After they tried to kill him, he asked if he could speak with them. Wait what? If someone tried to kill me, or someone I loved, I would stay far away from them. But Paul, in the Bible in the book of Acts, kept an eternal perspective. Let’s see how.
Multiple times through the book of Acts, Paul faced opposition to the Gospel, but he continued to preach. Instead of getting upset about it, feeling hurt, feeling angry or scared or sad, it even giving up on preaching God’s Word, Paul kept an eternal perspective. He kept focused on his God given mission.
For example, shortly after being set free from prison, he went to a new area to preach, where some people got upset about it, again.
“But other Jews [who did not believe the message,] were jealous; so they rounded up some bad characters from the marketplace, formed a mob and started a riot in the city. They rushed to Jason’s house in search of Paul and Silas in order to bring them out to the crowd” (Acts 17:5).
Seriously? Like, they couldn’t just be a reasonable person and think, “That dude is crazy. I don’t believe anything he says. Now, what was I going to have for dinner?” and MOVE ON! No, they had nothing better to do than to go recruiting people to oppose Paul. No, no, no, no, no. It’s worse than that. Instead of simply asking Paul to leave, they become an angry group and organized a protest. They did not even do that when Paul was preaching. They had to go looking for Paul and Silas in order to bring them to jail or beat them or do something to them. That’s a lot of opposition.
The above verse is from the New International Version. If you read it in other versions, you will read that “bad characters” has been replaced with things like evil men, vagabonds, ruffians, troublemakers, wicked men, or worthless men. Any way you spell it, the author of Acts says that those men were up to no good!
At another point, those who opposed Paul tried to kill him. Then the Roman soldiers showed up to break up the mob and arrested Paul. Wait what? That’s another question for another day, why he was arrested for being beaten. But while being transported to jail, Paul asked to speak with the crowd that had just tried to kill him (Acts 21:31-40).
However “bad,” the people were, let’s note Paul’s response. He did not think, “I give up. They’re not worth it. I think I need a new strategy,” or “how could they? Don’t they know I’m here to save their lives! After all I’ve done for them!” Or “oh poor me! Lord, how could You? I’m serving You after all!” Instead, he immediately moved from personal hurt to immediate forgiveness and an eternal focus on his enemies’ need for Jesus. Not only that, but Paul still very much desired to be the one to deliver the message of Jesus to them!
Maybe aspiring to be like Paul is too tall of a task. But perhaps we could at least pray to that extent the next time we face opposition. If our kids face bullies, we can try to keep an eternal perspective that those bullies likely don’t know Jesus. Are those against us Christ followers? If not, that is possibly why they treat people poorly. Pray about being able to move beyond your personal hurt in order to fulfill God’s purpose for you. Maybe your job isn’t to tell them about Jesus (though it might be), but to pray for your enemies to know Jesus. Pray for God to give you an eternal perspective.