Acts 13:42-47 (NIV)
As Paul and Barnabas were leaving the synagogue, the people invited them to speak further about these things on the next Sabbath. When the congregation was dismissed, many of the Jews and devout converts to Judaism followed Paul and Barnabas, who talked with them and urged them to continue in the grace of God.
On the next Sabbath almost the whole city gathered to hear the word of the Lord. When the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy and talked abusively against what Paul was saying.
Then Paul and Barnabas answered them boldly: “We had to speak the word of God to you first. Since you reject it and do not consider yourselves worthy of eternal life, we now turn to the Gentiles. For this is what the Lord has commanded us:
“‘I have made you a light for the Gentiles,
that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth.’”
Paul’s Spirit-guided, Spirit-empowered message burst through the hearts of the crowed that was listening, and many responded with faith in Jesus. The synagogue leaders asked Paul and Barnabas to return the following Sabbath, a decision they soon regretted.
The problem was that the new believers, both Jews and God-fearers, were so excited by their new-found faith that they couldn’t help sharing what they had learned and believed in with their families, friends, neighbors, coworkers, and even perfect strangers. So, when the next Sabbath came, the synagogue was packed out with Jews, God-fearers, and even pagan gentiles, all waiting to hear about Jesus. Nearly the whole town showed up!
But rather than being glad of the influx of people coming to worship God and to hear from His word, the leaders of the synagogue chose to respond with jealousy. They had been ministering for years with only a small group of Jewish faithful to show for it. But now these upstarts from Syria, teaching about this Jesus, had packed the place with a single sermon! So, as Paul spoke, they tried to aggressively rebut what he was teaching in an effort to blunt their success and to dissuade people from believing.
Paul and Barnabas responded strongly. They had come to the Jews with the good news first, because they were part of the people that God had chosen from the beginning. But if they rejected God’s messengers and the message they were bringing of salvation through faith in Jesus, that message would be taken next to the gentiles, who were already responding, and who would doubtless respond in even greater numbers, and with even greater enthusiasm. To back up the legitimacy of this strategy, Paul quoted Isaiah 49:6, a passage which clearly shows that the reach of the salvation that the Messiah would bring was designed to extend even to the gentiles and around the world.
Needless to say, the gentiles in the crowd were ecstatic. The Jewish Scriptures talked about them, and the Jewish Messiah was holding out the promise of salvation and a place in the kingdom of God to them! And many believed on the spot.
Many people in the Jewish community saw God’s salvation as exclusionary, reaching only as far as a specific group of people, the Jews, and to those who would go through the long (and painful!) process of conversion to Judaism. But the good news is actually inclusionary, with salvation being held out to all, both Jews and gentiles, to anyone who is willing to enter through repentance and faith in the finished work of Jesus.
Father, this is not only good news, it is earth-shattering in its uniqueness. The kingdom comes to people where we are and invites us in so that we can become who You have designed us to be. Even today some Christians seem to believe that a person must “clean themselves up,” start looking and acting like “good church people,” before they can really be saved. But the gospel of the kingdom that Jesus brought to life and that Paul preached is about transformation through faith, not faith enabled by self-improvement. What a profound difference! Thank You, Lord, for the instantaneous transformation that You brought into my life when I believed, and for the growth that You have facilitated in my life ever since that day. Amen.
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