I love reading detective novels and crime thrillers and often am drawn to books which have pithy or intriguing titles. The author Scott Moriani (whose hero, Ben Hope, combines all the strength and determination of a former SAS officer with the moral scruples of one who originally studied theology at Oxford) often chooses titles which draw me in: ‘The Alchemist’s Secret’, ‘The Doomsday Conspiracy’, ‘The Martyr’s Curse’ and so on. Perhaps it’s in homage to this series that I’ve entitled this post ‘The Gallio Incident.’

Titles are intended to draw us in, and once hooked, the reality may well be far more mundane than the title implies. Here, the ‘Gallio’ of the title was the Roman proconsul mentioned in Acts 18. Gallio was the younger brother of Seneca, the Stoic philosopher and tutor of the youthful Nero, and we know that he was the proconsul in the province of Achaia between 51 and 52 A.D. This gives us a definite time-frame for Paul’s missionary journeys. We know that he was in Corinth for 18 months (Acts 18:11), and therefore we have a rough starting-date for this visit of late 49 A.D. or early 50 A.D. As with so much of Luke’s narrative, we have a fixed historical point for the events he narrates; we have definite locations that can be investigated. Christianity is not an imaginary faith; it’s a faith which is rooted in history and geography because it deals with real life (and a real God!) Eugene Peterson comments that we may resent this very practical combination of faith with everyday life, but in truth, ‘the only place you have to be human is where you are right now. The only opportunity you will ever have to live by faith is in the circumstances you are provided this very day: this house you live in, this family you find yourself in, this job you have been given, the weather conditions that prevail at this moment.’ (‘Run With The Horses’, Eugene Peterson) God is always there, always present, always working in our world, whether we recognise this or not.

Gallio is important in this story because he effectively rules decisively that the disputes Paul was having with the Jews in the synagogue did not come under Roman jurisdiction. (Acts 18:14-16) In Achaia, Christianity could now presume to share such permitted status as the Jews enjoyed, and therefore, for a while at least, his ruling ‘provided a very welcome breathing-space for the church, at least in southern Greece.’ (Tom Wright) More than once in Scripture, we read how pagan rulers and officials end up doing God’s will, whether they realise it or not. God is able to use whomever He wishes to fulfil His plans and the Gallio incident, therefore, underlines for us that God is sovereign and will do whatever it takes to see His kingdom come on earth. (Which is immensely reassuring for us!)

One of the wonderful things about the book of Acts is how we are introduced to characters who clearly played an important role in the life of the early church. We may not know much about these people, but it’s fundamental to God’s story that people matter and that everyone has a role to play.

One such couple was Aquila and Priscilla, first introduced to us in Acts 18. Aquila (whose name means ‘eagle’) was born in Pontus on the southern shore of the Black Sea, but moved to Italy and from there came to Corinth because of the imperial edict banishing Christians because of the disturbances they were causing. He and his wife, Priscilla, later moved on to Ephesus with Paul, and some of the church there met in their home. (Acts 18:18, 19, 26). At some point later, they returned to Rome and are referred to fondly by Paul in that letter (Rom 16:3-4).

In Corinth, Paul stayed with this couple who shared his profession (tent-making) and we see them later teaching Apollos the ways of God (Acts 18:26) Both of them were involved in church ministry (and the fact that Priscilla is often named before her husband implies she had great influence in this work), and we see each time they are mentioned in the Bible the effect a united couple can have in Christian service.

They were clearly hospitable people, inviting people into their homes to teach and help them, and were people Paul grew to trust and love dearly. A church is blessed when it has such couples as members. The stability, faithfulness, kindness, hospitality and teaching skills of such couples helps every one of the church’s members. I have fond memories of couples like this whose warmth, acceptance, prayers and teaching have shaped my life and I pray we will be able to mentor others in the same way that Aquila and Priscilla did, to the strengthening and help of many people.

I was tired and discouraged. The church we attended had been without a pastor for some years and Garry and I were in an unofficial position of leadership, but there seemed to be little enthusiasm for God and much internal wrangling among the congregation. Burdens seemed heavy on my shoulders and I remember feeling the weight of helplessness and inadequacy (something that could be said to be my besetting sin) which left me overwhelmed. I sat before God one morning and felt that I just wanted to run away and give up. I’d reached the end of myself.

I did what I usually do on such occasions: listened to music to fix my mind and heart on God. I can’t remember why I chose that particular CD (‘Worship’) by Michael W. Smith on that occasion or that I expected anything in particular. But the first track contained the song ‘Forever’ by Chris Tomlin and as I listened to the proclamation of God’s faithfulness, strength and presence, life and hope began to seep back into my soul.

Then I came to the third verse: ‘From the rising to the setting sun, His love endures forever/ By the grace of God we will carry on/ His love endures forever’ and God’s word came to me afresh. How would I carry on in this position, when I felt as though I just wanted to give up? By the grace of God. Somehow, as I listened, God breathed new life and hope into me. ‘Keep going. Don’t give up. You can do it. Not by yourself, but because of my grace. By the grace of God we will carry on.’

Sometimes we all need that personal word of encouragement from God. Paul received it when he wasn’t sure where to go, in a vision of a man from Macedonia (Acts 16:9). He received it in Corinth. “Do not be afraid; keep on speaking, do not be silent. For I am with you, and no one is going to attack and harm you, because I have many people in this city.” (Acts 18:9-10) Even the apostle Paul needed encouragement – the opposition and constant persecution left him ‘in weakness, with fear and trembling’ (1 Cor 2:3). We may think he was impervious to criticism and physical abuse, but he tells the Corinthians later on, ‘we were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself.’ (2 Cor 1:8)

God knows what we need, and He is well able to provide the encouragement and help we need. Time and time again, Paul received that word of encouragement, that word which specifically strengthened him and enabled him to continue in his service for God. We too can know the same encouragement, the same personal word which lifts us up and carries us forward. Tom Wright says, ‘you tend to get the guidance you need when you need it, not before, and not in too much detail’, but what counts is that the guidance and encouragement do come!

Many have commented that Paul’s letters to the Corinthians show him at his most human: a man just like us, not an invincible super-apostle like some claimed to be (2 Cor 11:5), but an ordinary man who knew exhaustion, disappointment and despair just as we do and yet who came to see that it was when he was weak that God was strong. (2 Cor 12:9) In his first letter to the Corinthians, he spoke of the topsy-turvy nature of the gospel where God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength (1 Cor 1:18-25); he also spoke of coming to them (as described in Acts 18:1-17) ‘in weakness with great fear and trembling’ (1 Cor 2:3)

In the letters he later wrote to the Corinthians, we see behind the scenes, as it were, into Paul’s heart and into the demands of his daily life. He speaks of ‘troubles, hardships and distresses… beatings, imprisonments and riots… hard work, sleepless nights and hunger’ (2 Cor 6:4-5); he talks of the pressure he was under ‘so that we despaired of life itself’ (2 Cor 1:8) and of ‘deadly peril’ (2 Cor 1:10). It’s in these letters that we get the details of the persecutions he faced (2 Cor 11:24-29) and of the heartache he felt at times when disciplining those in the church, since he loved them as a father. (1 Cor 4:15) We certainly cannot ever get the impression that Paul was aloof and remote from the churches he founded; what pulses through every letter is the passionate care and jealous love he had for them. (2 Cor 11:1-2)

Yet the overall impression we get of Paul is not one of despondency and despair but of a man whose faith was in a God far stronger and wiser than he could ever hope to be. He spoke of God’s compassion and comfort which meant he had these to pass on to others in times of need (2 Cor 1:3-7) and how ‘we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.’ (2 Cor 4:7) Paul captures something of the tension we face on a daily basis when he wrote, ‘We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.’ (2 Cor 4:8-9) The Christian life is not about ignoring life’s difficulties or pretending they don’t exist. It’s about acknowledging them and seeing life from an eternal perspective. (2 Cor 4:16-18) When we are secure in God’s strength, we can deal with our weaknesses so much more effectively. When we realise that His weakness is stronger than our strength, we don’t have to be crushed, in despair or destroyed; we are never forsaken or abandoned and therefore hope pulls us onwards and upwards!

I apologise for the length of this testimony, but I hope you will bear with me and read to the end, for it’s a story of how God cares for each one of us personally and can act in the most miraculous of ways to help His children.

When my father died (officially on 12 April 2020, but in reality on 11 April 2020, Easter Saturday) in shocking circumstances (a fall down the stairs at his home fracturing his neck and abruptly ending his life), I was worried about selling his house. We may hail property as a financial investment and blessing, but to me, acquiring that house meant a financial albatross was hung around my neck. It had an equity mortgage on it – and only the sale of the house could release me from that debt.

To compound the problem (pun intended), this mortgage did not have a fixed amount to repay, but a daily rate of interest at exorbitant amounts meant it felt like the house, far from being an asset, was actually a liability – a ticking time bomb of debt waiting to explode into the faces of the unwary (and I was definitely the unwary when it came to selling houses!) To be sure, the mortgage value was at that point below the estimated value of the house, but this particular house would never sell for the valued amount. Years of neglect and decay would ensure that. The kitchen cupboards were hanging off the wall. There was no floor covering whatsoever in the kitchen; all the carpets in the house were at least thirty years old. Decay, mould and neglect were apparent everywhere, each factor reducing the value like the persistent, annoying drip-drip-drip from a leaking tap. Both gardens were more like wild jungles than gardens, forests which needed hacking down. It felt hopeless.

Panic filled my soul. We were living at the start of a global pandemic, three weeks into a nationwide lockdown, the likes of which I had never witnessed in my lifetime (nor had anyone else!) The country was in a state of high anxiety, with individual households forbidden from meeting other family members. The majority of people were working from home or on furlough unless they were ‘key workers.’ The police regularly parked on Doncaster Road in Ardsley by the church, stopping people in cars and asking where they were going and why. Town centres had benches plastered with crime scene tape to stop residents from sitting down while shopping. Normal life as I knew it had effectively been criminalised. No matter what protective justification the government gave for these measures, I felt the notion of selling a dilapidated, neglected, mould-filled, plaster-crumbling house was as probable as me landing a vehicle on the moon.

Having worked through the shock of my father’s sudden death, the swiftness of the post-mortem revealing a fractured neck as the cause of death (and uncovering a hitherto unsuspected cancerous tumour on his liver), the onerous tasks of notification of death at a time when no one was in an office to answer telephone calls or emails, having braved the apocalyptic town centre of Barnsley where tannoys blared out messages urging us all to go home and police prowled the centre questioning all who dared to be outside, the news which finally came about the mortgage stripped me of any hope or optimism I may have felt. How on earth could I sell this house and clear this debt in lockdown? It felt like the last straw, the knock-out blow.

I remember sitting before God in desperation, tears falling as I surveyed the mountain of jobs to do, feeling utterly inadequate for this task. Was this to be my legacy, seeing the numbers rising daily on a mortgage statement, sitting on this ticking time-bomb, knowing that within twelve months, I had to have sold the house? It wasn’t that I personally wanted anything from the house; I’d never seen it as my inheritance or my right. It was my parents’ house, to do with as they saw fit, but I wept that day from helplessness and grief that my father had felt compelled to hand over the house to a rapacious company for a pittance he needed to survive and that I was now left with the mess of sorting this out.

Into that storm of self-pity, God spoke kindly but bluntly. I talked about trusting Him, didn’t I? So was I going to trust Him?

I lifted my tear-stained face and mumbled uncomfortably that yes, I trusted Him.

“So what’s all the fuss about?” came back the answer.

I was a little surprised by the tone. It felt like I’d been slapped around the face to stop my hysteria. I marshalled my arguments: lockdown, the economic climate crumbling as a result of lockdown; who would ever want to buy a house that was falling to pieces? And even if they did, when? Didn’t God realise the clock was already ticking?

“Do you trust me?”

The question kept coming to the core of the matter. God is never fooled by the fluff. He always puts His finger right on the spot, right on the main issue, cutting away all the fripperies.

Again, I mumbled that of course I trusted Him.

“So what’s the problem? Are you really saying I can’t sort out the sale of a house for you?”

I sat, biting my lip. There is never any point being glib with God. I could trot out easy answers and quote Bible verses with the best of them. But at the heart of the panic gripping my soul was a fear that this problem was too big for God. Which was, clearly, rationally, if I stopped to think about it, stupid. Absurd. God has dealt with things far bigger than the sale of a run-down three-bedroomed semi-detached house. He who parted the Red Sea and rescued millions from Egypt’s murderous intents was hardly going to be fazed by one house, even in lockdown, was He?

“Um… I suppose You can do that.”

“So what’s the problem? Why are you sobbing like a hysterical child?”

Again, there is no point fudging the issue with God. I couldn’t play the grief card (‘I’ve just lost my father – cut me some slack!’) when the only father I truly needed was there with me, right then. I couldn’t really play the helpless-damsel-in-distress card, because my knight in shining armour was there with me, right then. I wanted to object to God’s calm reasoning tone, but I knew I couldn’t. He was right to ask these questions.

“I suppose… I know You can sort it, Lord, but…”

“But I won’t? Is that it? I have the power to do something to help you, but in my cruel, inflexible way, I’ll just leave you to flounder and drown? Is that it?” There was both playful amusement and tough steel in the questions now.

“Um… no. I know You can sort it.”

“O.K. So leave me to sort it and stop this ridiculous snivelling.”

I took a deep breath, stopped crying, stopped snivelling and decided I’d better start trusting instead.

That encounter took place on 21^st April. The next day, we called again at my Dad’s house for the next round of clearing. Black sacks of rubbish were being collected at an alarming rate. We had nowhere to take them as all the dumpit sites were closed, but still we sorted and sifted. We had a pile on and under the dining-room table of stuff to take to charity shops whenever they would eventually re-open. It felt like I was playing a game of moving items from one room to another, but still it had to be done.

As always, there was a mountain of mail to sift as we arrived (at least Royal Mail were still working, for which we thanked God!) In the pile was a handwritten envelope, clearly a sympathy card. From a neighbour, I assumed. I’d been phoning people to let them know the news.

I opened the card. “We’re so sorry for your loss”, it proclaimed. But then, my eyes widened. The card did indeed express condolences for our loss, but it was from the owner of the house next door and it said, “If you are thinking of selling the property we would like to have the opportunity to have a chat before it goes on the market, with a view to making an offer as it stands.”

This was one of those jaw-dropping moments of life when God does something so stunning that you can’t quite believe your eyes. I had long decided that the only person mad enough to buy the house would be a builder. I had even contacted the only builder I knew to ask if he was interested in buying the house, but he had said no. I hadn’t even known that the neighbours next door were only tenants and that the house was owned by a builder. I didn’t know any more builders. But God did.

I showed the card to my husband, all thoughts of clearing rubbish gone. I phoned my son to tell him the unexpected development. I phoned the builder and said that yes, we were interested. I plucked a figure out of the ether, enough to cover the mortgage even if the sale took months and enough to leave us just a small legacy. That was exactly the figure he’d been considering, he said, since the house would need a lot of work doing on it. We arranged to meet the following week so he could see the house before making a firm decision.

I sat on the sofa, hardly daring to believe what I’d just heard. Could it really be that easy? Could God sort it out all with one phone call? Could a house be sold in lockdown without estate agents and valuers, when at this moment technically I didn’t own it as I still had probate to sort? Could God really do the impossible?!

I could almost feel God’s wry smile. “Do you trust me now?” He was asking. “Is there anything too hard for me?”

And so it was to be. We had time to wait. We had a bizarre graveside funeral still to attend… countless forms to fill in… probate to sort… a solicitor to engage. Lockdown rules eventually eased slightly. We filled a skip with rubbish, made countless trips to the dumpit site and charity shops, obtained an EHC certificate that was needed to sell a property, gained probate to have the right to sell. And on 1 September 2020, twenty weeks after my father’s death, the keys were handed over to the builder and the sale of my childhood home went through.

Can you sell a house in almost impossible circumstances? You certainly can if God steps in! The God who made the universe cares about each one of His children. He knows what’s best for us. He is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine.

God is there for each one of us – not only as a hypothetical figure who might vaguely do something, but as One who loves us tenderly, provides for us lavishly and is involved in the nitty-gritty of life. He does for us what no one else could possibly do. As the saying goes, ‘God specialises in impossible situations.’ And when you’re on the receiving end of that care, you know that you simply can’t lose.

We had two birthdays to celebrate in advance tonight, looking ahead to September!