I am the Leaster

"To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ." (Ephesians 3:8)

Paul was in prison, and anybody could have looked at him and said, "He's wasting his life in there." But Paul knew not only who he was, he knew his purpose, and that gave him confidence. Not arrogance, but confidence that God was using him even behind bars.

Notice in Ephesians 3:1, he doesn't say, "I am a prisoner of Rome." He says, "I am the prisoner of Christ Jesus." Jesus has allowed me to be where I am. I don't fully understand it, but if He's okay with it, I'm okay with it. Then, in verse seven, he says he became a minister according to the gift of God's grace. Paul says, "I know God is using me. Even here in prison, my mission is still the same."

But watch what happens in verse eight, because this is where it gets beautiful. He calls himself "less than the least of all the saints." Did you know that in Greek, Paul could have chosen from several words for "least"? Instead, he combined words and invented one. He calls himself "the leaster." One translation even adds a footnote explaining that Paul has made up a word here. It's as if he could not get any lower, so he had to create a new word to describe how small he was.

And this wasn't the only time. In 1 Corinthians 15:9, he calls himself the least of the apostles. In 1 Timothy 1:15, he goes one step further and calls himself the chief of sinners. Notice he doesn't say he was the chief. He says he is. Perhaps he remembered holding the coats of the men who stoned Stephen. Perhaps he remembered the road to Damascus, where he was hunting down believers to lock them up, until Jesus knocked him down and said, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?" In that moment, Paul realized he hadn't just been persecuting people. He had been persecuting Jesus.

John Newton wrote the wonderful hymn "Amazing Grace". Before Christ saved him after the age of forty, he had been a slave-trader living a reckless life. He preached the gospel for decades, but he never forgot who he was. Near the end of his life, his eyesight failed, and his mind would go in and out. Sometimes, while preaching, he would pause and say, "Where was I?" and someone in the congregation would call out his last point. But toward the end of his life, he said: "I know two things: Jesus Christ is a great Savior, and I am a great sinner."

That's where real confidence comes from. Not from thinking highly of yourself, but from knowing that the grace of God reached all the way down to the leaster and still gave him a mission. In Galatians 1:10, Paul says if he were still pleasing people, he wouldn't be a servant of Christ. So let the outside voices come. Let them say you're not measuring up. All that matters is hearing from Jesus, "Well done, good and faithful servant."

Reflection: Who are you trying to please, and would Jesus call you faithful in the mission He gave you to do?

Dear Heavenly Father, thank You that Your grace reached even the leaster, the chief of sinners. Keep me humble enough to remember who I am, and confident enough to do what You have called me to do. In Jesus' Name, amen.

Adapted from: "Staying Positive in a Negative World": https://www.joshfranklin.org/media/d6xvd3t/11-staying-positive-in-a-negative-world-eph-3-1-13