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Today’s reading is Acts 7:1-8:40.

At the end of Acts 7, Stephen was stoned. Then in the beginning of Acts 8, the first purposeful, full-scale persecution against Christians began. This was easy to conduct because they were all in and around Jerusalem. But this persecution spread them out. According to Acts 8:1, the Christians were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. 

I can’t imagine what that must have been like. Up until Stephen’s stoning, Acts 2:47 was the general rule. They were praising God and having favor with the people. Then Stephen started debating with those Freedmen and they had enough of this upstart sect. They would stamp it out, starting with Stephen. How many others died in this persecution? How many lost their homes? I simply can’t imagine being driven from my home because of my faith. I simply can’t imagine watching my family die because of our faith or being executed myself because of it. I can imagine that if I had been in their shoes I would have been wondering, “God, how on earth can you let this happen? Why aren’t you stopping this?” I wonder how many Christians left the faith during this very trying and turbulent time?

However, not very specifically that the text says the people were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. This hearkens back to Jesus’ direction to the apostles in Acts 1:8. He wanted them to be His witnesses in Jerusalem, then Judea, then Samaria, and then the remotest parts of the earth. So far, they had only worked in and around Jerusalem. 

Why did God let this awful tragedy occur? Because it helped accomplish His plan. It helped spread His saving message into Judea and Samaria. We immediately see Samaritans turning to Christ, even the Sorcerer himself. Then we see the Eunuch traveling home from Jerusalem, probably after one of the feast days. Philip, who had gone into Samaria, teaches the gospel to him and the taking of the gospel on into the remotest part of the earth is on its way.

The overarching lesson behind all of this is I need to remember I am on one side of the curtain and God is on the other. I can’t see what God sees. I can’t see how all these things will work together into God’s plan. But God does. When bad things happen to me, I can trust God that He will work things out for my good and His glory. I can trust Him no matter what is happening. When bad things happen, it doesn’t mean God is abandoning me. It simply means He is using things that I can’t understand to accomplish His will. I can rest in peace knowing that God really is working and His plan will come through in the end.

***Question: When were some very difficult times that upon looking back you can see God’s hand providing you something good even through the negative?

Keep the faith and keep reading,

ELC

Today’s reading is Acts 27:1-28:31.

Acts 27:43-44 is one of the greatest examples of the providence of God I have ever read. There were 276 people on Paul’s ship that went down and all survived. The Bible says, “He [the centurion] ordered those who could swim to jump overboard first and make for the land, and the rest on planks or on pieces of the ship. And so it was that all were brought safely to land.”

WOW!

This wasn’t coincidence. This was God’s plan. In Acts 27:23-24, an angel told Paul everyone on the ship would survive. However, it wasn’t because of dumb luck or coincidence, but because of God. In God’s foreseeing care and guardianship over Paul, He granted everyone’s life on that ship. However, there is no miraculous work. The hand of God did not reach down from the heavens and lift the ship out of the water and rest it safely on dry land. Rather, those who could swim maintained their strength enough to get to dry land. Those who couldn’t were somehow able to find pieces of wood and float to the shore.

No doubt, the unbelievers were all amazed at their good fortune. How on earth could 276 people all survive a shipwreck? Paul and his fellow believers knew. God did it. He worked providentially.

We can trust God to care for us. I don’t know how He makes everything work, but I know He has promised to make everything work together for good in Romans 8:28. Things may be going smoothly or my life may feel like a shipwreck, but I know God is with me and cares for me. He will see me through. He can maintain my strength to get me to shore or He can find me some flotsam to float on. God will get me through. I just have to trust Him.

Keep the faith and keep reading.

ELC

P.S. One of my shepherds also commented on Romans 8:28 in his brief article this week on the Franklin church’s website. Check it out.

P.P.S. What did you get out of today’s reading.

I know this may seem odd, but the thing that stood out most to me in today’s reading was the little statement in I Thessalonians 2:18: “Because we wanted to come to you–I, Paul, again and again–but Satan hindered us” (ESV)

No doubt, it is nigh impossible in this earthly and finite realm to know when God is acting and when Satan is acting. However, this passage demonstrates that not every circumstance in our lives should be laid solely at God’s feet. Yes, I understand God could change things and everything that happens God allowed. I also understand that God can use everything that happened. 

However, Paul said he had wanted to come to Thessalonica again and again, but Satan hindered him. In our attempts to give God the glory, we often lay at His feet things that aren’t necessarily His direct doing. When something doesn’t go the way we plan, we often try to comfort ourselves by saying things like, “I don’t know why God did that, but He knows best.” I appreciate that attitude, but at the same time, it may well have been Satan trying to keep something from happening. 

Why does this matter at all? I think this demonstrates a flaw in the modern thinking that seems to suggest every day occurrences are close to a matter of revelation. We are looking for signs from God in what happens every day. When Paul was unable to go to Thessalonica, he knew it was not a sign from God, it was a hindrance from Satan.

Now, apart from miraculous revelation, there is no way of knowing which is which. We can’t hardly know when God was at work or Satan. Let us simply proceed with caution. Give thanks to God for the good things that happen. Rely on God through the bad things. Look at all things and strive to grow no matter what happens. But be careful trying to interpret what happens in your life as signs from God to direct you. It may well be a hindrance of Satan. Who knows, it may be a hindrance of Satan that God uses for good (cf. II Corinthians 12:7). 

The conclusion of the matter is that God is has revealed His will for us in His word. He is not expecting us to interpret the circumstances of life to figure out His will for us. Whether His providence leads us in a certain way or Satan’s hindrance, God wants us to obey His will from His word no matter what is happening to us. Let’s quit looking for signs hidden in life and start relying on His message revealed in the Word.

Keep the faith and keep reading,

ELC

P.S. What caught your eye, stood out to you or moved you in today’s reading?

I can’t read Ephesians 3-4 without being drawn to Ephesians 3:20-21:

“Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen” (ESV).

God can do what we ask or think. Not only that, He can do all that we ask or think. Not only that, He can do more than all that we ask or think. Not only that, He can do more abundantly than all we ask or think. Not only that, He can do far more abundantly than all we ask or think. This doesn’t say He will do anything we ask or think. It simply says He can. There is no request that challenges God. There is nothing that causes God to have a V8 moment, saying, “Whoa, I don’t know about that one, that’s tough.”

But did you also notice that this is through the power working in us? This is not something He does in spite of us. This is not something He does without us. This is something He does through us. If we are surrendering to Him, He can do amazing things through us. Surely the miracles of the apostles recorded in Scripture give us at least a picture that God can do amazing things through us when He wants. You and I may just be plain ol’ Jane and John Doe, but our God is not plain. He is powerful and He can do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think by the

 power at work within us.

What does this mean? It means we need to start thinking and asking. We need to get in God’s word and figure out what He wants and start asking for it. Start asking for Him to do it through us. But more than that, we need to think and ask big. I’m not saying trying to test God. I’m just saying let’s rely on God. Let’s have faith in the God who can do beyond what we are asking, so let’s ask Him do to even more.

What a great God we serve.

Keep the faith and keep reading.

ELC

I spent the week of New Years in the emergency room and then confined to my house because I developed pneumonia. I have never been so sick in my life. As I have heard other people say, for a time I was so sick, I was afraid I was going to die. Then I was so sick, I was afraid I wouldn’t. I was miserable. 

To be honest, in times like that I wonder why on earth God let that happen. It messed up an opportunity I had to teach at another congregation. It certainly didn’t help my family finances. It hit while Marita’s dad was extremely sick and she had to leave to go be with him. 

Now that it is eight months behind me, I recognize it really wasn’t that bad. I can hardly imagine what it must be like for people to go through really, really difficult times–the loss of a job, break up of a family, sickness and death of a child. 

There is one passage in today’s reading that really struck me. It almost seems like a throw-away statement just tucked in there between the important stuff. But it really gave me some comfort.

“You know it was because of a bodily ailment that I preached the gospel to you at first, and though my condition was a trial to you, you did not scorn or despise me, but received me as an angel of God, as Christ Jesus…” (Galatians 4:13-14, ESV).

This passage doesn’t give a great number of details. However, it does claim the reason Paul ended up preaching in Galatia was because he got sick. Perhaps it was something with his eyes as the continuing verses suggest. However, I can imagine how I would have felt if I were Paul. Here I am traveling around, trying to do the will of God, spreading the Gospel and saving souls. Then God up and lets me get majorly sick. I’m so sick it messes up my travel and teaching plans.

In the moment of sickness, I might be pretty upset. However, from the perspective of the letter written later, we can see God’s bigger plan. I don’t know what Paul’s interrupted plans were. However, God apparently had plans for Paul to teach the Galatians. In addition to that, God had plans for Paul to eventually write this letter to them, which would be incorporated in Scripture to help all Christians of all time. None of that would have happened if God hadn’t let Paul get sick.

Therefore, I have to remember my God is powerful enough to use my bad times in a great and glorious way to accomplish His plans. It may mess up my plans, but His plans are better anyway. 

I’m not saying it will be easy to face tough times. I’m just saying this faith can get me through, knowing that God is with me and He will use whatever happens in a way that makes me better and accomplishes His glorious work.

Keep the faith and keep reading.

ELC

Acts 27:9-10 used to give me a great deal of trouble.

“Since much time had passed, and the voyage was now dangerous because even the Fast was already over, Paul advised them, saying, ‘Sirs, I perceive that the voyage will be with injury and much loss, not only of the cargo and the ship, but also of our lives’” (ESV)

After all, here was Paul, an inspired apostle, saying there would be great loss of life on this ship. But, in the end, no life was lost. Acts 27:44 says, “And so it was that all were brought safely to land” (ESV).

This actually teaches me something about apostleship and inspiration. I don’t know why I have ever referred to the apostles as the “inspired apostles” as if somehow everything they said came directly from God. The Bible never calls them that. And yet, I have heard that taught and I have said it myself. This passage, however, demonstrates that the apostles were not inspired. The Bible teaches that the Scriptures the apostles wrote were inspired in II Timothy 3:16-17, but it never says the apostles themselves were inspired.

When Paul told the captain there would be no loss of life, he wasn’t speaking for God. His every word was not inspired. Only what God wanted him to write down as Scripture was. Therefore, God did not fail here. Paul did not fail. Paul was simply relying on his knowledge of sea travel to make this statement. Of course, it would have been true had God not intervened.

When Paul later told his shipmates no loss of life would come, that was true because that came from the angel of God.

Anyway, the whole point of this is to clarify our language. Paul wasn’t an inspired apostle. Neither were any of the other apostles. Rather, God used the apostles and prophets to record His inspired word. We had better listen to it.

Keep the faith and keep reading.

ELC