Help me to walk through the doors You open, God

This is the journal entry on what God shared with me today during my quiet time. See here for information on how I keep my daily quiet time with God.

Look: “I will stay on at Ephesus until Pentecost, because a great door for effective work has opened to me, and there are many who oppose me.” (1 Corinthians 16:8-9)

This interests me because, as Paul gives the Corinthian Christians a rundown of his plans, he mentions going to Ephesus. In one breath, he seems to give two almost contradictory reasons for being in Ephesus through Pentecost: (1) A door for effective work there has opened to him; (2) There are many there who oppose him.

On the second point, The Lutheran Study Bible says that Paul’s fellow Jews in Ephesus were offended that he “welcomed uncircumcised Gentiles into the churches.”

It seems almost silly to use the offense he will cause people as a reason to go among them.

Silly? Not when I consider what he wrote to the Gentile-Christian church in Rome about his fellow Jews. Paul agonized over the fact that God’s chosen people, who had the patriarchs and the ordinances, whose Messiah had come to be Lord and Savior of all the world, could miss out on the promises given to them through the patriarchs and Moses and the prophets by refusing to accept or trust in the God ultimately disclosed to them and the whole world in Jesus. At one point in the extended section of Romans in which he addresses his concerns, chapters 9 to 11, Paul says that he’d be willing to give up his own eternal salvation if only his fellow Jews would receive and believe in Jesus. “For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race,” he writes in Romans 9:3.

So, Paul doesn’t look forward to being in Ephesus merely to be provocative. He has an opportunity to share the gospel with many people. But he also has an opportunity to get his fellow Jews’ attention placed on Christ and His gospel. Paul's hope is that he will incite them to listen to the message and come to believe in Jesus, too, as God and Savior.

But first they must be provoked.

Paul talks about this very strategy--of provoking his fellow Jews in order to incite them to faith in Jesus--in Romans 11:

“I am talking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch as I am the apostle to the Gentiles, I take pride in my ministry in the hope that I may somehow arouse my own people to envy and save some of them.” (Romans 11:13-14)

Paul sees the opportunity to share the gospel--the good news of new life for all who repent and surrender their lives to the crucified and risen Jesus--as good not only for the Gentiles who are receptive to Christ and the gospel. He also sees the opportunity, the door opened, by his ministry to the Gentiles, to provoke his fellow Jews to jealousy of the Gentile believers for the forgiveness, peace, joy, and new life they have through their faith in this Son of David, Jesus.

Listen: By now, Paul is familiar with the opposition and even violence his proclamation of Jesus can bring upon his head. Jews and Gentiles have an inborn predisposition--rooted in our sinful natures--to reject any message that calls us to admit our wrongs and to surrender to anybody else, even to God. In Ephesus itself, Paul would be denounced by Gentiles tied to the production and sales of statues of the greek goddess Artemis or Diana.

But Paul can also see the “open door," the door that God has swung open, allowing him to win some people to Jesus. So, even when he sees opposition beyond that open door, he walks through it. He follows where Jesus seems to be leading him. He doesn’t do so with the naive notion that all will be well. He fully understands the danger and simple unpleasantness that awaits him if he passes through the open door. His eyes are wide open. But he plunges forward anyway.

In one of the books I’m reading right now, Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury, speaks of discipleship being made up, in part, of being with Jesus. Whether Jesus leads us to places of difficulty or ease, each of which have their own peculiar temptations to unfaithfulness, the disciple follows. And, it seems to me, they must do so with eyes wide open and constant prayer. Paul understands this, I think.

Respond: In looking at these two verses, I have to ask, Lord, if I haven’t too often opted for the comfortable ways, if I haven’t dodged controversy, if I haven’t failed to provoke when I should have been provoking--for the sake of those with whom I needed to share Christ’s gospel?

Have I opted for ease?

Have I passed open doors knowing that beyond them lay great promise, both for those who are immediately receptive to the gospel and for those who will be initially offended, but might later receive Christ?

The answer to those questions is yes, often.

And in passing on those open doors, I’ve also taken a pass on sharing the gospel with people You had called me to share it.

Which leads to another question, a haunting one: Once a Christian has passed on so many open doors, will You ever entrust them with the call to enter through others?

Jesus says that He only entrusts bigger things when they’ve been faithful in addressing smaller things (Matthew 25:23). Later, Jesus says: “For whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.” (Matthew 25:29)

So, God, I simply ask that, no matter the size or implications, You will open doors for me to share the gospel, following Jesus in order to share Him with others. Help me not to worry about the troubles it might bring my way. Jesus tells us that in this world we will have trouble, but that He has overcome the world. So, troubles shouldn't keep me from being faithful. Forgive my unfaithful past. Grant that Your Holy Spirit will empower me to be faithful today.

Open the doors that You call me to notice and let me walk through, whether my doing so will provoke some or not. So long as my end goal is not to provoke (because who wants to be someone who provokes just for the sake of provoking?), but to bring the gospel message of new life for all people, I need to go where You lead. Help me to do just that!

In Jesus’ name I pray.

[Blogger Mark Daniels is pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]