Staying on mission

“🎶the ships aground on the shore of this uncharted desert Isle…🎶”

For my generation most of my schoolmates would be hearing that song play from our TVs at 3:30 pm every week day.

Home from school, toss the books and coats and flip on the TV to Gilligan’s Isle.

It was a great distraction from life and school work and homework.

The Apostle Paul had a story about a shipwreck too. 15 days at sea in a terrible storm. We read about it in Acts 27.

In the midst of the storm Paul is visited by an angel and receives a hopeful message.

“The next day, as gale-force winds continued to batter the ship, the crew began throwing the cargo overboard. The following day they even took some of the ship’s gear and threw it overboard. The terrible storm raged for many days, blotting out the sun and the stars, until at last all hope was gone. No one had eaten for a long time. Finally, Paul called the crew together and said, “Men, you should have listened to me in the first place and not left Crete. You would have avoided all this damage and loss. But take courage! None of you will lose your lives, even though the ship will go down. For last night an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I serve stood beside me, and he said, ‘Don’t be afraid, Paul, for you will surely stand trial before Caesar! What’s more, God in his goodness has granted safety to everyone sailing with you.’ So take courage! For I believe God. It will be just as he said. But we will be shipwrecked on an island.”
Acts 27:18-26 – NLT

The danger didn’t stop there, the soldiers he was sailing with wanted to kill the prisoners but…

“The soldiers wanted to kill the prisoners to make sure they didn’t swim ashore and escape. But the commanding officer wanted to spare Paul, so he didn’t let them carry out their plan. Then he ordered all who could swim to jump overboard first and make for land. The others held on to planks or debris from the broken ship. So everyone escaped safely to shore.”
Acts 27:42-44 – NLT

Up to this point Paul had been beaten, stoned, and whipped numerous times yet he just kept on telling people about Jesus. He stayed on mission, stayed on task.

I need that focus. It embarrasses me to to admit how little it takes to get me off focus and off task. My mission is the same as Paul’s, tell other people about Jesus.

Here is how Paul describes his mission:

“I once thought these things were valuable, but now I consider them worthless because of what Christ has done. Yes, everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ and become one with him. I no longer count on my own righteousness through obeying the law; rather, I become righteous through faith in Christ. For God’s way of making us right with himself depends on faith. I want to know Christ and experience the mighty power that raised him from the dead. I want to suffer with him, sharing in his death, so that one way or another I will experience the resurrection from the dead!”
Philippians 3:7-11 – NLT

It’s time to go to work, both figuratively and literally, so I end here. I must ask myself, How am I doing? Am I staying on task? How are you doing?