Paul Urged Everyone to Eat
Daily Scripture
Acts 27:33-38
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Just before daybreak, Paul urged everyone to eat. He said, “This is the fourteenth day you’ve lived in suspense, and you’ve not eaten so much as a bite. I urge you to take some food. Your health depends on it. None of you will lose a single hair from your heads.” After he said these things, he took bread, gave thanks to God in front of them all, then broke it and began to eat. Everyone was encouraged and took some food. (In all, there were two hundred seventy-six of us on the ship.) When they had eaten as much as they wanted, they lightened the ship by throwing the grain into the sea.
Daily Reflection & Prayer
Just before dawn, on a ship that had been battered by a storm for two weeks, Paul told everyone on board to eat.
It must have sounded strange. Paul was a prisoner being taken to Rome to stand trial before the emperor. For fourteen days the wind had driven the ship across the sea, and the crew had thrown cargo and gear overboard to keep it afloat. No one had seen the sun or the stars for days, and Luke, who was traveling with Paul, wrote that they had given up all hope of being saved. Most of them had barely eaten. Now a prisoner was telling them the next thing to do was have a meal.
Paul told them they needed their strength and that not one of them would lose a hair from their heads. God had sent an angel to assure him that everyone aboard would survive. Then he took bread, gave thanks to God in front of all of them, broke it, and began to eat. Paul didn’t just tell them to eat. He went first.
Prisoners, soldiers, sailors, and passengers, two hundred seventy-six people in all, watched him do it. Their courage returned, and they ate together until they were full. Nothing about the storm had changed yet, and still a shared meal, begun with thanks to God, gave them the strength to face what came next. When the ship ran aground and broke apart the next day, every person aboard reached the shore safely, just as God had promised.
Paul was showing that a shared meal can be one of the places God meets us in the middle of a storm. God had already promised to bring everyone through, and Paul’s thanks over the bread pointed all of them toward that promise. We’re called to share what we have and give thanks to God together, even before the storm is over, trusting that God is present at the table with us.
- Telling frightened people to stop and eat may have seemed strange in the middle of a storm. Why do you think a shared meal gave them the strength to keep going when nothing else had changed?
- Paul gave thanks to God out loud, in front of people who didn’t share his faith. Who in your life is going through a hard season right now, and how might sharing a meal with them this week be a way of sharing your faith?
Prayer
God, you are with us even when the storm hasn’t passed. When fear makes it hard to keep going, gather us together and give us strength for the next step. Teach me to give thanks to you out loud, even before I can see how things will turn out. Show me someone this week who needs a meal and a reminder that you are near. Amen.
GPS Insights
Mikiala Tennie
Mikiala Tennie serves as the Program Director of Student Discipleship at Resurrection Leawood.
I remembered to eat this morning!
Sometimes ADHD gets the best of me, but I remembered to prep some food for a quick meal before work, and it worked out great. And then somehow, all of a sudden, it was 3:00pm and I was updating a new to-do list with the rest of the things I needed to do before leaving the office for the day…and I was hungry.
I stared at the screen watching the cursor blink while I went back and forth in my mind about whether I should power through and just eat dinner later or take the time to stop and eat.
The cursor blinked for a lot longer than I’d like to admit before I wrote the word, “eat” at the top of my new to-do list and then filled in all the rest of the tasks that were also necessary.
What I had to remind myself is that if I took the time to eat, I’d have the energy to get more of the tasks done than if I put it off in order to pretend I was more productive.
It’s harder to make that call right now because I am in the last few months of grad school while still working full-time. So, the list of tasks is endless and the temptation to put off important things like stopping to eat is intense.
The whole reason I’m in grad school though, is to eventually become a licensed therapist—which I hope will help me become a better youth director. Between grad school and ministry, I spend a lot of my time advocating for and helping people to take time out of their busy schedules to pause and take care of their mental health. But what kind of youth director/counseling student would I be if I chose the task list over a basic yet vital human need such as pausing to eat; which ultimately gives me the strength I need to continue the work!
When Paul instructed his peers to eat in Acts chapter 27, they were in the middle of dire straits. They were busy worrying about their situation, what steps to take next, and how to keep going. But Paul told them to pause for their own good and eat so that they could be strong enough to take those next steps.
Whatever your to-do list looks like—whatever situation you are going through—please pause. Prioritize your physical and mental health for your own good. Choosing not to pause is not worth it. You approach every circumstance in your life as a stronger version of yourself when you’ve taken care of yourself. And if, by chance, you are at a moment or place in your life where your needs are met and you’ve taken care of yourself…take a moment to see who else on your path might need to pause.
Take a pause for yourself, and then pass it along.
