Follow Thru Series

[Read Acts 17:5-9.]

So the jealous Jews set out to destroy their ministry and found out where the apostles were staying. They drag this Jason and other believers out into the city and start whipping up the crowd into an angry frenzy with exaggerated charges. They couldn’t find Paul, Silas and Timothy so they attacked the first people they found. In verse nine it says they received “a pledge” from Jason and the others which means they extorted money from them. The deal was that they had to pay the authorities a bond promising that the apostles would quit turning their town upside down, (which means they had to stop evangelizing). If they didn’t quit then Jason and the others wouldn’t get their money back.

The situation was so serious that Paul decided it was time for them to move on. But they had accomplished their goal there in Thessalonica and a new church had been planted. So now they’re off to Berea. Let’s see how things go there.

[Read Acts 17:10-12.]

Well, so far so good! These Jews were more noble-minded than the ones in Thessalonica and they wanted to know just how Jesus matched up with Old Testament predictions of the coming Messiah. The ministry amongst the Jews and Greeks went well and another church was planted. But pressure to stop was coming.

[Read Acts 17:13-15.]

Unbelievable! Don’t these guys have anything better to do? I mean, its one thing to try and own your own town’s religious thought, but to travel 46 miles to harass Paul is taking hate to a whole new level.

So again, Paul has to run for his life to another town. Now, Paul wasn’t afraid of dying, he was afraid of not staying alive long enough to complete his mission of reaching the world! So he leaves Silas and Timothy in Berea to finish the work there and off he went to Athens. (We’ll look at his incredible ministry there next week.)

Now this theme of the apostles going into a new town, reaching lots of people, setting up a church there, and then getting persecuted out of town happens over and over again. And of course some times the persecution includes beatings, imprisonment and even death.

So with all this pressure to stop, how did these guys follow through with what God had called them to do? Why didn’t they just give up and go home to find a job where they wouldn’t be under such pressure?

Well because they Knew what God wanted them to do, they surrounded themselves with people who were helpful, and they relied on the power of God to enable them to follow through.

If you and I are going to follow through on what the Lord has called us to do, we need to employ these principles in our lives. [6] First, know what God wants you to do.

It’s been said that a person who is committed to nothing will accomplish just that – nothing. We need to understand and know what the Lord wants us to do in our lives. Look at how Paul understood what the Lord wanted him to do. (Of course this is one of the letters that Paul wrote back to the church he started there in Thessalonica.)