Do you have an advocate? From time to time I am asked to write letters of recommendation. I have been blessed by so many of God’s people who spoke a good word on my behalf. My mentor Larry Nixon advocated for me at the second and third churches we served. I am convinced that God used his conversation to open the door for me to go to New Hope where God gave us a fruitful ministry.
As Priscilla and Aquila encouraged and taught Apollos, he decided he wanted to go and minister in the place that they and Paul had left behind: Achaia, where Corinth was located. So they wrote a letter of recommendation, vouching for him. Priscilla and Aquila’s recommendation meant everything in that community. The people in Corinth could trust Apollos because they trusted their former leaders.
Apollos had a gift. He offered great help to those who by grace had believed. He vigorously refuted the Jewish opponents in public debate. What was their dispute? The Jewish leaders there did not believe Jesus was the Messiah. Apollos knew Jesus and knew he was the Christ, so he confirmed it powerfully. In everything he did, he stood on the shoulders of Priscilla and Aquila’s ministry there.
Later, Paul wrote to the church in Corinth. We sense there may have been some competition between him and Apollos in the minds of the people. He asked poignantly, “Do I need letters of recommendation to you or from you? You yourselves are my letter written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts” (2 Corinthians 3:1-4). Paul reminded his friends there that he planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase.
We are all standing on somebody’s shoulders in the work we do. I am blessed to continue what good and godly men and women started at Tallowood. By God’s grace, I still care deeply about all the churches I have served, but they were never mine. No matter how long we serve, the church and the ministries never belong to us. They belong to God. And we pray that we will be faithful and fruitful for the season we have.
