Witnessing With Purpose: Rewarded For Obedience Not Result

“And the night following the Lord stood by him, and said, Be of good cheer, Paul: for as thou hast testified of me in Jerusalem, so must thou bear witness also at Rome.” Acts 23:11

Paul has done his Christian duty in Jerusalem and he has done all he could. He put his life on the line to witness to his countrymen and now the task is complete. It’s time to get ready for Rome. When we evaluate Paul’s work on this last trip to Jerusalem, he was rejected, imprisoned, and they plotted to murder him. No great pouring out of the Spirit or pouring in of souls into the kingdom. On the surface it appears that Paul was a failure in his witness for Christ. But Jesus tells him “Be of good cheer Paul: For thou hast testified of me…” This was all that Jesus expected of Paul and it is all that he expects of us!

The first lesson to learn here is the God does not reward us for our success but for our obedience. I read nowhere in the scriptures where God has called us to be successful. But throughout the Bible there is a clear call to obedience and a blessing for they who obey and a curse to those who don’t obey. We are living in a time where analytics and statistics is our way of measuring progress and success. If this was God’s standard of measurement for reward then men like Noah, Jeremiah, and even Jesus himself, would be considered failures. Each of these were faithful to God in proclaiming and doing God’s will and in some cases with very few results.

Noah preached to multitudes or people for 120 years but only eight souls were saved on the ark. Jeremiah preached forty years for Jerusalem to turn back to God or fall to the Babylonians. Then when he called them to surrender to Babylon they imprisoned him, charging him with treason. Jeremiah had very few converts. Even Jesus was rejected by the majority of the people he preached too, especially those who should have recognized him, like the scribes and Pharisees. John speaking of Jesus said “He came unto his own and his own received him not.” (John 1:11) He even lost one of chosen disciples, Judas, who would betray him with a kiss. If measured against modern standards of success in Churches today, these great men of God wouldn’t be considered successful. Paul had accomplished God’s purposes in Jerusalem and now it has made known to him that he will take the ministry to another great city; the city of Rome. Paul didn’t have much results, but he was“obedient to that heavenly vision.” (Acts 26:19)

The second lesson for us to learn here is that God has called us to a life of obedience and fruit bearing. Obedient in love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness and temperance. These are the standards by which we will be rewarded, not how many souls we win, how much we pay in tithes, or how big our church is. In fact, I believe that we have affected more people than we think, but to keep us from thinking highly of ourselves, God keeps some things hidden, only to be revealed in glory. All that he is looking for in us is our best! If we give him our best, then he will do the rest! The results are completely up to him for only he can work in the hearts of others.

May we look for open doors that God has put before us to witness for him, knowing that when those doors are closed and other opportunities arise, we can look back and say, we did our best, and God did the rest! Besides when we stand before him in glory, we will only give our rewards back to him, because it is his work in us anyway.

Pastor Robby