Hello, my ‘Walking with Jesus’ friends,
In many parts of the world, we are approaching the season of transitions and travel! Graduations propel new graduates to pursue higher education or careers and that often takes them from home to begin life independently from their parents. Weddings in these months launch new families, and often these months are job relocation months for families. I wonder what transitions the next few weeks will bring into your life my friends.
I left you yesterday walking down the dusty road with the apostle Paul in another one of his transitions! Perhaps for the first time since he left Syrian Antioch more than 1700 miles and many weeks ago, to begin this second missionary journey with Silas, Paul walks alone. Paul had left Timothy and Silas back in Berea, and as far as I can tell Dr. Luke stayed behind in either Philippi or Thessalonica.
While Paul had not been run out of town or persecuted in Athens as he had been in towns like Philippi and Thessalonica, I believe Paul is leaving Athens discouraged. Paul had used all his oratory and debate skills to their fullest in the Athens Jewish Synagogue with Jews and God worshiping Greeks, and in the marketplace with Athenians, and most especially in the Areopagus with the most intelligent philosophers, but Paul is walking away from Athens with very few converts. (Acts 17:33)
We don’t know how long of a trek it was for Paul to Corinth, but we do know he had lots of time to think and talk with God about the lack of response he has experienced in several towns on this his second missionary journey. I wonder how often you’ve found yourself discouraged at the lack of responsiveness or even friendliness of people to your attempts at being a God honoring person and sharing the hope of Jesus with people?
Take encouragement my friends, even the great apostle Paul found most people uninterested and unresponsive to his efforts in drawing people to Jesus! Still, the burning passion in Paul’s heart had not been extinguished, there were more cities and towns ahead, and hopefully soon, Silas and Timothy would find him and the team would be reunited again.
Dr. Luke opens his 18th chapter of his journal we know as the book of Acts with these words: “Paul left Athens and went to Corinth. There he met a Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla because Claudius had ordered all Jews to leave Rome! Paul went to see them, and because he was a tentmaker, as they were, he stayed and worked with them. Every Sabbath Paul reasoned in the Synagogue, trying to persuade Jews and Greeks. (Acts 18:1-4)
After a long journey alone from Athens, Paul finally arrived in Corinth. We can assume once again Paul had never been to this city nor did he know anyone here. I presume he went first to the Synagogue to see if he could find lodging with any generous Jewish people. You may recall hospitality to fellow Jews traveling was a very high value for God’s people. (1 Peter 4:9)
It seems clear Paul was needing some finances and so he sought to use his trade, tent making. Tents were needed in every city and town for a wide range of things, and raw materials for tent making would have been readily available. As a young boy Saul Paulus had studied with the Rabbi in his hometown of Tarsus, and he would also have been urged by his father to learn some trade which could generate some income when needed. Tent making would have been a trade Paul could do almost anywhere, anytime.
It appears this tent making ability is what first connected Aquila and Priscilla with Paul, as they were tent makers also. Seems they had recently come to live in Corinth, fleeing Rome. History tells us the Roman Emperor Claudius reigned from 41ad – 54ad. For a variety of reasons his patience with Jews and Jewish Christians in particular ran out and he expelled them all from Rome, unwilling to allow either group to become a significant influence in the capital of the empire.
Quickly these three became friends and it should not be difficult for us to see Aquila and Paul side by side with needle and materials sewing tents. Of course, there would be little Paul would rather talk about than the Gospel of Jesus and we presume in short order both Aquila and his wife Priscilla became passionate followers of Jesus and then well discipled in the deeper truths of the life and teachings of Jesus.
Of course, Paul would have told them many stories about both his first missionary journey with Barnabas and now his second journey with Silas and Timothy. I’m sure Paul would have explained in great detail the Jerusalem council meeting, in which he and Barnabas had explained their Gospel efforts and results among the Gentiles, and you’ll recall the apostles embraced the Gentile believers in Jesus without conditions.
Luke tells us Timothy and Silas finally caught up with Paul in Corinth, and what a reunion that must have been! “When Silas and Timothy came from Macedonia, Paul devoted himself exclusively to preaching, testifying to the Jews that Jesus was the Messiah. But when they opposed Paul and became abusive, he shook out his clothes in protest and said to them, ‘Your blood be on your own head! I am innocent of it. From now on I will go to the Gentiles.’ Then Paul left the Synagogue and went next door to the house of Titius Justis, a worshiper of God. Crispus, the Synagogue leader, and his entire household believed in the Lord Jesus; and many of the Corinthians who heard Paul believed and were baptized.” (Acts 18:5-8)
It appears with the arrival of Timothy and Silas, Paul was re-energized for passionate preaching and once again experienced the resistance and rejection of Jews in Corinth, thus Paul made a clear proclamation to the Jewish Synagogue that he would take the Gospel to the Gentiles of Corinth, and they would stand responsible before God for having rejected Jesus and His Gospel. It must have been a very significant day when Crispus, the Synagogue leader, and his family professed their faith in Jesus as their Messiah and were then baptized along with others in his household. Most likely Crispus, like Paul, was then rejected by the Synagogue congregation.
Let’s pause right here to consider what it may have looked like in the evenings as Paul, Silas, Timothy, Aquila and Priscila, Titius Justis and his family, and now Crispus and his household all gathered together for teaching from Paul, listening to news from Timothy and Silas about what the Holy Spirit had done in previous towns they’d visited, and of course time for prayer together.
The Corinthian Church was being formed, my friends, and let’s settle down and spend some time with them, and I’ll meet you back here tomorrow in Corinth. Here’s a worship song they might have sung, if it had been written in their day…
Today’s Scripture is Acts 18:1-8.
Choose below to read or listen.
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Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.
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Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
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