It’s All Down to Jesus

Even in the decisions of world leaders: Emperor Claudius, the most powerful man in the world at the time, decided that Jewish people should be moved from Rome, and Priscilla and Aquila ended up in Corinth. They were of great help to Paul, and that was all down to the Lord Jesus’ decision.

The fact that, in the Lord Jesus’ plan, the particular people who would be in Corinth to meet Paul would be people who shared a trade with him, and were able to help him pay his way as a missionary so that he didn’t need to ask anyone for any money in Corinth because he was selling tents; the fact that he could stay with Priscilla and Aquila when he first arrived, providing for him—that was all from the Lord Jesus.

And these sorts of ordinary means are also used by the Lord Jesus in the lives of Christians today.

Now, if we don’t have a clear doctrine of providence, then we’re going to get ourselves into a lot of trouble. We need to believe that absolutely everything is ordered by the Lord Jesus: things in the past, things in the future. The Lord Jesus rules over absolutely everything. He will use means; he will work without means; he will work against the grain of the expected use of means too.

Now, there is a care that the Lord Jesus takes for the whole of humanity in all of history. The rain falls on the wicked and the good, yes. So there’s a general providence. But what we’re talking about here, and what the books of the Bible that contain the history of the Christ’s people are especially concerned with, is to show us how the Lord Jesus especially cares for the people of his church.

That’s really, from many perspectives, what the story of the book of Acts is: to show that the ways of Christians are so carefully guarded by the Lord Jesus that no Christian will even stub his toe without the Lord Jesus deciding that that would be right.

This means that the Lord Jesus will sometimes command that Christians should suffer, as we’re going to come to see. And this also does not mean that we are devoid of responsibility. “Oh, Jesus is in charge, then I don’t need to worry about anything. I’ll just stay in bed.” No, that’s not true either.

But, on the other hand, we have to believe, as is presented to us here, that the Lord Jesus orders everything. And this is what lies between the lines of these words written by Luke. He’s presenting these things to us so that we’ll see, “Oh, wow, isn’t it amazing that the Lord Jesus planned that?” And the reality is that the Lord Jesus plans everything.

And, for Christians, nothing will happen that will not work out for the good of the Christian. It’s all down to Jesus. He’s in charge of the whole thing.

That doesn’t mean we don’t thank people for what they’ve done. So Paul would have thanked Priscilla and Aquila for their hospitality towards him. He wouldn’t have thought, “Oh, I don’t need to thank Priscilla and Aquila because the Lord Jesus has provided them.” No, of course he thanked them.

Neither would Paul ever have done anything wrong and then discounted himself of all responsibility because the Lord Jesus was in charge of it all. No, that was not true either.

Yet ultimately, Paul does not have to be miserable—and neither do we—thinking that he was living in a world where everything was governed by chance and that it was totally random what happened. “What a stroke of luck it was that Priscilla and Aquila turned up!” No, he didn’t think in that way, and neither did Dr Luke, who recorded this.

Now, this is a clear example of the providence of the Lord Jesus, especially caring for his people. And how awful it would be if we weren’t aware of this—if we were under the illusion that the whole of the universe was totally random and under the dominion of chance.