Week #48 | A Wide-Scale Blueprint for Reaching the Lost

LOOK | WHAT DOES IT SAY?

Acts 13-19; Galatians 1-6; 1 Thessalonians 1-5; 2 Thessalonians 1-3; 1 Corinthians 1-16

THINK | WHAT DOES IT MEAN?

Mission to Galatia and the Battle for the Gospel (Acts 13:1-15:5 and Galatians). The first sponsored, funded missions trip in history was led by a former persecutor of the church, and it resulted in a major council to sort out what God was doing in the Gentile frontier.  The church had first heard about the opening for the Gospel among non-Jews back in Acts 10-11, but here in Acts 13 the church in Syrian Antioch becomes the sending base for an official, wider mission to the Gentiles. First they went into the region of Galatia, reaching Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe (Acts 13-14). There are some missions and church planting principles evident in these chapters which are worth going back to look at. They experienced encouraging success, but also violent opposition from the Jewish community who followed and opposed them (13:50; 14:2; 14:19). Still, they made a return trip before they finished up, circling back through the places that they had reached and strengthening the fledgling communities there. The process for these early missions seems to have been to preach the Gospel in as broad a region as possible, then circle back to strengthen any groups that actually took hold, and then send back more organized support and instructions afterwards. Upon coming back to their sending church at Syrian Antioch, another group of Christians came from Judea and accused Paul and Barnabas of having preached the wrong Gospel. They insisted that these Gentiles should have had to accept the marks of Judaism to be saved (15:1-2). So they went down to Jerusalem to sort out the matter. This was a high-stakes meeting: the church was being called on to define the Gospel right as it had just started being proclaimed among the nations. Some time after initial discussions with the leaders in Jerusalem, but before an official decision was reached at the Jerusalem Council, Paul wrote his letter to the Galatians, sending it back to the churches he had just founded to defend the Gospel that he had preached to them. Soon afterwards the Jerusalem Council decided in his favor.

Mission to Macedonia, Athens, and Achaia, and Letters to the Thessalonians (Acts 15:6-18:11 and 1-2 Thessalonians). After the Jerusalem council and some initial visits, the Spirit directed Paul into the unreached region of Macedonia (16:6-10). Among the cities that he and his team reach, two are notable for most Christians: the cities of Philippi (Acts 16) and Thessalonica (Acts 17), both of which have biblical letters addressed to them. Unfortunately, while there was good opportunity for the Gospel in those places, the opposition made it impossible for the team to stay there. So they moved on to Athens (Acts 17), and then went to Corinth (Acts 18), where an unusual openness to the Gospel made it possible for Paul to stay there for "a year and six months" (Acts 18:11). This made it possible for Paul to organize the work that had begun, and this is likely when he wrote his letters to the Thessalonians with the input of his helpers Silas and Timothy. It's interesting that although Paul experienced a specific call to Macedonia (Acts 16:6-10), both cities in the area were full of opposition. Just because God calls us to do something, and just because he opens the hearts of people to the Gospel, doesn't mean the work will be easy. Anyone looking for a balanced, stable, gradual, and safe advance of the Gospel is not going to find it. God calls us to hard places to do difficult things.

Ministry in Corinth and Ephesus, and First Letter to the Corinthians (Acts 18:12-19:10 and 1 Corinthians). The two cities of Corinth (in the province of Achaia) and Ephesus (in the province of Asia) were unusually stable and fruitful frontiers for Gospel ministry. However they both had their problems. In the affluent and diverse city of Corinth, Paul seems -as his letters show- to have had to battle nearly every conceivable niche take or distortion of the Gospel that one could imagine, and more. The people were used to the best speakers, the flashiest presentations, and the most well-put together parties. Paul apparently had none of these things. But as his letter shows, he went in as a simple man with a simple message, and the contrast of that approach combined with the power of the Gospel was enough to make people in Corinth pay attention. Afterwards he traveled to Ephesus, which opened up a whole new regional ministry all throughout the province of Asia (Acts 19:10). Through his co-labourers and his letters, though, he continued to battle the divisions that infected the Corinthian church. As the early non-biblical letter of Clement of Rome to the Corinthians shows, even decades later the church at Corinth was a difficult group. It is hard to take hold of the Gospel when you are still hanging on to worldly standards of wisdom, success, and stability, as the Corinthians were doing.

Riot in Ephesus and Departure to Macedonia (Philippi?) in Acts 19:11-20:1. If Paul would not have been willing to move beyond one particular local ministry and on to further regions, then you and I would still be bowing down today at the pagan altar of Odin or Jupiter or of some druidic deity. It is tempting for us to be very invested in our own thing, and to tend to what we already have going. There is safety and stability in that. But as long as there were new regions where Christ had not been named, Paul was ready to move on as long as he could still support the work that had begun through sending helpers, writing letters, and making return visits. Paul moved on from Philippi in Acts 16, but when the time was right he circled back. He moved on from Thessalonica in Acts 17, but he sent Timothy back and gave them direction through his letters. He moved on from Corinth but continued to provide guidance and support there through writing to them and through the ministry of Titus. Here, he moves on from Ephesus, but we will see later in Acts 20 that he continued to provide guidance to the Elders who he had raised up in that region. This is still relevant for us today. While we should still be concerned to faithfully reach our surrounding neighborhoods, we should also be asking how God might be opening up opportunities in other under-reached areas, and how we could help to reach them. In the last 20 years, Canada has gone from 19% down to only 6.5% Evangelical Christian. How might we see that number change in the next few years if we enabled visionary missions works, and adopted the expansionist, large-scale missionary methods of Paul in our own regions and beyond?

DO | HOW DO WE RESPOND?

How can we respond in our worship, attitude, and actions? I won't lay out exact responses in this space because the possibilities are often endless. But it is worth it to think about application in the categories of worship, attitude, and actions. Does this reading direct me to God in worship and thanksgiving and praise, or does it direct me towards a change that I need to make here and now? If it's about a change that I need to make, is this something inward in my attitude, or outward in my actions? This helps to rescue application from just being a series of how-to tips, or one-size-fits-all instructions that go beyond what the Bible actually states. Sometimes, the most helpful application we can make is to get a different perspective on what's the most important thing, or about how we should respond inwardly to the things going on around us.

PRAY | HOW DOES THIS BRING US TO GOD?

Whether in response to anything pointed out here, or to something else in your Bible reading time, take a few moments before you close up your Bible to pray in response to God. If you need a format for prayer, both the ACTS (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication), CALL (Confess, Ask, Love, Listen), and PRAY (Praise, Repent, Ask, Yield) methods are helpful ways to stay consistent.

-Sean