Key: Focus
FOCUS upon one specific people group
Stephanas and his team decided it would be wiser to reach out to one specific unreached people group. The gospel will spread with the least barriers within a people group with common background and affinity to one another.[1]
If there were other receptive people groups in the area with different languages and cultures, they would try to organize more teams. [2]
The aim was a “people movement to Christ.” Rather than just reaching a few isolated people, their expectation was for the Gospel to spread through households,[3] communities and eventually the whole people group. They would not pull individual people out of their circle of influence to bring them into a foreign group.
Stephanas believed it was important to seek a responsive segment of the people group, who were content with their own culture. As outsiders, the team might attract people eager merely for cultural change and material gain.[4]
The team watched to see where God was already at work among the people. They prayed that God would open their eyes to see where His harvest was ripe, and that He would lead them to those who were spiritually hungry.[5] [6]
[1] Acts 10:23-24 Peter goes cross-culturally to Cornelius as well as Cornelius’ relatives and friends.
[2] Normally, we need a separate church planting penetration for each unreached people. A modern analogy: In the USA, the state of Minnesota is referred to as the “Land of 10,000 Lakes”. If you go to Minnesota and throw a stone into one of the lakes, ripples spread out from where the stone hit. How far will those ripples go? Through all 10,000 lakes? No, they will spread to the shore of the lake that the stone was cast into – and no further. To get ripples going in every lake, you would need a separate stone for each lake.
[3] The Greek word for “household” is “oikos.” In the Graeco-Roman culture “oikos” described not only the immediate family in the home, but included friends, servants, servants’ families, and even business associates. The Apostle Paul expected more than the Jailer to be saved when he said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you shall be saved, you and your household.” Acts 16:31
[4] Acts 10:1-2; Acts 8:18-23
[5] John 4:35
[6] Luke 10:6 Jesus told the workers He send out two by two, to look for “a man of peace.”