Paul’s Priorities

Priorities have a significant impact on life. They can weigh you down. They can pick you up. They influence every decision you make, whether big or small. When you come across different parts of your life, you take on different responsibilities and priorities. For many, it is when you get a car. Or when you become a parent. Or when you become a Christian. And after you take on those things, a set of maintenance and upkeep “protocols” are put into place. When you buy a car, it is to abide by the law. When you become a parent, it is to raise up your children in the way they should go (Proverbs 22:6). When you become a Christian, you live every waking second as the Lord has commanded. He expects this of those who commit to following him. You are brought out of your former sin. You enter into a new life of victorious faith (Ephesians 4:22).

For the apostle Paul, his biggest priority emerged when he was blinded on the road to Damascus. This event is recorded in Acts 9:1-19. The priority he took on: Spreading the gospel, and becoming all things to all men (1 Cor. 9:22). He put off his old life of sin and persecuting Christians. He looked over the coats of men who were stoning Stephen (an integral person in the Early Church, a deacon, the first martyr), and persecuted the Lord’s Church “beyond measure” (Gal. 1). Paul had lived a life of sin and wrongdoing. But when he was blinded, he took on a new priority. It shaped the rest of his life. I hope that we can recognize the priority we accepted. We put on the grace of Christ through the waters of baptism. Paul wrote about this in his letter to the church in Colossae: “having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.” (Col. 2:12). 

Too often today I believe the commitment we make is forsaken and forgotten. The ebb and flow of today’s culture is furthering us from commitment. Marriages are being ended at record highs and rates. In the church, a worrying trend is seen. People in modern culture are plagued by disinterest. They show indifference to the gospel. Such people are affecting the numbers. 

This was not Paul. Paul was not indifferent nor disinterested in the work that had been laid before him. In fact (as I have preached on before), Paul counted all of his former life as loss. Philippians 3:7 says “But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ.”. Even in a culture with commitment issues due to differing opinions, there remains a cause to fight for. Paul fought for it just the same. 

Fight to count all as loss, and fight to prioritize what really matters (The cause of Christ) as Paul did! When you do that, you will be able to resist a shifting and imperfect culture.

Written by: Mason MacDonald