THEMES:
- Suffering Servant: Paul in Acts 21 starts his long journey to Rome and Ceasar. The rest of the book will detail his journey to Rome and Paul’s most prolonged imprisonment. We now enter the last part of Acts where Paul becomes a suffering servant similar to Jesus. Paul is unjustly imprisoned. He is accused of something he didn’t do by his Jewish brothers and sisters. Paul came back to his own to Jerusalem, and his own received him not. In Acts 7, we saw Saul as a willing participant in Stephen’s suffering, and in Acts 9 we saw Saul the persecutor of the Christians. But, in Acts 21, we see Paul the suffering and the persecuted. And, this is a poignant example of the power of the Gospel. Jesus changed Paul. Jesus transformed Paul more and more into his own image. And, as Paul became more like Christ, he always invited others to grow with him. As Paul wrote, “Imitate me as I imitate Christ.” But, now we see Paul persecuted and imprisoned. We see Paul as a suffering servant; we see the Paul that is following the passion of Jesus. And, we must ask ourselves, “Are we prepared to suffer?” We may not be imprisoned as Paul was in Acts 21, but are we willing to testify of Jesus and be scoffed at by co-workers and loved ones? Are we willing to suffer physical ailments and grow closer to Jesus because of them not despite of them? Are we able to lose all of our financial stability, yet still give of what we have like the parable of the women with two mites? Often times it takes suffering to push us to Jesus, do you welcome the idea of possible suffering? Do you view weakness as an opportunity for God’s power? These are hard questions to answer, and Paul’s story gives us confidence that following Jesus with faith in our suffering is the correct response.
PEOPLE:
- James, the Brother of Jesus: “James, The Lord’s Brother, (died AD 62, Jerusalem; Western feast day May 3), a Christian apostle, according to St. Paul, although not one of the original Twelve Apostles. He was the leader of the Jerusalem Christians, who with Saints Peter and John the Evangelist is one of “the pillars of the church.”
- James evidently was not a follower of Jesus during his public ministry. Paul attributes James’s later conversion to the appearance of Christ resurrected (1 Corinthians 15:7). Three years after Paul’s conversion, James was an important leader in the Jerusalem church (Galatians 1:18–19), where he assumed even more significance after King Herod Agrippa I of Judaea in about AD 44 beheaded the Apostle St. James, son of Zebedee, and after Peter fled from Jerusalem (Acts 12:1–17). He was the chief spokesman for the Jerusalem church at the Council of Jerusalem regarding Paul’s mission to the Gentiles (Acts 15:13) and final visit to Jerusalem (Acts 21:18).
- Later tradition records that James was called “the Just” and was noted for his fulfillment of Jewish law. Though opposing those Jewish Christians who required that Gentile Christians submit to Jewish Law, including circumcision, he believed Jewish Christians should continue loyalty to Jewish practice and piety, as he did himself. His piety and zeal for the Law had become a basis for various legends; thus, later traditions emphasize James’s piety and popularity with Jews and Jewish Christians. This popularity is evident in the Jews’ anger when priestly authorities had James put to death, reputedly either by stoning (after Flavius Josephus, historian of the Jews) or by being thrown from a Temple tower (after the early Christian writer St. Hegesippus). The early church designates him the first bishop of Jerusalem, though the title is not used in the New Testament.”
CULTURE:
Places:
- V 1 - Cos (or Coos) - An island in the Archipelago, or Aegean Sea, one of those called the Sporades. It was famous for the worship of Aesculapius and Juno; and for being the birthplace of Hippocrates, the most eminent of physicians, and Apelles, the most celebrated of painters.
- V 1 - Rhodes - Another island in the same sea, celebrated for its Colossus, which was one of the seven wonders of the world. This was a brazen statue of Apollo, so high that ships in full sail could pass between its legs.
- V 1 - Patara - One of the chief seaport towns of Syria.
- V 7 - Ptolemais - This was a seaport town of Galilee, not far from Mount Carmel, between Tyre and Caesarea, where the river Belus empties itself into the sea. It was at first called Accho, (and this is the reading of the Syriac and Arabic), and belonged to the tribe of Asher, Judges 1:31.
Cultural Background:
- Under a Vow: “Those under a Nazirite vow would abstain from wine, strong drink, grape juice, grapes, or raisins; would avoid any contact that would defile them (such as contact with a dead body); and would not cut their hair (cf. Mishnah, Nazir 6:3). If Paul went with them and personally paid for the cost of their offering, it would show that he did not object to Jewish converts following OT customs voluntarily, so long as those same customs were not required of Gentile believers.”
- Defiled this Holy Place: T”he Jews from Asia charged Paul with defiling the temple by taking a Gentile (“Trophimus the Ephesian,” v.29) beyond the stone barrier that divided the outer courtyard (Court of the Gentiles) from the inner sanctuary, which was off limits to Gentiles under penalty of death. To aid and abet such a trespass was also a capital offence, even if the offender was a Roman citizen. For this offence the Jewish authorities were allowed by the Romans to execute the death sentence. But their accusation was a lie. Paul, knowing of the death penalty, would not have brought a Gentile into the forbidden area.”
CONTEMPLATING GOD:
Voice of the Past: Seeking Christ over the Approval of Man - “Let not us greatly care to be accepted by the majority of people, nor think about solely being accepted by man. It is unto God we live, and not to men: in heaven we have our real life, not on earth: in heaven lie the awards and prizes of our labors, so it is to God that we look for our praises and thence for our crowns.”
Footnotes:
Encyclopedia Britannica. “James, the Brother of Jesus.”
https://www.godtube.com/bible/acts/21-1.
https://www.godtube.com/bible/acts/21-7.
ESV Study Bible, p.2132.
ESV Study Bible, p.2132; Commentary on Acts, F.F. Bruce, Chapter 21:27-39.