Paul continues his travels in Acts 17. I think I would have enjoyed listening to his arguments in the synagogues and with the council of the Areopagus. I wonder if I would have been a “prominent woman” and how I would have accepted his proclamation that I was “ignorant of everything I worship”. No wonder he had some difficulties in some of his travels.

Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: “People of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. So you are ignorant of the very thing you worship and this is what I am going to proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands, and he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. Acts 17:22-25

What I do admire about Paul is his intensity, the strength of his words and his ability to cut through the excesses and help us understand where we have come from and who we are in God. God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ Acts 17:27-28

Prayer

Dear Lord, please help us to hear your words and reach out, knowing you are close. Amen