Duet 26 and 28-end
and Acts 15 and 16
The Deut passage is amazing. God calls the people to offer a basket of first fruit as an offering to God, but then in the third year they are to offer this basket to the poor, fatherless and the alien so that they may be satisfied in their towns. enough said what a wonderful vision from a wonderful God.
The Acts passage is perhaps the most exciting. I imagine the jailer ready to kill himself as he would have been very badly treated and then killed if the prisoners had all escaped. There in his moment of darkness and dispair Paul calls out ' we are here'. I know if I were a prisoner I would have taken the earthquake to be Gods sign for me to escape.
Perhaps here I get the sharp realisation that Pauls life was about sharing the gospel now not about survival or anything else. he was an intelligent man and knew that by his escape the jailer would be killed and that was not the reputation Paul wanted to give others. His life was a sacrife. Toil and labour worthy of knowing that he can stand before God with a clear conscience.