Back to Emmanuel Evangelical Church - Sermons

Rev Graham Harrison           Sunday July 11th a.m. 1999

Lydia - Philippians 4

ëAnd on the sabbath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer was wont to be made; and we sat down, and spake unto the women which resorted thither. And a certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira, which worshipped God, heard us: whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul. And when she was baptized, and her household, she besought us, saying, If ye have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house, and abide there. And she constrained us. [Acts 16: 13-15]
And they went out of the prison, and entered into the house of Lydia: and when they had seen the brethren, they comforted them, and departedí [Acts 16: 40].

Now before we come to look at Lydia I want to look at the earlier verses of that chapter because they tell us a quite remarkable and indeed a pretty unique story as far as the New Testament is concerned. I want you to picture the country of Turkey ó the Apostle Paul has been preaching and evangelising and he has come to a place, Derbe and Lystra, where there is a young man who has been converted, a man by the name of Timotheus. Paul takes this man and decides that the hand of God is upon him and he wants him as his companion in the Gospel. A man who is going to be a preacher and so he joins Paul and Silas, who had been engaged in this missionary journey.

So they leave that part of Turkey where Timothy had been born and brought up and they move North towards what today we would call the Black Sea. There were different Roman provinces that made up that part of Turkey in those days, and verse six tells us this: ëNow when they had gone throughout Phrygia and the region of Galatia, and were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia, After they were come to Mysia, they assayed to go into Bithynia: but the Spirit suffered them not. And they passing by Mysia came down to Troasí [Acts 16:6-8]. So if you can picture those different provinces ó the actual geographical location does not matter. But Paul was trying to go into one ó he thought, ëWell, here are people who have not heard the Gospel. We are preachers of the Gospel, we want to bring the Gospel to them.í But there was some sort of constraint upon his spirit that prevented him from doing that. First of all Phrygia, Galatia, Mysia, Bithynia and one after the other prevented him, by whatever means it was, from going into those various provinces and preaching the Gospel.

So they come down to the coast, a place called Troas, or Troy it would be more familiar to us as, and there they were really in perplexity. ëWhat are we to do? Where are we to go? God has shut the door on all these places. He made it very clear to us that whatever He wants us to do it is not to preach the Gospel in those places at this time.í Yet Paul knew that He was called to preach the Gospel; when he had been saved and commissioned as an Apostle, the Lord Jesus Christ made it very clear to him that was to be his lifeís work. So you can understand something of what must have been the perplexity and the predicament that the Apostle Paul found himself in.

Then in the night, whether he was asleep or awake I do not know, he had a vision ó and this was the vision: ëThere stood a man of Macedonia, and prayed him, saying, Come over into Macedonia, and help usí. Now Macedonia was across the Aegean Sea ó it is part of what we would today call Greece, the northern part of Greece. So the next morning Paul shares this vision with his companions and they it is evidently of God. ëThis is what God wants us to do. He does not want us to preach in this part of Turkey at this present time ó perhaps some time in the future, but not now. Evidently He wants us to go across to Macedonia where as yet the Gospel has not penetrated and He wants us to preach the Gospel thereí.

So they went down to the port, they were able to get a boat that was sailing across and it took them just two days. They had a very favourable wind blowing and they came to a place called Neapolis, and that was not far, that was the port that served the provincial capital, a place called Philippi. So there they were in Macedonia; they knew why they had come; they had this vision which they were sure was from God ó ëa man of Macedonia, saying, Come over into Macedonia, and help us.í So they must have got some sort of lodgings there, in Philippi. And it came to the Sabbath day ó now it was always Paulís practice when he came to a new city or a new town to see if there was a Jewish synagogue there. He did that deliberately because he reasoned quite sensibly: ëIf anybody is likely to believe in the promised Messiah, it is going to be the Jews. The Old Testament has been telling them to look forward to the coming of the Messiah and we are able to tell them that He has come. We can prove it from the Old Testament scriptures. We can tell them about Jesus of Nazareth; we can prove that He is the Messiah, the Christ.

But the trouble was that in Philippi there was no synagogue. In order to have a synagogue the Jews insisted that you must have ten Jewish men. It did not matter how many women, you had to have ten Jewish men. So the fact that there was no Jewish synagogue there in Philippi was indicative of the fact that there were not ten male Jews in the city. So when it came to the Sabbath day Paul and his companions ó that would have been Silas, or Silvanus that is the other word that is used for his name, he had started the missionary journey with Paul; then there was Timothy as well, they had brought him along with them from Derbe and Lystra. Then there was another man, Luke, the man that actually wrote the book of the Acts of the Apostles. You might have noticed as I was reading through verse ten, you have that little word we. ó not they but we: ëAnd after he had seen the vision, immediately we endeavoured to go into Macedonia ë [Acts 16:10]. Previously it had been they, they, they.

In other words Luke has joined Paul at this time and so there are four of them. There they are in Philippi ó it was an important place, it was a colony of Rome. That meant that it had special privileges and all the laws of the city of Rome applied there in the city of Philippi. If you were a Roman citizen, this was one of the benefits, you did not have to pay local taxes ó so it was good to live in a city like that. (It is a pity there are not some places like that in Britain today!) So that is where they were. On this Sabbath day, what are they to do? Well they had heard that there was a place just outside the city, on the river bank of the little rivers at Philippi, and a group of women used to meet there for prayer. So Paul went out there with his three companions and as the scriptures tell us, the began to speak ëunto the women which resorted thitherí. ëWe went Ö where prayer was wont to be made; and we sat down, and spake unto the women which resorted thitherí [Acts 16:13].One of them was called Lydia. ëAnd a certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira, which worshipped God, heard us: whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paulí [Acts 16: 14] So this is the woman that I want us to think about this morning.

Now I began in the way that I did because I wonder if Paul was a bit perplexed. Remember the vision? ëA man of Macedonia, saying, Come over into Macedonia, and help us.í And when he gets there it is not a man, it is a woman and she does not come from Macedonia, she comes from the very part of the country , back across the Aegean Sea, the Roman province of Asia, the city of Thyatira, that Paul had been told he was not to go in to and preach the Gospel. Yet it was so evidently of God that Paul had come. ëA man of Macedonia, saying, Come over into Macedonia, and help us.í ó and here is a woman from Thyatira and she becomes the first convert in what today we would call the continent of Europe. I do not think that Paul would have thought of it like that of course! It was just a journey across the sea as far as he was concerned, but here is something very significant happening ó this woman becomes a Christian.

Now she is a remarkable woman. The commentators say, well, probably she was a widow and here husband had the business before her, he had probably died and so she was carrying it on after him. Or, maybe she was not a widow, maybe she was a single lady, a lady of some initiative and business skill and she had come across from the city of Thyatira in order to engage in this particular trade. Thyatira was famous because it produced a purple dye. There was some shellfish that they would use in order to manufacture this dye and there was a particular wool that they used in the dying process and that then became something that was very desirable as far as Roman citizens were concerned because one of the things that a smart Roman used to do was to wear a toga. If you were a citizen you were a purple toga and the best purple togas came from cloth that had been dyed with the purple dye that came from Thyatira. So you can see why Lydia was there in this Roman colony where there would be lots of Roman citizens ó obviously they would all want togas and she could give them the authentic article ó you know, made in Thyatira ó it probably had a little label on it to prove it!

She was conducting a business there in Thyatira, so I think that you can say that she must have been a woman of some unusual enterprise ó and not only that, I think that you would probably be right to say that she was quite a prosperous business woman. She is able and insists, when she is converted and has been baptised, that this little group of Christian men that have come preaching the Gospel, move into her home and have lodgings with her. Now I do not know how many of you ladies would suddenly like to discover that you have four guests staying ó not just for a meal but Bed and Breakfast and everything else that goes with it, and presumably for some extended period of time! Initially it seems that Paul was not eager to do it. You see Paul always worked on the basis that he did not really want to be indebted to those who were converted under his ministry. He did not want to give the wrong impression, he did not want them to think that he might be after their money, or anything like that. So very often he would do tent making ó that was his trade ó and find somewhere to lodge so that he could support himself while he was preaching the Gospel. But here in Philippi he did not do that, he did not have to bother with the tent making, they obviously provided this board and lodging for him and his three companions and they become very generous to him when he has actually moved on. You will notice in the reading in Philippians 4, he speaks of: ëno church communicated with me as concerning giving and receiving, but ye onlyí when I moved on from you. ëFor even in Thessalonica ye sent once and again unto my necessityí [Philippians 4:15-16]. So obviously they were generous in their support of the Apostle Paul as far as material things were concerned.

So probably we can infer that this woman, Lydia, was a prosperous woman, fairly large house and that probably became the place where the church used to gather. I read the last verse of the chapter ó you remember what comes in between ó the Apostle Paul and Silas they have been arrested, they are thrown into prison, they are beaten, the earthquake comes, the gaoler is converted and then the next day the magistrates they just want to get rid of Paul and Silas ó but there is no way that Paul is going to submit to that, because he is a Roman citizen and they had no right to beat him. So he tells them as much and they come more or less on bended knee and say, ëPlease leave our city!í and that is what Paul and Silas and Timothy do. But when they come out of prison they go ëinto the house of Lydia: and when they had seen the brethren, they comforted them, and departedí [Acts 16: 40]. So it is obviously the gathering place of that new little church of Philippi, the church to which Paul is going to write the letter that we call the letter to the Philippians.

So here is this woman. It is interesting to make certain observations about the New Testament Church from looking at a woman like this. I put it to you that she is probably quite a rich woman ó she had a household. Maybe there were slaves in that household, certainly servants so they would not all have been in the same social bracket as Lydia. That would have been typical of the New Testament ó you would have had masters, you would have had slaves in one and the same congregation ó and there was no pecking order as far as the church was concerned. It was not that here was a man who was the head of the factory and therefore everybody cow-towed to him ó and there was somebody who just worked on the assembly line and he was a non-entity. No, in the church, the one was as important, or unimportant, as the other. No distinctions on the basis of distinctions that might have operated out there in the world. The gospel penetrated all strata of society; rich and poor, the slaves as well as the prosperous people and it was a wonderful testimony because you see this was something that nothing else could do.

I think that we can say still it is something that nothing else can do today. The world is filled with divisions, sometimes on a racial basis, sometimes on a social basis, financial basis ó but the church is to be so mething in which all of those things are spiritually irrelevant. God looks upon us not as rich or poor, or clever or unintelligent ó God looks upon us as human beings that He has made and whom by His grace He has redeemed through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. In that sense we are all on a level before God. He gives different ones different gifts and calls them to perform different functions in the church ó but in regard to standing before God we are all on an absolute equality. There is something that the great Reformers used to argue for, it was called the priesthood of all believers. There is no pecking order in the service of God and you see that illustrated here in the very people that were converted.

There is another thing as well, this woman had come from Thyatira ó and if you read the reference to Thyatira in Revelation chapter two you can find that out there ó it was something of a centre of Jews. They caused a lot of trouble subsequently to the Christians as Revelation chapter two makes clear to us ó but there were many Jews there. Lydia was not a Jewess, however Lydia must have been impressed by the Jewish religion. It is not difficult to understand why that would have been the case. You imagine yourself back, for example, in the ancient world. There you were surrounded by paganism, all these statues to gods and goddesses, the idolatry that went along with it, the lifestyle that was so immoral and debilitating ó and here were these Jews. They said: ëThere is only one God and you dare not make a statue to Him. He is a spiritual being and He has spoken, He has given us commandments, ten of them ó what we are to be like, what we are to do, what we are not to do.í So often the Jews would stand out over and against their pagan neighbours as being morally different. This often made a great impact upon some of the pagans at any rate and they said, ëWell, we wish we were like you!í Some of them actually went as far as they could towards becoming Jews and became proselytes, or some of them became what were called God-fearers or somebody that worshipped God. They had not actually become Jews but they were there as it were under the Jewish umbrella.

It seems that this woman Lydia was probably a person like that. You notice how she is described: ëAnd a certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira, which worshipped God, heard usí. There is this woman probably having been back in Thyatira and was spoken to by the word of God through the instrumentality of the Jews and God had spoken to her. I think that one can say that. I find this very encouraging because you know there is another verse, and it is actually in that same epistle that I read to you, the epistle to the Philippians, it speaks of God completing what He has begun. ëBeing confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christí [Philippians 1:6]. When God starts something, God finishes it. Now you might say, ëHow does that apply here and what encouragement is there for us in it.

Well, who would have thought that Lydia had to leave Thyatira, move across the Aegean Sea to this foreign city of Philippi, set up a business there, be engaged in the business there and then this strange Jewish Apostle, Paul comes along and speaks to her about Jesus Christ? Who would have thought that all of that would have been in the plan and the purpose of God, as far as Lydia was concerned? But it was! We none of us know what particular steps God will involve himself in, in bringing a person to salvation. I expect some of you who are gathered here this morning, if you were to tell us your spiritual life story they would be strange. You could perhaps go back to childhood and it might be something that you were taught in Sunday School or something that you heard preached or that you read and you had forgotten all about it but somehow it had lodged there. Then later on perhaps you were brought into contact, quite unexpectedly, with a Christian or some means of evangelism and God touched you again. Maybe you were in a different part of the country, a different part of the world ó but God had His hand on you and eventually there came the time when God did to you what He did to Lydia ó He opened your heart and you became a Christian.

It should be an encouragement to us. Looking back over the years that I have been here as minister, and the same would go for any minister as far as that is concerned ó how many hundreds, thousands of people must have heard the Gospel? How many hundreds, thousands of people, as far as I know, have never been touched by the Gospel? But I would never be surprised if when I get to heaven some of those whom I have written off will be there ó because God will have begun a work in them and what God begins, God will complete. It is something that we can be confident about with God and Lydia I suggest is a case in point.

Well here she is with the ladies that work with her and they are out at this place of prayer ó presumably they might have had some sort of liturgical form that she had remembered from Thyatira and they were going through it, perhaps saying their prayers. Then here come these four men, Paul and Silas and Timothy and Luke ó and Paul and the others begin to speak to them. They tell them of Jesus Christ, Paul especially, he seems to be the one that was doing the preaching. An impression is made on Lydia and on her household and then eventually Lydia is converted. ëLydia Ö heard usí, the implication is that she attended to us. Sometimes a preacher has this experience ó he knows that somebody is listening. Now I say that not to suddenly all start looking intelligent and responsive but you are aware that there is somebody who is listening particularly and there is an impact being made upon them. That I think is the sort of thing that happened with Lydia. ëLydiaÖ heard us Ö whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul.í

So here was no casual passing interest. Some of you have been out on door to door evangelism or maybe you have spoken with other people about the Gospel and they have heard you politely ó but you know that it has been in one ear and out the other and nothing has happened. But here was something different: ëshe attended unto the things which were spoken of Paulí. She obviously confesses her faith and then eventually she is baptised ó and not only Lydia but the household as well. You can be sure that Paul and his companions they would be very meticulous to cheque out that it was not that the junior members of the household were doing it because Lydia had been converted. They would question them one by one and they would want to be absolutely certain that they were all converted ó then they were baptised. Then Lydia says: ëIf ye have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house, and abide there. And she constrained us.í It means that she persuaded us, she insisted and so we did it.

So that is the woman ó and I want to use her, or see in her an example of what God does typically when he saves somebody. The word of God is involved. When Paul and his companions went out to that riverside, that place of prayer, I am sure that they did not talk about the weather. ëIsnít it a lovely day? We have not had rain for a long time, have we? I suppose the rains will come soon, wonít they?í Then feeling about to try and get a turn into a spiritual conversation. Paul went and he spoke to them of the things of God; he brought the word of God to them. Now it maybe sometimes of course that we do have to use ordinary techniques of conversation in order to introduce the gospel ó but we are not just there to speak with people about passing irrelevant things. We are there to speak about the gospel of Christ ó to bring to them the word of God, the message of the Lord Jesus Christ. God uses the word. Remember how the same Apostle argues in the Epistle to the Romans:

ëBut what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach; That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him. For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach, except they be sent? as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!í

ëSo then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of Godí (Romans 10:8-15,17]

Then the progression goes on, in a spiritual sense, quite naturally ó ëwhen she was baptizedí. You see it is the clear teaching of the New Testament that when a person has become a Christian that person should be baptised. It is something that in which God speaks to them again all the promises of the gospel, a means by which God is able to come to them and assure them of His love for them and it as if God visibly, through the sign and the significance of baptism, restates the gospel as it applies to them. Of course along with that, in a subordinate place, goes the act of confession. Here is this Christian, he is not ashamed to say that he is a Christian.

Think what a brave thing it was for Lydia to do this. There she is, she is already a foreigner in the city, her business is dependant you might say on the people of the city approving her and wanting to do business with her. What does she do? She believes the gospel, she faces the implication of baptism, she knows that she is going to become the talk of the town. Do you know what that business woman Lydia did? She let those Jewish preachers baptise her in the river just outside the city where they used to go for prayer every Saturday! Ever heard of anything so stupid? None of our gods or goddesses require you to do something as public and ridiculous as that! But Lydia recognises this as the will of God and she does it. She is not ashamed to be a Christian. May I say that the same should be true of you if you are a Christian, you should publicly confess your faith in baptism. It is here in the word of God.

Well, she was baptised and obviously as a Christian she wants fellowship. She is a hospitable woman, that is why she invites these four men to come and live in her rather capacious house. I think that there is an ulterior motive there ó ëWhat an opportunity it will be to learn more and more of this gospel! Every meal we will be able to talk over the truths of the gospel. I will be able to learn more of the Messiah, more of the Lord Jesus Christ!í I am sure that Paul and Silas and Timothy and Luke, they must have relished this. There were the household gathering together and the church was being established. It was going to be added to of course; there was a slave girl that was converted a little later on, there was the Philippian gaoler and his family they become members of the church. Then after Paul and Silas and Timothy have moved on, they leave Luke behind them there in Philippi, I suppose you could say that Luke was acting as the pastor of the church. No doubt there were more and more people being converted and the church began to grow and to expand. Here in the home of Lydia, the meeting place of the church, here was a place of fellowship. They were able to learn more of the Lord Jesus Christ; they were able to demonstrate their commitment, publicly, to him.

What a blessing and an advantage it was to Paul and his companions while they were there in Philippi. It meant that they had a base, they did not have to worry about where they were going to sleep that night or where their next meal was coming from. They knew that all that was taken care of, they could just get on with preaching the gospel and that is what they did. The very next verse indicates as much: ëAnd it came to pass, as we went to prayer, a certain damsel possessed with a spirit of divination met us, which brought her masters much gain by soothsaying: The same followed Paul and us, and cried, saying, These men are the servants of the most high God, which shew unto us the way of salvation. And this did she many daysí [Acts 16:1-18]. The implication is that day after day the Apostle Paul and his companions they were going out speaking the gospel, speaking about Jesus Christ, saying that there is salvation only through Him. We need no stay with the trouble that came and the way in which God enabled Paul to deal with it. But it is an insight into what Paul was doing; so this church is a church that grows. It is wonderful, is it not, to see how God makes provision for the outworking of His purposes. Who would have predicted something like this happening in Philippi?

But God had known all about it; God had planned it. It is one reason of course why Christians should not become anxious and they should not become anxious for the work of God. God is big enough to take care of what concerns him. It does not mean that we become lackadaisical and have no burden in our hearts for the spread of the gospel and concern that the work of God is done in a way that will please God ó but we are not to become agitated and anxious and uptight about it all, we are to bring it all to God in prayer. Sometimes the way that He works things out are very strange, as far as we are concerned, unpredictable, from our point of view. But, thank God, He is the One who brings to pass in time what He has purp osed in eternity. He did it here in Philippi, He did it in the case of Lydia and you know as far as many of you here this morning are concerned, He has done it in your case as well. He has come to you. There was a time when your heart was shut against the gospel, but God had purposed to save you. God came and He touched that part of you that no mere human being can penetrate ó your heart. You found that there was a softness; you found that the gospel that once you argued against and that you rejected with bitterness and vituperation ó you could not do that. Eventually you found yourself standing up for it and standing up for Christians and you realised that those that once you hated, now you belonged to them. More than that the One whose Name at one time you could not stand, now you loved and you served and you called yourself a Christian. Well it is all here epitomised in Lydia: ëa certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira, which worshipped God, heard us: whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul.í

Has it happened with you? Are you somewhere along that line of progression that I have been describing from these verses? Pray to God that He will come and do for you what He did for Lydia. And if He has opened your heart, what must you do about it? Must you not come forth and confess Him openly and publicly?
Amen
 
 
 
 

Back to the top of the document

Back to Emmanuel Evangelical Church - Sermons