ACTS 24: Be creative with your time
So here we are on the final stretch of this journey through the Book of Acts – it’s certainly quite a ride!
We continue to read a chapter a day and I’ll provide a link to the chapter in the NIV(UK) version, but you can of course read the chapter in whatever version you like. I’ve been sharing some short reflections, but the important part is the last part: ACTION.
Just a week of these challenges left – I wonder what challenges are in store for us!
READ: Acts 24
REFLECTION: We have found this man to be a troublemaker, stirring up riots among the Jews all over the world. He is a ringleader of the Nazarene sect…
We tend to paint the Jews in a bad light, as enemies of the way, the truth and the light. But try to think of Paul from their perspective. The Jewish spiritual leaders are the guardians of faith in the one true God. They know from the ancient stories how jealous this God can be. This man Paul is rocking the boat with his subversive teachings about Jesus. The Way is nothing more than a sect. There have been subversive religious groups before and there will be again. When I was growing up, I was part of a church that met in a school hall. That was pretty unusual back then. I remember that when my friend started coming with me, her parents were worried it was some sort of cult.
But Paul has been careful to keep a clear conscience before God and man. He has always striven to do the right thing. There is nothing that Felix can condemn him for. He keeps him under house arrest for two years – two years! – and is at once fascinated by his teaching about this Jesus and frightened of it. Paul could have offered him a bribe – that’s what Felix is hoping for – but Paul is a man of integrity, a man of God.
ACTION: Be creative with your time
Paul was a man of action. He’d been travelling for years, taking the message of Jesus far and wide. He’d face arrest and persecution. And now here he was under house arrest for two whole years! What a waste of time! Except it wasn’t though, was it? He took the time to share with Felix and his wife. He wrote some of his letters that form much of the New Testament while under house arrest. So it was not a waste of time at all.
There’ll be things you have to do today that will feel like a waste of time: waiting at a bus stop, waiting in a queue at the Post Office, waiting for a child to come out of school…today, use that time creatively to do something, rather than spend it in frustration that you can’t get on with that long list of things to be done. Read an article, listen to a blog, write an encouraging message, spend time with God…
No time ever needs to be wasted time.
