Strengthening Believers

The middle of Acts 18 (verses 23-24) say something very interesting about Paul. On his second missionary journey, Paul was doubtlessly excited about the possibility of bringing the Gospel to new people. He had seen some powerful things happen among people of Greece and Asia Minor during his first journey and must have itched to get out there again! The interesting thing that the verses say is that Paul stopped along the way to strengthen the believers.

This interests me because stopping to strengthen the believers likely took a lot of time from the missionary journey. There is no indication that Paul had any time constraints on the journey, but it seems logical that more time spent in new locations would result in new converts.

Could it be, then, that effective ministry is not only about evangelism? Sure, many of you are thinking how elementary this is. Yet, we often approach our ministries this way. I've been a member of more than one church whose philosophy was to reach all the unsaved for Christ. Once those people were reached, though, many of them have yet to experience true spiritual freedom in Christ! Many people assume they are now "saved" because they said a particular prayer with the right person somewhere and now attend church. Sure, they made an initial to place their hope in Christ. Salvation is more than a prayer and church attendance. Salvation can play into our daily lives, constantly drawing us into the likeness of Christ. We can experience complete cleansing as we live our new lives if salvation is a continual process. Otherwise, we get bogged down with questions like, "The Bible says all Christians are free of sin, but I still have struggles - what gives?"

A final note is necessary, too. Sometimes we acknowledge that strengthening the believers has great eternal value, but we long for people to come and strengthen us. That's normal, but we must allow God's grace to be sufficient for us. We must seek others to strengthen. We'll quickly find how strengthening other believers leaves us strong.