paulisttalk.org

Although Paul alludes to his livelihood in only a few places, tent-making was not a bad occupation for doing exactly what Paul was so good at doing—for reaching out to other people, particularly those different from himself.

Ancient society was often structured around occupations, with those who had similar skills or employment gathering together in certain parts of cities, to form an instant bazaar and to exchange information about their trade, business, politics, society and even larger questions.

As a result, Paul could come into a strange city with a pre-arranged setup for meeting people, getting introduced, understanding the layout of the town, and informally talking with others who were working in leather goods, and, of course, with customers.  Paul could build bridges. From this vantage point, Paul could raise questions for others to consider.
If they were Jews, Paul could probe with them the meaning of numerous Old Testament scriptural passages which the early Christians saw as pointing to Jesus; in this way, Paul’s Jewish audience would be able to learn at least the outline of Jesus’ life and death, and receive as well an invitation to explore the implications of Jesus’ resurrection.  From the local Jews, too, Paul could arrange a visit to the local synagogue meeting.

If his co-workers were Gentiles, then they were Paul’s specialty, because Paul could appeal to them with a dynamic new community in which all were equals—quite a shift from those highly regimented and hierarchically organized ancient societies—and in which community, prayer, ritual sacraments and future hopes offered far more than either general pagan religion or the various mystery cults circulating at that time.

In this year of Paul, then, we have an example of how our various callings in life give us access to others in a way to serve them by possibly opening them to the deeper questions of life, and opening them to opportunity for faith.

Not many of us are tent-makers, but all of us interact with others who live with various levels of seeking, whether for a positive word, or a way to get through a struggle, or a chance to think about getting active in faith again—or whether it’s an opening to faith, to Jesus, for the first time.  Maybe we don’t think of ourselves as aggressive as we sometimes make Paul out to be; but maybe all of us can think of how opportunities from our various daily tasks provide a chance to care for others and advance the Kingdom.  We can all build bridges.