Well, good morning, everyone. Do my best with my voice here this morning. I'm getting over a cold this week, so bear with me. It's a beautiful morning out there. I went out at about 8:21. I usually leave at 8:30 and went out at 8:21 to start the car, and I had eight cows out running around the yard. So there I was chasing them around in my suit and tying muck boots, but we got them back in. 

So we're going to be continuing our study in Acts 23 this morning, and we're going to be looking at the sovereignty of God and that encouragement to Paul and to us in our lives every day. We could look many places in the Bible and see the hand, the sovereign hand of God. Sometimes he intervenes supernaturally, circumventing the laws of nature, and doing great works and miracles to accomplish his will. We see this throughout the Bible, throughout God's revelation of Himself to us and His deliverance of His people so often. 

You think about from the beginning in creation to the parting of the Red Sea, to the fiery furnace, all the way to the events of the book of the Revelation. God clearly has worked in the past, and he will work in the future by intervening in a supernatural way. But more commonly throughout history, and especially today, we see that God works providentially. In other words, He works through men lost and saved, men in Adam, men in Christ, and through the events and circumstances to orchestrate His will, to bring the gospel to men, and to move His people where He wants them, or to bring judgment on those who reject Him.

And we have a beautiful example of this in our text today. It is God's continuing work in the life of Paul, a ministry that from all human wisdom and perspective was now finished, was doomed, as he sits in chains in a Roman prison, where he'll remain the next years before his martyrdom. But our perspective is very often not God's perspective. 

We see from Paul's letter to the church in Philippi that the believers there were struggling to see God's perspective in Paul's imprisonment. I'd like for you to turn over to Philippians 1 with me, please, as we begin. But we see that Paul was keeping his focus. In Philippians 1:3, he writes, "I thank my God upon every remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine, making a request for you all with joy for your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ, just as it is right for me to think this of you all, because I have put you in my heart."

"And as much as both in my chains and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel, you are all partakers with me of grace. For God is my witness, how greatly I long for you all with affection of Jesus Christ. In this, I pray that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and all discernment, that you may approve the things that are excellent, that you may be sincere and without offense till the day of Christ, being filled with the fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God.”

"But I want you to know, brethren, that the things which happen to me have actually turned out for the furtherance of the gospel, so that it has become evident to the whole palace guard and all the rest that my chains are in Christ. And most of the brethren in the Lord, having become confident by my chains, are much more bold to speak the word without fear. Some indeed preach Christ even from envy and strife, and some also from goodwill. The former preach Christ from selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing to add affliction to my chains, but the latter out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the gospel. What then? Only in that every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached. And in this I rejoice, yes, and will rejoice."

"For I know that this will turn out for my deliverance through your prayer and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, according to my earnest expectation and hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but with all boldness as always. So now also Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain." 

Paul is in chains. He's not knowing the outcome, not knowing the timing. But he's seeing all of this as the hand of God working, as he trusts God through it all, and sees fruit because of it. Notice how he points them to the sovereignty of God. He says, "Here I sit in chains." And in verse 6, he says, "But I know that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ." In verse 10, he says that he wants them to approve the things that are excellent, be sincere and without offense till the day of Christ. 

He points them to their salvation, to the coming of Christ for them, to their deliverance from this evil world. And he tells them that God is in control in all of this. In fact, he writes, "Even my chains have worked out." God has worked this out, this situation, for the furtherance of the gospel. And it's with this attitude that Paul can say, "For to me to live is Christ, but to die is gain." What can they do to me? Kill me? Amen, Paul says. But as long as I'm here, I am a witness, seizing the opportunities that God provides to witness for Jesus and lead men to faith. And they're everywhere, my friends, even in Caesar's household. 

Paul was preaching to the guards, to the servants, anyone he could get a hold of to tell about Jesus. And it says the whole palace guard had heard about Jesus and many had believed. We've been asking the question the last several weeks as we observe the life and struggles and amazing trials of Paul. How could he keep going? How could he keep being bold? How could he keep witnessing for Jesus? In our text today, I think we see the answer manifested to us. 

Paul believed. He trusted. He depended on the sovereign hand of God, whether that be in some supernatural event or miracle, which Paul had experienced often in his life, or if it be the steady working of God's hand through men and circumstances and through His powerful message of truth. Excuse me. This is a great example for us today of how to keep our focus and how to keep going in the commission of bringing the gospel to every creature in spite of all that the world is doing, that Satan and his system is throwing at us and the hatred of men toward the gospel, toward Christ that is so evident in our world.

Let's look at our text together, Acts 23. We'll begin in verse 12. Acts 23:12 says, "And when it was day, some of the Jews banded together and bound themselves under an oath, saying that they would neither eat nor drink till they had killed Paul." Now there were more than 40 who had formed this conspiracy. They came to the chief priests and elders and said, "We have bound ourselves under a great oath that we will eat nothing until we have killed Paul. Now you, therefore, together with the council, suggest to the commander that he be brought down to you tomorrow as though you were going to make further inquiries concerning him. But we are ready to kill him before he comes near."

So when Paul's sister's son heard of their ambush, he went and entered the barracks and told Paul. Then Paul called one of the centurions to him and said, "Take this young man to the commander, for he has something to tell him." So he took him and brought him to the commander and said, "Paul, the prisoner called me to him, and he asked me to bring this young man to you. He has something to say to you." 

Then the commander took him by the hand, went aside and asked privately, "What is it that you have to tell me?" And he said, "The Jews have agreed to ask that you bring Paul down to the council tomorrow as though they were going to inquire more fully about him. But do not yield to them, for more than 40 of them lie in wait for him, men who have bound themselves by an oath that they will neither eat nor drink till they have killed him. And now they are ready, waiting for the promise from you."

So the commander let the young man depart and commanded him, "Tell no one that you have revealed these things to me." And he called two centurions saying, "Prepare 200 soldiers, 70 horsemen, and 200 spearmen to go to Caesarea at the third hour of the night, and provide mounts to set Paul on and bring him safely to Felix, the governor." 

He wrote a letter in the following manner: "Claudius Lysias, to the most excellent governor Felix, greetings. This man was seized by the Jews and was about to be killed by them. Coming with the troops, I rescued him, having learned that he was a Roman. And when I wanted to know the reason they accused him, I brought him before their council. I found out that he was accused concerning questions of their law, but had nothing charged against him deserving of death or chains. And when it was told me that the Jews lay in wait for the man, I sent him immediately to you and also commanded his accusers to state before you the charges against him. Farewell."

Then the soldiers, as they were commanded, took Paul and brought him by night to Antipatris. The next day they left the horsemen to go on with him and returned to the barracks. When they came to Caesarea and had delivered the letter to the governor, they also presented Paul to him. And when the governor had read it, he asked what province he was from, and when he understood that he was from Cilicia, he said, "I will hear you when your accusers also have come." And he commanded him to be kept in Herod's Praetorium.

I've given you four points on your outline. First, we're going to see that evil men plot against God. Second, God knows how to deliver the righteous. Third, God uses unbelievers to accomplish His will. And fourth, God will accomplish His will. 

Well, the first point that we see in our text today is that evil men, men in Adam, plot against God and His people. I was sick ever since last Sunday evening this week, and I was forced to the couch for a good part of the week. And I'm not really used to laying around that much, so much downtime. It was pretty hard on me, actually, to sit still. But at the same time, I was having trouble getting through the chores in the morning, and I was ready to get back to the couch when I was done. 

So I decided that I'd watch something on the computer. And I don't like to waste a lot of time being entertained, but this time of year, it gets dark early, and it's cold, and I was sick. So since it was around December 7th, I had this idea that I would watch something about World War II. So I found a documentary and watched a couple documentaries, actually, on the Great War. 

And I was impressed. I think it would behoove every American to go back and to study what happened in that war. For many young people, I know it would be the first time that they've heard the truths about what happened there. I began watching a couple documentaries about the Japanese, the Bataan Death March, the Guadalcanal Battle, and I'm not sure that our society today, our culture, could do what the great men and women of that generation did. The sacrifices that they made, unimaginable struggles, torture, hunger, pestilence, and the stunning evil of those we fought against. 

The ambition of the Japanese, in their often cruel ways, the amazing success and plans of Hitler, his evil passion to kill Jews and so many others as well. My brothers and sisters, there's no question that evil men plot against truth, against God, against Christ and His gospel, as well as His people. And I fear that we will forget these kinds of tremendous examples of this in our history, in our world. 

I read a news article the other day that a survey was done in Europe and in America of millennials concerning World War II. 46% of millennials in Europe had never heard of the Holocaust. In Europe, it was true of 20% in America. And among American millennials, more than 60% could not name one of the German concentration camps. 

It's a fearful thing what the philosophies and the education system of men and the parents have done to this generation of young people. Let me give you a manifestation of this just this week in our modern culture and university system. At the Public University of Minnesota at Mankato, a psychology and sexual studies professor, I don't think they had those when I was young, taught that, quote, "God acted in a predatory way when He impregnated the Virgin Mary without her consent." When pointed out that Mary did give her consent, he said that in such a lopsided relationship of power between an all-knowing, all-powerful deity and a teenage girl, such consent could not be valid. And thus, God has gotten caught up in the Me Too movement of our times. 

What are we to do in such a world? How are we to think, respond, and act, deal with such blatant acts of blasphemy against a holy and righteous and loving God? I sent that article to Andrew, and he reminded me that in the news, there is no good news. There's only good news in this book, my friends. And what we see in this book over and over is the truth that evil men will wax worse and worse. They will be lovers of selves, headstrong, haughty inventors of evil. They will hate God and Jesus and everyone who follows Him. Do not marvel, Jesus said, when the world hates you, because it hated me first. 

The man in Adam clearly hates the truth. John tells us that he loves darkness because his deeds are evil, and he will not come to the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. Man hates God because man loves sin. And evil men will plot against God, will plot even against those who love Jesus and speak the truth, and that's what we see in our text today. 

Look at verse 12; it says, "When it was day, Jews banded together and bound themselves under an oath, saying that they would neither eat nor drink till they had killed Paul." Forty men. We won't eat, we won't drink until we kill him. The hatred of the Jews for Jesus, for Paul, is amazing, mind-numbing to the point of insanity much like we see in our world today, rage and hatred. 

These guys are willing to take a vow not to eat or drink until they kill Paul. They go to the corrupt leaders of the Jews and bring their plan of deceit and murder, and the leaders of Israel join right in. They have no compunction concerning this plot to kill Paul. It's just what they want. We could talk about corruption and religion and politics till the cows come home, and we could explore the dark heart of man scripturally and otherwise for many sermons, but what we need to see concerning the evil plotting of men for our understanding and perspective, as we see in Paul's example, is the sovereignty of God. 

Turn over to Psalm 2 with me, please. Psalm 2 at verse 1 says, "Why do the nations rage, and the people plot a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His Anointed, saying, 'Let us break their bonds in pieces, and cast away their cords from us.' He who sits in the heavens shall laugh; the Lord shall hold them in derision. Then He shall speak to them in His wrath and distress them in His deep displeasure. Yet I have set My King on My holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree. The Lord has said to Me, 'You are My Son; today I have begotten You. Ask of Me, and I will give You the nations for Your inheritance and the ends of the earth for Your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron. You shall dash them to pieces like a potter's vessel. Now therefore, be wise, O kings; be instructed, you judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and you perish in the way when His wrath is kindled but a little. For you are all those who put their trust in Him.'"

I think of Psalm 37 where David said, "Do not fret because of evildoers, nor be envious of the workers of iniquity, because they will soon be cut down like the grass and wither as the green herb. Trust in the Lord and do good. Dwell in the land and feed on His faithfulness. Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart. Set your way to the Lord. Trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass." What will He bring to pass? "He shall bring forth your righteousness as the light and your justice as the noonday." 

Truly God is good to Israel, Psalm 73 says, "to such as are pure in heart. But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled, my steps had nearly slipped, for I was envious of the boastful when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. The psalmist says he looked around at all the wicked and he saw that they prosper in this world. And he said, 'When I thought how to understand this, it was too painful for me until I went into the sanctuary of God, until I looked at the truth, until I saw their end. He sets them in slippery places. He says, "My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever."

All men will plot against God. Peter tells us in 2 Peter 2, he promises, "False teachers will be among you, just as they were among the people of Israel." But there is good news when we go into the house of the Lord, when we seek truth and perspective and solace in His Word. God knows how to deliver the righteous. 

Turn over to that passage in 2 Peter 2 with me, please. Let's look at that. God knows how to deliver the righteous. 2 Peter 2:1 says, "But there are also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed, for by covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words. For a long time their judgment has not been idle, and their destruction does not slumber. For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world but saved Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly, and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly, and delivered righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked, for that righteous man dwelling among them tormented his righteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds." 

Look at verse 9, "Then the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment." What is our worry? What is our fear? God is in control. God is sovereign. God knows how to deliver the righteous and to reserve the unjust for punishment. Jesus is coming. He will make things right, punishing the wicked and bringing those who love Him to glory. These are the promises of the Scripture, again and again, and we see the sovereign providential hand of God in our text again today. 

Look at verse 16 of our text. This tells us about how Paul's sister's son heard of their ambush and he went to the barracks and he told Paul, and Paul sent him to the commander, and the commander asked him what he had to tell him, and he told him about the plan, and said not to yield to them. And verse 22 says, "So the commander let the young man depart, commanded him to tell no one that you have revealed these things to me." 

One of the most fascinating truths to see in the Scriptures is that God often uses unbelievers to accomplish His will, to deliver the righteous when He so chooses. We don't have time to go through the many examples of this, but think about Pharaoh. God used Pharaoh in his own stubborn will, his refusal to believe, to submit to God, and then it says that God further, in judgment, hardened his heart to set him against Israel. And God's used him to deliver the Hebrews out of Egypt, out of bondage and slavery.

One of the most fascinating examples in the Scripture of God's sovereignty in using unbelievers to accomplish His will is the story of King Cyrus during the life of Daniel. Listen to 2 Chronicles 36:22: "And on the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and also put it in writing, saying, 'Thus says Cyrus, king of Persia, all the kingdoms of the earth the Lord God of heaven has given me, and he has commanded me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Who is among you of all his people? May the Lord his God be with him, and let him go up.'"

Speaking of the sovereign power of God, Isaiah wrote, "Who says to the deep, 'Be dry,' and I will dry up your rivers? Who says of Cyrus, 'He is My shepherd, and he shall perform all My pleasures,' saying to Jerusalem, 'You shall be built,' and to the temple, 'Your foundation shall be laid.'"

The great King Cyrus, God calls His servant, His shepherd. He was used by God to accomplish His will concerning His people Israel. There are so many amazing, encouraging examples of this throughout the Word of God, and here we see another in our text today. The nephew of Paul is used, and we don't really know anything about Paul's family; I think it's presumable that they rejected him after he came to Christ. In any event, we have no indication that his sister's son was a believer. He may have been, we don't know, but God placed him among these legalistic Jews so that he would hear this plan and that he could go to the commander. 

And the commander is used of God again and again in this ongoing story of the arrest of Paul. What we see is that God is working out all the details. Paul didn't do any of this; he didn't know anything about it until he was told. God was watching over Paul. He was taking care of Paul, even though we might not see this in his present circumstances. 

And we can trust the truth that God knows how to deliver the righteous. It may not be the way we plan; it may not be the way we think. But we will be delivered ultimately to glory to be with our Lord forever, just as Paul was. And my brothers and sisters, we can trust God with the details along the way. And we can trust, we can know, we can have confident assurance that God will accomplish His will in our lives. Look at verse 23 of our text. 

"And he called for two centurions saying, 'Prepare 200 soldiers, 70 horsemen, and 200 spearmen to go to Caesarea at the third hour of the night, and provide mounts to set Paul on and bring him safely to Felix, the governor.' And then Claudius Lysias writes this favorable letter concerning himself and how he rescued Paul after finding out he was a Roman, which you'll remember wasn't exactly how that worked out. He had to stretch Paul out to scourge him before he found out he was a Roman. 

But he tells Felix what's going on, sends him up to Caesarea, gives him this great entourage of military protection, sets him on a horse and brings him up to Herod's Praetorium. So the evil plot of the Jews, the plans of the wicked men against God and His servant Paul are foiled again. 

Do you think this is hard for God? Do you think it's a difficult thing for Him to work His will through men? He sits in the heavens and laughs. He will hold them in utter confusion, it says. They profess to be wise like this professor at the Minnesota State University, but they are complete fools, morons, the Greek says. The fool has said in his heart, "There is no God." 

My brothers and sisters, God is in control. God's will for Paul was to go to Rome. It would not be the way that Paul would have chosen, nor the path or the timing that he might have thought expedient. But God knows, and God is working. God is moving in control, accomplishing His will in the life of Paul as we see this first move up to Herod's Praetorium. 

Now, most of us have not been in such a dire circumstance as Paul. Yet sometimes we wonder, don't we? We have to go back to the Word of God. We have to go into the sanctuary of God to look at His Word, to look at His promises, to renew our mind, to remember that God is sovereign, that He's in control. We see that God sometimes blesses us with special little blessings. Not only did He deliver Paul from death in the hands of the Jews, but He put him in Herod's palace. 

Now you know that Herod was no longer around to enjoy this palatial estate in all its comforts, having exalted himself in his speech before the people and then being eaten with worms, falling down dead and all. He was no longer there. But now Paul was here, and he would be here for a while. He got a first-class escort up to Caesarea, mounted on a horse, and now he's in Herod's Praetorium, his palace. 

My brothers and sisters, how is it that Paul could keep his focus? How is it that he could continue to be a faithful witness, trust God and depend on Him to do the hard things, to persevere and just to live on each day? Let me ask you, how can you, how can I, press on when things get really difficult, when nothing seems to be going right, to be the way we think it should be, when we begin to doubt and to fear because of our circumstances? How? 

The answer is in faith and trust in the sovereign God of the universe. We need to know His Word. We need to believe Him. We need to depend on Him. We need to look to Him and keep on obeying Him day by day, moment by moment, no matter what comes. And we have to remember and affirm that He's in control, that He has made promises to us. 

I love what Don said, "Behold." Bobbie and I first got saved; she used to say that means, "Check it out, behold." So many promises. Behold, God is in control, He's sovereign, He's promised to take us to be with Him. He will never leave us or forsake us. His grace is sufficient. And He's coming. I love what Jesus said in John 14, "If it were not so, I would have told you." He's coming. 

And we can trust Him no matter what comes our way, day by day. Let's close in prayer. 

Father, we thank You for, again, the example of the life of Paul and just thank You for what You teach us through it. Thank You for Your sovereignty, Your control, Your love, Your grace and mercy, Your faithfulness, Your patience with us. And thank you that You continue to work out Your will in our lives, conforming us to the likeness of Christ. Thank you for the promise that we will be with You forever in heaven. It's in Jesus' name we pray.