What Does It Take To Change A Life?

For this week and next Pastor Andy will be teaching on Acts 16, He titled this series “What would it take to change a life?” The gospel does not change everyone in the same way, but it brings very different people to the same Savior. Acts 16 gives us four examples: Timothy, Lydia, the slave girl, and the Philippian jailer. They could hardly be more different. Timothy was a young man willing to learn. Lydia was a successful businesswoman who was already seeking God. The slave girl was exploited by others and spiritually oppressed. The jailer was a working man serving within the Roman system. Their backgrounds, circumstances, and experiences were completely different, yet beneath those differences was the same fundamental need. They all needed Jesus Christ.

Timothy seems to have come to faith through a combination of godly family influence, lifelong exposure to Scripture, and the ministry of Paul. Scripture does not give us one dramatic conversion moment for Timothy. His faith began with the influence of his mother and grandmother. Paul specifically points to Timothy's spiritual heritage:

2 Timothy 1:5 says that Timothy's sincere faith had first lived in his grandmother Lois and his mother Eunice, and then in Timothy himself. That's significant. Timothy didn't grow up in a completely Christian household. Acts 16:1 identifies his mother as a Jewish believer and his father as Greek. He was taught Scripture from childhood. Paul tells Timothy in 2 Timothy 3:14–15 that from childhood he had known the sacred writings, which were able to make him "wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus." So before Timothy became one of Paul's closest ministry partners, Lois and Eunice had apparently laid an important spiritual foundation in his life.

Lydia's story reminds us that being religious or spiritually interested is not the same as having a transformed heart. Acts 16:14 says, "The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul." Paul proclaimed the truth, but God opened Lydia's heart to receive it. Conversion is more than learning new information about God. God works within us so that we begin to see Christ differently and respond to Him in faith. This is why evangelism requires both proclamation and prayer. We faithfully share the gospel while depending upon God to do what we cannot do: open the human heart.

The slave girl's story is dramatically different. In Acts 16:16–18, we find someone caught in both spiritual bondage and human exploitation. When she is delivered, the people profiting from her become angry because, as Acts 16:19 says, "their hope of gain was gone." Her story reminds us that the gospel does not merely make us more comfortable within our bondage. Christ confronts the things that enslave and control us. When the gospel changes what we love, it eventually changes how we live. Our money, relationships, ambitions, priorities, identity, possessions, and treatment of others all begin to come under the lordship of Jesus. Next week we will meet the Philippian jailer.

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