Don’t Park Here by Richard Roberts
OR: Expect a miracle. Expect a new miracle every day. This is our day for a miracle. Turn in your Bibles to Philippians, about the middle of your New Testament to chapter 3. We’re going to be reading in chapter 3 and then a little later in chapter 4. Philippians, chapter 3, verse 13 and 14.
The apostle Paul is talking to his partner people in Philippi, the great Roman city where he had gone and established a church under tremendous persecution. He almost lost his life. He was put into prison with his associate Silas, and at midnight they sang and praised God. And the Lord shook the place with an earthquake and broke off the bands upon their wrists and bodies, as he did on the other prisoners.
And the jailer saw them free, and under Roman government if a jailer let prisons escape, he would lose his life. So he came in, scared to death. And Paul said, “Don’t kill yourself. We’re all here.” And Paul began to explain to him that miracle of God shaking the place and shaking off their bonds and he explained salvation through Jesus. And the man accepted Christ, he and his family, and among others in that town turned to the Lord, and they became a church. And it became the favorite church of the apostle. He said things to them he never said to anybody else because the others were not in position to receive it.
And there’s some things God can only say to me and to say to you when we are in position to receive it. If we’re not open, if we’re not listening to that still, small voice, if we’re not studying His Word and hearing the Word, we’re not in position to hear and receive what God has for us. But when we’re open, truly, we do receive great and mighty things.
Paul is now in Rome, hundreds of miles away, in a dark and filthy and lonely and cold prison. He’s there for the Gospel. And this church has been on his heart. They’re very dear to him. And they have carried out his instructions from the Lord, to the extent that he says, “You are partakers of the grace of God in my life. God’s grace in me is coming in your life.” And can you realize what that would mean to you if Paul was standing here and telling you that, “You are partakers of the grace of God in my life?” Wouldn’t you like to be a partaker of Paul’s grace?