However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace.
Acts 20:24 (NIV)
Paul’s One Aim
On his way to Jerusalem, with the Holy Spirit warning him in every city that prison and hardships are waiting, Paul says he considers his life worth nothing to him. His only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given him, the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace.
He can say what his life is for without stopping to think about it, and he didn’t pick it himself. The Lord Jesus gave him the task. The content of it is grace, and Paul is carrying it toward a city where he’s already been told what’s waiting for him there.
The lost and found at a bus station is a counter and a wall of shelves in the back. The clerk takes a description and goes to look. Umbrellas by the dozen, one crutch, a set of dentures in a paper bag, a bike helmet with a name on masking tape inside it. He can tell you his job at the counter without looking up. Keep it until the owner comes back for it.
Most of what he keeps is never claimed. He keeps it anyway, and a slow month doesn’t change what he’s there for. I’m impatient with work that has nothing to show for it by evening, and there are whole weeks in that back room with nothing to show at all.
Paul’s aim has that shape and a much longer reach. The task came from Jesus, he can name it in a line, and he’d rather finish it than keep his life. Finishing the race and completing the task are one thing for him, and the thing is grace, said to people who haven’t heard it.
What would you say you’d been given to do?
A Prayer to Remember
My friend would shrug at that question, Father. He puts in long days and couldn’t tell you what any of it is toward, and he’d change the subject if I asked. Don’t let him settle there. Give him something of yours to do, and let him be sure whose it is.
In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.
