lord Jesus has given us for the building of his church. And we went right back to Exodus twenty-five, where God asked the children of Israel to bring precious costly gifts to bring and give to him And these gifts were to be used in the building of a tabernacle. And God says, I'm going to come down and dwell among you. But I want you to make the house. It wasn't a house. It was a tent. I want you to make this tent, this tabernacle, in which I will dwell. Remember, he came down and dwelt in the Holy of Holies in that holy place in the tabernacle. But he said to Moses, Come up into the mount, and up in the mount I'm going to show you. patterns of the things you have to make and I want you to do all things according to the pattern that I will show you that's Exodus twenty five and Moses came down and he built the tabernacle according to the pattern now what I've been suggesting here is that when the Lord Jesus went back to the glory of heaven he came here of course on earth to give his life for us. Man is a sinner. Man could never enter heaven because of his sin. And the Lord Jesus came down here, and in that wondrous redemption he wrought his calvary, he made it possible for lost sinners to be saved and to be cleansed and made fit to enter heaven. God The word of God is divided the history of the human race into dispensation, periods of time. Each one has its own characteristic, and God has his own way of dealing with them under these various dispensations, starting from the dispensation of innocence in the Garden of Eden, right on until we got, in the time of Moses, Moses went up onto the mountain, God gave him the law, and there started the dispensation of law, law. Some fifteen hundred years God dealt with his people under law. And the Jewish people who came up out of Egypt, slaves out of Egypt, he welded them into a nation, and they became a great people. but they were always governed by his law. Now they didn't keep it, because they couldn't keep it. He said, when God gave the law, the foolish things they said, we will do all things. Now, you just read the words, how foolish they were. Exodus nineteen. Is this thing going around? Can you hear me all right? Not too garbled? I don't get too near to it. In Exodus nineteen, Moses went up into the mountain, and God gave the Ten Commandments. And Moses went up unto God, chapter nineteen, verse three, and the Lord called unto him out of the mountain, saying, Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel, You have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bear you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself. Now therefore, if you will obey my voice, look at this. If you will obey my voice, and keep my covenant, then ye should be a peculiar people unto me above all people, for all the earth is mine, and ye should be under me a kingdom of priests and an holy nation, And these are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel. And Moses came and called for the elders of the people, and laid before their faces all these words which the Lord commanded. Now listen to what they said. And all the people answered together and said, All that the Lord has spoken will we do. They were bold, weren't they? Weren't they brave? All that the Lord has spoken will we do. And Moses returned the words of the Lord, of the people unto the Lord. And then Moses went back into the mountain. And God gave him the law. And the first words of the law is, I am the Lord thy God that brought thee out of Egypt. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. And then he gave him the Ten Commandments, and they said, All that the Lord has spoken will do. And when Moses came down from the mountain already... They'd made two golden calves, and they said, These be thy gods, though Israel, that brought thee up out of Egypt. How bold they were. All that God has spoken, we would do, and immediately. Within forty days, they were worshiping idols. Now that tells you something about the human heart. We make promises to God. We say, We'll do this. How we all know. How I know. How you know. We promise we'll do this. We'll do that. But, oh, how we fail. because we're human, because we're sinners. And the law of God was given to prove that man is a sinner. God says, do his. And I said, well, I can't do it. Oh, boldly they said, we will do it, but we can't do it. How many people today have been to church today and quoted the Ten Commandments? And yet in some kind of a blindness, they feel they can still keep the Ten Commandments, but you can't do it. That's God's perfect law, which proves to man he's a sinner because he can't do it. But I'm rather wondering, digressing, this is what God does in this law. The Lord Jesus came down here to do something altogether fresh. He went to the cross of Calvary and I have the opinion that when he said it is finished, when he said it is finished, because that covers a lot of things, but there was one scripture not fulfilled. Everything that was written about him, all the prophecies concerning his suffering and his death fulfilled except once. He said, in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink. And so the Lord cried with a loud voice, I thirst. And they gave him the vinegar. And then he said, it is finished. Every scripture written about him was complete. It is finished. I remember once when I was preaching in England as a young man in my twenties, I suppose, and a very honored servant of God was in the meeting. And I was preaching on that verse, it is finished. And I said, When the Lord said it is finished, salvation's work was done. He got older than me after this, very honored man. He said, now listen, young man, that wasn't right what you said on Sunday nights, you know. I said, oh, what was wrong? He said, well, salvation's work was not finished when he said that. He said the Lord was referring to all the scriptures being finished. Well, I said, how about the seventeenth chapter of John, where he says, I have finished the work thou gavest me to do. He says, that's right. The work that God gave him to do here, as a perfect man on earth, he finished all that. But salvation was another thing. He said, on the day of atonement, when the high priest went into the holy place, he sprinkled the blood on the mercy seat. And he said, salvation's work was not finished. until the Lord Jesus, after his resurrection, I couldn't follow him, but this is what he was telling me, that he morally, in effect, his blood was sprinkled on the mercy seat in heaven. And when his blood was sprinkled on the mercy seat in heaven, then it was finished. Well, I said to you, Brother, I bow before you as a man of knowledge and learning, but I still believe through all the years that when the Lord Jesus said it is finished, salvation's work was done. I believe that when the Lord Jesus paid that tremendous price on the cross, he bore our sins in his own body on the tree, and there is nothing left for you and me to do to get to heaven. We cannot work to get there. The only thing we can do is accept what the Lord Jesus did. The Lord Jesus paid the price of our sins at the place called Calvary. He died for our sins according to the Scripture. He was buried. The third day he rose again, and all we have to do is accept that. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and God gives us eternal life. Now Paul preached this, God. And I say that the Lord Jesus came here to start a new dispensation. The dispensation of law, when he said it is finished, that's another thing that's finished, I believe. The dispensation of law ended. And it talks about it beginning to dawn towards the first day of the week. The Sabbath was connected with the law. Not necessarily the Sabbath... Right back in creation, the Lord rested on the seventh day. But the Sabbath was largely connected with the law. But it says on the resurrection morning, it was dawning towards some new era, the first day of the week. And today we don't talk about the Sabbath anymore. People who don't understand the scriptures, they say, they go to church on the Sabbath, but they don't. If you go to church on the Sabbath, you've got to go on a Saturday. That's the Sabbath. The Sabbath was the seventh day of the week, but there was a new word came in, the Lord's day. That's the first day of the week, and it was dawning toward the first day of the week. Now the Lord Jesus was going to set up a new dispensation. We call it the dispensation of grace. And in this period, which has been running now since the day of Pentecost, nearly two thousand years, in this era, God is calling out of the nations of people for himself. God is building a church. Now, a church in the New Testament is not a building made with stones. We say, I'm going to church. Well, they mean people when they say that man, they mean they're going to a building, which they call a church. Well, we can do that if we want to, but that's not what the New Testament means by a church. A church is built of living stones, built of men and women who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's a spiritual church. Paul says we have been built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets. And God is building a spiritual house. It says you're no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens were the saints in the household of God and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets. Now the apostles and prophets were the leaders and the found the Lord Jesus was the chief cornerstone the church is built on he says upon this rock through this confession that thou art the Christ the son of the living God upon this rock will I build my church the Lord Jesus is the chief cornerstone but the apostles and prophets were built upon the foundation of apostles and prophets when the Lord Jesus went up to heaven he gave gifts to men he gave apostles prophets evangelists pastors teachers The apostles and prophets were first, this thing's worrying me. Is it worrying you? Yeah? Wait a minute. I think we're a bit junior. Is that better? Now it's going to go for a walk. I think that's better, isn't it? The Lord Jesus ascended upon high Ephesians chapter four, and he gave gifts to men. He gave apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers. The apostles were for the first century, for the establishing of the church. An apostle had to be a person who had seen the Lord. Paul said, Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen the Lord? That's an apostle. The prophets were those men to whom God gave special vision and special revelations in the early days of the church. Don't forget that when the church came into being, when Paul went out and preached these sermons we're talking about here, there was no New Testament. They had the Old Testament. The New Testament was being written. It was Paul who wrote most of the books of the New Testament. That had to be written. And these prophets, were the ones to whom God revealed things in that early day of the church's history, and they wrote them in the epistles. But the apostles have gone and the prophets have gone. And today we have pastors and teachers. And we have a sitting thing here, too. So the Lord Jesus came here to start something new. His church. Now until the day of Pentecost, there were two groups of people in the world, the Jew and the Gentile. The Gentile takes a vast, in a vast area. The Jew was God's chosen people. He said, I read to you. You should be able to keep these commandments. You'll be a peculiar people unto me. But on the day of Pentecost, a new thing starts. It's called the Church of God. So Paul tells us in the Ephesian Epistle, Paul tells us that... Remember, he says to these Gentiles, in times past, You were Gentiles in the flesh. At that time you were, without Christ, being aliens from the Commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ, you sometimes were far off. The Gentiles were far off. In Christ, you were sometimes were far off or made nighed by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who has made both one and broken down the middle wall of perdition, and abolishing his flesh the enmity, and so to make of twain one new man. What he's saying is, out of the Jew and out of the Gentile, he's making something new. And in the world today, there are three groups of people that God looks down upon. The Jew, the Gentile, and the Church of God. Now most of us were born Gentiles. Maybe someone here was born a Jew. But when I accept Christ as my Savior, I'm no longer a Gentile, no longer a Jew. I become something new, the Church of God. And every true born-again believer in the Lord Jesus. Never mind the question of denominations or what church he belongs to. Every true born-again believer in the Lord Jesus, the moment he accepts Christ as his Savior, becomes a member of the Church of God. And he's no longer in God's reckoning a Gentile or a Jew, but he is in the Church of God. And this is what God is doing today. He's calling out of people, according to Acts chapter fifteen, out of the nations. He's calling of people for himself. He's building a church. That church will be the bride of Christ. We're going to share the glory of heaven with the Lord Jesus Christ. But the great vital question for you and me today is, Am I in the church? Am I in the church? I was born a Gentile, but have I ever been born again? Oh, they're playing with this term, this phrase, born again today, and I think they're banding it around and making the right thing, being born again to Jesus. To be born again means I have accepted the Lord Jesus. The Lord Jesus said to Nicodemus, this religious man, Marvel not that I say unto you, ye must be born again. Now if the Lord Jesus said ye must be born again, let me ask myself now. And would you please ask yourself now, have I ever been born again? Is there a moment in my life when I accepted the Lord Jesus and became a Christian? When I was born again. Now I remember that moment. I could take you to the very spot. And I remember the moment. The last Sunday in March in the year. Nineteen ten. Far, far away in the city of Bristol, England. On that Sunday night. As a man read John three sixteen. And he came to the word believe it. Whosoever believed it in him. I said to myself. I've always believed it. But that moment God saved me. God so loved the world. that he gave his own begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. And so by believing in the Lord Jesus, accepting him as our Savior, we are born again, and then we become members of this new thing, the church. Now this is what I'm getting at. Up in the head, up at the top of Mount Corinth, God gave Moses a pattern. but the Lord Jesus has given us a pattern for his church. And I'm suggesting in this series of talks that that pattern which he's given us is the Acts of the Apostles. That in the Acts of the Apostles we find out how the church should be run, what we should do. Now in the chapter we're in, the thirteenth chapter, we're talking about foreign missions. You see, the Lord told his disciples to start in Jerusalem and then go to Judea, Samaria, and then the other most parts of the earth. They did a wonderful job at Jerusalem. In Acts four, the last verse, it says there were five thousand of them saved and in the fellowship of that early church. And then they spread out to Samaria, Judea and Samaria, and they got down to Antioch in Syria, where a large local church was formed. And out of that church, God called two men. We read of it, we studied it. It says, as they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I've called them. And Barnabas and Saul were called what for? To go to the othermost parts of the earth. The Lord said, Beginning in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the othermost parts of the earth. And these men, when they passed, they prayed, laid their hands on them and sent them away. So they being sent forth by the Holy Ghost. They weren't sent forth by a mission board. They didn't have to go around and visit lots of churches and say, can you pay me thirty dollars a month and you thirty dollars a month and you thirty dollars a month so I can get my support. No, they didn't do that. They were sent forth by the Holy Ghost and they went out. God supported them. And they preached to God. The first missionary journey in the church's history, they went to the island of Cyprus and went through there. One great work was done there. There was a man called Sergius Paulus, and he was a deputy there, had a big position in the government. God saved him, and I'm sure a church was formed there. And then they went over to the mainland of Asia Minor and went to Perga, and then went up to Pasidia, and Paul went into the synagogue. His method was to go into the synagogue and preach to the Jews. And he recounted to them in this wonderful address, we talked about it last time I was speaking, he recounted to them how God dealt with his people, brought them out of Egypt, and then how they rebelled and rebelled and rebelled against them. And then finally he accused them of the Jewish nation with the murder of the Lord Jesus. He said, They that dreaded Jerusalem and their rulers, because they knew him not, no yet the voices of the prophets which are read every Sabbath, they fulfilled them in condemning them. And though they found no cause of death in him, yet they desired that Pilate should, desired Pilate that he should be slain. And when they fulfilled all that was written of him, they took him down from the tree and laid him in the sepulchre, but God raised him from the dead. And then he preached the gospel. And the result of the preaching was there, that Sabbath day in the synagogue, in Antioch Percius, the result was, It says, God, be it known unto you, therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins. Now these Jews were going on trying and trying and trying to keep the law and never knew what forgiveness of sins meant. But Paul says, through Jesus Christ, is preached to you the forgiveness of sins. And by then, listen to this verse. by him all that believe are justified from all things from which they could not be justified by the law of Moses. What Paul is saying, and he repeats it and makes it so clear in the third chapter and the fourth chapter of Romans, he tells us that by faith, when we accept the Lord Jesus, the Lord justified. It says of Abraham in the fourth chapter of Romans, Abraham believed God and God reckoned it unto him for righteousness. We can never be righteous ourselves because we're sinners. But when we accept the Lord Jesus Christ, God reckons us righteous. Why? Because the Lord Jesus bore all our sins. We accept him. Our sins are put away and we're clean and cleansed in his sight. This is what he's saying. Do I justify? Justify me to be reckoned. just as if I'd never sinned at all. So he says, by him, all that believe are justified from all things from which they could not be justified by the law of Moses. Now what if there's someone here this morning and you're wondering now, am I saved? Suppose I die today, would I go to heaven? I wish I was sure. I wish I could be sure about it. Well here you can be sure. All that believe are justified. made just as if they never sinned before at all. I justified from all things. So this morning you can sit in the seat there, justify. All sins put away because the Lord Jesus bore your sin at Calvary's cross. That's what Paul preached. Now then, what did that do? Well, When Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles would thought that these words might be heard the next Sabbath. And when the congregation was broken up, many of the Jews in religious proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who was speaking to them, persuaded them to continue in the grace of God. That's the case. That day many had accepted Christ as Savior, and he continued them to, he persuaded them to continue. And the next Sabbath day, that's where we come today, the next Sabbath day, came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God. This is a missionary going out for the first time with the gospel. Gospel had never been preached in this city before, and came nearly the whole city together to hear the word of God. And when the Jews saw them of the Jews, they were filled with envy. When the Jews saw their city God filled up with Gentiles that Sunday, that Sabbath day, they didn't like that at all. We Jews have no dealings with the Gentiles. They called them Gentile dogs. They didn't want, and when the Gentiles came in, they didn't like that. They were filled with envy, and they blasphemed and contradicted Paul. And Paul turned and said it was necessary because Paul says, when the Lord commanded Paul and gave him his marching orders, he said, to the Jew first and also to the Gentiles. So it was necessary, he said, that we should preach to the Jews. It was necessary that the Word of God should first be spoken to you, but seemingly the Jews should put it from you and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life. Lo, we turn to the Gentiles, for so hath the Lord said, I have set thee to be a light to the Gentiles. that thou shouldst be for salvation to the ends of the earth. And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and glorified the word of the Lord, and as many were ordained to eternal life's belief. Now he turned to the Gentiles, and many Gentiles accepted Christ. And the Lord Jesus is building his church. His church is built of Jews and of Gentiles. And the Lord's starting here, he's building his church in a strange land, not in Israel, a way out in Asia Minor, Paul is preaching and men and women, Gentile men and women, accept him and a church is formed there in Antioch in Christ's city. Now this is how the gospel has to go out. This is the way missionary work must be done. We go out and in the power of the Holy Spirit we tell people the way to be saved, form the scripture and the Holy Spirit does the work. You and I can't say so. I could talk to you all night, but I can't save you. I can only tell you what God says. And if you will accept what God says, the Holy Spirit will confirm it in your heart and you'll be saved. And this is what happened. Most of Jews accepted Christ. And churches were formed. And Paul went on and on and on. We'll see that as we go on in our study. As a great missionary to the Gentile nation. This was his first missionary journey. And the reaction in that city, and it was the same in nearly every city, the Jews were against him. The Jews stirred up the devout and honorable women, and the chief men of the city, and raised persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them out of their coats. And they shook off the dust from their feet and came to Iconia. So that was his work in Antioch and Presidia. And the Jews stirred up the whole crowd against them, and they went on to the next city. And when they got, well, we'll come to it. They dragged him out. They stoned him to death. They dragged him out as a dead man in Lystra. God restored his life to him. But Saul suffered persecution. But still he went on. Still he went on preaching this gospel. Now that's the gospel that we preach. That by faith in the Lord Jesus, we're justified from all things from which we could not be justified from the law of Moses. And I say to you this morning, as we close our meetings, If you've never yet fallen in with God's offer of mercy, if you've never yet accepted the Lord as your own personal Savior, now is the chance. It couldn't be a better one. If you bow where you are in your seat, and as we close our meeting, you say, Lord Jesus, I'm a sinner. I believe you've died for me, and I would like this peace. I would like to know I've got this justification. I would like to know I've saved. I'd like to be sure I'm going to heaven. I was talking to some people last night and they told me what a wonderful thing it was when they found out. They heard somebody talk about eternal security. Eternal security. They'd never heard of it. They said, what's that? Eternal security. This person said, I had to leave down the Lord Jesus. But I never knew what eternal security means. It means this. I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish. And now they shall any man pluck them out of my hand. When you accept the Lord Jesus as Savior, you have eternal salvation, eternal security. And we'll all be in heaven there because of what you do. Shall we pray? Blessed be Lord Jesus, we bow before thee now and thank thee for the great sacrifice thou didst accomplish at the place called Calvary. And thou knowest every heart here this morning. We don't. Thou knowest the thoughts of our heart, how we're feeling and thinking, how we're reacting to this message from thy word. We pray, Lord, that quietly in the quiet closing moments of this meeting, each one of us saved and unsaved, might afresh renew our covenant with these. He that believeth on the Son, half of our lasting life, give us that eternal security in our hearts this morning, that because we believe in the Lord Jesus, we know we are eternally safe and sound and secure. And we'll be in heaven with thee, and that we've been justified, and our sins put away forever. We pray this might be so in every heart here this morning, as we separate and seek thy parting blessing in our Savior's precious name.