What Are You Persuaded By?

In Acts 27 the apostle Paul begins his journey to Rome.  Since this was around 60 A.D. the option of air travel was not available, nor could he take a train.  So, Paul boarded a ship.  However, the sailing was not very good and things turned dangerous.  Paul said, “Men I perceive that this voyage will end with disaster and the much loss, not only of the cargo and ship, but also our lives.”  Nevertheless, the centurion was more persuaded by the helmsman and the owner of the ship than by the things spoken by Paul.  (Acts 27:10-11) 

As it turned out Paul was right and the helmsman and owner of the ship were wrong.  Though the crew did not lose their lives, the ship and cargo were ultimately destroyed.  As I read this today, I focused in on verse 11 with the thought, “What am I persuaded by?”  In this event we have Paul, who represents the word of God, against the word of man.  The centurion chose the word of man over the word of the godly man, Paul.  We face these kinds of situations frequently in our lives don’t we?  There are often times when we find ourselves with two different paths to take, one which is outlined by the word of God or the direct leading of God, and another which is defined by the advice and counsel of man, sometimes even the advice of good people.

However, we’ve all experienced this truth:  “Good people can still give bad advice”.  So, let’s not make the same mistake as the centurion did here.  Let’s be persuaded by the word of God and the godly counsel of wise people.  If we do that, we won’t make a shipwreck of our lives.