Power Walk Ministries

Guest (Male): Welcome to the Power Walk Ministries broadcast. Thanks for joining us today as we continue with our series called Intentional. From the Book of Acts, chapter 16, our teacher, Pastor Paul Cannings, has been sharing about the condition of Lydia's heart and her desire to seek God and serve him. Pastor Cannings continues today to share about the soil of her heart. In the polytheistic society in which she lived, with many choices to run after deities and false gods, Lydia sought the one true living God. Here's Pastor Cannings with today's message, The Heart That God Made.

Dr. Paul Cannings: Just the other day, my wife was cooking in the kitchen for seven grandkids, seven grandkids. We had them over, we were all excited to have them. And we have a dilemma. We have some grandkids that are pescatarians and some that are meat lovers like their papa, the blessed ones. Now, I'm just kidding. But we had seven grandkids there, and they were all moving around. We know they were hungry, went to the pool, been swimming, you know, they don't come out the pool that fast. You get them finally get them out, trying to run around, make sure everybody get their showers and stuff in preparation for dinner.

But dinner was just not fully there yet. And I saw two of the granddaughters going to the kitchen and I put their hands around GG and said, GG, let us help you. Tell us what next to do. And the seat I'm in there, they were doing this because they understood they're gotten older now, and they understood that she has a lot of different things to get done. And they know the kitchen. And so they were doing things. She has a point someplace, you know, where to go do it. And they know arguments, no anything. And then they say, GG, we need to help you with the dishes as well.

When you look at that, I'm going, hallelujah. You're excited to see it. I was like, look at that. That's the heart of a servant. The heart of a servant is not somebody who you have to go tell anything. The heart of a servant is a person who sees the issue. And because they are committed and love the person, they automatically do it. They automatically do that. You see the same thing with my siblings and I serving our mom and dad in their senior years. There's a discussion on the phone, and the phone calls are easy to put together.

The schedules are easy to put together as we work through that process and love them because of what they poured into us. It was easy to do that. You see, when we come to serving God and we have schedules we throw at him, we have this person in the church they just do things just make me so mad. We have all these different things. It's so hard because there's so many different dynamics when you come here because this person says you have to do it this way that and all the different church structure things that make us think it is so hard to get anything done, that make us sit down and say things like, oh, I don't want to get to know anybody this church.

When you get to know people, that's when you leave the church. All those kind of things. It's really ridiculous and disappointing because what it says is it's a description of how our hearts and our relationship with God is actually had a description of how the church structure is, how the people may be in the church, and what your schedule says. Because our schedules could say a whole lot of things, but we still go get things done. It is what we find in this text today in Acts chapter 15 verse 14 that describes a person who's made such a difference.

The this lady started a church. This lady changed her family. This lady is the reason we could talk about a church in Revelation called Thyatira. That church, this woman got going. Please understand. She could have made all kinds of excuses. I'm a single woman. I have to provide for my family. I got to get all these camels pack or donkeys pack. I got to make this journey to Philippi. I got to get my business operating so that all these employees that I have, I got to keep paying them. Then I have to get the purple color and that that's not like you just go down here to this factory and pick it up.

I mean, it's different in their day. So she has all of these different dynamics. She could have used it an excuse. None of it affected her because of what we studied the last couple of days concerning this woman named Lydia. Is she in verse 14 of Acts chapter 16 a certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple in the city of Thyatira, which worshiped God, heard us, whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul. Let's spend some time in that section of this verse so that we can see how to evaluate ourselves when we come up with excuses as to how we serve God.

Look at this carefully. First thing we studied is that she was a worshiper of God. We learned that there was a high reverence of God, learned that she was devoted to God, and learned that her scope and understanding of God led her to such an appetite for God that she could never stop wanting to know about him. This is what we found out from that. Next thing we learned from this process is that she heard us, meaning she had a heart that was of ground that was fertile soil as described in Luke chapter 8 verse 15.

She says a good soil ground. We talked about how that soil is what God used. But then watch carefully. The Lord opened her heart. He opened her heart. It literally means that God used his authority to make sure that nothing, whether it's pagan religion that she's had in her past most likely, whether it's a situation that maybe her husband passed like some scholars would believe that her husband may have passed. That's why she was equipped to be able to do all of this. There's nothing in the text that says that. So you you had a situation where it could have been that could have said, well, you know, she has a business to run.

And and in those days a woman doing a business was not the most easiest thing to accomplish with a male-dominated society that is more dominating than it would be for us now. You could have said all those things that coming among the Jews and and trying to break her business work could have had all of those things. So none of those things God in his power and his authority and his might. This why it says Lord his power, his might, his authority to be able to do whatever he wants to do. Make sure that when he came in there is no resistance because he knew that her heart was so ripe, so ready that there is nothing that needs to prevent this woman from being what he could see her being simply because she had a ready heart to serve God.

I want you to make this comparison with me. Mary Magdalene has seven demons. She was demon possessed. Christ, when he removed those demons from her life, she became so excited for God that she would hang out with Jesus Christ at the cross. The disciples except for John, they're gone. Mary Magdalene stays there. And Mary Magdalene stays there so much that she would go to the tomb in the garden. She would be in the garden with the tomb. And Jesus Christ would send her to tell the disciples what she saw. And he would tell her, stop touching me.

He would say that because he has to he's a wave offering. He has to go to heaven, wave before God that everything God wanted is done and is done without any sin stayed on him. He paid the price, got up from the grave. So therefore there's no more sin that cannot be removed. And until God accepts that wave offering, he can't be touched cuz he came down later and said to Thomas, touch me. So obviously he's done it wrong with touching him. There was a timing of when he was going to be touched. He had to tell her, don't touch me.

And she's willing to just go. It's not easy to just go down the road as a single woman in that day, and especially with a woman with her reputation. But she goes anywhere that he tells her to go. That's the difference, folks. The disciples, they need a theological lesson. This woman just needs Jesus. That's the heart we're talking about. When that heart understands that Jesus Christ know his authority, his power, his might, who he is, this woman has been studying the Hebrew God, opened up the Red Sea, talking about the promise to Abraham on time 400 years later.

Boom, he's out of Egypt. No matter how powerful Satan was, how powerful the army was done. This God will have this nation going there with 70 people and come out of 2 million. This God was allowed him to go through a Red Sea on dry ground. This God she's been learning about that took him through the walls of Jericho. This God she's learning about that established this nation only because of their disobedience they are where they are. This woman is ready to do whatever God says. And then she hears Paul talking about the Christ. Wait a minute.

That's new. Who is this Christ? I you know, Paul, he's a Jew. He's a Jew, Hebrew of Hebrews, man. Paul is going to take that and break it down and tie in the Old Testament to the New Testament. So she's already ready and understand the Old Testament cuz she was devoted to come into Philippi and learn about this. And she was ready to get this done. So she listening to this ready, open heart, ready to go. God says, okay, that heart, I need to make sure there is nothing there that would resist a heart that is fertile soil that I need to land on.

Nothing will prevent her from totally surrendering her life to God. That's what a open heart here means. Not just that God remove any possible pollution from ever making anything messed up. Not only that, but she had a readiness to surrender to God, a readiness. So that all she needed was an opportunity. She didn't need to be pushed because her readiness was there. Soon as she gets this message, she she doesn't know Paul for a long period of time. Paul shows up in here and he's preaching. Many people believe that she's also helped to plant the church of Philippi because her influence is there.

You could see it in there. And then she's probably the one who gave the people money to go find Paul to make sure that Paul can be able to do more ministry. So her commitment to Paul was not just all right, when you hear man, I keep giving you honorarium so you keep preaching. No, no, no, no, no. She understood like the folks in second Corinthians chapter 8 of Macedonia. She understood that grace of God has saved her. And he saved her and gave her a brand new life. And she's so excited about it. she want to make sure it's going to everybody else.

And she's going to make sure that her business continues to prosper to make sure grace needs to be exposed to everybody else to make sure that is happening around the world. That is the heart that when God touches it, it is working. It is serving. It is loving because the love is pure. The love is right, and the love is passionate for the person and therefore for the agenda. Folks, what we're missing in church today where people sit and sour. My mom used to say that all the time, all folks do is get fat with the word and they sit and sour rather than get up and do things for God.

And I hear her fussing about that one day. Next thing I know she has a vacuum in the back of my dad's car saying, please take me to the church house. I'm tired of it being dirty. Bathroom's not clean. And here's a 70 something year old woman retired cleaning a church for no money because I can't understand how we could just walk into the house of God and it's not clean. So you don't have to wave a fist at her. You don't have to push her out the door. There is a heart that is opened by God because he sees the nature, the person, the appetite for his word to serve him, to love him, to walk with him.

So it's just a matter of what the needs are in the kitchen. Stay focused.

Guest (Male): That was Pastor Paul Cannings telling us that Lydia's heart refused all the pagan teachings of her community and zeroed in on Paul's teaching about what Christ did for her. From that she became passionate and fulfilling God's agenda. To obtain a copy of this series, log on to powerwalkministries.org. That's powerwalkministries.org. Or you can call us at 281-260-7402. Please save the date, December 5th, 2026, as Dr. Paul Cannings will be hosting a fundraiser luncheon. Dr. Tony Evans, founder and president of the Urban Alternative, will be our guest speaker. The luncheon will be at 11:00 a.m. at Crown Plaza in Shenandoah, Texas.

Please visit us online at powerwalkministries.org for reservation and further details. We hope you'll be with us this December 5th to join our host Pastor Paul Cannings at 11:00 a.m. for the luncheon and for a message from God's word by Dr. Tony Evans. December 5th, get your reservation, powerwalkministries.org. We hope to see you there.

Guest (Male): We appreciate your prayerful and financial support of Power Walk Ministries. To make a financial contribution, please call us at 281-260-7402. The number again is 281-260-7402. Or log on to powerwalkministries.org. Once again, that is powerwalkministries.org. And as we leave you, remember when we are surrendered to the Lord as Lydia was, God can unleash his might, power, and authority to do whatever he pleases to fulfill his purposes in our lives.