Being marked as belonging to Jesus
Acts 19:1-10
19 While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul passed through the inland regions and came to Ephesus, where he found some disciples. 2 He said to them, ‘Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?’ They replied, ‘No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.’ 3 Then he said, ‘Into what then were you baptized?’ They answered, ‘Into John’s baptism.’ 4 Paul said, ‘John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, in Jesus.’ 5 On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. 6 When Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied— 7 altogether there were about twelve of them.
8 He entered the synagogue and for three months spoke out boldly, and argued persuasively about the kingdom of God. 9 When some stubbornly refused to believe and spoke evil of the Way before the congregation, he left them, taking the disciples with him, and argued daily in the lecture hall of Tyrannus. 10 This continued for two years, so that all the residents of Asia, both Jews and Greeks, heard the word of the Lord.
Luke returns to the Paul story, picking it up from Acts 18:23. Luke is also at pains to show readers that Paul and Apollos are not in Ephesus at the same time.
Paul and his team arrive in Ephesus having come the overland trade route through inland Turkey. He finds Christians already present in Ephesus; he will not be starting from scratch in drawing people into the church. But Paul discovers the believers had been baptized for the repentance of their sins, but not baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
Conversion, becoming a follower of Jesus, is a two-stage process, both parts are essential. Part one is repenting of the wrong one has done and participated in; and seeking forgiveness. In other words, saying sorry. Part two is trusting in Jesus Christ and declaring our loyalty to Jesus.
So, while the teaching is correct that Jesus saves us from our sins, that is not the end of the story. Having been saved from the just consequences of our wrongdoing, we are called to follow that up with a commitment making Jesus the Lord of our lives. Forgiveness must lead us to loyalty to Jesus or the job is only half done. But by the same token, our loyalty to Jesus is predicated on our having confessed our sins and having received the forgiveness offered to us in Jesus Christ’s death on the cross.
Paul then launches into his regular pattern of going to the local synagogue to speak about Jesus until it is obvious that no more Jews are prepared to become followers of Jesus, and then Paul turns to preach to the Gentiles. Notice that he does not get thrown out of the Ephesian synagogue, instead he realizes his efforts are not being rewarded and so he turns to a new audience. Paul had learned the discipline of knowing when to move on, to stop pushing someone to come to faith, because more pushing was becoming counterproductive. This is a call to discernment about when it is time to stop speaking, arguing, cajoling, and trust God through the Holy Spirit to do things in God’s time.
PRAYER:
O Lord, we rejoice that in Jesus Christ, you have offered us forgiveness of our sins, through Jesus’ death on the cross. We celebrate as well that you have invited us to be loyal to your Son and in the waters of baptism have marked us being yours. In Jesus’ name. Amen.