It was important for Paul to take some time to work, making tents with Priscilla and Aquila. After having traveled through Macedonia, then down to Athens, and now over to Achaia to the city of Corinth, he was by himself, and I surmise that he had run out of money. He needed a way to eat. He needed a way to find shelter, but his resources had run low.
In that case, it made sense for him to stop evangelizing, stop preaching and teaching as his full-time work. He needed to resupply himself, so he started working alongside of Priscilla and Aquila.
After this, Paul left Athens and went to Corinth. There he met a Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had ordered all Jews to leave Rome. Paul went to see them, and because he was a tentmaker as they were, he stayed and worked with them. Every Sabbath he reasoned in the synagogue, trying to persuade Jews and Greeks.
When Silas and Timothy came from Macedonia, Paul devoted himself exclusively to preaching, testifying to the Jews that Jesus was the Messiah.
Acts 18:1-5
Yet God used this time as well. Paul stayed with them and worked with them and this time became very fruitful. We see Priscilla and Aquila go on to be instrumental in the start of the church in Ephesus, and then they are mentioned later in Paul’s letter to the Romans, so they had later returned to Rome, where they were from originally, to be part of starting and the church there as well. Beyond this, they also taught and discipled Apollos, who would himself end up back in Corinth to continue to teach the same people where Paul had met Priscilla and Aquila.
Even while Paul was making tents, he would still go to the synagogue on the Sabbath. He was still teaching and preaching. He was still doing the work of the Lord.
But the point that I want to make here is that there came a time when Silas and Timothy arrived to find Paul there in Corinth. They had followed his footsteps from Macedonia down to Athens and then over to Corinth, finally reaching him there. But when they arrived, what did Paul do? He returned back to preaching and teaching full time.
Why was he able to do that? While it doesn’t say it here specifically in Acts 18, Silas and Timothy had brought an offering from the Macedonian churches, probably specifically from Philippi. Paul makes reference to this offering in both his letter to the Philippians as well as his later letter back to the Corinthians:
Moreover, as you Philippians know, in the early days of your acquaintance with the gospel, when I set out from Macedonia, not one church shared with me in the matter of giving and receiving, except you only; for even when I was in Thessalonica, you sent me aid more than once when I was in need.
Philippians 4:15-16
And when I was with you and needed something, I was not a burden to anyone, for the brothers who came from Macedonia supplied what I needed. I have kept myself from being a burden to you in any way, and will continue to do so.
2 Corinthians 11:9
So there came a time at which Paul stopped making tents. He was able to do that because of the financial support that he received from the church in Philippi. And when he did receive that support, he stopped making tents and returned back to doing that which God had called him to do full-time.
Paul did what he needed to do for the time that he needed to do it, but he also knew the calling that he had received from the Lord, that the Holy Spirit had called him into service for a specific work to be the Apostle to the Gentiles. He would take the word of God across present-day Lebanon, Turkey, North Macedonia, and Greece, and his work would result in many others coming to know the Lord because his teaching would be repeated and spread into several other locations. He needed to do the work full-time, not holding to a notion that he must continue to make tents to support himself, but instead using the resources provided by the Lord, from the harvest field, for the work of continuing to see the kingdom of God continue to spread amongst those who had not yet heard.