I think one of the most comforting things that God allows us to see in Scripture is his comfort of others. I say that because, though we often read about these individuals, we forget that ythey are real people. We forget that Paul was a real person and that the other apostles were real people. They were no different from us in their fears and anxieties.
We forget that, because we read of incredible things like the disciples rejoicing because they had been counted worthy to suffer for Christ (Acts 5:41). That seems so foreign to us that we think that we cannot relate to them, but we can. For, again, they were no different than us. They got scared, and they were prideful, and they were flat wrong on occasion (e.g. Peter leaving the Gentiles, eating with the Jews, and having to be rebuked by Paul).
Thus, if we realize this and then see God’s comfort and encouragement to them, it should be a great comfort to us as well. For the heart of God never changes. And just as he loved his children when Scripture was being written, he loves his children now.
Therefore, tonight, I want us to realize Paul’s situation as he came into Corinth and how God responded to him with comfort and encouragement. Then I want us to see how that action and characteristic of God’s heart should encourage us today, as we know that he acts the same toward us. In doing so, I think God will set many of your hearts at ease that might have walked into this building with fear and anxiety.
When Paul came into Corinth to preach the gospel, he had been driven out of the three Macedonian cities that he had just visited. Though in Athens he had been simply “sneered” upon and mocked, in Thessalonica he had been threatened and one of his companions (Jason) was beaten. He had also been driven out in Berea by the Jews that followed him from Thessalonica. And in Philippi, he had been beaten and thrown into jail. Therefore, he was surely not anticipating an open-armed welcome when he came to Corinth.
On top of all that, he was eagerly awaiting the news that Silas and Timothy would bring from Thessalonica and was entering a city where the individuals prided themselves on their intellect and a city that was known for sexual immorality. In fact, sexual immorality was so common in Corinth that the phrase “to Corinthianize” meant to be sexually immoral.
So Paul wasn’t greatly exited or confident as he came into Corinth. In fact, he would later write to the Corinthians, “I came to you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling” (1 Corinthians 2:3).
I used to try to figure out what that phrase meant theologically, but now I’m pretty sure it just means that he was scared and nervous. He was weak, tired, scared, and anxious about ministering in this city. He had the same emotions that any of us would have had.
But look how God encourages him in the midst of his struggles.
As he enters the city, he comes across two other individuals who practice his same trade, and he is able to stay and work with them (v.2-3). This couple was Aquila and Priscilla, whom Paul would later describe as his “fellow workers in Christ Jesus, who for my own life risked their necks” (Romans 16:3-4). Not only this, however, but when the Jews rejected the gospel that he was preaching in the synagogue, God provided a home for him to stay in that was right next door to the synagogue (v.7). Therefore, if any were interested in his message that they heard in the synagogue, they would know where to find him, and some did. For Luke also tells us that “Crispus, the leader of the synagogue, believed in the Lord with all his household, and many of the Corinthians when they heard were believing and being baptized” (v.8).
But God did something even more encouraging and comforting at this time for Paul.
Though all these things were going well, Paul was probably still a bit anxious, wondering if in the next second an angry mob could bust through the door, drag him outside, and stone him. Therefore, that night the Lord appeared to Paul in a vision, saying, “Do not be afraid any longer, but go on speaking and do not be silent; for I am with you, and no man will attack you in order to harm you, for I have many people in this city” (v.9-10).
Upon seeing this vision, Luke comments that Paul “settled there a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them” (v.11). Can you imagine the comfort? The one who had been beaten on multiple occasions, frequented jail, and was run out of almost every city he had been in was now assured that no one would attack him in order to harm him. Therefore, when the Jews brought him before the proconsul to get him to judge Paul, he dismissed the case even before Paul had to defend himself (v.12-16). God did that.
And not only was Paul able to minister the gospel free from the worry that he would be harmed, but he also knew that his goal would be accomplished. In the vision, God had already assured him that he had “many people in this city.” Paul could minister free of worry and anxiety, knowing no one would harm him, and knowing that people would come to place their faith in Christ as Lord.
Therefore, I believe the vow that we read of in verse 18, is a vow that Paul made that he would faithfully preach the gospel in this city until the church was firmly established (or something along those lines) as long as the Lord’s faithfulness to his promise was evident before him.
For these kinds of vows were taken as thankfulness for the blessing of God and were concluded with one shaving his head (Marshall, Acts, 300). Thus, I believe that as Paul was leaving Corinth, after successfully ministering there for a year and a half, he shaved his head as a sign of thankfulness for God’s faithfulness. For look at what God had done in the city in which Paul entered “in weakness and in fear and in much trembling.”
But what does this story mean for us almost two thousand years later? I think it means a great deal that will bless our hearts if we hear it and let its reality soak in deep within us.
First of all, it’s okay to be scared in submitting to God using you for the advancement of his kingdom. It is not sinful to submit to God and still be scared, even as Paul was going to Corinth (obedience) with much fear and trembling. Faith does not mean that we never get scared. It means that we trust God in spite of our fears.
Second, understand that God sees your struggles.
I want you to take this two ways: 1) you can readily admit to God that you are fearful, or nervous, or doubting, or whatever other emotion you feel when you think of doing what you feel that he has called you to do. You don’t have to try to hide it from God. He already knows anyway. 2) He understands what’s going on in your heart that nobody else knows.
As Paul came into Corinth, scared and anxious, he didn’t have Timothy or Silas or anybody else that he knew. He was all alone in a terribly immoral, intellectual, and prideful world trying to share a message that is sure to offend everyone. He had nobody to whom he could say, “Man, I’m scared and nervous, but I thank God that you are hear with me.”
But God knew all that. He saw Paul’s fears, anxieties, and struggles; and he gave him Aquila and Priscilla. In the same way, even if nobody here tonight knows exactly how you feel, God does. And he is probably doing things like he did with Paul that you cannot even see. It may be that he is bringing you in contact with someone right now who will be your fellow worker in the gospel who is ready to lay down his life for you. It may be that he is opening a door where you can share God’s work in your life, and others will come to delight in him even as you do.
I’m not exactly sure what God is doing in your life tonight if you are here tonight in fear, weakness, and anxiety; but I do know that he is working your situation together for good if you are his child (Romans 8:28). In fact, Paul himself was the one who penned those words in Romans. He penned them, I believe, with a smile. He knew it to be true in his own life.
And just as Paul didn’t know what would await him in this intimidating city, God was setting him up to stay there a year and a half. So with you, though you don’t know what is going on, you can rest assured that God wants to use your life to magnify his glory even more than you want him to use it. We can never long more to glorify God than God longs to glorify himself. For he longs for it so much that it resulted in him sending his Son that we might love him and praise him as his very own people.
Also, this story of Paul tonight should remind us that we can be part of a work that will be accomplished. I mentioned the joy that Paul must have felt in his work as God had assured him that he had people in Corinth; Paul just needed to call them out by preaching the gospel. In the same way, we are invited to throw our lives into a task that we know will be accomplished.
In describing the days before the end, Christ says in Matthew 24:14, “And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world for a witness to all the nations, and then the end shall come.” And if you read the verses before this, you see that this happens in the midst of a lot of darkness. He says that we will hear of wars and rumors of wars, there will be famines and earthquakes (as we are hearing about earthquakes daily), followers of Christ will be persecuted and killed (Just yesterday, on Christianity Today’s web-site, there was an article about a Hindu leader telling his followers that it is time to take up arms against the Christians. Also, there have been more martyrs in the last century and a half than the pervious 1800 combined.), sin will increase (as if I need to comment more), and many people’s love will grow cold. This is our time. This is our world. This is why Scripture says that the days are evil (Ephesians 5:16).
But in the midst of all of that, there is going to be a laser beam of light piercing through the darkness as the church completes the task of taking the gospel to the whole world. It is going to happen, and we can be a part of it. Isn’t that exiting when so many people live in this world with no purpose?
Haven’t you ever dreamed that your next prayer meeting would turn into the next Great Awakening? If you have, then quit wishful thinking, and join in prayer and with your lives for the final sweep of God’s hand that Matthew 24:14 tells us will happen in the last days. We are as blessed as Paul was after receiving the vision that many Corinthians would be converted. That is exciting!
And let me warn you of something in light of that. Don’t measure God’s use of your life by instant results. For it could be that as you are faithful and possibly see no fruit that God is using you to lay a foundation for a great working of his power that you will never see.
I say that mainly for myself, because as I preach of these things, I am longing to see dozens of people from this place come and give their lives for this purpose of world evangelization. And there are times that I question God as to why it is not happening. Why is he not sending forth laborers? However, if God uses my life and my preaching to establish an environment in this church from which he will call forth many that I will never get to see, then I am the most blessed man in the world to be a part of the work of God. And so I rejoice, now, knowing that he is faithfully working even when I cannot see it and may never see it.
Richard Baxter, the Puritan pastor who could say that there were only one or two families in his parish that were not converted, followed two men, Richard Greenham and Richard Fairclough, who faithfully preached the Scripture for fifty years and saw maybe one or two families converted. Thus, in the midst of this harvest, Baxter wrote, “O, what am I … that God should thus abundantly encourage me when the Revered Instructors of my youth, did labor fifty years together in one place, and could scarcely say they had Converted one or two of their Parishes”
The answer, I believe, is that (like all of us) he was simply the one blessed from the foundation laid by the labor of those faithful men before us. They might not have seen the fruit of their labor, but they were part of a work that was going to be successful.
We have the same invitation today. Finally, as Paul made a vow in light of God’s faithfulness, know that you can step out in faithful obedience to God because God is faithful.
I remember when I had first declared that I would be obedient to God’s call on my life that I turned down an opportunity to preach when I could have done it simply because I was scared. As I hung up the phone after saying “no” I went to my room and prayed. I felt sick. It was in my room that night that I told God that I would never turn down another opportunity to be faithful to my calling if it were possible for me to do so.
To this day, I don’t think I’ve turned down another opportunity for the same reason as I did that night. God has been faithful. And I know that he will be faithful forevermore.
He was faithful to Paul in Corinth, and he is no less faithful today because his heart and character do not change. Be willing, then, to step out on his faithfulness.
Know that he sees your fears, but he has invited us to join him in his work—a work that will be accomplished. Therefore, let us be faithful to obey him, knowing he will be faithful to love and comfort us.
O what a precious Savior! Amen.