WEEK 3: INVESTED IN THE
MISSION
TODAY’S CHARACTER: PRISCILLA
AND AQUILA
SCRIPTURE REFERENCES: ACTS
18:1-4, 18:18-20, 24-28
MAIN
POINT: God gives us opportunities, skills,
and resources to serve and invest in others to fulfill the mission He calls us
to as a church. We’re called to be ‘followers’ of Christ, not ‘fans.’
INTRODUCTION
Why do you think God designed the work of gospel ministry
to be a shared responsibility among Christians?
What benefit comes from working with others to advance the
gospel?
What was the most difficult thing God has called you to do?
Did you do it? Why or why not? What made it difficult?
We recognize the big-name folks in the New Testament, but
there are so many others whose names we may or may not remember. These men and
women are no less significant and represent to us a picture of gospel
partnership and friendship among the early church. Paul met many of these
people in his daily lives and they became much needed partners in his ministry.
God designed us as interdependent parts of one body, functioning together for
one goal.
UNDERSTANDING:
Let’s unpack the biblical text to
discover what the Scripture says or means about this particular topic.
READ ACTS 18:1-4
After this, Paul left Athens
and went to Corinth. 2 There he met a Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontus, who
had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had
ordered all Jews to leave Rome. Paul went to see them, 3 and because he was a
tentmaker as they were, he stayed and worked with them. 4 Every Sabbath he
reasoned in the synagogue, trying to persuade Jews and Greeks.
Why do you think Luke included this reference to Paul’s
staying with Aquila and Priscilla and working with them as a tentmaker? What do
we learn about Paul’s ministry approach from these details?
What do we know about Priscilla and Aquila from these
verses? Why had they left Italy?
Paul’s tentmaker job was a means to an end for him to
travel and spread the gospel message. During this time in Corinth, Paul’s
primary means of earning a living was not vocational ministry. Rather, he
shared the gospel in the midst of his day-to-day life and work.
READ ACTS 18:18-20,
24-25; 1 COR 16:19
Priscilla, Aquila and
Apollos
18 Paul stayed on in
Corinth for some time. Then he left the brothers and sisters and sailed for
Syria, accompanied by Priscilla and Aquila. Before he sailed, he had his hair
cut off at Cenchreae because of a vow he had taken. 19 They arrived at Ephesus,
where Paul left Priscilla and Aquila. He himself went into the synagogue and
reasoned with the Jews. 20 When they asked him to spend more time with them, he
declined.
24 Meanwhile a Jew named
Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was a learned man, with a
thorough knowledge of the Scriptures. 25 He had been instructed in the way of
the Lord, and he spoke with great fervor and taught about Jesus accurately,
though he knew only the baptism of John.
Final Greetings
19 The churches in the province
of Asia send you greetings. Aquila and Priscilla greet you warmly in the Lord,
and so does the church that meets at their house.
What does the fact that Aquila and Priscilla left Corinth
and traveled to Ephesus with Paul suggest about the relationship he had built
with this couple?
What do we learn about Apollos from verses 24-25? What
lessons can we learn from Priscilla and Aquila’s investment in Apollos’ life?
What key truths about Jesus would have been included in their teaching?
How did Priscilla and Aquila serve in Ephesus?
Apollos was an eloquent speaker and a cultured, learned
man. As a Jew, he was well-versed in the Old Testament. By word of mouth,
Apollos learned about Jesus’ life and work. Apollos knew only of John the Baptist’s
baptism and didn’t know that Jesus was the Messiah. This is where Priscilla and
Aquila, married believers who spent time with Paul, intervened (v. 26). This
husband and wife team listened to Apollos’ teaching. They understood the
complete message of Christianity, and they recognized Apollos’ limited
knowledge. Apollos knew the importance of repenting of sin, but he didn’t yet
know about the second step of believing in Jesus Christ. Priscilla and Aquila
filled in the gaps—including Jesus’ life, ministry, death, and resurrection—and
perhaps what had transpired since His resurrection.
READ ROMANS 16:3-5 AND 2
TIMOTHY 4:19
3 Greet Priscilla and Aquila, my co-workers in Christ
Jesus. 4 They risked their lives for me. Not only I but all the churches of the
Gentiles are grateful to them. 5 Greet also the church that meets at their
house. Greet my dear friend Epenetus, who was the first convert to Christ in
the province of Asia.
Final Greetings
19 Greet Priscilla and Aquila and the household of Onesiphorus.
What else do we learn about the willingness of Priscilla
and Aquila to invest in the mission?
Would you say they were willing to lay it all down? (Romans
16:3)
(These believers must have meant a lot to Paul to include
them in his most important missionary letter and the last piece he ever wrote.)
APPLICATION
How do these truths from the Scripture passage apply
directly to our lives?
Who has invested in your faith like Priscilla and Aquila
invested in Paul, Apollos, and others?
If you are married, how can you invest in someone or
disciple another couple together as a family?
If you are single, who can you partner with to share the
gospel message?
What other ways can you be more of a ‘follower’ rather than
a ‘fan’ when it comes to investing in the mission of our church?
PRAYER
Praise God for the ability to invest
in others with our time and resources. Ask God to plant in us a desire to be an
effective gospel witness and a godly example for others in the faith, and to be
willing to do the ‘hard things’ in service to one another and the mission He
has called us to.
Hope to see everyone this Sunday!
In His Love,
David & Susan
Teacher's Notes:
Teacher's Notes:
Click Here to Watch
WEEK 3: INVESTED IN THE
MISSION / ACTS 18:1-4, 18:18-20, 24-28
Fan or Follower
What do you think the difference is between a follower of
Christ and a fan?
A fan is an admirer but a follower is committed to their master.
A fan may be a fan of one or more person but a follower will have only one
master. A fan enjoys but a follower is a disciple. A fan is following
his mentor for his pleasure but a follower is following for learning and understanding
of his life.
Application: John 6 Jesus feeds the
5000, they followed, but why? And then many went away.
There
were many fans along the way because of what He had done for them here on earth
or because of what they wanted Him to do for them here on earth. Jesus did not
come to make our earthly life easy or comfortable. He came to make a way for us
to experience eternity with Him. When we are only striving for things of this
world and are treating this world as the end all and be all of life, we are
seeking out things that are only temporary and will perish. That is what these
fans of Jesus were looking for in John chapter 6.
Application:
What
about you? Why are you here today? Why do you come out to church on Sundays? Just
showing up on Sunday and sitting in the pews doesn’t make us a follower.
We see
from Scripture that there were many who liked to be around Jesus and it made
them feel good, but many were only fans. They even liked what he was saying,
for the most part. There comes a point that you have to “Define the
Relationship” in regards to Jesus. Are you a follower of Christ? Or are you
just a fan?
Definition of Christian: The
definition of being a Christian is to be a follower of Christ, not a fan.
BOARD:
Why do you think God designed the
work of gospel ministry to be a shared responsibility among Christians?
- God gives us opportunities, skills, and resources to serve and invest in others to fulfill the mission He calls us to as a church.
- Paul met many people in his daily life and many of them became needed partners in his ministry. God designed us as interdependent parts of one body, functioning together for one goal.
BOARD: We recognize the big names in the New Testament, but there
are many others we may not remember.
These men and women are no less significant and represent
to us a picture of gospel partnerships and friendships among the early church.
Paul met these people in his daily life and they became
partners in his ministry.
MAIN
POINT: God gives us opportunities, skills,
and resources to serve and invest in others to fulfill the mission He calls us
to as a church. We’re called to be ‘followers’ of Christ, not ‘fans.’
Opportunities: Talk
with others about Christ, friends, family, work, strangers God puts in our
path, missions
Skills: Our vocation, communication
skills, knowledge, wisdom, discernment,
Resources: Our homes, money,
possessions, places of influence, positions of influence
To
Serve and Invest in Others
To fulfill the Mission
Alright, PRISCILLA AND AQUILA – Who were they?
Let’s unpack the biblical text to discover what the
Scripture says or means about this particular married couple.
READ ACTS 18:1-4
Why do you think Luke included this reference to Paul’s
staying with Aquila and Priscilla and working with them as a tent-maker? What do
we learn about Paul’s ministry approach from these details?
Paul’s tent-maker job was a means to an end for him to
travel and spread the gospel message. During this time in Corinth, Paul’s
primary means of earning a living was not vocational ministry. Rather, he
shared the gospel in the midst of his day-to-day life and work.
Each Jewish boy learned
a trade and tried to earn his living with it. Paul and Aquila were tent-makers –
cutting and sewing woven cloth of goat’s hair into tents. Tents were used to
house soldiers, and so these tents may have been sold to the Roman army. As a tent-maker, Paul could go wherever God led him, carrying his livelihood with him.
What do we know about Priscilla and Aquila from these
verses? Why had they left Italy?
READ ACTS 18:18-20, 24-25; 1 COR 16:19
Priscilla, Aquila and
Apollos
What does the fact that Aquila and Priscilla left Corinth
and traveled to Ephesus with Paul suggest about the relationship he had built
with this couple? How did Priscilla and Aquila serve in Ephesus?
- They traveled with Paul
and became life-long friends. The met him
in Corinth, traveled with him to Ephesus and helped him start churches and carry
on the mission.
- They used their homes
for church meetings. A church met in their house in Ephesus and
a church also met in their home in Rome once they came back. The home is a valuable tool for evangelism
- They taught others the
gospel. They invested their knowledge of the gospel
in Apollos.
18:18 This vow Paul took
was probably a temporary Nazirite vow that ended with the shaving of the head
and offering the hair as a sacrifice.
What do we learn about Apollos from verses 24-25?
Apollos was an eloquent speaker and a cultured, learned
man. As a Jew, he was well-versed in the Old Testament. By word of mouth,
Apollos learned about Jesus’ life and work. Apollos knew only of John the
Baptist’s baptism and didn’t know that Jesus was the Messiah.
18:24-26 Apollos had
heard only what John the Baptist had said about Jesus (Luke 3:1-18), so his
message was not the complete story. John focused on repentance from sin, the
first step. But the whole message is to repent from sin and then believe in
Christ. Apollos did not know about Jesus’ life, crucifixion, and resurrection.
Nor did he know about the coming of the Holy Spirit. Priscilla and Aquila
explained the way of salvation to him.
What lessons can we learn from Priscilla and Aquila’s
investment in Apollos’ life? What key truths about Jesus would have been
included in their teaching?
This is where Priscilla and Aquila, married believers who
spent time with Paul, intervened (v. 26). This husband and wife team listened
to Apollos’ teaching. They understood the complete message of Christianity, and
they recognized Apollos’ limited knowledge. Apollos knew the importance of
repenting of sin, but he didn’t yet know about the second step of believing in
Jesus Christ. Priscilla and Aquila filled in the gaps—including Jesus’ life,
ministry, death, and resurrection—and perhaps what had transpired since His
resurrection.
1 COR
16:19 Many in the Corinthian church would have known this Christian couple.
READ ROMANS 16:3-5 AND 2 TIMOTHY 4:19
What else do we learn about the willingness of Priscilla
and Aquila to invest in the mission?
Would you say they were willing to lay it all down? (Romans
16:3)
(These believers must have meant a lot to Paul to include
them in his most important missionary letter and the last piece he ever wrote.)
16:3-5 Priscilla and
Aquila were a married couple that had become close friends of Paul’s. They
along with other Jews had been expelled from Rome by the emperor and had moved
to Corinth. They met Paul there and invited him to come and live with them.
They were Christians before they met Paul, and probably told him much about the
Roman church. Like Paul, they were missionaries. They helped believers in
Ephesus, in Rome, Corinth, again in Rome when they were allowed to return and
again in Ephesus.
4:19
Paul
ended the final chapter in his book and in his life by greeting those who were
closest to him. Although Paul had spent most of his life traveling, he had
developed close and lasting friendships.
APPLICATION:
How do these truths from the Scripture
passage apply directly to our lives?
If you are married, how can you invest in someone or
disciple another couple together as a family?
What other ways can you be more of a ‘follower’ rather than
a ‘fan’ when it comes to investing in the mission of our church?
Close...
Who were Priscilla and Aquila?
The story of these two friends of the apostle Paul is
told in Acts 18. Aquila, a Jewish Christian, and his wife, Priscilla, first met
Paul in Corinth, became good friends of his, and shared in his work. Eventually
the Corinthian church met in their home. These two remarkable people belong in
the pantheon of Christian heroes, and their ministry is both an encouragement
and an example for us.
When we first meet Aquila and Priscilla, we are told that
they had come to Corinth from Italy as victims of Roman persecution, not for
their Christian faith but because Aquila was a Jew. The Emperor Claudius expelled
all Jews from Rome, and no doubt Jews deemed it unsafe to remain in any part of
Italy. Aquila and Priscilla found their way to Corinth and settled there,
pursuing their trade as tent-makers. When Paul, a tent-maker himself, came to
Corinth, he went to see them, no doubt having heard of their faith in Christ.
Paul lived and worked with them while he started the Corinthian church.
After a year and a half, Paul left for Ephesus and took
Aquila and Priscilla with him. The couple stayed in Ephesus when Paul left,
again establishing a church in their home (1 Corinthians 16:19). Then an
eloquent preacher named Apollos came through Ephesus. Apollos was mighty in the
Scriptures, but he only knew the baptism of John. This means Apollos knew
Christ had come and fulfilled John’s prophecies, but he didn’t know the
significance of Christ’s death and resurrection, the ministry of the indwelling
Holy Spirit, or the mystery of the church containing both Jews and Gentiles.
Priscilla and her husband took Apollos aside and explained these things to him
(Acts 18:24-26). Both Aquila and Priscilla possessed an in-depth understanding
of doctrine learned from Paul, and this husband and wife team was able to pass
it on to another Christian and build him up in the faith.
These two remarkable people set an example for us of
hospitality, seen in opening their home to Paul and using their house as a
meeting place for churches wherever they went. We are also impressed by their
passion for Christ and their hunger for knowledge of Him.
Another hallmark of the lives of Priscilla and Aquila is
their desire to build others in the faith. Paul’s last reference to them is in
his last letter. Paul was imprisoned in Rome and writing to Timothy one last
time. Timothy was pastoring the church at Ephesus, and Aquila and Priscilla are
there with him, still faithfully ministering (2 Timothy 4:19). To the end,
Aquila and Priscilla were offering hospitality to other Christians, spreading
the gospel they had learned from Paul, and rendering faithful service to the
Master.
Aquila & Priscilla
Some couples know how to make the most of life. They complement each other, capitalizing on each
other’s strengths, and form an effective team. Their united efforts affect
those around them. Aquila and Priscilla were such a couple. They are never
mentioned separately in the Bible. In marriage and ministry, they were always together.
Priscilla and Aquila met Paul in Corinth during his 2nd
missionary journey. They had just been expelled from Rome (Italy) by Emperor
Claudius’ decree against Jews. Their home was as movable as the tents they
made to support themselves. They opened their home to Paul, and he joined
them in tent-making. He shared with them his wealth of spiritual wisdom.
Priscilla and Aquila made the most of their spiritual
education. They listened carefully to sermons and
evaluated what they heard. When they heard Apollos speak, they were impressed
by his ability, but realized that his information was not complete. Instead of
open confrontation, the couple quietly took Apollos home and shared with him
what he needed to know. Until then, Apollos had only John the Baptist’s message
about Christ. They told him about Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection, and the
reality of God’s indwelling Spirit. He continued to preach powerfully – but now
with the full story.
As for Priscilla and Aquila, they went on using
their home as a warm place for training and worship. Back in Rome years
later, they hosted one of the house churches that developed.
In an age when the focus is mostly on what happens between
husband and wife, Aquila and Priscilla are an example of what can happen through
husband and wife. Their effectiveness together speaks about their relationship
with each other. Their hospitality opened the doorway of salvation to many. The
Christian home is still one of the best tools for spreading the gospel. Do
guests find Christ in your home?
Importance of husband and wife being ALL IN for
the mission.
Strengths and Accomplishments:
·
Outstanding husband/wife team who
ministered in the early church
·
Supported themselves by tent-making while
serving Christ
·
Close friends of Paul
·
Explained to Apollos the full message of
Christ
Lessons from their lives:
·
Couples can have an effective ministry together
·
The home is a valuable tool for
evangelism
·
Every believer needs to be well educated
in the faith, whatever his or her role in the church
If you are married... Importance
of husband and wife being ALL IN for the mission of this church.
Priscilla and Aquila
- Their names always appear together. Like for you just to think about that for a moment. When you are referenced with any sort of ministry, is your spouse mentioned alongside you?
- They experienced difficult circumstances together. They were expelled from Rome, Paul said they risked their lives for him and the ministry.
- They worked together. They were tent-makers, together. But like Paul this wasn’t their identity to the world, it was simply their means of sustaining their needs so that they could go anywhere God sent them to fulfill the mission.
- They traveled with Paul and became life-long friends. The met him in Corinth, traveled with him to Ephesus and helped him start churches and carry on the mission.
- They taught others the gospel. They invested their knowledge of the gospel in Apollos.
- They learned the Scriptures together. They were Christians before the met Paul but they invited Paul into their home so that they could learn and understand more about Christ. Every believer needs to be well educated in the faith, whatever his or her role in the church,
- They used their homes for church meetings. A church met in their house in Ephesus and a church also
met in their home in Rome once they came back. The home is a valuable tool for
evangelism
A Challenge to Married Couples: Talk as a couple about Priscilla and Aquila’s remarkable
marriage, and then pray together. Ask the Lord to give you the kind of
commitment to one another that is seen in their marriage. And pray for God to
empower you to spend your remaining days as a faithful husband and wife team,
committed to God’s kingdom no matter the cost.
In an age when the focus is mostly on what happens between
husband and wife, Aquila and Priscilla are an example of what can happen through
husband and wife. Their effectiveness together speaks about their relationship
with each other. Their hospitality of opening their home as a church and for
training others in the gospel became a doorway of salvation to many. The
Christian home is still one of the best tools for spreading the gospel.
Priscilla and Aquila as husband and wife were ALL IN
for the mission of the church.
