Mark Twain famously wrote, “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men [sic] and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” 

As we continue to follow Paul’s journey in our sermon series on the Acts of the Apostles, it is impossible not to notice just how much Paul travels. There seems to be no where he won’t go. While the stories told in Acts are not often explicit about it, we can’t help but surmise that Paul is changed by the traveling he undertakes. 

At the very least, the story in Acts chapter 18 presents Paul fighting against “prejudice and narrow-mindedness.” Here we see Paul and friends — and by extension, the early church and, as much as we may so assert, God — once again rejecting the notion that the gospel of Jesus, the Liberating King, belongs solely locked to one particular cultural expression of faith. 

What have we learned from our travels — both physical and metaphorical?

In what ways are we failing to live the message of Acts today?

How might we remove those blindspots from our life of faith — both as individuals and as a congregation?