Keller shows us how a variety of approaches in sharing the gospel might work with different kinds of people. We will take two weeks on his wonderful sermon: A Woman, A Slave, and a Gentile from Acts 16.

This week we’ll see how he compares Lydia, a wealthy seller of purple fabric, to a sophisticated business woman from Manhattan. Lydia was  Jewish, and so I’m going to imagine the business woman as either a Jewish or a Catholic woman that  who believes in God, but hasn’t grasped the gospel. How would we approach her? Keller shows us. I have the transcript from Logos, as well as the link to the sermon, so I suggest doing them together so you don’t miss Keller’s anointing.

https://gospelinlife.com/sermon/a-woman-a-slave-and-a-gentile/   \

SUNDAY

1. We are half-way through the summer that always goes so fast. For what are you particularly thankful so far? Or, how has God been at work in your life this week?

MONDAY: THE TEXT (ACTS 16:13-15)

¹³ On the Sabbath we went outside the city gate to the river, where we expected to find a place of prayer. We sat down and began to speak to the women who had gathered there. ¹⁴ One of those listening was a woman named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth from the city of Thyatira, who was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to respond to Paul’s message.

¹⁵ When she and the members of her household were baptized, she invited us to her home. “If you consider me a believer in the Lord,” she said, “come and stay at my house.” And she persuaded us. ¹⁶ 

2. Make 5 observations.

3. What stands out to you from this text and why?

TUESDAY: PROFILING LYDIA

READ AND LISTEN TO THE SERMON THROUGH THIS TRANSCRIPT

Christianity was born into a culture that was every bit as resistant and unsympathetic to its claims as ours is. In those days, to the people in that heard about it in the original culture where it was born, Christianity sounded dangerous, sounded impossible, and sounded outrageous, just like today. The case for the truth of Christianity was made with such strength, people believed in it in such numbers that it changed that entire brutal society.

What we’ve been doing is we’ve been looking at the book of Acts. Because in the book of Acts, we see that case being made. The book of Acts was written to Theophilus. It was written to a man who was culturally and intellectually sophisticated. Each week we’ve been looking at how this message was made, how this case was made.

Today we stay in Acts, but for today and the next couple of weeks, we’re going to change our focus a bit. Instead of looking at what the message is, we’re going to look at how the message came into the lives of people and actually changed people. What we have in the book of Acts are more case studies of conversion than you really have anywhere else in the Bible.

In fact, in this particular passage, this particular chapter (chapter 16), I’ll show you in a minute it’s almost been scientifically chosen. There were probably many conversions. There had to have been many conversions in Philippi. They started a church there, and there were no Christians there to start with. Luke has chosen these three to show us both how incredibly different and yet how incredibly similar Christian conversions can be.

We’re able to address the questions … What does it mean to be a Christian? How do you become a Christian? Christian conversion. Let’s take a look at these three case studies Luke has very carefully selected to teach us something about what it means to be a Christian and how to become a Christian. We see Lydia, the slave girl, and the jailer. Lydia is a case of the gospel for the religious. The slave girl is a case of the gospel for the oppressed. The jailer is a case of the gospel for the secular.

1. Lydia

Let’s first of all look at Lydia. The first of the case studies is Lydia. Who is Lydia? Let’s profile her. Okay. She was wealthy. We see she was a businesswoman. She was a dealer in purple goods, which means, since purple dye was extremely expensive, she was a retailer of fashion and luxury goods. She owned her own home. She was probably wealthy. She was the CEO of her own company. She lived on the Upper East Side. She had a house at the Hamptons. She had a house in Palm Beach.

The other thing we see about her is she was a moral and spiritual person. When it describes her as a worshiper of God, that actually was a technical term almost. It meant a Gentile who was reading the Hebrew Bible and trying to please and seek out the God of the Hebrew Bible. So when Paul went down to the waterside to find this prayer meeting, this would be something like a kind of proto-synagogue meeting. It would have been a place where the Bible was being read and prayers were being offered.

Now how does the gospel come to Lydia? The answer is through a rational discourse, because we’re told here that her heart was open to Paul’s message. It’s a word that means a discourse, a discussion. The word respond … Do you see the word? It says, “The Lord opened her heart to respond …” The word respond means to be attracted. She had an aesthetic experience on the basis of a rational discourse. She got it. She saw the beauty of … What?

Well, this is almost certainly what would have happened. Paul would have come and said, “Tell me what you’re learning about the God of the Bible.” The women would have said something along these lines: “Well, we’ve learned he made a promise to Abraham that through Abraham, he would bless all the nations of the earth. We also know he came to Moses, and through Moses, he brought the great Law of God, the Ten Commandments, a Law that is wonderful but impossible to fully fulfill it.

Then in addition to the Law, God also gave to Moses the sacrificial system. He gave him the tabernacle and the sacrifices. Though it’s very mysterious and rather confusing, the sacrificial system means there must be some way for atonement for sin to be made for the people who aren’t able to live up to this great Law.”

Paul must have said, “Let me give you the key. Let me give you the key to the whole Bible. Let me make sense of it all: Jesus. Jesus is the fulfillment of Abraham’s promise. He is the one through whom all the nations of the earth can be blessed. Jesus is the fulfillment of the Mosaic law. He is the only human being who ever lived an absolutely perfectly righteous life, loving God with all his heart, soul, strength, and mind and loving his neighbor as himself.

On top of that, he was also the Lamb of God. He was the ultimate sacrifice. In other words, he came, and he fulfilled the law perfectly. So he earned the blessing that such a life deserves, but at the end of his life, he went to the cross, and he took the curse our life deserves. So when I believe in him, my curse is transferred to him, and his blessing is transferred to me.”

In other words, Paul says, “Every prophet, every priest, every hero, every lamb, every sacrifice, every suffering servant, every majestic lord, every returning king is Jesus. They’re all pointing to Jesus!” You see, that word respond means that Lydia … We don’t know about the others, but we know when Lydia listened to that, it was beautiful. It made sense. She had an aesthetic experience. She realized, “Wait. It clicks.” The penny beings to drop.

4. Summarize the approach Paul has toward Lydia and why he approaches her as he does. 5. We know it is possible to be religious and moral and yet miss the absolute beauty of Christ that has the power to melt your heart. How did Keller imagine Paul doing that for Lydia? 6. How does the sentence I put in red show that the Bible is one story authored by God? 7. Can you remember a time, either in the past or recently, when the beauty of Christ pierced your heart? If so, share.

8. Is there someone in your life like Lydia — moral, even religious, intelligent — but may
not know the gospel? Pray for wisdom for how you might talk to them.

Wednesday: Approaching the Lydias of our World

I have seen the Lord bring many Catholics to faith in Christ, some, who, like Lydia, do have faith in God, yet the gospel penny hasn’t dropped. They see Christianity as rules in which they might please God. They’ve missed the beauty of the gospel and His Word. This certainly isn’t true of all Catholics, but of many. My dear roommate from college is a Catholic with whom I have stayed in touch, and truly knows the Lord — and there are many others. Yet there are many who don’t truly understand that we are saved through Christ alone and can have an intimate relationship with him.

One day at pickleball Frank asked me to give him two copies of The Jesus Who Surprises, a book that shows the beauty of Christ throughout the Old Testament. God opened their hearts and Frank called me and asked me to come over to see if they were ready to be baptized. They were baptized in my hot tub and began coming to our church and studying the Bible. They have have surpassed many long-term evangelicals in their knowledge of the Bible. I have no idea how many Life Application Bibles Frank has given away, but I am guessing at least fifty. He is on a mission to get Catholics into the Word. He even joined a Catholic women’s Bible study in a nearby town! 🙂 This week he gave a Bible to a Catholic at pickleball. This week I overheard him explaining the gospel to another pickleball player. He plans to give her a Bible. Our church is made up of many who were raised in the Catholic faith but the gospel penny had not dropped. Frank feels called to them — and they are responding.

9. Thoughts on the above?

Read/Listen to this:

One of the things Paul was going to show her (and this is very important for you) … Because, you see, the gospel doesn’t make people religious. The religious need the gospel. Lydia was religious, but she needed the gospel. Here’s why. Because religion is outside in. “If I really obey the law, if I live right, then God will come in and bless me.” But Christianity is inside out. God, through Christ, completely loves and blesses me, and therefore, I try to please him. Those are two completely different dynamics, as we often say here.

Because in religion, God is useful. “I obey because he is useful.” Why? “My obedience is useful. If I obey, then God will give me things. God will bless me. He’ll answer my prayers. He’ll give me good health. He’ll take me to heaven. I obey because God is useful.” In Christianity, you obey because God is beautiful. You don’t obey him to get things because in Christ you have everything. Why are you obeying him? Aesthetically. You’re praising him.

You know, the way C.S. Lewis puts it in his famous place in Reflections on the Psalms is when you hear a piece of music or you see a beautiful sight, you feel like you have to grab somebody else and praise it with them. You grab your friend, and you say, “Look at this. Isn’t this great?” Why are you praising it? Because it’s beautiful. The more you praise it, the more you enjoy it. Isn’t that right? The more you praise it, the more you enjoy it.

You say, “Look at this. Isn’t this great? Look at the lines. Look at the colors. Look at this and that.” The more you praise it, the more you’re enjoying it, the more the other person is enjoying it. Right? Why are you praising it? Does it need it? It doesn’t. It’s beautiful. It’s an end in itself. Lydia had a God who was useful, but that day, she received a God who was beautiful. Before that, she was not bearing false witness, not committing adultery, honoring her father and mother, observing the Sabbath.

After salvation, what happened? After the gospel came in, what happened? Did she start lying? Did she start committing adultery? No! “Well, there’s no difference.” All the difference in the world! It’s not a burden. It’s not crushing. She is not doing it because God is useful. Now she is doing it because God is beautiful. She obeys to enjoy him. She obeys to delight him. She obeys to praise him.

10. What stands out to you from the above and why?

11. Was there a time when you saw God more as useful than beautiful? If so, what changed it?

 Rebecca Pippert sometimes says this. “I have had an experience with Jesus that changed my life. If you’d like to hear abut it, I’d love to tell you.” Then she leaves it up to them. Frank tells people His life has been changed by a great study Bible he has. If they show any interest, he gives them one!

12. What have you learned that has been helpful in initiating spiritual conversations?

Thursday: An Aesthetic Experience

One of the aspects that wooed me to the Lord as a child was creation: the stars on a midnight dark sky over our cottage; the woodlands covered with forget-me-nots. My mother sang the hymns all the time in her lilting soprano — O Holy Night on Christmas Eve. My Dad would often make the connection for me, saying “The heavens declare God’s glory,” or “Consider the lillies…”

13. What aesthetic experiences have drawn you to God, either in childhood or now? How have you helped children or grandchildren make the connection between beauty and God?

Read and Listen:

Let me tell you something. That is a dynamic that will make you grow and grow and grow. It won’t drain you, but it will fill you. A rational discourse, right, a message, and she saw the beauty. It made sense. The whole Bible now made sense. The whole thing made sense. The gospel for the religious. Religious people need the gospel more than anyone else maybe, because they think they have it. Everybody else knows they can’t because of how grumpy they are or at least how burdened they are or how guilty they are.

If they’re not grumpy, they’re guilty, you see. If they think they’re living up to their standards, they’re not guilty, but they’re grumpy, and they’re harsh on everybody else. On the other hand, if they’re not living up to their standards, they may not be grumpy, but they’re guilty. Boy, they need it. Lydia got it. Rational discourse, aesthetic experience. She saw the beauty.

14. Comments on the above?

Friday: Combining Rational with An Aesthetic Experience

I feel my friend Frank does by giving these expensive but beautiful Bibles to people.

Linda Strom’s grandmother would take her for a walk along a stream each night, they would eat an Eskimo pie, and she’d tell her how wonderful Jesus was and why.

I have given Theo of Golden to several people for it such a beautifully written book and Christ is hidden in it. I’ve found even atheists are drawn by it.

I am blessed to live on a lake. I have international students who work here down for supper and tell them my story while we watch the sun go down.

15. Has this week percolated any ideas for what you might do in reaching out to the Lydias or anyone in your life?

Saturday: 

16. What is your God shot?