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| Volume 27 Number 10 October 2025 |
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| Volume 27 Number 10 October 2025 |
Page 9 |
A Glimpse of God’s
Providence and Wisdom
Wayne A. Dixon
God’s providence is at work in our lives, and His providence has been operative since Creation. We marvel at God’s wisdom and are thrilled to read of it in His Word.
Such an example is found in Acts 18 and in the beginning of Acts 19. In Acts 18:1–3 we read of the apostle Paul coming in contact with a Christian husband and wife in Corinth. “After these things Paul departed from Athens and went to Corinth. And he found a certain Jew named Aquila, born in Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla (because Claudius had commanded all the Jews to depart from Rome); and he came to them. So, because he was of the same trade, he stayed with them and worked; for by occupation they were tentmakers” (NKJV).
Likely the providence of God placed Aquila and Priscilla so that they would be “found” (v.2) by Paul. Being Christians, as well as being of the same trade (“tentmakers”), they obviously had much in common.
At this time, Silas and Timothy came from Macedonia as Paul had previously requested (Acts 17:15). Paul continued to preach, and what a daunting task that must have been in the sensual setting of Corinth. His frustration surfaced as “…he shook his garments and said… I will go unto the Gentiles” (Acts 18:6), which was God’s commission to him (Acts 13:46; Romans 1:16).
Fear gripped Paul, and the Lord reminded him that He was with him. “Now the Lord spoke to Paul in the night by a vision, ’Do not be afraid, but speak, and do not keep silent; for I am with you, and no one will attack you to hurt you; for I have many people in this city’” (Acts 18:9–10). Therefore, Paul continued to teach and preach in Corinth for about eighteen months (Acts 18:11, 18).
Now, note God’s hand in having Paul take Priscilla and Aquila with him as they traversed the Aegean Sea together to Ephesus. By God’s providence, Apollos also was in Ephesus at that time.
Paul left Aquila and Priscilla in Ephesus (Acts 18:19), and likely, it was for them to hear Apollos preaching in the synagogue. “So he began to speak boldly in the synagogue. When Aquila and Priscilla heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately” (Acts 18:26).
God’s wisdom is apparent as we note how abruptly Luke stopped his record of Paul’s third missionary journey, which he had begun at Acts 18:23. After only one verse of the narrative of this journey, the Holy Spirit guided Luke to give us the conversion of Apollos at the hands of Priscilla and Aquila. Luke later continued Paul’s journey at Acts 19:1. Why? Why did Luke abruptly stop his record of this third journey after Acts 18:23 and give us the conversion of Apollos from John’s baptism to Christianity? It likely was for us to read and learn thereby (Romans 10:17) from back-to-back conversions to Christianity from the baptism of John, one of which did not require re-immersion and the next which did require re-immersion. Certainly, this is a glimpse of God’s wisdom.
In the case of Apollos, “though he knew only the baptism of John” (Acts 18:25), he was not re-baptized, evidently because he received John’s baptism while it was still in effect.
However, re-baptism was required in the next of these back-to-back examples regarding John’s baptism. Paul… “finding some disciples,” (Acts 19:1) taught them so that they understood the necessity for being re-baptized after previously having been baptized with John’s baptism. How is this? It is obvious from the text that these disciples (“about twelve” Acts 19:7) had received John’s baptism after Pentecost, at which time John’s baptism was no longer in effect.
We use back-to-back examples in our lives frequently. For example, if we were in the market for a new television, isn’t it common for us to visit a big-box store and view different makes side-by-side (i.e., back-to-back)? That practice allows us to learn from our observation.
It appears that is exactly what God did with those two back-to-back examples. Studying (2 Timothy 2:15) these two examples given to us by God teaches us, among other things, that John’s baptism was in effect for a while but did indeed have an expiration date, which was Pentecost. We thank God for the examples in His inspired Word (2 Timothy 3:16–17).
