Methods

 DEVOTION

THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES

METHODS

Acts 17:1-4

17:1 When they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a Jewish synagogue. 2 As his custom was, Paul went into the synagogue, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures, 3 explaining and proving that the Christ had to suffer and rise from the dead. "This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Christ," he said. 4 Some of the Jews were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, as did a large number of God-fearing Greeks and not a few prominent women.

NIV

Sometimes it takes a little while to get the message across to some people and it takes a bit of reasoning. Of the premise of this reasoning was the scriptures that those in the synagogue believed in. Proving Jesus was the Christ from what someone believes in should be a lot more effective than having to reason with someone who does not believe in the scriptures. We also notice that some of the Jews were persuaded, but not all. In some of the past examples of Paul proclaiming the message of Christ, we were not told it took him this long or that he was reasoning with them. What we might learn here is that each situation of sharing the gospel message might be different from others. We cannot have a set plan that we must stick to in order to share the message. We have to be able to adapt to the need of each individual situation for them to understand the truth. Some we might be able to simply ask, “Do you know Jesus?” while others we might have to spend days reasoning with them from the particular translation of the Bible, they believe is the right one. The point is we cannot be frozen with a formula that we must use each and every time. Of course, we are not all called as Paul was to travel around persuading all that he can that Jesus is the Christ. But in some sense, we are all called to go into the world. We each have a world that we are in, a world or circle of influence that we live in, and people we associate with on a regular basis. Do we bring them the message in any way at all? How do we if we are not allowed to by the rules of engagement in which we work? Yet the point is we should be open to various methods of sharing the message as well as know the scriptures well enough, at least those regarding Jesus, to reason with those who need required proof.