Year 4, Day 260: Acts 27

Theological Commentary: Click Here 

Discipleship Focus: Protection

• Protection: In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray that God might deliver us from evil – even the Evil One.  Sometimes we need God’s protection from the sin around us.  Sometimes we need protection from the sinful people around us.  Other times we need protection from the sin that lies within ourselves. In any case, Jesus’ point is clear.  We need protection from the Father to make it through each and every day.

Here’s a neat chapter near the end of Acts.  We are getting to the end of the story – at least the part that we have recorded in the Bible.  Paul is still arrested.  But let’s look at how God provides protection for Paul throughout this chapter.

Of course there is the story about the shipwreck.  Paul and his friends and shipmates could have easily drowned.  But they did not.  In fact, there was not even the loss of a single life in spite of the ship beings torn apart by the storm and the reef.  Now that’s protection!

However, it goes deeper than this.  Paul is delivered by God into the hands of a Roman centurion named Julius.  He seems to respect Paul.  He allows Paul’s companions to journey with him in spite of the fact that Paul is a prisoner.  God not only protects Paul physically but he also protects Paul’s need for companionship.

God is a God who cares way more than just for our physical needs – although they are often on our mind and certainly are important.  God is a God who is capable of protecting our social, emotional, and spiritual needs, too.  He cares for us more deeply than we could possibly imagine or hope.

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