Lydia is described as a woman who ‘worshiped’ God, whose heart the Lord ‘opened…to respond to Paul’s message’.

(a) What do you think it meant for Lydia to have been a ‘worshiper of God’?  Who today might be similarly described, but has yet to hear and respond to the Christian message?

(b) Lydia’s experience of coming to Christian faith seems to have been quite calm and unspectacular.  Paul’s, on the other hand, had been much more dramatic.  What does this tell us about different experiences of conversion that people (including you!) might have had?

(c) Verse 14 tells us that when Lydia came to faith in Christ there was a divine enablement (‘the Lord opened her heart’) followed by a human response (she responded to Paul’s message).  Think of someone you know and care about who does not yet have faith in Christ.  What, in particular, would you like to ask God to do for that person, so that she or he might accept the message?  Why not ask God right now to do that?