20:25
Paul knew that he would never see the disciples in Ephesus again. We see that he preached the kingdom. Sometimes people get hung up on “preaching the kingdom”, “preaching salvation”, “preaching the gospel”. The truth is that all these are interlinked and part of the same whole. Sometimes people will use “preaching the kingdom” as a pretext for missing out various essential parts of the gospel! In the Bible there is no conflict between the kingdom and salvation. Nor is there any conflict between the importance of the individual and the corporate importance. Take a look at the Old Testament, what do we see? We see God working with the nation of Israel, and clearly the corporate nature of God’s plans, and His working with the nation is an essential part of what God is doing. But what do we also see? Indeed, what do we see in how God works to bring about this plan? He works in the lives of individuals, there are enormous chunks of the Old Testament devoted to God’s working in the lives of individuals. This is mostly in the lives of leaders like Abraham, Jacob, Moses, David etc, but also in the lives of “lesser” figures (in the world’s eyes) like Ruth.
20:26,27
See what a serious matter the preaching of the gospel was to Paul. “I am innocent of the blood on any of you”. The gospel is a matter of life or death. Paul declared the whole will of God. He did not focus on one aspect of God’s will at the expense of another aspect, but gave a complete picture of the gospel. So often today people will focus on one part of the gospel only. This is a serious error whether that one aspect be good in itself. So if someone focuses on caring for the poor, reaching the powerful, prosperity, family or whatever, if it is overemphasised it leads to imbalance and error.
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