Episode Transcript
You're listening to the Travis Rutland Podcast. Travis Rutland is a spirit filled pastor and ministry leader who has been featured on International Christian Television. He serves as lead Pastor of Liberty Square Church in Cartersville, Georgia and as President of Global Servants. His sermons focus on clear biblical teaching, practical truth and encouragement for everyday life. Each message is designed to strengthen your faith and draw you deeper into God's word. This podcast is brought to you you by Global Servants. For more information about Global servants, please visit globalservants.org now here's Travis Rutland.
[00:00:42] Speaker B: Journey to Macedonia Turn, if you will to Acts chapter 16. We're going to begin reading with verse 9, Acts chapter 16, verse 9. We'll talk about Journey to Macedonia.
Acts 16:9 and a vision appeared to Paul in the night. A man of Macedonia stood and pleaded with him, saying, come over to Macedonia and help us now. After he had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go to Macedonia, concluding that the Lord had called us to preach the Gospel to them. Therefore, sailing from Troas, we ran a straight course to Samothrace and the next day came to Neapolis and from there to Philippi, which is the foremost city of that part of Macedonia, a colony. And we were staying in that city for some days.
Let's pray. God, we ask in the next few moments that you will speak to us. We long to hear from you. Your spirit is here so wonderfully and so powerfully and we ask that you would continue to challenge and convict. Speak to us, each of us, all of us, myself included. We want to hear from you this morning. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
Recently there was a BBC documentary about how the brain works and different ways, things that the brain does. Interesting phenomenon regarding our continuing understanding of the human brain, the human body, things like that. And so they did a fascinating thing. They took an MRI of different people and they took highly religious people and put them in an MRI machine and, and showed them pictures of whatever deity they might worship.
So if it was a Protestant, they would show them, you know, pictures of Jesus so to speak. And then maybe if it was whatever, some other type of religion, they would show them pictures of their deity. And they watched what areas of the brain lit up when they saw these pictures.
Then they took a technologically obsessed individual that loved Apple products, that loved Apple, the company, iPhones, iPads, Mac airs, all the stuff that Apple creates. They took that individual and put them in an MRI machine. And then when they were in the MRI machine and the machine is scanning their brain, they showed them pictures of Apple Products, Right. Their deities, so to speak.
Because you probably know where this story is going. The same areas of the brain that when the Christians saw pictures of Jesus, then brain areas lit up. The same areas of the brain lit up when the apple obsessed individual saw pictures of Apple products.
It's fascinating, right? Because here's the thing. We know this.
We are creatures created to worship. We are creatures created. We are worshipful creatures. We are creatures that were made for worship. The problem is, since the beginning of humanity, we've almost always gotten it wrong.
We create. They created idols to worship. They created the created instead of the creator, as the Bible tells us. Right? They invented deities to worship that weren't real. There's no such thing as Zeus or Poseidon or Thor. These are invented deities by cultures.
So we were looking. And now, now thousands of years later, we don't worship deities as much. But like the individual obsessed with Apple computers, we worship the idea of fame or we worship celebrities.
Have you seen people that freak out when they meet a celebrity? I'm embarrassed for them.
They're like, you're like, are you kidding me?
She's on a reality show. You cannot be this emotionally involved in this.
Right? But we choose all these things to worship because we are creatures created for worship.
But here's the thing.
I want to talk about worship this morning, but not in the way you might think that we're going. As I start, we're not going to talk about the who we worship. That's settled.
We worship God and God alone. Okay? So the who that we worship, I'm not going to get into details on that.
I assume if you came to a church service at 10:30 in the morning on a Sunday morning, the who that you worship is decided. Or at least you're leaning in that direction. You know what I'm saying?
The who is God, right? Triune God. God in three persons. Father, Son, Holy Spirit. We. The who we worship is God.
I also don't want to talk about how we worship. The how of worship. I'm not dealing with style. Okay. I'm not also not dealing with song selection.
Okay. I also want to say right here, and I'll mention it again, that when we talk about worship, I am not just talking about singing. Singing. I think that for many of us, we misunderstand how worship operates. And so we think that worship can only happen when we're singing praise courses. That is a component of worship. But we worship in prayer. We worship in prayer. We worship in Bible study. We worship.
We're supposed to Worship with every aspect of our life. Why do we say every Sunday that giving in worship is worship and worship is giving? Because we. We're supposed to be worse worshiping with our giving.
We are supposed to worship through our generosity, not just the money. It is we are worshiping and being generous in every aspect of our life. Right? We worship. I'm going to challenge you this morning. You worship God through your willingness to forgive others, forgiveness of people who have wronged you and damaged you. That is a form of worship.
We worship through operating in the fruit of the spirit, Right? We worship through our joy. We worship through our patience. We worship through our kindness.
We worship. We're supposed to be worshipful in every aspect. But I don't want to dig into that. So like I said, the who we worship is settled. I don't want to talk about the. The how we worship because how we worship should be worshipful in every aspect of our life.
So what do we want to look at this morning?
I want to look at the what of worship. The what of worship, which is what does worship do? I think that too often we focus instead on who we're supposed to be worshiping or how we're supposed to be worshiping. And we don't really dig into what does worship do. What. What. What happens when we worship? And this is important because if we understand what happens, I promise you, you will begin to start worshiping more because you will want what happens to happen on a more regular basis.
So what happens when we worship? So we're going to go back to Acts chapter 16. They go to Philippi, which is a city in Macedonia. This is the journey to Macedonia. Paul has this vision. We read it. He has this dream in the night. A man of Macedonia says, come over to Macedonia and help us. They do. They go to Philippi.
They begin to preach the Gospel. And like it always happens with Paul, they immediately get in trouble with the authorities, with the local people. People. Somebody's always mad at Paul, no matter where he goes, doesn't matter who it is. Somebody's mad all the time. So that. So they get angry with Paul and they go to arrest him. So skip down, if you will. This is Paul and Silas. This is now Acts 22, the same chapter. But look, if you will, at Acts 16:22.
Then the multitude rose up together against them. That is Paul and Silas, okay? And the magistrates tore off their clothes and. And commanded them to be beaten with rods. And when they had laid many stripes on them, they threw them into prison, commanding the jailer to keep them securely, having received such a charge, he put them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in the stocks. Verse 25. But at midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God.
But at midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God. Now remind yourself of where you. Where they are. They have been accused unjustly. Every single accusation against Paul is always unjust. It's always wrong. It's people just mad at him for preaching the gospel. So they are arrested, they are beaten, they are put into jail. And the jailer is told, do not allow these men to escape. Under no circumstances can you let these guys get away. And so what does it say? They are put in the inner prison, in the bottom part, in the basement of the prison, in solitary confinement. And not sufficient for that, because the jailer doesn't want them to escape. He doesn't allow them to freely roam about the prison or the room, the cell that they are in. He secures.
Look again at verse 24. And fastened their feet in the stocks.
In prison, in solitary confinement, in chains, all of the. You see how it goes down Prison, solitary, in chains. It gets worse and worse and worse. And yet at midn. We find Paul and Silas praying and singing hymns. Why? Because they know this great truth, which is worship transforms the atmosphere. That is the first thing that worship does. Worship transforms the atmosphere. They are in prison. But I got news for you. They were no longer in prison. They were in chains. But they were no longer in chains because the worship had changed what was happening in that place.
The worship was transforming the spirit of that place.
Right? You, we here, we ourselves. I'm we're we, all of us. I'm not blaming anybody else, me included. We always want to talk about, oh, this thing has gone so wrong in our. In our city or our state or our country or our world. Right?
But listen, we have the ability to see that transformed.
We have the ability. You say the spirit at my work is oppressive. I got news for you. You can transform that spirit. Do you see that? The spirit of that prison, of that solitary confinement, in chains, their feet secured in stocks. But Paul and Silas knew my worship transforms this place.
The atmosphere is changed when we worship.
We know this in the. In the natural. We know this in the natural, but we often don't make the connection to the supernatural and the spiritual. We know this in the natural, though. What do we talk about? We talk about sports, Home field advantage.
We talk about it all the time. Home court advantage, Home field advantage, which is what?
That your Fans, your home fans, your home team fans are going to cheer loudly for you.
And in that, it intimidates the opposing team.
Mark, I've shared many times.
I didn't grow up with a college football team.
My dad went to University of Maryland.
Nobody's rooting for the Terrapins. He's an alumni and he doesn't root for the Terrapins.
Right? So when I got in middle school, everybody had a team. Georgia, Auburn, Clemsa, whoever it was, everybody had a team. And I was like, I gotta find a college football team. So I turned on the television and I saw these guys winning games, winning national championships, taking their helmets off all the time, getting tons of penalties and all this stuff, and winning and dancing and celebrating. And I was like, I love these guys.
So since I was in middle school, I've been a Miami Hurricanes fan. Because if you were in the late 80s, our transplants from Miami are cheering.
If you were a college football fan in the late 80s, the Hurricanes, man, you can't deny. I'm just saying, all right, that's beside the point.
So I raised the boys. We all cheer for the Hurricanes. But then, against my wishes, Mark moved to Athens, Georgia.
Listen to all that applause when I say Athens, Georgia. And just me and Matthew cheering for the Hurricanes. Unbelievable, right? So he moved to Athens, Georgia. And I told him when he moved, I said, don't cheer for the Bulldogs. Don't. Don't get sucked in. It's a cult. Don't get sucked in.
He wouldn't listen to me. He wouldn't listen to me. And he just, he started dabbling. You know, that's how sin gets you. You just kind of. You just, you just kind of dabbling. And now he's a full on Georgia Bulldogs fan. He loves the Bulldogs.
So he told me a couple years ago, you may or may not remember this, Tennessee at the time was ranked number one in the country. And they came to Georgia to play. Was it Tennessee? Yeah. Okay, so it was Tennessee. They're ranked number one in the country, and they came to Georgia to play at Georgia. Mark got tickets to that game and he told me that the stadium was so loud that night, he could not hear the person next to him talking. They couldn't hear each other speaking to each other. He said the person next to him was screaming in his ear and he could not hear what the person right next to him was saying because the stadium itself was so loud and. And Georgia just waxed Tennessee, by the way, okay. Because that is what we refer to as home field. Advantage. So we know it in the natural, right?
The stadiums do it. They say, get loud cheer, it's third down. The other teams trying to get a first down cheer, do all that stuff, right?
We do that for our favorite team and then we immediately leave and act like we have no control over the atmosphere of places we go into.
But I want you to hear me. When you worship, you take home field advantage with you. Anywhere you go, anywhere you go, any place you are at, when you begin to worship, you turn that into home field advantage. You are changing the atmosphere. Were they still in prison? Yes. Were they in prison?
No. They were no longer in prison. There at. The atmosphere had been transformed because Paul and Silas are praying and singing hymns.
Worship transforms the atmosphere.
That, that.
That neighbor that you go to visit worship, you go, oh, I just. That's so. I just. Their house, this and that. No, listen. You are not beholden to the spirits of this world.
We, when we worship the Holy Spirit, transforms the atmosphere.
You see that your workplace environments, anywhere that you go, you have home field advantage through your Creator.
Worship transforms the atmosphere. Now back to where we were. We stopped halfway through verse 25. At midnight, they're praying and singing hymns. Look.
And the prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken.
And immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's chains were loosed. And the keeper of the prison, awaking from sleep and seeing the prison doors open, supposing the prisoners have fled, drew his sword and was about to kill himself. And Paul called with a loud voice, saying, do yourself no harm, for we are all here.
Then he called for a light, ran in and fell down trembling before Paul and Silas. And he brought them out and said, sirs, what must I do to be saved? And they said to him, believe on the Lord, Jes Christ, and you will be saved, you and your household. Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house.
Here's the second part.
That. That place you go, that atmosphere, it feels oppressive. Our worship can transform that atmosphere. But here's the next step in this. We have all these people around us and they are difficult and they can be oppressive, right? And we have these people. Oh, I wish this person wasn't in my life. Oh, this person is driving me crazy. Oh, this person frustrates me. Oh, this person.
All this stuff, right? But here's the thing we forget.
Worship transforms others.
In the same way that worship transforms the spirit, the atmosphere, worship also transforms others.
This Guy just put Paul and Silas in chains, in solitary confinement. And hours later he says, sirs.
You notice that he doesn't say inmate, he says, sirs.
Do you see that? What happened? Worship, worship, worship. He's putting them in chains there. Inmate Paul, inmate Silas. He chains them up in solitary confinement. They worship. The atmosphere is transformed. And in the atmosphere being transformed, the jailer himself is transformed, because their worship has transformed him. And he says, sirs, what must I do to be saved?
I want to challenge you. Those difficult people that you have in your life.
You need to implement a lot more worship when it comes to them.
You can badger them and you can berate them. Why don't you do better? Why don't you this and that? Or you can worship the God who created you and them, and you can let him deal with it. You understand what I'm saying? You can't change them anyway, so you might as well worship the God who can change them.
That is what worship does. You've got this, you've got a kid or a grandkid that you're praying for and you're agonizing over, and you love them, but they're far from God. And I'm telling you, your answer, your key, your solution is worship. Your worship transforms them.
Your worship transforms them.
The jailer is transformed. His whole family is transformed. It doesn't mention it, but I'm pretty sure a bunch of those prisoners got saved too, right? If I'm in jail and the dude in solitary worships so hard that all the doors get knocked off their hinges, I'm probably going to start worshiping the God he's got.
Cause Zeus hadn't done anything for me, right? I'm in prison. This guy worships his God. The chains come off, the doors come off their hinges. I'm going to worship his God. The other prisoners transformed. The jailer transformed. The jailer's family transformed. All of them changed because two men in solitary confinement prayed and sang hymns.
Worship transforms the atmosphere.
But worship also transforms others.
But we're not done. Look back, if you will, at 33. Now, verse 33, Acts 16:33.
And the jailer took them the same hour of the night, washed their stripes immediately he and his family were baptized. Now, when he had brought them into his house, he set food before them and he rejoiced, having believed in God with all his household.
They start the night in solitary confinement, in chains.
They end the night being fed dinner in the jailer's house.
Why worship? Worship transforms the atmosphere. Worship transforms others. But glory to God. Worship transforms us.
Worship transforms us. The stuff you're going through, the things you're dealing with, you can try and do it in your own power and you're gonna get nowhere. Or you can step back, take your hands off of it, and say, God, this is yours. And you can worship him.
You can worship him in the midst of the prison. You can worship him when the chains are there. You can worship him when it seems impossible. You can worship him when there's no hope. You can worship him when everybody else tells you there's no possibilities.
They say to you, it's finished, it's over.
Worship transforms the atmosphere. It transforms everybody else. But also, glory to God. It transforms us.
Do you see that?
They don't go back into solitary.
They don't get the chains put back on them.
They worship. And the jailer himself wipes the blood off their backs from the beating, puts it at his table, and he feeds them dinner.
Worship transforms everything.
If it only transformed the atmosphere, it'd be wonderful.
If it only helped to transform others, it would still be great.
But it doesn't. It also transforms us.
It also transforms us.
I want us to look real quick at an Old Testament psalm David wrote. Psalm 57. We know this, the beginning of Psalm 57. It says, a miktum, a psalm, a song, but a psalm of David when he fled from Saul into the cave.
So David is in the cave. My dad's been teaching on David on Wednesday nights. You know this.
David and his men are hiding in the back of this cave, this series of kind of caves.
And Saul and his troops are out front. David has been anointed king of Israel. He knows that God is for him. But Saul is trying to kill David. David is hiding in this cave, being hunted for his life for doing nothing other than being God's chosen person.
And David feels the weight of that.
He says things like. He talks about these calamities.
He talks about all the stuff that's happening. I want you to see. Look at verse 4, Psalm 57 and 4. My soul is among lions. I lie among the sons of men who are set on fire. Their teeth are spears and arrows, their tongue a sharp sword. He's in this cave. He's being oppressed. He's being hunted. He's trying being killed. He's on the run for his very life. Look at verse six.
They have prepared a net for my steps. My soul is bowed down. They have dug a pit before me. Now I want you to look at the end of verse Six. There.
It says Selah.
Says Selah. It is.
It's a term in Hebrew that means arrest.
Means to stop.
So David writes all this, right? My net has been prepared for me. My soul is bowed down. They're hunting me. Their teeth are like spears, right? He's in this cave. He's writing these words. He has done nothing wrong. The same as Paul and Silas, in jail for nothing.
Now he says, selah.
He says, let's take a break.
He says, you know what? I am in this cave. But that's enough of that.
That's enough of that. And I want you to see how the language changes in verse seven.
He says, my heart is steadfast, oh, God, my heart is steadfast. I will sing and give praise. Oh, awake, my glory, awake. Lute and harp. I will awaken the dawn. I will praise you, O Lord, among the peoples. I will sing to you among the nations. For your mercy reaches unto the heavens and your truth unto the clouds. Be exalted, O God, above the heavens. Let your glory be above all the earth.
Because here's what David knew in that cave.
We are all in a cave at one time or another. All of us have that cave moment.
It may have been this week. You may be going through something and you feel like you are in a cave. And I am telling you, it will happen. If it hasn't happened already, it will. And if it has happened, it will happen again.
We all find ourself in the cave, and that moment is critical for who we are.
We can stay in the back of that cave and say, woe is me. We can stay in the back of the cave and complain, and I can't believe this is happening. And that's all the first part of that psalm.
Or even in the midst of the cave, we can flip it and begin to worship God.
Every cave.
Every cave. I want you to hear me on this. Every cave has two endings.
Every cave can end one of two ways.
It can end as a tomb, or it can end as a womb.
It can end as a tomb, or it can end as a womb.
Now, you can stay in that cave and you can complain, and you can just do nothing but talk about how miserable life is. And all these guys trying to kill me, and a net's been dug and they're trying to destroy me. And you can die in the back of that cave. Or you can say, no, Mutter, no matter what life brings against me, I will worship God.
I will arise. My heart is fixed on you and you alone. Oh, God, my glory Arises, I will worship you. And in the back of that cave, it no longer is a tomb. You are reborn, you are rebirthed, and you come out of that cave experience radically different than who you were.
Because the worship doesn't just transform the atmosphere and others, it transforms us.
We are reborn in the fire of the cave. If we will worship him in the midst of it now, it's not easy and it's not fun, because what we want to do is feel sorry for ourselves. But if we will worship him in the midst of the cave, we will be reborn.
I love Psalm 57.
So let me close with this.
I have worshiped all over the world. I've worshiped all over the world.
The prayers and the songs.
I've worshiped in English and Spanish, French.
I've worshiped in Cantonese. When I was in Hong Kong, I've worshiped in Tri. In West Africa, I've worshiped in Konkomba. I've worshiped in Thai. I've worshiped in aka the songs are all different.
The speed is all different.
The rhythm is all different.
The experience is all different. The instruments are all different.
But the worship is always the same.
Prayer songs, praise, lifestyle.
We worship with everything that we are.
It looks radically different on the surface.
You go, how can I worshiped on soccer fields and I've worshiped in mud huts in West Africa.
And you go, how can this be the same as that?
It is the same because the who is the same. Right? The who we worship is the same. And because that's the same, all the rest of the variables can be different. But watch this.
Because of who we worship, the variables don't matter and the what is the same.
You worship God in Konkomba in a mud hut in North Ghana. The atmosphere is transformed. The same way. If you worship God in English at Liberty Square in Cartersville, Georgia, the what of worship is the same. The what of worship is the same. It doesn't matter. The language, the country, the place, the location, the song, the what of worship. Why? Because we are worshiping the one true God. Because we worship the who, our worship to him. We see the atmosphere transformed. We see others transformed, and we see ourselves transformed.
None of the other variables matter one bit.
True worship is always transformational.
True worship is always transformational.
So here's how we're going to close.
Obviously, I'm not going to stand up here and preach my brains out and then go, all right, everybody, see you later.
I'm preaching hard on worship this morning. So guess what? We're going to do we're going to worship? Yes, obviously.
I'm not just going to let you go. Well, good luck. See you later. We're going to worship in just a moment. Matthew, the band singer, singers are going to return and we're just going to worship. We got a couple songs picked out and we're just going to worship this morning.
That's.
I just want us to enter in.
I just want us to worship. I just want us. You say.
You say my job needs to be transformed. My answer to you is worship.
You say my grandson needs to be transformed. My answer to you is worship.
You say, I am in the back of this cave and it is eating me alive. It is killing me. My answer to you is worship, Worship, worship, worship. It transforms everything that we need transformed.
Not because of anything we do, exactly. We're not making anything transform. What we are doing is simply worshiping God. We're simply focusing on him. We are simply refusing to allow the circumstances in the natural to dictate how we behave.
You see what I'm saying? They were in solitary confinement, in chains, and they refused to allow the circumstances of the natural to inform how they reacted in the spiritual.
They said, it doesn't matter where we are. We are going to worship God. And we take our hands off of it and we step away from it. And we worship God and God alone. And his transformational power begins to move in this place.
Among others, among us.
Pastor Chris and some of the prayer team are going to be at the front.
This is not just about singing. I've already said that we worship. If you want to worship through prayer, you want to pray with somebody, I encourage you to do that. You want to pray by yourself, you want to stand up and worship, you want to sit down and worship. But we're going to sing some songs. I want to see the atmosphere of this place transformed this morning.
I want you to take that with you to your job. And I want you. I want to see it transformed at your work.
I want to see relationships that you have transformed. I want to see you yourself transformed.
I've been in a cave. You may be in that this morning.
I want to see you reborn in that cave, rebirthed in that cave.
Worship.
We got a couple of songs picked out. We're just going to take our time.
We're just going to worship.
Worship transforms everything.
Worship transforms everything.
So let's worship God this morning. Let me pray God. I ask that you would finish this message.
As we begin to enter into worship, as we begin to focus on you as we worship right now with our prayers. Others may need to worship with their forgiveness.
They may have not been able to truly worship because they've been holding unforgiveness inside God. Others worship with song right now.
Others worship however it is you're calling them to do it. But God, they worship you right now. Lord, finish this message. Help each of us in our own unique way to enter into corporate and individual worship. Right now, we worship you. We want to see this atmosphere transformed. We want to see people that we love Transformers transformed. And we ourselves want to be transformed.
And it's all possible through worship In Jesus name. We worship you right now.
We ask transform this place and transform each of us. We worship you. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen.
[00:34:25] Speaker A: Thank you for listening to the Travis Rutland Podcast. If you enjoyed this message and you're in the Cartersville, Georgia area, we invite you to join us at Liberty Square Church. You can also watch online and connect with us on Facebook and YouTube. We'll see you next week for another message from Travis Rutland.
