God’s Acts

We fall into traps of pleasing people, don’t we? It’s in our nature. Most times it’s because we are trying to be good to people so they will hear about Who God is and what He can do for them. Sometimes it’s just to make us “feel good” and be recognized for being a good person. “It’s nice to be nice to the nice” as Frank Burns said on Mash. Other times, we do things in order to avoid worse things so we can advance the good news of Jesus. Paul is in this latter situation.

After telling Paul how the gospel is advancing saying, “thousands upon thousands of God-fearing Jews have become believers in Jesus, they tell him of a problem. To make a long story short, they want Paul to be more Jewish so he will be more acceptable to the traditional Jews. If not, his life may be in danger. And it is.

Acts 21, The Message
17-19 In Jerusalem, our friends, glad to see us, received us with open arms. The first thing next morning, we took Paul to see James. All the church leaders were there. After a time of greeting and small talk, Paul told the story, detail by detail, of what God had done among the non-Jewish people through his ministry. They listened with delight and gave God the glory.

20-21 They had a story to tell, too: “And just look at what’s been happening here—thousands upon thousands of God-fearing Jews have become believers in Jesus! But there’s also a problem because they are more zealous than ever in observing the laws of Moses. They’ve been told that you advise believing Jews who live surrounded by unbelieving outsiders to go light on Moses, telling them that they don’t need to circumcise their children or keep up the old traditions. This isn’t sitting at all well with them.

22-24 “We’re worried about what will happen when they discover you’re in town. There’s bound to be trouble. So here is what we want you to do: There are four men from our company who have taken a vow involving ritual purification, but have no money to pay the expenses. Join these men in their vows and pay their expenses. Then it will become obvious to everyone that there is nothing to the rumors going around about you and that you are in fact scrupulous in your reverence for the laws of Moses.

25 “In asking you to do this, we’re not going back on our agreement regarding non-Jews who have become believers. We continue to hold fast to what we wrote in that letter, namely, to be careful not to get involved in activities connected with idols; to avoid serving food offensive to Jewish Christians; to guard the morality of sex and marriage.”

26 So Paul did it—took the men, joined them in their vows, and paid their way. The next day he went to the Temple to make it official and stay there until the proper sacrifices had been offered and completed for each of them.

Paul did it. But did this compromise, this act of obeying Jewish tradition just to be acceptable work out? Not so much…

27-29 When the seven days of their purification were nearly up, some Jews from around Ephesus spotted him in the Temple. At once they turned the place upside-down. They grabbed Paul and started yelling at the top of their lungs, “Help! You Israelites, help! This is the man who is going all over the world telling lies against us and our religion and this place. He’s even brought Greeks in here and defiled this holy place.” (What had happened was that they had seen Paul and Trophimus, the Ephesian Greek, walking together in the city and had just assumed that he had also taken him to the Temple and shown him around.)

30 Soon the whole city was in an uproar, people running from everywhere to the Temple to get in on the action. They grabbed Paul, dragged him outside, and locked the Temple gates so he couldn’t get back in and gain sanctuary.

31-32 As they were trying to kill him, word came to the captain of the guard, “A riot! The whole city’s boiling over!” He acted swiftly. His soldiers and centurions ran to the scene at once. As soon as the mob saw the captain and his soldiers, they quit beating Paul.

33-36 The captain came up and put Paul under arrest. He first ordered him handcuffed, and then asked who he was and what he had done. All he got from the crowd were shouts, one yelling this, another that. It was impossible to tell one word from another in the mob hysteria, so the captain ordered Paul taken to the military barracks. But when they got to the Temple steps, the mob became so violent that the soldiers had to carry Paul. As they carried him away, the crowd followed, shouting, “Kill him! Kill him!”

The Romans do not like religious riots and put a stop to it all. But is interesting to note here is how GOD ACTS! God intervenes in this human mess and uses Paul’s predicament as a platform for his testimony of Jesus the Christ! No wonder, Paul later writes to the Roman believers…”26-28 Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That’s why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.” Paul knows how God works!

This is what happens next…

37-38 When they got to the barracks and were about to go in, Paul said to the captain, “Can I say something to you?”

He answered, “Oh, I didn’t know you spoke Greek. I thought you were the Egyptian who not long ago started a riot here, and then hid out in the desert with his four thousand thugs.”

39 Paul said, “No, I’m a Jew, born in Tarsus. And I’m a citizen still of that influential city. I have a simple request: Let me speak to the crowd.”

Paul Tells His Story
40 Standing on the barracks steps, Paul turned and held his arms up. A hush fell over the crowd as Paul began to speak. He spoke in Hebrew.

Paul begins to relate his personal, very personal testimony of how God saved him through Jesus Christ. There is a lot more to this story…more tomorrow.

What do we learn?
–No matter what, God is there, works all things for good, and sees through hard times, strengthening our resolve.
–Don’t quit talking about Jesus, the Savior and our Lord.
–Just as the Roman government did not like religious riots, our own nation does not need to see Christian believers fighting among themselves. Let us unite and allow God to turn our nation around using our own testimonies about Him to do it!
–Other nations do not need to see us fight among ourselves, either!

Dear Heavenly Father, In good times and bad, through problems and attacks, You are there. You clear the path to resolution, sometimes using our bad stuff as a platform for telling about Your works and greatness. Thank you for being in all the details of this life. Thank you for Your Presence in our lives. Thank you for being our Savior and our Lord. In Jesus Name, Amen