August 30, 2026
• Rev. Dr. Rob Fuquay
St. Luke’s UMC
August 30, 2026
Run It Back
“Second Choices”
Acts 16:6-10
Frank Laubach was a missionary who devoted his life to education. He was next in line to become president of a seminary in the Philippines, something he thought was God’s plan for him, but he was passed over. In his disappointment he turned to missionary work with Muslims who lived in a remote region. In teaching languages, he discovered an education principle, Each One Teach One, that became a major educational tool used around the world. He became known as a pioneer of modern literacy.
When Martin Luther King Jr, finished seminary he was interviewed to be pastor of First Baptist Church in Chattanooga, a position he very much wanted. But the congregation felt he lacked the experience needed and chose someone else. King accepted his second choice, Dexter Avenue Baptist in Montgomery, AL, and shortly after arriving, Rosa Parks was arrested and local clergy asked King to lead them in responding, and the modern civil rights movement was launched.
When I was in college I got to know a girl named Martha Weathers. She had recently lost a leg in a bicycle accident. She had been a star softball player with a strong chance of getting a college scholarship. That was her dream. But then she went to the University of Kentucky, studied music, and came to know Henry Leck, the director of the Indianapolis Children’s Choir. She found a new dream to start a choir like that back in North Carolina. And that’s exactly what she did, roughly 30 years ago.
Throughout history we see abundant examples of people who did great and meaningful things in their lives but things that were not their first choice. In being prevented from having what they wanted, they embraced a second choice that brought rich fulfilment not just for themselves but others as well.
The matter before us today concerns not the elite or uniquely determined individuals, but everyone of us. For in every life we face the reality of an interrupted plan, a closed door, but not everyone perseveres. Some never get beyond the disappointment and spend the remainder of life holding onto a dream that was not meant to be. Yet if the spiritual life offers any practical help to us, it is in this very experience. Long ages ago when the people of God were carried away as prisoners of war and their hope was no more, the prophet spoke a startling message from God saying, “Behold, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?” (Isaiah 43:19)
And ever since, those who believe this truth and look for God’s new thing have found that the greatest disappointments can lead to great new adventures.
One of the best examples of this is seen in a little story in the life of the Apostle Paul.
On his second missionary journey he went through Asia Minor revisiting churches he helped started on his first journey with Barnabas. After doing that, Paul decided to keep going to regions he’d never been. He wanted to go to Bithynia. (Now I want to point out that friends who shall remain nameless make fun of my use of maps in sermons. They have petitioned Staff Parish to ask future senior pastor candidates if they use maps in sermons, and if they don’t, to please elevate them in consideration. So I’m on a quest to use as many maps as I can between now and my last sermon!)
So as you’ll see on the map(!), Bithynia was a Roman province bordering the Black Sea. It was, in fact a Senatorial Province, which meant it was not in a danger zone. There was no need military presence, so Caesar Augustus allowed senators to be the political officials over such provinces because they couldn’t have oversight of an army and possibly lead a rebellion. In other words, senators could have authority as long as there wasn’t a chance they mess anything up. I’ll just leave that there.
No wonder Paul wanted to go to Bithynia. No conflict. Strategic commercial location. Highly and diversely populated. Paul no doubt believe he would have great success there, and so his plan was to go to Bithynia, until we read that, “When they had come opposite Mysia, they attempted to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them…” (Acts 16:7) Wouldn’t you like to know how they got that message? Sometimes I wish the Bible gave more explanation. How did Paul and others perceive the Spirit of Jesus “preventing” them. Was it written in the sky? Did they hear an audible voice?
I think the Bible is purposely vague sometimes, because if too much detail were given, we would turn Paul’s experience into a template for everyone’s experience. When the reality is, God gave everyone of us a brain to use, and reason to make sense of things, and best of all a soul and spirit to interpret what we sense God saying to us. If we turn that into a pattern that looks the same for everyone then we don’t develop the ability to discern.
There’s a story about American explorer Henry Stanley. He’s the one who famously found David Livingstone in Africa and said, “Mr Livingstone, I presume.” Well
Stanley traveled with Frank Pocock following the Congo River. They went deeper into Africa than any other explorers, but the journey was getting hard and treacherous. They had a meeting one night and said, “We have to decide whether to keep going or turn around. How shall we decide?” So they flipped a coin. Heads go forward, tails turn around. It came up tails. They said, “Let’s do best of 3.” Tails again. Best of five. Tails again. It came up tails six straight times! SO they said, “Let’s draw straws. Short straw, we turn around. They drew the short straw. They finally looked at each other and said, “Enough. We both know in our gut we need to keep going, and they nodded their heads in agreement.”
They couldn’t deny what was in their gut but they relied on each other for confirmation. This is what discernment looks like. Notice that Paul didn’t just decide by himself that Jesus was preventing him. It says “the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them.” It was a group discernment experience. It most likely started with one person finally admitting, “You know, my gut is telling me this is not where God wants us to go.” And someone else says, “I’m so glad you said that, because I’ve been feeling the same.” And then the whole group reaches a decision.
The way we find the best direction is finding what is not the best direction. And the way you find that out is to go in a direction! As you go, you learn. Sometimes the greatest gift God gives us is a closed door. That never feels good, especially when it is a door we wanted. But when we give ourselves time to release that want, to give to God that dream, we come to see a closed door as a gift. Have you had any closed doors you can look back on and say, “Thank you Lord?”
As the great theologian Garth Brooks wrote:
Sometimes I thank God for unanswered prayers
Remember when you're talking to the man upstairs
That just because He doesn't answer doesn't mean He don't care
Some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers
When you release an old dream you make room for a new one, and that’s what happened for Paul. Literally. They came to Troas, a port city on the Aegean Sea. This was a significant city in Paul’s time, the tenth largest in the Roman Empire.
I got to visit Troas while working on a DVD resource for a book on Paul back in 2015. The ruins are amazing. Giant archways still in tact. Great views overlooking the sea. It was a vibrant place, But it was still not where Paul set out. It was a between place, between where you wanted to be and where you will be. Ever been to Troas? It’s a place that can make you feel stuck, or bitter, or even depressed.
But this can also be the place where dreams happen… “During the night Paul had a vision: there stood a man of Macedonia pleading with him and saying, ‘Come over to Macedonia and help us.’ When he had seen the vision, we immediately tried to cross over to Macedonia, being convinced that God had called us to proclaim the good news to them.” (Acts 16:9-10)
Now, back to our map, because I know how much you love maps. Paul was Here, in Troas, modern-day Turkey. This is the continent of Asia Minor. His vision was of someone There, in Macedonia, modern day Greece. A dream, a vision, a hope always has that element to it, going from here to there. In this case, there was Europe. When Paul carried the Gospel to Macedonia he landed in the port city of Neapolis, which today is Kavala, Greece. This is a beautiful mosaic in the town this story.
On the left Paul sees the vision of the man from Macedonia calling him. Then on the right is Paul responding to the vision and stepping onto the land of Greece. Now think of the significance of that step. Paul carried the Gospel to Europe.
Some question whether that was a good thing. They site events that happened as a result of Europe becoming Christianized: the Inquisitions, Anti-Semitism, Colonialism. Much of the slave-trade prospered because of Christian support. There are people who would look at this history and say, “I don’t know that it was such a good thing that Paul pursued his vision.”
We can’t deny this history, but to say the influence of Christianity has been a bad thing would be a denial of other histories, like Bartolome de la Casa. His father traveled with Christopher Columbus and ended up owning plantations in the West Indies. At first Batolome was fascinated with the West Indian people, but when he went and saw how he and other Spaniards were profiting on the backs of indigenous people he sold all his property and became an avid critic of colonialization and slavery the rest of his life. He participated in the first debate on the matter. Most plantation owners argued that slaves weren’t fully human and needed masters to help civilize them. He vehemently argued the opposite, that native people were fully human created in the image of God.
Where did he get such an idea? His Christian faith.
So, yes, there’s the history of what people do with Christ, but then there’s the history of what Christ does with people. And it’s the latter history always opens doors to the future.
Paul’s vision was of a man who said, “Come help us.” That’s it. That’s what gave Paul the conviction to go through this new door. And it points out that new doors often come along when we are willing to respond to a call for help; when we say, “Lord, how can I be useful to someone? How can you use me?”
Go back to the Here to There reference. Strategic planning has always operated on this simple analogy. You articulate a Preferred Future, some ideal “There.” Then you recognize where you are, “Here”. And you craft a plan to get from here to there. Typically “there” is something very appealing, a place where you really want to end up. Maybe a place where life is easier and satisfying. But the funny thing is, “There” is typically a place you never reach…completely.
One day Apple Computer came up with a There called the I-Mac. It was hugely successful but that wasn’t enough. They needed a new There and came up with the I-pod. Again, hugely successful, but not enough. A new There created the I-Phone, but not enough. They needed the I-Phone 2 and so on. Then the I-Pad, then the Apple Watch. And they are all great devices. Most of us have all of them!
But we understand that the satisfaction of “there” is a temporary thing. And subconsciously we can start to believe about our own lives that we never get there. The idea of ever getting to a place of satisfaction and joy is unrealistic. Even when we get to some There that was our dream, it’s not long before it loses its appeal. And we just conclude that There is just not to be found in this life.
But what is the difference between here and there? It’s one letter. T. And what does t look like? A cross. When we put the cross in front of here, we get there. Do you see what I’m saying? When we put redemptive living, be available to ways Christ can use us, our here will become there. Our source of satisfaction, our joy, the discovery of our hopes, can be something we find right now.
***My doors…