In the Acts of the Apostles we find the record of

two distinct ministries of Paul, the one entered and accomplished while he

was a freeman, the other entered when he became a prisoner at Rome.  Acts 9

is the chapter that gives us the first commission, and Acts 20 the chapter

that prepares the way for the second commission, and while each ministry has

its own distinguishing features, they have this in common that they are

intimately associated with suffering.

'He is a chosen vessel unto Me, to bear My name before the Gentiles,

and kings, and the children of Israel: for I will shew him how great

things he must suffer for My name's sake' (Acts 9:15,16).

The reader will notice that the clause which speaks of Paul's

sufferings follows the statement concerning his commission as though it were

explanatory 'for I will show him'.

'Bonds and afflictions abide me.  But none of these things move me,

neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my

course with joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the Lord

Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God' (Acts 20:23,24).

The list of Paul's sufferings that filled up the measure of his first

ministry is enough to make the boldest tremble.  In 1 Corinthians 4, he uses

two figures that almost seem to exhaust suffering and degradation.  The 1935

revised and reset edition of the Complete Moffatt Bible translation, is very

free, but gives a vivid idea of his meaning:

'For it seems to me that God means us apostles to come

in at the very

end, like doomed gladiators in the arena!  We are made

a spectacle

(theatre) to the world, to angels and to men'! (1 Cor.

'To this hour we are treated as scum of the earth, the

very refuse of

the world!' (1 Cor. 4:13).

And yet, Paul has the glorious temerity to conclude

this list of degradation, by saying to the self -satisfied Corinthians,

'I beseech you, be ye followers of me'! (1 Cor. 4:16).

Further revelations of his sufferings during this period are made in 2

Corinthians.  Chapter 4 speaks among other things of 'bearing about in the

body the dying of the Lord Jesus' (2 Cor. 4:10).

In chapter 6, there is another list that should be read, and even after

these two chapters, there is a further one of tremendous scope, namely

chapter 11, where stripes, prisons, deaths, stoning, shipwreck, endless

perils, hunger, cold, nakedness are recorded, and beside all this, the care

of all the churches (2 Cor. 11:23 -28).

When he commenced his second ministry, it was still essentially

associated with prison and with suffering as Ephesians, 2 Timothy and Acts 20

have shown.  He knew that he had more affliction to endure as he took up this

second ministry: