“But the apostles stayed there a long time, preaching boldly about the grace of the Lord. And the Lord proved their message was true by giving them power to do miraculous signs and wonders.” Acts 14:3
Suppose you were invited to speak to a group; maybe a civic club, a local college, or a community group of some kind, and suppose that with this invitation to speak you were given a very limited amount of time to share with your audience. Maybe you would have within yourself the ability and expertise to speak on a variety of topics, but you knew that time would not allow you to do so. So, what would you do? You would find the one thing that, if you never had the chance to speak to this group again, you would want to leave with your listeners; the truth you believe to be the most important to share.
You know the saying, “you only get one chance to make a first impression.” Well, for Paul, he knew he only had one chance to make an impression and he wanted that impression to be a lasting one; one that would change, for all eternity, the hearts and lives of those in his audience.
Paul had obviously grown spiritually since the moment he was knocked down off his horse. In fact, Paul would eventually write over two-thirds of the New Testament, so there’s a lot of things he could have talked about in any one of the cities that he and Barnabas passed through. So, of all those things he could have spoken on, what did he choose as his topic?
Acts 14:3 tells us that Paul preached “boldly about the grace of the Lord.” He didn’t waste a moment teaching about the Levitical Law, how to follow all the ordinances of sacrifice, or how to present the proper sin offerings. No, he preached “boldly about the grace of the Lord.” He knew that a change had come, and that change was all about God’s abundant Grace through Jesus!
Let me encourage you today, though there may be many topics and passions we could focus on, let’s keep our focus on the “main thing” the grace of our Lord. Don’t be “sin conscious,” but instead be “righteous minded.” Don’t focus on right behavior, but instead focus on right believing, because as it’s been said, “right believing will lead to right living.” Let’s keep our focus on the main thing, the grace of our Lord.