Your mission, should you choose to accept it. no. 56, Acts

podcast: https://www.pastorwoman.net/podcast/episode/1db2c466/your-mission-should-you-choose-to-accept-it-no-56-acts

Greetings, fellow travelers!

As though marching to the beat of a drum, Paul is heading toward the culmination of all he had lived for. His intention and intensity are palpable as he heeds the call of the Holy Spirit in his life, anxious to get to Jerusalem.

From town to town, Paul moves confidently, as we look to Acts chapter 20:

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Acts 20&version=ESV

and then he addresses the elders of the Ephesian church who come to meet with him.

Notice the incredible statements Paul makes about how he had lived wide open for the Lord, and also acknowledges that he knows the way will be rough for him, and yet on he goes. Luke records his thoughts:

“You yourselves know how I lived among you the whole time from the first day that I set foot in Asia, serving the Lord with all humility and with tears and with trials that happened to me through the plots of the Jews; how I did not shrink from declaring to you anything that was profitable, and teaching you in public and from house to house, testifying both to Jews and to Greeks of repentance toward God and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. 

And now, behold, I am going to Jerusalem, constrained by the Spirit, not knowing what will happen to me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies to me in every city that imprisonment and afflictions await me. But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God. And now, behold, I know that none of you among whom I have gone about proclaiming the kingdom will see my face again. Therefore I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of all, for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God. 

Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood. I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things, to draw away the disciples after them. . .

And when he had said these things, he knelt down and prayed with them all. And there was much weeping on the part of all; they embraced Paul and kissed him, being sorrowful most of all because of the word he had spoken, that they would not see his face again. And they accompanied him to the ship.1

I am struck by the similarity in the intentional footsteps of our Lord, recorded in Luke's gospel, "When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem."2 Your attention? Jesus deliberately set out to go to Jerusalem, even though he knew what awaited him there--torture and death. And from the time Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem, there is the constant drumbeat marking his purposeful footsteps. The closer Jesus got, the higher the stakes, the greater the intensity.

Hmmm, what if Jesus had not gone?

What if Jesus changed his mind and decided to go the opposite direction, heading back north to his hometown of Nazareth? He did not.

Jesus was born to go to Jerusalem that final time.

Paul is determined to finish well, and is willing to endure anything for the cause of Christ. "I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me--the task of testifying to the gospel of God's grace."3 Paul wrote of the humility of Jesus Christ in his letter to the church at Philippi: "Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing... and became obedient to death..."4

I had never stopped to think of how Paul's determination was similar to that of Jesus. Just cannot miss his incredible humility which caused him to be obedient to the will of God, above everything else in his life, no matter what it cost him. Paul wept as he told his ministry partners from Ephesus 'good bye', knowing he would not see them again--for him, the end would come first.

And Jesus' incredible humility made him willing to subjugate his will to the Father's. . . even though it meant pain, death, and separation from God--still He went.

What if Jesus hadn't been willing? And what if Paul hadn't explained the life of faith in his letters to believers, then and now?

You and I would still be subject to the Law, constantly striving with good works. Are we 'good enough' to get to Heaven?

We would not know what it means to have freedom in Christ or the assurance of eternal life with him.

Finally, I draw your attention to Paul's culminating statement to the elders:

"Now I commit you to God and to the word of His grace, which can build you up and give you an inheritance, among all those who are sanctified." 5

That was the charge to those men to continue on in the work of the Lord:

--to teach the world about the grace of God, and share His Word. . .

--that Word gives us an eternal home--our inheritance. . .

--continue to be refined by the Spirit of God

The freedom we enjoy in Christ cost Jesus everything, and ultimately, Paul's calling would cost him the same. But you and me? We have the privilege of walking in the grace of God, sharing the love of God with those we encounter--that is our mission!

I commission you - Go, love others well by giving them Jesus.

Please listen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APATH3ea-D0&list=RDAPATH3ea-D0&start_radio=1

Christine!

1 - Acts 20.18-38

2 - Luke 9.51

3 - Acts 20..24

4 - Philippians 2.5-8

5 - Acts 20.32