Come over to Macedonia and help us

 

Come over to Macedonia and help us

 

Acts 16:8-10 "After passing through Mysia, we went down to Troas. A vision appeared to Paul in the night. A man of Macedonia was standing there, urging him, 'Come over to Macedonia and help us.'" After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them."

When Paul realized God's plan through a vision, he left for Macedonia Philippi without delay and arrived there. Paul wanted to go to Asia, but the vision changed his mind about going to Asia. So he said, "We got ready to leave for Macedonia immediately."

Boedeson means to save, to aid. The word “help” is used in the sense of salvation. 2 Corinthians 6:2 “For he says, ‘In a time of favor I heard you, and in a day of salvation I helped you.’ Behold, now is the favor of God; behold, now is the day of salvation.”

Matthew 15:25 "And, lo, a woman came and knelt before him, saying, Lord, help me (boedei)" A Canaanite woman said that her daughter was demon-possessed and asked for help. Here too, it means to cast out the demon and save her.

The first city in the region of Macedonia was Philippi, where the gospel began to spread in the house of Lydia, a seller of purple cloth. Acts 16:13-15 On the Sabbath day we went outside the city gate beside a river, where we could pray. And when we had sat down, we spoke to the women who had gathered. A woman named Lydia, a seller of purple cloth from the city of Thyatira, a worshiper of God, was listening to us. The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to the things spoken by Paul. She and her household were baptized. Then she urged us, saying, ‘If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house and stay.’ And she urged us.

Lydia was a woman who served God, but she had not received the baptism of the Holy Spirit. However, the Lord opened her heart to follow Paul’s words. And she and her family all received the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

The meaning of opening the heart is that the door of the heart has been closed for a long time. Revelation 3:20 "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me."

John 5:26-29 "For just as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son to have life in himself. And he has given him authority to execute judgment as well, because he is the Son of Man. Do not marvel at this, because an hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear his voice and come out—those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgment." The grave does not refer to a place where the dead are buried, but to the sleeping spirit trapped in the body. He who hears his voice will open the door. He who opens the door knows that he is the master.

John 10:26-28 “But you do not believe because you are not of my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. And I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.”

Who hears the voice and opens the door? The door of the heart responds and opens when someone knocks. It is almost impossible to open the door of the heart on your own. 1 Peter 3:18-19 "For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the Spirit; in which spirit he went and preached to the spirits in prison." The prison refers to the door of the heart that is imprisoned in the flesh, and Jesus knocks on the door to all people in the world in spirit.

Peter connects this to Noah's ark. 1 Peter 3:20 "Who were formerly disobedient, when the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which only a few, that is, eight souls, were saved by water."

Noah cried out for repentance for 120 years, saying that if they did not repent, God would judge them with a flood, but no one believed, and only Noah and his family of seven were saved. This shows that it is not easy to open the door of the heart.

Even today, Jesus continues to knock on the door of the heart through his disciples and saints. He is asking them to rise from the spiritual dead. If the sleeping person opens the door, Jesus will give them the life of resurrection and establish the kingdom of God, but there is no response.

What is the difference between those who respond and those who do not? 1 Peter 3:21, "Baptism, which now saves you (not the removal of dirt from the body but the appeal to God for a good conscience), through the resurrection of Jesus Christ." Baptism means dying in water and being born again by the Holy Spirit. Those who are born again by the Holy Spirit return to a good conscience.

A person whose conscience is dead cannot return to a good conscience. If the conscience is alive even a little, it can be restored to the conscience given by God through the power of the Holy Spirit. A person cannot know whether his conscience is dead or still alive. That is why the saints continue to knock on people's doors with the gospel. If he has a conscience alive even a little, he will respond to the word of God.

The word conscience means a good heart. When God created the first man, he made him in the image of God, and this image means a temple. Who sits in this temple? Most people become sinners from the moment they are born, which means there is no God in this temple. So the fleshly self sits in that temple and acts as a king. The fleshly self kills a good conscience.

In the parable of the sower, Jesus used the metaphor of "the good field of the heart, which is well plowed and organized, will yield much fruit," and the heart field refers to the temple in the heart. "When a believer listens to the word, meditates deeply, and responds to the word of God," this is plowing the heart field. Therefore, when you realize why you are in the world and that you are a sinner who has turned away from God, only then does your living conscience begin to work.

Hebrews 3:6-8 "But Christ is over God's house as a Son. We are his house if we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope. Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, 'Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion in the day of testing in the wilderness.'"

"The death of the cross and the life of resurrection" is the gospel, and when believers hear this, they must accept it without rejecting it. Those who do not believe in the union with the death of the cross and the present resurrection are not those who hear the voice of Jesus.