Acts 28:21-31 The Message
21-22 They said, “Nobody wrote warning us about you. And no one has shown up saying anything bad about you. But we would like very much to hear more. The only thing we know about this Christian sect is that nobody seems to have anything good to say about it.”
23 They agreed on a time. When the day arrived, they came back to his home with a number of their friends. Paul talked to them all day, from morning to evening, explaining everything involved in the kingdom of God, and trying to persuade them all about Jesus by pointing out what Moses and the prophets had written about him.
24-27 Some of them were persuaded by what he said, but others refused to believe a word of it. When the unbelievers got cantankerous and started bickering with each other, Paul interrupted: “I have just one more thing to say to you. The Holy Spirit sure knew what he was talking about when he addressed our ancestors through Isaiah the prophet:
Go to this people and tell them this:
“You’re going to listen with your ears,
but you won’t hear a word;
You’re going to stare with your eyes,
but you won’t see a thing.
These people are blockheads!
They stick their fingers in their ears
so they won’t have to listen;
They screw their eyes shut
so they won’t have to look,
so they won’t have to deal with me face-to-face
and let me heal them.”
28 “You’ve had your chance. The non-Jewish outsiders are next on the list. And believe me, they’re going to receive it with open arms!”
30-31 Paul lived for two years in his rented house. He welcomed everyone who came to visit. He urgently presented all matters of the kingdom of God. He explained everything about Jesus Christ. His door was always open.
The Word of God for the Children of God.
Glory be to the Father,
and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen, amen.
GOD Will Take Care of Me? I Just Got Bit by a Poisonous Snake!
Yes! No! Maybe Maybe Not? I Doubt it! Not Worth Believing! Not Worth One Single Moment of My Time! You’ll Stop Talking and Just Keep Walking on By! Not on Any Day of the Week Which has a ‘Y’ at the End of it! Tell it to the Hand!
In moments of despair, depression, and disillusionment, we all need to take a cue from our brother Paul and shake it off. Literally, Paul shook the snake off him and didn’t suffer any effects from what should have been a lethal bite.
Friend, I’m gonna tell on myself and keep it real here: I am hardcore horrible at shaking things off and choosing to believe the best. But so I want to emphasize shaking off disillusionment is key to getting back up when life knocks us down.
And when we shake all of that slithering snake bit envenomated trash off us, we need not make ourselves, obligate ourselves, suffer any ill effects from it either.
Meaning, when you start spiraling into disillusionment, you have to first stop obsessing over the lie that you have been abandoned by God and shake it off.
But we have to be assertive, we have to be God seeking, ready to take things a step further, make sure the venom of catastrophizing isn’t lingering inside us.
Paul learned the hardcore way what we have to learn, too: when you make it through the storm and all hell breaks loose on the shore— when you’ve been through all and it still keeps coming— we’ve got to pick up our Bibles, read the Word of God, Pray and Pray some more. God will hear us and we shake! it! off!
Bad memories? Bad Experiences? Bad Judgement? Bad Choices? Bad Decisions? Bad Results! Catastrophic Results! Lingering Results! My Sin is ever before Me!
Who of humanity can actually, genuinely, truthfully claim they have not been there, done that, have one or two or 10 mega tons of hardcore hardened regret?
I Suggest Raise Up! Pray Up! Pound your chest right now and say, “Get off me!”
Nah, you didn’t do it.
By my own confession, personal experience; You didn’t say it out loud. You said it in our head, and that doesn’t count. Say it out loud so the whole of your soul is shaken, is stirred, you can hear yourself, feel yourself, making that declaration.
Say it again so you feel it in your soul.
Say it a third time so the devil and his demons start shaking!
The Bible gives no record of Paul screaming, running around, or freaking out.
Why?
I think it’s because he didn’t do any of that.
Paul knew he wasn’t going to die on Malta.
Paul didn’t make a scene because he knew Rome was waiting, Rome was where Paul would proclaim the gospel of the risen Messiah before Caesar himself.
Well, friend, I’m with Paul.
I’m not going to inflict more suffering upon myself die on my Malta, because my arrest, prison in Rome is waiting too. Paul told his crew in the middle of a storm, “This has to happen.” And I’m telling myself, “This has to happen” too.
If you are shipwrecked and gasping, grasping for life, you’ve been on “Malta” trying to figure out why you’re there, I want to point you back to the who.
Who is in control of your life?
Who cares? Who loves you? Who gave you the vision or dream for your life?
I pray that you answered “God” to all of those questions, stand firm in the faith that has brought you this far. It’s time to shake off the disillusionment.
This action isn’t just for you.
It’s for everyone who is watching you too!
See, when Paul got bit by the snake, no one came around him to help.
Everyone stood there, watched to see what he would do or what would happen.
Child of God, people are watching you.
People are always going to be watching you and for you, to start that fatal walk.
People are waiting for you to lose it, to walk away, or to curl up and die. But look at you! You are still here, still surviving and steadfastly refusing to ever give up.
I’m standing up! I am putting my running shoes on and tying them tight. and giving God some praise because God is still here, you are going to shake it off.
Speed Dial God Pick, Pray, yourself up and get ready because Rome is waiting.
Do we know what to do in our own Malta?
If we find ourselves there, how should we live?
Remember, dear friend, Paul didn’t want to go to Malta either.
Visiting Malta was not at all in his plan.
And yet . . .
When a viper attacks Paul, the local islanders think he will die. But Paul shakes the snake off, and no harm comes to him. When Paul does not die, the people think he is a god. But no, Paul is not a god. He does represent God, however.
Paul is almost all the way to Rome, but the witness of God through him continues every step of the way. Paul is on Malta because of a storm and a shipwreck. Paul gathers kindling for bringing warmth. And God continues to take care of him in different ways. God also takes care of the people of Malta.
The chief official of the island opens his home to welcome the shipwrecked visitors. During this time, God heals the official’s sick father through Paul.
A single moment of recognizing opportunity, sharing hospitality, becomes the momentous setting to see God’s healing power, many others are healed also.
At first glance, we see Paul shipwrecked on an island, delayed for three months on his journey to Rome. But soon we can see that God has brought Paul and the others there to bring presence, assurance, healing and the good news of Jesus.
In addition, we see God taking care of Paul and the others by bringing them to Malta. But then we also see that God takes care of Malta by bringing Paul and the others there and we witness the testimony of the healed being sent forth!
And as they travel on to Rome, they meet other people and are welcomed and encouraged. Doors are kept open! God, the Disciples are visible, welcoming!
May we too take heart and learn from God this day.
May we the Body of Christ, His Church in the world, be people who look again and again to see our God who is always at work taking care of us and others.
In the name of God, the Father and God the Son and God the Holy Spirit,
Let us Pray,
Psalm 46 The Message
46 1-3 God is a safe place to hide,
ready to help when we need him.
We stand fearless at the cliff-edge of doom,
courageous in seastorm and earthquake,
Before the rush and roar of oceans,
the tremors that shift mountains.
Jacob-wrestling God fights for us,
God-of-Angel-Armies protects us.
4-6 River fountains splash joy, cooling God’s city,
this sacred haunt of the Most High.
God lives here, the streets are safe,
God at your service from crack of dawn.
Godless nations rant and rave, kings and kingdoms threaten,
but Earth does anything he says.
7 Jacob-wrestling God fights for us,
God-of-Angel-Armies protects us.
8-10 Attention, all! See the marvels of God!
He plants flowers and trees all over the earth,
Bans war from pole to pole,
breaks all the weapons across his knee.
“Step out of the traffic! Take a long,
loving look at me, your High God,
above politics, above everything.”
11 Jacob-wrestling God fights for us,
God-of-Angel-Armies protects us.
Glory be to the Father,
and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen, amen.
Loving God, Living God, Loving Hope, Living Hope, Loving Living Life His Way! "Many things are possible for the person who has hope. Even more is possible for the person who has faith. And still more is possible for the person who knows how to love. But everything is possible for the person who practices all three virtues." - Brother Lawrence (1605-1691), Practicing the Presence of God (1692). 