The Mystery of Providence – Acts 15:26-41

If we had a quiz this morning on the geography of the United States, I wonder how well we would do?

If I asked you to name the capitals of the fifty states, how well you would do?

If I asked you to visualize the location of the state of Rhode Island, would you get it right?

If I asked you to name the capital of Rhode Island, would you be able to tell me?

The history of Rhode Island and the name “Roger Williams” cannot be separated very far.

And whether you love or hate Roger Williams for being called a Baptist when he really wasn’t, I think that he still deserves our respect for several reasons.

One of the things that he did was to risk his life for the sake of religious freedom.

When he fled Massachusetts in 1636 and settled on Narragansett Bay, he establish a community that eventually became the capital of Rhode Island.

How God spared his life through that first extremely bitter winter is an inspiring story.

And because he could see the handiwork of God throughout that year, Williams gave his new and tiny community the name: “Providence.”

The word “providence” is defined as “advanced care or preparation – foresight.”

DIVINE providence is the care, guardianship, control and direction of God.

In the sight of William Rogers, there was Divine providence in his settling in Providence.

I realize that I preached a message which I called “Divine Providence” back in March.

I used a passage from Acts 8 as our text.

I make no apology for coming back to this theme this morning,

Because Divine providence is one of the core characteristics of the Kingdom of Heaven.

It may not be properly called an attribute of God, but it is so closely linked to the sovereignty and omnipotence of the Lord, that it cannot be ignored.

If God is God then there must be such a thing as Divine providence – the care, guardianship, control and direction of God.

Throughout Acts 16 and on through the rest of the New Testament we are going to catch glimpses of the missionary ministry of Silas.

He was with Paul in Philippi when Lydia became a Christian and when a demon-possessed girl was freed from her bondage.

Silas was then arrested with Paul and cast into prison, only to be released by a 6.4 Richter earthquake.

This man was extremely important in the initial evangelization of Europe.

And because of that, Silas is a part of the reason that the United States has been traditionally called a Christian nation.

Permeating every part of this extended equation has been the providence of God, overseeing and guaranteeing every step.

I’m calling this message “The Mystery of Providence.”

But let’s begin with the mystery of SALVATION.

On several occasions Paul asked people to pray for him that he might be able clearly explain the mystery of the gospel.

In Ephesians 1 he wrote: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ:

According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:

Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,

To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.

In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace; wherein he hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence;

Having made known unto us the MYSTERY OF HIS WILL, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself.”

It has been a part of the mysterious will of God to save a few of us wretched sinners for His glory.

For several weeks I have been reading a very detailed debate about the nature of salvation from sin.

At least half of it is so far over my head that all I can see is the contrail.

The various litigants argue over such things as the difference between faith and believing,

And which comes first seeing or perceiving.

They argue over the difference between pardoning the guilty and justifying the ungodly.

I have to admit that I haven’t been able to get very excited about most of these things.

Several of the articles discuss the different opinions of people who all agree that God sovereignly saves by grace alone.

So basically the difference between them lays in the area of WHAT man does and WHEN he does it.

Does the sinner repent of his sin after regeneration but before conversion, or is it the other way around.

One chapter heatedly discusses the question of whether faith precedes or follows repentance.

That is a question on which I do have an opinion,

But then the debate switched to whether the order was chronological or moral.

Does it matter? A few people, a VERY few people, think that it really does.

Whatever the answers to these questions might be:

I think that it’s safe to say that your pastor is not going to be invited to join the staff of any of the big seminaries in the near future.

I really don’t care whether the hair should be split down the middle or diagonally from side to side.

If I have learned anything during these studies, it is that there can be a great deal of mystery in salvation.

But the DEGREE of that mystery doesn’t have to be as mind-boggling as some people make it to be.

As the council in Jerusalem declared, salvation from sin is by the grace of God.

It is not necessary, or even practical, to order the Gentiles to obey the laws of Moses in order to be saved.

Salvation is by grace alone.

That means that the sinner can’t do anything to cause or contribute to his FORGIVENESS.

If a man steals something, and returns it undamaged, he might be forgiven by the victim based upon that return.

But, although stealing is sin, sin is not a theft of the property of God.

A sinner has nothing that he can return to the Lord in order to facilitate God’s forgiveness.

And there is nothing that a sinner can do to be born again or REGENERATED.

To regenerate something means to restore something that is dead back to life – to generate it again.

A rechargeable battery can be regenerated, but even it has to be regenerated by outside source.

Sinners are spiritually dead, and there is nothing that a dead person can do to force, entice or otherwise convince God to restore him to life.

And there is nothing that a sinner can do to become a CHILD OF GOD.

Does a little baby determine its own conception?

We can go through each aspect of salvation and point out the impossibility of the sinner’s input.

We could talk about justification, atonement, adoption, the work of the Spirit, etc. etc. etc.

There is absolutely nothing that a spiritually dead sinner can do to bring about any part of his salvation.

“But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared,

Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost;

Which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour;

That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.”

We sometimes sing the hymn “Amazing Grace.”

One of ways in which God’s grace is so amazing is in its mystery.

It is not impossible to define and explain grace in some sort of dictionary fashion,

But at the same time in many ways it IS inexplicable.

For example, when our first parents chose to rebel against God,

Why didn’t the Lord eradicate man from the face of creation and start over again?

Not only did the Lord have the ability to destroy creation, but He had the right to do so.

But God graciously chose to take a different path: to make some of those filthy sinners into saints.

The Lord chose to make a bunch of those sinners better than even Adam and Eve had been.

That choice is illogical to the mind of man, especially when we consider the Price that had to be paid in order to do it.

And then there is the even more inexplicable choice of which ones of us to save.

God doesn’t save the smartest sinners, or the cutest, the best, or the worst.

About the closest that we come is to say that God saves the AVERAGEST.

“For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called:

But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;

And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are: That no flesh should glory in his presence.

But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption:

That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.”

If Jehovah had made man’s forgiveness of sin dependent on something that the sinner did, there wouldn’t be any mystery about salvation.

If all we had to do to be saved was to run a 6 minute mile, then the world would be full of track coaches.

If all that we had to do was to recite the 66 books of the Bible in proper order, then we’d be catechizing our children and training our pets to speak.

If all that we had to do to go to Heaven was to give a tenth of our income to the poor, then the government would increase our taxes by 15% and handle the calculation and distribution for us.

But the problem is that despite knowing the plan, we’d still not have a heart to work that plan.

There is the necessity of a new heart in order to enjoy God’s salvation.

And thus it is essential that salvation be by grace.

Salvation is by grace through faith.

But even faith and repentance are mysteries.

The Lord Jesus said, “Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.”

Over and over again, the Bible says that faith is a requirement of salvation.

“Therefore being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

“Whosoever believeth on Christ should not perish, but have eternal life.”

But wait a minute, if repentance and faith are required in the people whom the Lord saves, doesn’t that mean that salvation is by the sinner’s works?

No they are not, and in that there is a mystery.

Even though it is required in sinners that they repent of their sin and believe on Christ, they are incapable of doing so because they are spiritually dead.

A part of the mystery of salvation is when and how those sinners CAN DO things that they CANNOT DO.

The Bible says that spiritually dead sinners must be quickened by God’s Spirit – made alive by God.

To put it theologically: They must be regenerated.

What a marvelous mystery.

We’ll come back to this in a couple of minutes, but before we do . . .

Consider the mystery of PROVIDENCE.

At the beginning of Acts 15 Silas was sitting in his nice warm house in the heart of Jerusalem,

But by the end of chapter he was traveling from place to place and living in motels from Syria to Galatia.

How did he get from point A to point B?

It was through the mystery of Divine providence.

And here is a part of that mystery:

If men were only chess pieces – incapable of moving from space to space,

And if God was the Chess Master, moving those inert, unthinking pieces according to His design,

Then the only mystery would be where the Lord was going to move the King Bishop’s Pawn next.

But mysteriously, the sovereign God, so governs His creation that He often moves the pieces by directing the heart of those pieces themselves and letting them choose into which space to move.

How was it that Silas got from Jerusalem to Philippi, Thessalonica and Berea?

It began, but didn’t really begin, in Acts 15:22:

“Then pleased it the apostles and elders, with the whole church, to send chosen men of their own company to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas;

Namely, Judas surnamed Barsabas, and Silas, chief men among the brethren.”

The statement that it “pleased” the church” is the Greek word “dokeo” (dok-eh’-o).

This word is found 63 times in the Bible, but only twice is it translated “pleased.”

It is also translated “seemed good” three times and two of those are here in this chapter.

More than half the time “dokeo” (dok-eh’-o) is translated “to think.”

(Do you suppose that the phrase “okie dokie” was derived from this Greek word?)

“It seemed good unto us, being assembled with one accord, to send chosen men unto you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul.”

The leaders of the church in Jerusalem thought that it would be a good idea to send a couple of their members back to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas, and so they chose Judas and Silas.

Did they pray about these matters or did it just seem reasonable and logical?

Did an angel of God visit James and tell him to send Silas to Antioch, because he was to go with Paul to the ends of the earth preaching Christ?

Was there a Heavenly vision to that effect?

There doesn’t appear to have been any visions or special visitations;

The decision was practical and logical, but it was still sovereignly controlled and governed by the Lord.

That is the nature of Divine providence.

Not only did the church think that it was a good idea, but Judas and Silas thought it was good too.

So Judas and Silas went to Antioch as commissioned by their pastor.

They ministered there for several months – some scholars say that it was about a year.

Then it was time for them to return home, and so the church in Antioch blessed them and thanked them.

But somehow the heart of Silas had become knit with the hearts of those Syrian Christians.

He didn’t want to leave them.

How did he become so attached to the Church in Antioch and to the Apostle Paul?

I’m sure that if we could ask him, Silas would describe certain events & situations which drew out his love.

But at the same time, if we could asked the Lord, He would tell us that it was His sovereign will that Silas make Antioch his temporary home.

And then there was the quarrel between Paul and Barnabas regarding the taking of John Mark on a second missionary journey.

We’ll come back to this tonight, but suffice it to say at this point that Paul and Barnabas “departed asunder one from the other.”

They had a fight.

Was Jehovah the author of that fight? No!

If there was sin involved, could someone charge God with that sin? Absolutely not!

And yet, the Lord was in sovereign control of the situation which ended with the separation of the two missionaries and the incorporation of Silas into Paul’s plans.

So once again we see the hand of Divine providence.

“And Paul chose Silas, and departed, being recommended by the brethren unto the grace of God.”

So we’ve briefly looked at the mystery of salvation and the mystery of Divine providence.

Now let’s tie them together by considering . . .

The mystery of DUTY.

As we shall see in the next chapter, God’s providence led Paul and Silas through Galatia to the city of Troy on the coast of the Aegean sea.

But then the Lord DIRECTLY directed the missionaries;

In the midst of His providential leadership, He stepped in directly.

At one point the Lord forbade the missionaries from going into Asia to preach the gospel there,

And then at another point He gave them a special vision inviting them into Macedonia.

So Paul and Silas sailed into Europe

They went to Philippi, the city named after the father of Alexander the Great, Philip of Macedon.

There they led Lydia to the Lord, exorcized a demon from another young lady, and were cast into the Philippian jail.

In Acts 16:30 and 31 we have one of the most famous conversations in the Book of Acts:

The Philippian jailer asked: “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”

And Paul replied, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.”

I’m not going analyze the details of that man’s conversion just yet.

But I want to point out the principles of that very important statement:

“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou salt be saved.”

The Bible teaches that besides the Lord Jesus Christ, “there is none other name under heaven, given among men, whereby we must be saved.”

The Bible declares that the Lord Jesus is “the way, the truth and the life, and that no man cometh unto God the Father, but by Him.”

That heathen man was told in order for him to be saved, he had to “believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.”

And as I’ve already pointed out, this is a theme which is repeated throughout the New Testament.

But what if that man had never heard about Jesus?

What if that man had never heard the gospel of Christ, how that “Christ died for our sins according the scriptures, that he was buried and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures?”

Just because he was a heathen, and not a Jew, or baptized as a baby, was this man going to be given a special dispensation to forgiveness – based upon his kindness towards Paul and Silas?

Was God going to bend the rules just so that this Roman government employee could be saved without ever trusting the Lord Jesus?

It didn’t happen then and it will not happen today.

A part of the mystery of Divine providence is the mystery of duty and the obedience to that duty.

The Saviour had given a commission to all His churches:

“Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.”

Just before His ascension into Heaven Jesus reiterated that commission:

“Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.”

I don’t know that Philippi qualified as the uttermost part of the earth, but it was beyond Samaria.

When Paul was converted the Lord said that he was “a chosen vessel to bear Jesus’ name before the Gentiles.”

Then when Paul and Silas were sent from the church in Antioch they once began telling the lost about Christ, exhorting them to repent and to trust the Saviour.

It was the commission of God, the plan of God, and the Providence of God, that these missionaries be standing before that jailor just after the big earthquake.

They had been sent there to tell him about the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus. –

Just as I have been sent to remind you.

So it was a part of the mystery of duty and the mystery of Divine providence, that man believe on Christ.

In fact it was a part of the decree of God and the plan of God from before the foundation of the earth.

Yes, I know that salvation from sin is by the grace of God.

And yes, I know that sinners are dead and incapable of doing anything that can please the Lord.

But I also know that this man, like all other sinners in the world, was commanded to believe on Christ.

And by the grace of God he did, proving that the Lord had quickened his soul.

And similarly, it is Divine providence that you are here this morning, even though you may have been here a thousand times before.

And it is Divine providence that you hear this exhortation to believe on Christ once again.

Is it also Divine providence that you repent of your sins and believe on Christ?

Despite what you might think, if you do not trust Christ, humble yourself before Christ, and love Christ, the fault will NOT be with divine providence.

The fault will be entirely yours.

Are you in love with the Saviour?

Is your faith in Him?

Why not? Isn’t it because of your stubborn, sinful, unregenerated heart?

“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.”