Everydayness


Acts 18:1-8
1After this Paul left Athens and went to Corinth.
2And he found a Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontus, recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had commanded all the Jews to leave Rome. And he went to see them,
3and because he was of the same trade he stayed with them and worked, for they were tentmakers by trade.
4And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and tried to persuade Jews and Greeks.
5When Silas and Timothy arrived from Macedonia, Paul was occupied with the word, testifying to the Jews that the Christ was Jesus.
6And when they opposed and reviled him, he shook out his garments and said to them, “Your blood be on your own heads! I am innocent. From now on I will go to the Gentiles.”
7And he left there and went to the house of a man named Titius Justus, a worshiper of God. His house was next door to the synagogue.
8Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue, believed in the Lord, together with his entire household. And many of the Corinthians hearing Paul believed and were baptized.

Up to this point in Paul’s story we have learned that he was a well-trained and well respected Pharisee. We now learn that he also has a skill. He was trained, probably by his father, to be a tent-maker. And who knew that he could use that skill to further the Kingdom of God? So he spends over 18 months in Corinth working with two people who had recently been ejected from Rome because they were Jews. God arranges the situation so that Paul and Aquila meet in the synagogue and strike up a relationship.

When you read through these verses you see that faith is lived out in the everydayness of life. (Wow! I thought that the spell checker wouldn’t like “everydayness” and it does!) Paul gets up every morning and goes to work. While he’s there he speaks of Jesus as he has opportunity and then on the Sabbath he speaks in the synagogue to all of the assembled Jews. Life falls into a pattern and even there God is able to bring people to Himself. But Paul remains Paul and his feisty personality is still present. When some of the Jews reject the message he gets a little heated. He calls down their rejection of God onto their own heads and declares that he will now take the message to the Gentiles instead. It was probably quite a scene packed with emotion and conviction. I can just see him stand up, shake off his clothes, make his statement and stomp out of the room. Only God knows what was said of him after he left. It probably wasn’t good. But he did make an impression and there were many Jews who did accept Jesus as the fulfillment of their Scriptural prophecies.

This passage, while simple, brings great comfort. Even in my regular life God can work great things. All it takes is a willingness to be present with the people He has given you in the moment. That might be a co-worker or that might be a child. Yesterday in my car, driving home from a conference, it was me. Didn’t see that coming did you? The trip home was through a torrential downpour – for 2 hours. The traffic was unbelievable and there were two accidents that backed everything up for miles. When I was about 30 minutes from home the clouds broke off to the west and the sun began to shine in the distance, although I was still driving in the pouring rain. That meant there had to be a rainbow somewhere. And sure enough off to the east was a magnificent double rainbow. It was easily the brightest, largest, most complete rainbow I had ever seen. And the colors were perfectly mirrored in the florescent colors of the trees I was passing. It was a surreal 30 minutes. That rainbow simply didn’t disappear. It stuck with me almost to my driveway. Those 30 minutes were a worship experience. I praised God for the work of the day and the people I had met. I prayed for those who came into my mind and sought God’s presence for them. Instead of just enjoying an everyday event like a rainbow God moved me into His presence and together we celebrated.

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