God Works Even In Apparent Hopelessness

Acts 27:23: "Last night an angel of the God whose I am and whom I serve stood beside me and said, 'Do not be afraid, Paul . . . God has graciously given you the lives of all who sail with you.'"

There were 276 people on board the Alexandrian ship that sailed from Crete for Italy. The apostle Paul was on board the ship as a prisoner being sent to Caesar in Rome. Previously he had been charged by the Jewish religious leadership in Judea as being a "troublemaker and rioter . . . who desired to desecrate the temple" (Acts 24:20). Having been taken to Caesarea to stand trial before the Roman Procurators, Felix and later Festus, Paul discredited all the charges made against him except one. Paul admitted that he "worshipped the God of (the Jewish) fathers as a follower of the Way . . . having the hope in God that there will be a resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked" (Acts 24:14-15).

From Fair Havens, they set out for Phoenix on the northwest side of Crete, but a nor'easter caught them and carried them westward 14 days until the ship reached the shores of Malta, hundreds of miles away from their intended destination. The people on board had given up hope of being saved (Acts 27:20); however, God triumphed over the storm because He had a purpose for Paul: to stand before Caesar and present His precious gospel (27:24).

As a gift to Paul, God determined that He would spare the lives of everyone on board . . . God worked the miraculous in an otherwise hopeless predicament, so that His Divine purposes would be accomplished.

As Psalm 24:1 aptly states, "The earth is the LORD's, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it." God is in complete control of every situation that we may encounter, and He works all things in accordance to His will, to the praise of His glorious grace. When we begin to fathom God at this level of majestic Holiness, we will find ourselves responding not unlike the prophet, Ezekiel, in Ezekiel 1:28b: "When I saw the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the LORD, I fell face down." Our consequent response to God's glory should be awe and obedience. Paul understood this quite well, for in the Acts passage cited above, he boldly proclaimed that he was the LORD's possession and therefore he served His LORD faithfully.