Semikkah7

04/05/2021 – Day 323 – Acts 17 – 18 // “I am prepared to go anywhere, so long as it is forward.” David Livingstone. (after being asked where he was prepared to go) And so it was with Paul.

I think tonight I am going to quotes exclusively from William Barclay’s commentary on Acts. So unless I footnote the quote with a specific source, just know it is Barclay. Let’s get started!:

Acts 17: 1- 9

“The coming of Christianity to Thessalonica, was an event of the first importance. The great Roman road from the Adriatic Sea to the Middle East was called the Egyptian Way; and the main street of Thessalonica was actually part of that road….”

• THe first verse is short but actually it was a journey of over 100 miles. That’s walking folks.
• 17: 10 – 15 – This is on to Beroea, 60 miles west of Thessalonica. “The Jews were certain that Jesus was not the Messiah because he had been crucified. To them a man who had been crucified was a man accursed. It was no doubt in passages like Isaiah 53 that Paul set the people of Beroea to find a forecast of the work of Jesus.” (jimmy note: Another Psalm 22: Isn’t this a scene of a crucifixion that David is phrophesying about, or was he just on a lsd trip.)
• 17: 16 – 21: “.. It was said that there were more statues of gods in Athens than in all the rest of Greece put together and that i Athens it was easier to meet a god than a man….”
  Here is a very good succinct summary of the Epicureans and the Stoics:
• “Epicureans: (1) They believed that everything happened by chance. (ii) They believed that death was the end of it all. (iii) They believed that the gods were remote from the world and did not care. (iv) They believed that pleasure was the chief end of man….. (Basically modern day Pagan nihilism.)
• “Stoics: (i) They believed that everything was God. God was a fiery spirit. That spirit grew dull in matter but it was in everything. What gave men life was that a little spark of that spirit dwelt in them and when they died it returned to God. … Very similar heretofore with Pantheism (Hindu religion)…
• Acts 17: 32-34: “.. It would seem that Paul had less success in Athens than anywhere else. It was typical of the Athenians that all they wanted was to talk. They did not want action; they did not even particularly want conclusions. The wanted simply mental acrobatics and the stimulus of a mental hike.
• Chapter 18 summary – Preaching in Corinth: “Its very position made Corinth a key city in Greece. Greece is almost cut in two by the sea. On one side is the Saronic Gulf with its port of Cenchrea and on the other is the Corinthian Gulf with its port of Lechaeum. Between the two there is a neck of land less than five miles across and on that isthmus stood Corinth. All north and south traffic had to pass through Corinth because there was no other way. Men called her the bridge of Greece.” But the voyage round the southern extremity of Greece was a voyage of great peril… Corinth was the market place of Greece…. Corinth was also a wicked city. The Greeks had a verb , “to play the Corinthian,” which meant to live a life of lustful debauchery.”

• I’ll come back within the next day or two to finish chapter 18…..
• 04/06/2021: Ok , praise God, I’m back:
• Acts 18: 1-11: “Here we have a vivid light on the kind of life that Paul lived. He was a rabbi and according to Jewish practice every rabbi was to have a trade. He must take no money for his preaching and teaching and must make his own living. The Jew glorified work…. ‘Excellent,’ they said, ‘is the study of the law along with a worldly trade; for the practice of them both makes a man forget iniquity; but all law without work must in the end fail and causes iniquity.’ So we find rabbis following every respectable trade. It meant that they never became detached scholars and always knew what the life of the working- man was like.
• Acts 18: 23 – 28: “The story of the Third Missionary Journey begins at Acts 18:23 It began with the tour of Galatia and Phrygia to confirm the brethren there. Paul then moved on to Ephesus where he remained for nearly three years. From there he went to Macedonia; he then crossed over to Troas and proceeded by way of Miletus, Tyre and Caesarea to Jerusalem.”
• A an introduction to Apollos and also Aquila and Priscilla is definitely in order here in that they played a pivotal role in assisting Paul in his ministry. Barclay points out that in A.D. 49 that Claudius banished all the Jews from Rome and it must have been then that Aquila and Priscilla came to Corinth. Barclay adds that Paul would have considered a major blessing.
• “Apollos came from Alexandria where there were about one million Jews. So strong wre they that two out of the five wards into which Alexandria was divided were Jewish. Alexandria was the city of scholars. It was specially the place where scholars believed in the allegorical interpretation of the Old Testament. They belieed that not only did the Old Testatment record history but that every recorded event had an inner meaning. Because of this Apollos would be exceedingly useful in convincing the Jews, for he would be able to find Christ all over the Old Testament and to prove to them that the Old Testament looked forward all the time to his coming. For all that there was a lack in his training. He knew only the Baptism of John. When we come to to deal with the next passage we shall see more clearly what that means. (Next Monday – Chapter 19) But we can say now that Apollos must have seen the need for repentance and have recognized Jesus as the Messiah; but as yet he did not know the good news of Jesus as the Saviour of men and of the coming of the Holy Spirit in power. He knew of the task that Jesus gave men to do but he did not yet fully know of the help Jesus more fully instructed. By the words of Aquila and Priscilla he was more fully instructed. The result was that Apollos, who already knwo Jesus a figure in history, came also to know him as a living presence; and his power as a preacher must have been increased a hundredfold.

Soli Deo Gloria!