Year 4, Day 251: Acts 18

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Discipleship Focus: Authority, Power

• Authority: Our calling.  This comes from God as king.  Because He calls us as His representatives, He gives us authority to go and do His will.
• Power: This is the natural outcome when we truly get our authority from the king.  When our authority is from God, we are equipped with His power to accomplish His will.  We act on His behalf in a world that He desperately loves.

I always find Acts 18 to be a very humbling chapter for me to read.  Here we see what happens to a spiritual leader when they are at their wits end.  Paul gets to Corinth and once more finds opposition rising up against him.  Paul stops, turns to the people, and says, “I’m done.”  He walks away from them.  He vows to no longer go to the Jews and instead focuses upon the Gentiles.

I know what that feels like.  I know what it is like to always have to overcome the inertia of tradition in order to actually get to a place of the Spirit’s movement.  It’s tough work.  It’s easy to want to quit and find a place where the inertia is very much smaller and easy to affect.

But look at what God does in Paul’s moment of quitting.  Jesus comes to Paul and says, “Stop throwing a tantrum, Paul.  Keep going.  You don’t know how many supporters I have here.”  Essentially, God is reminding Paul that he’s lost sight of one very thing.  Paul’s lost sight of the fact that God is king.  For a moment, Paul thought of himself as king.  That’s what got him in trouble.

What that also means is that Paul forgot that his authority and power come from God.  If our authority and power come from God, then we are to answer His calling by His means.  It’s not up to me to say, “I quit, God.”  Nor is it up to me to say, “I’m not strong enough.”  Because if I am truly living out of the authority and power of the king, then if I claim to not have the strength then either I’m claiming God isn’t able to make me strong enough or I’m focused in the wrong area.  Neither of those are good conclusions.

Paul has that moment.  Paul is frustrated and he throws up his hands.  But God refocuses Paul and gives him a second chance to continue his work.  Once Paul remembers where his authority and power come from, we can see that Paul stays for another 18 months in Corinth and has a wonderful ministry there.

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