Acts 14:1-13

(Acts 14:1-13) – Missionaries on the move.

What the enemy intends for evil, God intends for good.

God, being in control of everything, has the ability to turn things around in such a way that bad situations can have good endings.

When we look at a particular circumstance by itself, it can be easy to tag that situation as “bad” altogether. And in many cases that’s true.

Death, by itself, is bad altogether.

Sin, by itself, is bad altogether.

Persecution, by itself, is bad altogether.

But we don’t look at life that way. We look at the big picture.

We know that the quality of an event isn’t fully determined by what takes place in that moment alone. It’s determined by what God ultimately does THROUGH that event.

Did God accomplish good through that situation? If so, then we don’t have to look at it as “bad” altogether. We look at it as “worked out for good”

And God says that He does that with ALL circumstances. Sin, death, suicide, abortion, genocide, persecution…it ALL gets worked out for good.

Again, it doesn’t mean that those things ARE good, it means that those things aren’t the end of the story.

It means that we can’t lose! To live is Christ, to die is gain!

Here, persecution of Christians continued to bring about the spread of the Gospel in other regions, causing more people to receive God’s eternal grace.

Think of how God might want to use your tough times to bring about great things for Him! Let him move you out of misery toward ministry.