The Scattering of the Church - The Great Outbreak of Persecution

Well, if you would take your Bible, turn to Acts chapter 8. Tonight we're going to be in verses 1 to 8, although we did touch on the beginning of verse 1 last week when we looked at Stephen, the first Christian martyr. Now since we moved into chapter 6, we have been seeing quite a few changes in the life of the church here in Jerusalem, and I have been pointing out these changes really along the way. They're really not hard to see. And if you have not kept up with our study, especially since we've moved into chapter 6, you may not be aware of these changes. Now I know how life is. You can get behind. That's life.

But I would encourage you to catch up with our study in the book of Acts. You can go back and listen to those messages, get in your copy of God's Word, and you can catch up because we are seeing the birth of the church, the progression of the life of the church there in Jerusalem, and things really change rather quick as we will see. But since chapter 6, we have been seeing the attention shift from Peter and the apostles to Stephen. Actually, almost all of chapter 6 is about Stephen, and all of chapter 7 is about Stephen.

I have said that Peter is the main character from chapters 1 to 5, and of course the apostles are right there with him, but Stephen is absolutely the main character in chapter 6 and chapter 7. But we have seen that Luke highlights two things about Stephen in chapter 6 and chapter 7. First, he was a man of exceptional Christian character. He was a man of exceptional Christian character. And then second, he was a man of exceptional Christian service. His character is seen when Luke says that he was full of faith and full of the Holy Spirit there in chapter 6 verse 5.

That meant that Stephen was full of and controlled by the Christian faith and his personal faith, and that was because he knew God. He had come to faith in Christ. And then he was also full of and controlled by the Holy Spirit of God. And his Christian service is seen when Luke shows us that he faithfully served in physical matters in the church. He served the widows of the church in the daily distribution of food, and no doubt he served meeting other physical needs. I know there is a debate about whether or not these men wore deacons. I do not have a problem believing they were deacon in prototype. They were definitely doing deacon ministry.

And Luke also shows us that he faithfully served in spiritual matters. He performed great miracles before the Hellenistic Jews when he preached Jesus in the Gospel to them with great power. And he preached with great power that Christ was the Messiah of God, and he preached the Gospel before the Jewish ruling council. That would have been the Sanhedrin. And ultimately this led to Stephen being killed, violently stoned. He was the first Christian martyr. Again, we covered that last week. Now last week I used Stephen's life as a tremendous in life and death lesson and example for us. And really this is desperately needed.

It definitely is desperately needed today. Christian character is what counts most. And our Christian character must be what defines us, and it must be what we pursue and value the most. Let me repeat that. Christian character is what counts the most. And our Christian character must be what defines us as Christians and men and women of God. And Christian character must be what we pursue and value the most.

If we are not first and foremost men and women of God who are filled with and controlled by the Holy Spirit of God and filled with and controlled by the Word of God every day in all things, then we are lacking in our personal Christian character. What do we see in Stephen in his example? What do we see? And we must see that because of his excellent Christian character, Stephen was able to excel in his Christian service. And look church, we should work hard at our Christian character in being faithful in our local church and let God take care of the service that he has for us.

Look folks, if we are faithful in our Christian character and faithful in the life of the church, well the Christian service will just come to us. It'll just happen spiritually and organically. And if we're going to excel in Christian service that God has for us, look it starts, it starts by not neglecting these things. And sadly if we look at well known Christian leaders and other professing Christians who have fallen into sin, disqualifying sin, sin that kicks them out of Christian service, we can see that their downfall began when they neglected their Christian character or when they didn't have any Christian character all along.

Now there's a couple of warnings I want to give here. Warning number one, do not be the Christian who allows inconsistencies and compromises in your Christian character, but then you cover it up with Christian service. Do not become the Christian who allows inconsistencies and compromises in your Christian character, but then you somehow cover it up with Christian service. And here's warning number two, beware of the one who covers over their lack of Christian character with their Christian service. Let me repeat that. Beware of the one who covers over their lack of Christian character with their Christian service.

Through my years of being in the life of the local church and serving in the life of the local church, I have seen Christians come along who were lacking in Christian character, very inconsistent in their Christian character, had compromises in their Christian character, and they failed to address those things. And then they began to cover those things over with Christian character, sometimes seeming exceptional Christian character all along while that Christian character was getting worse. They were covering their faulty Christian character over with Christian service or seeming Christian service.

I think you understand where I'm going there. Now I said this earlier, since we moved into chapter six, we have seen quite a few changes in the life of the church there in Jerusalem. Well starting here in chapter eight, we will see more change. Actually we will see an explosion of change. So much so that the church in Jerusalem would never be the same and the mission of the church would never be the same and for good. Here we see the fulfillment of two things that Jesus said to his disciples. First in Matthew 24, before he was taken back into heaven, Jesus told his disciples that after he was gone, his enemies would persecute and kill them.

And in this persecution, they would believe that they were actually serving God. And I have to believe that when Stephen was violently stoned and killed by the Jewish religious leaders as seen in chapter seven verses 54 to 60, Peter and the other apostles had to have remembered Jesus' teaching here. And when this explosion of persecution and death came about through Stephen's death, which we began to, which we studied last night, Peter and the other apostles, those other disciples, they had to have remembered what Jesus taught.

But then second, in Acts 1, just before his ascension back to heaven, Jesus told his disciples that they would be his witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea, and even in Samaria, and even to the ends of the earth. And when this explosion of persecution and death was unleashed upon the church because of Stephen's death and everything that happened after now, Peter and those other disciples, Peter and those other apostles, they had to have remembered Jesus' words here. Now, right here, I want to remind us of something that I say often, and that is this. We should have a mighty expectation in the church.

We should have a mighty expectation for the growth and the development of the church. Jesus told his disciples that he would build his church, and the gates of Hades or hell would not be victorious against a church, Matthew 16, 18. And Jesus told his apostles and us, by extension, that he would take his gospel and the work of the church to the ends of the earth, Acts 1a. And the lesson that we will be learning tonight is this. Sometimes God uses difficulties, trials, great trials, and even persecution unto death to accomplish this work.

The question right here for us is this, will we get in on the great work of his church here and even to the ends of the earth? Will we get in on the great work of his church as God gives us opportunity? Now tonight as we move from chapter 7 to chapter 8, we find that the killing of Stephen as the first Christian martyr became this great spark that ignited this great fire of persecution and death that came up against the church of Jerusalem, which was the third outbreak of persecution against this church. Here in these verses we see the beginning of this great persecution, but starting in verse 4 we see the reaction of the believers now.

Starting in verse 4 we see the great preaching of the gospel and the great work of the church through and because of the great persecution. Now let's read our verses and then I will explain how we will break them down. We covered this part of verse 1 last week. In Saul approved of his execution. That's Stephen. And here's a transition. And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria except the apostles. And about men buried Stephen and made great lamentation over him.

But Saul was ravaging the church and entering house after house he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison. Now your Bible might have some kind of a heading here that indicates a transition. Verse 4, "Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word. Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ." And the crowds with one accord paid attention to what was being said by Philip. And when they heard him and saw the signs that he did for unclean spirits crying out with a loud voice came out of many who had them and many were paralyzed or they were healed so there was much joy in that city.

Now this is how we're going to approach or divide the verses. First I want us to look at the great persecution that broke out against the church and these believers. We see this in verses 1-4. Very easy to see. Then we will look at the great preaching of the gospel which took place as these believers were scattered. It's easy to see in verses 5-8. So number 1, the great persecution. We could expand this by saying that this is all about the great persecution against the church and the believers now there in the church at Jerusalem. And notice that we see the greatness of this persecution in three ways. First all the church was scattered.

The verse says all the church was scattered. Now I said this last week but the blood of Stephen bred more blood. The death of Stephen bred more death. The successful violent persecution of Stephen bred more violent persecution. Well the immediate result of Stephen's death was that this great persecution was ignited so that all the church was scattered. But notice the verse says all the church was scattered except the apostles. Seems like a contradiction. Now we need to see that this does not mean that every believer except the apostles fled. This simply means that a great many of the believers fled Jerusalem.

And we know this for one simple reason. Simply the church at Jerusalem was not wiped out. The church continued to exist. First of all the apostles stayed behind the text says which indicates that the church remained. And second the testimony of the rest of the book of Acts indicates that the church remained. And I fast forward to Acts chapter 15. In Acts 15 we see that the church at Jerusalem remained what could be seen as the most important and influential of all the churches. One scholar that I use often named F.F. Bruce he says and I'm quoting from this time onward the Jerusalem church appears to have consisted almost entirely of Hebrews.

That would have been the native Palestinian Jews. And if we move on into Acts chapter 11 verses 19 to 20 those verses seem to indicate that many who did flee Jerusalem at this persecution were indeed those Hellenistic Jewish Christians. Now my point here is this. Luke is showing us that the church was really broken up, torn apart, scattered. Many of the members of the church at Jerusalem were scattered, broken apart and sent out because of this great persecution. So the church was scattered. Second notice the church was scattered in all directions. Second the church was scattered in all directions.

Here we see that those who fled they went somewhere. And Luke tells us that they went to Jerusalem, excuse me, and Luke tells us they went to Judea and into Samaria. Now I will come back to the significance of Judea especially Samaria next week. But at this point I want us to see where they fled to, spoke to, and this was a fulfillment of what Jesus said would happen. Let me explain. In Acts 1.8 Jesus told his disciples and he told us by extension now that they would be witnesses in Judea and even into Samaria. I read that verse earlier. Listen to this great promise in prophecy.

Acts 1.8 "But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you." And of course Jesus is talking about Pentecost. "And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem." We've already seen that. In Judea that's beginning to happen and Samaria we see that before us and to the ends of the earth. And the point here is this. What Jesus said would happen in and through his church did come to pass. And Jesus had a mighty expectation for his church. And these believers in Jerusalem had the same mighty expectation even when they faced persecution. So the church was scattered in Judea and into Samaria. And then third the church was ravaged by Saul.

Third the church was ravaged by Saul. Look back at verse 3 "But Saul was ravaging the church and entering house after house he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison." Now notice what Saul was doing here. Luke says he was ravaging the church. I'm reading from the English Standard. The New American, the Legacy Standard Bible says, used the same word ravaging. The King James says he, that Saul, may havoc of the church. In this word ravaging it is only used here in the New Testament and it simply means to destroy, to ruin, to damage.

John MacArthur points out that this same word was used in secular writing of the day to describe the destruction of a city in a time of war. And it was used to describe the destruction caused by the ravaging of a wild animal. A.T. Robertson mentions this word used to describe a wild boar when they destroy a vineyard. So what Luke is telling us here is this. Saul literally sought to tear apart. He worked to destroy. He worked to ruin and to damage the church. And in the eyes of men and men he did because the havoc that he caused literally tore apart the church at Jerusalem. It seems that most, if not all, of the Hellenistic Jews fled.

And notice what he did in this word. Luke says that he drug off men and women, house to house, taking men and women and throwing them in the prison. Now how was he able to do this? Saul says in Acts 26.10 that he was able to arrest, imprison and kill Christians because he had the authority of the chief priests. So it was Saul who brought about this work under the authority of the Jewish religious leaders. And now that we see what they did with Stephen, this doesn't surprise us. And we see that Paul spoke of what he did in ravaging the church many times in the book of Acts. We see this in Acts 22.45 and in Acts 26.9-11.

Listen to what Paul said when he was before King Agrippa in Acts 26.9-11. He says, "I myself was convinced that I ought to do many things in opposing the name of Jesus of Nazareth." That's kind of an understatement. "And I did so in Jerusalem. I not only locked up many of the saints in prison after receiving authority from the chief priests, but then when they were put to death, I cast my vote against them. And I punished them often in all the synagogues and tried to make them blaspheme, an enraging fury against them." Paul says, "I persecuted them even to foreign cities." So we see that the church was ravaged. It literally was torn apart.

It was broken apart. Now take a step back from what we've seen here in verses 1-3. This great persecution was unleashed against the church at Jerusalem because of or through the death of Stephen. The church was literally broken apart as it was scattered all throughout Judea and into Samaria. And it was broken apart because a man named Saul ravaged the church like a wild animal, like this wild, violent, marauding, one-man army. But before I move on into making some much-needed application, notice that this scattering was not a scattering of defeat, but a scattering of victory and gospel success. Verse 1, look back at verse 1.

Verse 1 says, "And there arose on that day," that's the day Stephen was stoned, "a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem." And they were all scattered. That's the key word. It would be good for you to underline that. They were all scattered throughout the regions, Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. And the key to understanding their success and victory lies in understanding this word scattered. This word translated scattered, it means to be scattered abroad, to disperse. But the Bible scholar Jim Boyce really helps us here.

He points out that there are different words in the original language that this was written for the word scattered. One means to scatter so that which is scattered is gone. Let me give you an example. Like when a body is cremated and the ashes are scattered. Well, those ashes are gone. They're dispersed. They're gone. But here, this word scattered, it is the word used that means to scatter in order to be planted. For example, when a seed is scattered, it is scattered so as to be planted. Now we can see the victory and the success of this scattered church.

Boyce goes on to say that those who were scattered, they were scattered so as to be planted in the places they were scattered. When they were scattered, in verse 4, we see that they were scattered to preach the word and to plant the word. See the victory? See the success? Now there is much we can learn here. One thing I want to say in application is this. When we as individual believers or as a church, when we find ourselves moved or scattered by the providential work of God in our lives, we should understand that God is moving and scattering us so as to plant us in new ground. Let me repeat that.

When we as individual believers or as a church, when we find ourselves moved or scattered by the providential work of God in our lives, we should understand that God is moving and scattering us so as to plant us in new ground. God sovereignly, out of His great love for us and because He desires to work through us ultimately for His glory, He moves us into new places and new ground so that we will be planted in the Word of God and the gospel will be planted there through us. And sometimes He uses negative circumstances, even negative events and even persecution to bring this about.

Now one thing I pointed out over and over, persecution is God's business. We don't seek persecution. We live in a time of prosperity. If persecution should come, obviously we can learn from these things. So the great persecution that broke out against the church. But then number two, I want us to see the great preaching. The great preaching. We could expand this by saying this is all about the preaching of the church that came about because of the great persecution of the church. Let's look at verses four to eight. Now those who were scattered went about preaching and Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them Christ.

And the crowds with one accord paid attention to what was being said by Philip when they heard Him and saw the signs that He did for unclean spirits crying out with a loud voice came out of many who had them and many who were paralyzed or lame were healed so that there was much joy in that city. Now I want us to see the greatness of this preaching by looking at three things that Luke tells us here. First those who were scattered went preaching. First those who were scattered went preaching.

Here we see that those who were violently scattered, those who were violently persecuted out of Jerusalem, they went home, they locked themselves up with fear. They turned into hunker and bunker Christians. Here we see that those who were scattered by the wild dog of Saul and his persecution, they went home and they made all kind of Facebook and social media posts. They all went home and they called American Family Radio to get a movement stirred up in the church. They went home and they called the government for help. You know I'm just making those thought provoking statements.

We know "Christians who act like that." But as they were violently scattered they went about preaching the Word. We see that. In this word this phrase went about. It is used often throughout the book of Acts and we will see this. It's used often in the book to speak of evangelistic or missionary works and the point here is this. They purposely went about preaching the Word. If you were going to underline another word that phrase went about as a good one. They purposely went about preaching the Word. In this preaching here it speaks of preaching or proclaiming the Gospel. So what Luke is showing us here is this.

When these believers were scattered out of Jerusalem because of this very, very violent persecution they went about. They went about preaching the Gospel and working to evangelize the laws. Now a question here. Why was Satan instigating the persecution of the church in the first place? It's pretty simple. Satan wanted to stop the spread of the Gospel. Satan wanted to stop the salvation of sinners. Satan wanted to stop the building and the success of Christ's church. Now there's a lesson here.

You can tell when a church and its leaders are spirit filled in their understanding of persecution, trouble, and divisions and attacks against the church by how they react. When persecution, trouble, division and attacks come from without and from within against the church if the church and its leaders do not react by understanding that God is working for the greater progress of the Gospel well then they are not spirit filled. Let me repeat those two statements because you need them and then I will illustrate with an example.

You can tell when a church and its leaders are spirit filled in their understanding of persecution, trouble, and division attacks from within and attacks from without against the church by how they react. Persecution, trouble, division and attacks come against the church if the church and its leaders do not react by understanding that God is working for the greater progress of the Gospel well they are not spirit filled. Let me explain. There's a church within our Anchored in Truth network. Some of you know this church. Some of you visited this church to help.

They were attacked from within and because of the attack from within their pastor had to resign. The pastor had to step down. It was a serious attack. They were believers in that church that understood that that was for the greater advancement of the Gospel and the greater advancement of the church. Their attitude was this. Our pastor may have stepped down. We may have been attacked on the inside but we are not giving up. No, we see this as a greater opportunity because the leaders within Anchored in Truth understood that well. They partnered that church with an up and coming Anchored in Truth pastor. They have since planted a new pastor.

God is working in a new way. We see a greater work of the church, a greater progress of the Gospel in the church. So they understood that that attack that came from within, oh it wasn't to destroy the church, no it was for an opportunity, an opportunity for the greater progress of the Gospel in the church. Then second, Philip was scattered down in Samaria preaching. Second we see that Philip was scattered down in the Samaria preaching. Look at verse 5. Transition from the general to the specific. Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ.

Here we see a specific man and a specific example of this they went about. You see? A specific man, a specific example of how they went about preaching the Gospel. But now question, who was this man Philip? First of all, don't be confused, this was not the Philip who was one of the apostles, but this was the Philip mentioned in Acts 6, 5 who was one of those men, those seven men chosen to serve in the physical needs of the church. He very well may have been one of the first deacons.

And besides being one of the church's leading laymen who was singled out for the physical ministry in the church, Philip is the only man given the title of evangelist in the Scriptures. Did you know that? The only man given the title of an evangelist in the Scriptures. We see this in Acts 21 verse 8. Now question, are we not revisiting the same lesson we have learned with Stephen? That is possessing and maintaining exceptional Christian character should come before and lead to exceptional Christian service. Philip was just like Stephen.

Philip pointed out his Christian character in Acts 6, 5 before he pointed out his exceptional Christian service starting here in Acts chapter 8 verse 5, you see? Look folks, when you see a repeat of something in the Bible, you better perk up and understand that God's trying to teach us something. Third, we see the success of Peter's preaching in Samaria. Third, we see the success of Philip's preaching in Samaria. We see this in verses 6 to 8. Now back up and start with verse 4.

"Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word, and Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ." Verse 6, "And the crowds with one accord paid attention to what was being said by Philip. And when they heard him and saw the signs that he did, for unclean spirits, crying out with a loud voice, came out as many as who had them, and many who were paralyzed or laying they were healed, so there was much or great joy in that city." Now here I will not get into the significance of Philip being in Samaria. There's quite a lot there now, but I will get into that next week.

But here I want us to see the success of Philip in his evangelistic ministry. I want us to see the supernatural things of God that God did through Philip. First we see the crowds listen to Philip's preaching in great Holy Spirit unity. The crowds, this will be the lost crowds, listen to Philip's preaching with great Holy Spirit unity. Luke says that with one accord the crowds paid attention to Philip and his preaching. In this phrase one accord it speaks of being of one mind, of one passion. We would call this great unity. And this is a phrase that we saw earlier in Acts chapter 2 when the church was described as being in great unity.

But notice something very curious here. This was lost, unconverted people. But they were listening to Philip preaching the gospel, preaching Christ with one accord or in great unity. So what is Luke showing us here? What does this mean that the lost were unified? Is it even possible that non-Christians can be unified in listening to gospel? Well here we have the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit whereby he, the Holy Spirit, was drawing these un-Christian Samaritans to Christ to the saving message of the gospel as being preached by Philip. And in the end we see that many lost Samaritans were unified in this work.

So here Luke is giving us a glance of the supernatural drawing and working of the Holy Spirit as he, the Spirit, was drawing these lost Samaritans to Christ to the gospel through Philip's preaching. Jesus said in John 6 44 that no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. Simply here in Acts 8 6 Luke is showing us that these unconverted Samaritans were being drawn to Christ so they were unified in hearing the gospel. Now notice how this applies to us. A part of our praying for the lost should be this. One that the Spirit would actually draw the lost to Christ.

The Spirit would draw the lost to the saving message of the gospel. Yes, but we have more than one person around us who are lost. And we need to pray for a great unifying drawing work. How wonderful would it be if the Spirit of God would blow through this place and we would have one, two, three, four, many come to saving faith because we have quite a few who associate with us who visit us who are lost and without Christ. I think if that were to happen we would call that maybe a mini revival. But then second, as Philip performed great miracles and preached the gospel many were healed and believed.

As Philip performed great miracles and preached the gospel many were healed and they believed. Here in verses 6 to 7 we see that many things were happening. Philip was enabled by God to heal the sick and to cast out evil or demonic spirits. And we saw the very same thing when Stephen was before the Hellenistic Jews. Simply God enabled Philip to perform what I have called apostolic miracles. He healed the sick. He cast out evil spirits. But notice that the miracles were not the end but the means, a means to the end.

Philip's ultimate goal was to preach Christ and the gospel so that the unbelieving Samaritans would come to saving faith in Christ. And those miracles were merely vehicles to carry the gospel and the gospel message to them, to validate the gospel message before them. Now remember our position here. We do not believe in apostolic gifts today now. Those apostolic healing gifts ceased with the death of the apostles and those who were close to the apostles who had these God given gifts. But we certainly do believe that God can heal today. He very well may heal today.

But if someone is healed today we do not believe that we have an apostle here today who could administer that healing. But then third, there was great joy among the people as a result of Philip's miraculous gospel ministry in the city. It's real short. Look back at verse 8. So there was much joy in that city. We could overlook that but we must not. There was much joy in the city. And notice what this short verse tells us. Gospel preaching and the work of the gospel brought about a great work in the city. You see that?

Gospel preaching by this faithful gospel evangelist and a work of the gospel through this faithful man brought about a great work in the city because so many sick and demon afflicted people have been healed and set free because so many of the lost have been transformed by the soul-saving power of Jesus and the gospel because so many individuals and no doubt even families have been changed by the saving power of the gospel in Jesus, much joy was in the city. Now take a step back from verses 4 to 8 and notice what we see here.

Luke shows us the great preaching of the church that came about because of the great persecution of the church or against the church. Those who were scattered because of the violent persecution went about. They went about preaching the gospel and the life-changing power of Christ. And then Philip, he went down into Samaria in great gospel power. God enabled him to heal the sick, cast out evil spirits, and God enabled him to proclaim Christ in the gospel. And as a result, many Samaritans came to faith in Christ. Now what do we need to see here? Let me make a few statements and now I want to ask some probing questions. I do that often, I know.

The gospel and the saving power of Christ can work in the hard places. Samaria was hard now. We're going to get into that next week. The gospel and the saving power of Christ can work in the hard places, even the Samaritans of our day, and as we will see next week, look, Samaria was a very, very hard place, especially for the Jews now. But a question, do we shy away from the hard places? Do we shy away from the hard people? Do we shy away from the hard families who desperately need the gospel? Folks, there are two kinds of people that God brings our way, missionaries or mission fields.

A lot of times God brings people into the life of our church, into our lives, and they are mission fields. And many times they are hard mission fields. So do we shy away from the hard places? Do we shy away from the hard people? Do we shy away from the hard families? Maybe we should ask God to help us to be like Philip. And then after some time of prayer and maybe some prayer and fasting for some of the hard law sinners we know, maybe we go to them and we share the gospel like Philip. Another question, do we think that the hard places and the hard people are only for missionaries and not for us?

Do we think that the hard places and the hard people are only for missionaries but not for us? A question I've asked us before, I've asked this many times now as a church, if God were to open up for us as a church, an opportunity to go to the hard place like a Samaria would we go? I pose this question quite often. As a matter of fact, within anchored in truth, the pastor who is over anchored in truth, I have told him often that I believe one day God will raise us up or enable us to be able to go even to the hard places. And that's been my prayer for Grace Life Church and for us for years.

So the great preaching of the gospel that took place because of this great persecution. Now as I close, notice what we have here. This is all about the third outbreak of persecution against the church in Jerusalem. We've seen these persecutions too so far that weren't very successful. Oh but this one was violently successful. This is all about the work of the church preaching the gospel as they went about because they were scattered. We've seen this scattering as a lot of meaning. They were scattered but oh they were planning.

This is all about the gospel and the work of the church being scattered and planted in Judea and even in Samaria and ultimately we're going to see that it went to the ends of the earth. So this is all about, and this is the title of the message, the scattering of the church, the outbreak of persecution. The scattering of the church, the outbreak of persecution. Now one more thing before I pray and close out the message. I want us to make sure that we see that God has a plan to reach the lost and to grow His church and He uses people like us in the Word. Let me repeat that.

I want us to make sure that we see that God has a plan to reach the lost and to grow His church and God uses people just like us in this Word. And when Satan attacks His church to stop the advancement of the gospel, Satan's attack is always for the further advancement of the gospel and His church. Let me repeat that. When Satan attacks His church and He will and He does to stop the advancement of the gospel and the church, Satan's attack is always for the further advancement of the church and the gospel. But there's a big F here. There's a big F here. If we do it right. If we do it like Philip. If we do it like Stephen.

If we do this work like the apostles. But oh, we can fumble the ball now. And I don't understand how all this works out with man's responsibility and God's sovereignty. But if we fumble the ball here, God will move on and use someone else. So let's pray. We'll commit these things to the Lord and then we'll look at some prayer needs.