Verses 1-40
Chapter 16
16:1-5 Paul arrived at
Derbe and Lystra and, look you, there was a disciple there called
Timothy. He was the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer, but his
father was Greek. The brethren in Lystra and Iconium were witnesses to
his worth. Paul wished him to go out with him and he took him and
circumcised him because of the Jews who were in these places, for they
all knew that his father was Greek. As they made their way through the
cities they handed over to them the decisions which had been arrived at
by the apostles and elders in Jerusalem, that they should observe them.
The churches were strengthened in the faith and increased in number
every day.
It was five years since Paul had preached in Derbe and Lystra
but when he returned his heart must have been gladdened for there had
emerged a young man who was to be very dear to him. It was only natural
that Paul should be looking for someone to take Mark's place. He was
always well aware of the necessity of training a new generation for the
work that lay ahead. He found just the kind of man he wanted in young
Timothy. On the face of it, it is something of a problem that Paul
circumcised Timothy for he had just won a battle in which circumcision
had been declared unnecessary. The reason was that Timothy was a Jew and
Paul had never said that circumcision was not necessary for Jews. It
was the Gentiles who were freed from the ceremonies of the Jewish way of
life.
In fact by accepting Timothy as a Jew, Paul showed just how
emancipated he was from Jewish thought. Timothy was the son of a mixed
marriage. The strict Jew would refuse to accept that as a marriage at
all; in fact, if a Jewish girl married a Gentile boy or a Jewish boy
married a Gentile girl, he would regard that Jewish boy or girl as dead.
So much so, that sometimes a funeral was actually carried out. By
accepting the child of such a marriage as a brother Jew, Paul showed how
definitely he had broken down all national barriers.
Timothy was a lad with a great heritage. He had had a good mother and a good grandmother (2 Timothy 1:5). Often in the days to come he was to be Paul's messenger (1 Corinthians 4:17; 1 Thessalonians 3:2-6). He was at Rome with Paul when the apostle was in prison (Philippians 1:1; Philippians 2:19; Colossians 1:1; Philemon 1:1 ). Timothy was in a very special relationship to Paul. When Paul wrote to the Corinthians (1 Corinthians 4:17)
he called him his beloved son. When he wrote to the Philippians he said
that there was no one whose mind was so much at one with his own (Philippians 2:19-20).
It seems very likely that Paul saw in Timothy his successor when he had
to lay down his work. Happy indeed is the man to whom it is given to
see the result of his training in one who can take up the burden when he
lays it down.
16:6-10 They went
through the Phrygian and Galatian territory, but they were prevented by
the Holy Spirit from speaking the word in Asia. When they had gone
through Mysia they tried to go into Bithynia.; and the Spirit of Jesus
did not allow them to do so. So they passed by Mysia and came down to
Troas. During the night a vision appeared to Paul. A man from Macedonia
stood and urged him, "Cross over into Macedonia and help us." When he
saw the vision he immediately sought to go forth into Macedonia for we
reckoned that God had called us to tell the good news to them.
For a time all doors seemed shut to Paul. It must have seemed
strange to him that he was barred from the Roman province of Asia by the
Holy Spirit; it contained Ephesus and all the recipients of the letters
to the seven churches in the book of the Revelation. Bithynia, too, was
shut to him. How did the Holy Spirit send his message to Paul? It may
have been by the word of a prophet; it may have been by a vision; it may
have been by some inner and inescapable conviction. But there is the
possibility that what kept Paul from journeying into these provinces was
ill-health, the consequence of that thorn in his flesh.
What makes that quite likely is that in Acts 16:10,
suddenly and without warning, there emerges a "we" passage. The story
begins to be told not in the third person but in the first person. That
tells us that Luke was there, an eye-witness and a companion of Paul.
Why should he so suddenly emerge on the scene? Luke was a doctor. What
is more likely than that he met Paul then because Paul needed his
professional services, having fallen ill and so being barred from making
the journeys he would like to make? If this is so, it is suggestive to
reflect that Paul took even his weakness and his pain as a messenger
from God.
It was the sight of a man from Macedonia which finally gave Paul
his guidance. Who was this man Paul saw in the vision? Some think it
was Luke himself, for Luke may have been a Macedonian. Some think the
question should not be asked since dreams need no explanations like
that. But there is a most attractive theory. There was one man who had
succeeded in conquering the world. That was Alexander the Great. Now it
would seem that the whole situation was designed to make Paul remember
Alexander. The full name of Troas was Alexandrian Troas after Alexander.
Just across the sea was Philippi, called after Alexander's father.
Farther on was Thessalonica called after Alexander's half-sister. The
district was permeated with memories of Alexander; and Alexander was the
man who had said that his aim was "to marry the east to the west" and
so make one world. It may well be that there came to Paul the vision of
Alexander, the man who had conquered the world, and that this vision
gave Paul a new impulse towards making one world for Christ.
16:11-15 When we had
set sail from Troas we had a straight run to Samothrace. On the next day
we reached Neapolis and from there we came to Philippi which is the
chief city of that section of Macedonia and a Roman colony. We spent
some days in this city. On the Sabbath day we went outside the gates
along the riverside where we believed there was a place of prayer. We
sat down and were talking with the women who met together there. A woman
whose name was Lydia, who was a purple seller from the city of
Thyatira, who reverenced God, listened to us. God opened her heart so
that she gave heed to the things said by Paul. When she and her
household had been baptized she urged us, "If you judge me to be
faithful to the Lord, come into my house and stay there." And she
pressed us to do so.
Neapolis--the modern Kavalla was the seaport of Philippi.
Philippi had a long history. Once it had been called Crenides which
means "The Springs." But Philip of Macedon, the father of Alexander, had
fortified it as a barrier against the Thracians and had given it his
own name. At one time it had possessed famous gold mines, but by Paul's
time these were worked out. Later it had been the scene of one of the
most famous battles in the world, when Augustus won for himself the
Roman Empire.
Philippi was a Roman colony. Roman colonies were usually
strategic centres. In them Rome planted little groups of army veterans
who had completed their military service. They wore the Roman dress,
spoke the Roman language and used the Roman laws no matter where they
were. Nowhere was there greater pride in Roman citizenship than in these
outposts of Rome.
In Philippi there was no synagogue from which to start. But
where the Jews were unable to have a synagogue they had a place of
prayer and these places of prayer were usually by the riverside. On the
Sabbath Paul and his friends took their way there and talked with the
women who met in that place.
The extraordinary thing about Paul's work in Philippi is the
amazing cross-section of the population that was won for Christ. Lydia
came from the very top end of the social scale; she was a purple
merchant. The purple dye had to be gathered drop by drop from a certain
shell-fish and was so costly that to dye a pound of wool with it would
take the equivalent of 150 British pounds. Lydia, wealthy woman and
merchant prince that she was, was won for Christ.
Her immediate reaction was to offer the hospitality of her house
to Paul and his friends. When Paul is describing the Christian
character he says that the Christian should be "given to hospitality" (Romans 12:13). When Peter is urging Christian duty upon his converts he tells them, "Practise hospitality ungrudgingly to one another" (1 Peter 4:9). A Christian home is one with an ever-open door.
16:16-24 When we were
on our way to the place of prayer.. it happened that a certain
slave-girl who had a spirit which made her able to give oracles met us.
By her soothsaying she provided much gain for her owners. As she
followed Paul and us she kept shouting, "These men are the slaves of the
most high God and they are proclaiming the way of salvation to you."
She kept doing this for many days. Paul was vexed at this and he turned
and said to the spirit, "In the name of Jesus Christ I order you to come
out of her." And it came out that very hour.
When her owners saw
that their hope of gain was gone they laid hands on Paul and Silas and
dragged them to the city square to the magistrates. So they brought them
to the chief magistrates and said, "These men, who are Jews, are
disturbing the whole city and are proclaiming customs which it is not
right for us who are Romans to receive." The crowd came together against
them. The chief magistrates tore off their clothes and ordered them to
be scourged with rods. When they had laid many blows upon them they
threw them into prison with instructions to the jailer to guard them
securely. When he received such an order he flung them into the inner
prison and secured their feet in the stocks.
If Lydia came from the top end of the social scale, this
slave-girl came from the bottom. She was what was called a Pytho, that
is, a person who could give oracles to guide men about the future. She
was mad and the ancient world had a strange respect for mad people
because, they said, the gods had taken away their wits in order to put
the mind of the gods into them. She was probably also gifted with a
natural turn for ventriloquism. She had fallen into the hands of
unscrupulous men who used her misfortune for their gain. When Paul cured
her of her madness, these men felt not joy at a fellow-creature's
restoration to health but fury that their source of revenue was gone.
They were astute men. They played on the natural anti-semitism of the
mob; and they appealed to the pride in things Roman which was
characteristic of a Roman colony and they succeeded in having Paul and
Silas arrested. Not only were they arrested; they were put in the inner
prison in the stocks. It may be that not only their feet but their hands
and their necks also were held in the stocks.
The tragic thing is that Paul and Silas were arrested and
maltreated for doing good. Whenever Christianity attacks vested interest
trouble follows. It is characteristic of men that if their pockets are
touched they are up in arms. It is every man's duty to ask himself, "Is
the money I am earning worth the price? Do I earn it by serving or by
exploiting my fellow men?" Often, the greatest obstacle to the crusade
of Christ is the selfishness of men.
16:25-40 About
midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God and the
prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was a great earthquake
so that the foundations of the prison were shaken. Immediately the doors
were opened and everyone's bonds were loosed. When the jailer woke up
and saw the doors of the prison standing open he drew his sword and he
was going to kill himself, for he thought that the prisoners had
escaped. But Paul shouted to him, "Do yourself no harm, for we are all
here." He called for a light and rushed in. He fell in terror before
Paul and Silas and brought them out and said, "Sirs, what must I do to
be saved?" They said, "Believe on the Lord Jesus and you and your house
will be saved." And they spoke the Lord's word to him together with all
in his house. And that very hour he took them and washed their weals and
he and his household were immediately baptized. He brought them into
his house and set a meal before them and he rejoiced with all his house
when he had believed in God.
When day came the
chief magistrates sent their officers saying, "Let these men go." The
jailer brought the message to Paul, "The chief magistrates have sent
word that you are to be released. So now, go out and go your way in
peace." But Paul said to them, "They beat us and they put us into prison
although we never had a trial and we are Romans. And now are they going
to put us out secretly? Certainly not! Let them come themselves and
bring us out." The officers told the chief magistrates what Paul had
said. They were afraid when they heard that they were Romans. So they
came and requested them and brought them out and asked them to leave the
city. When they had come out of prison they visited Lydia. They saw the
brethren and exhorted them and went away.
If Lydia came from the top end of the social scale and the
slave-girl from the bottom, the Roman jailer was one of the sturdy
middle class who made up the Roman civil service; and so in these three
the whole gamut of society was complete.
Let us look first at the scene of this passage. This was a
district where earthquakes were by no means uncommon. The door was
locked by a wooden bar falling into two slots and the stocks were
similarly fastened. The earthquake shook the bar free and the prisoners
were unfettered and the door was open. The jailer was about to kill
himself because Roman law said that if a prisoner escaped the jailer
must suffer the penalty the prisoner would have suffered.
Let us look at the characters.
First, there is Paul. We note three things about Paul. (i) He
could sing hymns when he was fast in the stocks in the inner prison at
midnight. The one thing you can never take away from a Christian is God
and the presence of Jesus Christ. With God there is freedom even in a
prison and even at midnight there is light. (ii) He was quite willing to
open the door of salvation to the jailer who had shut the door of the
prison on him. There was never a grudge in Paul's nature. He could
preach to the very man who had fastened him in the stocks. (iii) He
could stand on his dignity. He claimed his rights as a Roman citizen. To
scourge a Roman citizen was a crime punishable by death. But Paul was
not standing on his dignity for his own sake but for the sake of the
Christians he was leaving behind in Philippi. He wanted it to be seen
that they were not without influential friends.
Second, there is the jailer. The interesting thing about the
jailer is that he immediately proved his conversion by his deeds. No
sooner had he turned to Christ than he washed the weals upon the
prisoners' backs and set a meal before them. Unless a man's Christianity
makes him kind it is not real. Unless a man's professed change of heart
is guaranteed by his change of deeds it is a spurious thing.
-Barclay's Daily Study Bible (NT)