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Gospel: Acts 14: 19-28
In those days, some Jews from Antioch and Iconium
arrived and won over the crowds.
They stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city,
supposing that he was dead.
But when the disciples gathered around him,
he got up and entered the city.
On the following day he left with Barnabas for Derbe.
After they had proclaimed the good news to that city
and made a considerable number of disciples,
they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch.
They strengthened the spirits of the disciples
and exhorted them to persevere in the faith, saying,
“It is necessary for us to undergo many hardships
to enter the Kingdom of God.”
They appointed presbyters for them in each Church and,
with prayer and fasting, commended them to the Lord
in whom they had put their faith.
Then they traveled through Pisidia and reached Pamphylia.
After proclaiming the word at Perga they went down to Attalia.
From there they sailed to Antioch,
where they had been commended to the grace of God
for the work they had now accomplished.
And when they arrived, they called the Church together
and reported what God had done with them
and how he had opened the door of faith to the Gentiles.
Then they spent no little time with the disciples.
The Gospel of the Lord.
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This is the first time in the Acts of the Apostles that we find the idea of suffering as a prerequisite for entering the kingdom of God.
As a bruised, bloodied, and bandaged Saint Paul says to his brothers in ministry, “It is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the kingdom of God.”
He and Barnabas just concluded their missionary journey throughout Greece and Turkey. Sometimes their words fell upon fertile hearts. Other times, it was as if they stoked the hornet’s nest, provoking outrage and violence.
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As we heard in our first reading, people tried stoning Paul to death before dragging his lifeless body out of town, covering him with a pile of rubble.
But, once he came to his senses, a bloodied Paul stood up and went right back into the very same town, where he preached the very same message!
His courage and stubbornness moved hearts quicker and deeper than a thousand well-crafted sermons ever could. “After all he just went through, how could this man return to us for more punishment?” Many must’ve wondered. “Unless, of course, his message is true.”
The core of Paul’s message was simple: “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures. He was buried, raised from the dead, then he appeared to Peter and the others, and last of all he appeared to me” (1 Cor. 15:1-8).
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Who do you know today who embodies the courage of Saint Paul? Who among us is willing to bear their share of hardship for the sake of the Gospel?
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“It is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the kingdom of God,” Paul reminds us.
May his intercession lead all of us to do something for Christ today.
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Image credits: (1) EB Global (2) TheBostonPilot.com, Public Domain via Flickr (3) Convoy of Hope