Recreate Church, Pastor Michael Shockley—Service, February 9, 2025

Can’t Save Yourself.

Today, Pastor Michael is continuing last week’s theme on salvation, and we continue with our previous week’s essential list:

1. Everyone needs to be saved.You cannot save yourself.
2. God sent the one and only savior, Jesus Christ, to save us.

Pastor Michael picks up the story about 15 years after the Resurrection. Paul and Silas set out on a mission to start new communities of believers. Jerusalem and Antioch were two of the leading Christian areas at the time. During this trip, they enlisted Timothy as part of their troupe, and Luke may have also joined them.   

So they headed west to Troas, and Paul had a vision, a waking one.  In this vision, he sees a man calling him from across the water, asking them to come to Macedonia to help them. So, the gang headed out, from Troas to Neopolis to Philipi, in Macedonia.  Paul was preaching there when Lydia approached them and offered them shelter in her home. Soon after they stayed with Lydia, they were out preaching again, and a slave approached them, having an ability to predict the future and screaming, “These are servants of the highest God!” 

That sounds good because it was correct, but it was an evil spirit that gave her the ability to predict the future and shout what she did. But she followed them for days, continuing to shout this out. 

Finally, Paul turned around and commanded the evil spirit to come out of the girl.  The spirit immediately left her, and she was fine!  Now, at this point, everyone is happy except the men who enslaved the girl to make money with her talents.  They dragged Paul and Silas back into the city, in the middle of a marketplace, and stirred up an angry mob.

Paul and Silas are dragged to prison after suffering a good smackdown, courtesy of the crowd.  They prayed and sang praises to God in prison, and other prisoners and the jailer are listening.

Then, an earthquake shook pretty much everything, and the jailer panicked. He understood that everyone would get away, and under Roman law, if a prisoner escaped, the guard could get the prisoner’s sentence. So he was pretty freaked out!

He draws his sword and places it against his chest to kill himself, and a shout tells him to STOP.  It’s Paul. 

Paul told him “Believe in Jesus, and you will be saved.”

Roman guard, Jesus’s love.  The perfect example of how salvation works.

(CSB Bible Notes) 16:28 We are not told how Paul knew what the jailer was about to do. There may have been just enough light, Paul may have had prophetic insight, or he may have heard enough to surmise what was about to happen. 16:29-30 The jailer fell down trembling because he realized the earthquake was supernatural. This prompted him to ask the most important question in the book of Acts: What must I do to be saved? He was spared from death in the quake, spared from suicide by the discovery that the prisoners had not fled, and now wanted to be spared from God’s future judgment.

Today’s verses can be found in Acts 15:39 - 16:40.

Scripture quotations marked CSB have been taken from the Christian Standard Bible®, Copyright © 2017 by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission. Christian Standard Bible® and CSB® are federally registered trademarks of Holman Bible Publishers.