Midnight Praise

Midnight Praises

Acts 16:16-24

This setting of scripture first finds Paul and Silas in spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ and teaching the people this new doctrine of being saved by grace through the new birth application, it was new obviously to Gentile people, but it was also new to Jewish people. In the previous chapter Acts 15:5 we see the conflict arising (There will always be conflict in church but there was a way to settle it, they went to the elders)

Act 15:5 But there rose up certain of the sect of the Pharisees which believed, saying, That it was needful to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses.

Act 15:6 And the apostles and elders came together for to consider of this matter.

After much deliberation and Peter making his case as well stating that we nor their fathers were able to keep the law this is what James the leader stated

Act 15:19 Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble not them, which from among the Gentiles are turned to God:

Act 15:20 But that we write unto them, that they abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood.

Act 15:24 Forasmuch as we have heard, that certain which went out from us have troubled you with words, subverting your souls, saying, Ye must be circumcised, and keep the law: to whom we gave no such commandment:

Act 15:29 That ye abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication: from which if ye keep yourselves, ye shall do well. Fare ye well.

Act 15:30 So when they were dismissed, they came to Antioch: and when they had gathered the multitude together, they delivered the epistle:

So Paul and Barnabas were supposed to take this letter and make it official in the churches they started that this is what was supposed to be taught because this gospel was a place of transition.

What I want us to begin to notice here that this was a place of huge transition for the church and the Jewish people. This is all new to them because God was doing a new thing. He was showing them the New Covenant. And when you are in places of transition and change things can be difficult. They are difficult because while many good things are happening on one end (people believing, people being converted, lives moving in right direction), people were also against them. Many people were against changing the way things had been.

As you progress and make godly orchestrated changes there is always going to be opposition.

And in particular when we get to verse 16 where our text is this morning, we are going to see that Paul deals with a woman who was possessed with a spirit of divination. Through this spirit in her, her masters made a lot of money. But Paul had about enough of that spirit and commanded in the name of Jesus Christ for it to come out of her, and it did.

Paul used the authority that God had given to him and set someone free, someone was made different, someone was delivered. It was great! But even though something is great for one person it usually is a problem for someone else.

But her masters saw that they had lost their cash cow and said these men, being Jews, are troubling our city, teach customs that are not lawful for us to receive and they had them beat and cast them into prison, put them in the inner prison, and made their feet fast in the stocks.

I told you all of this because I want us to see that in places of transitions and places of growth and advancement there are going to be opposition, people and things that want to stop you from doing what you were called to do. Here Paul was walking in His calling, being effective, giving someone hope and it caused problems for him.

As you are transitioning towards what God is shifting you into there is going to be opposition, there is going to be those that don’t like the new you, there are going to be dark times, but the Word of the Lord for you today is know how to give a Midnight Praise.

Midnights are the darkest of times, Midnights are lonely places, midnights are the moments of not seeing clearly because all of the darkness that surrounds you, midnights are the places where you feel stuck, midnights are the places where you feel trapped, midnights are the places where things are scary, midnights are the places where you truly wish you weren’t.

Midnights are the times where you kids are going astray.