The final chapter of the Book of Acts takes us from Paul on the island of Malta to Paul under house arrest in Rome. He has a meeting with the Jews of Rome, where discord is the result. And we leave Paul doing nothing but daily and with boldness and clarity proclaiming the gospel to all he would meet. Let’s take a look.
1) V1-11 – 1Once safely on shore, we found out that the island was called Malta. 2The islanders showed us unusual kindness. They built a fire and welcomed us all because it was raining and cold. 3Paul gathered a pile of brushwood and, as he put it on the fire, a viper, driven out by the heat, fastened itself on his hand. 4When the islanders saw the snake hanging from his hand, they said to each other, “This man must be a murderer; for though he escaped from the sea, Justice has not allowed him to live.” 5But Paul shook the snake off into the fire and suffered no ill effects. 6The people expected him to swell up or suddenly fall dead, but after waiting a long time and seeing nothing unusual happen to him, they changed their minds and said he was a god. 7There was an estate nearby that belonged to Publius, the chief official of the island. He welcomed us to his home and for three days entertained us hospitably. 8His father was sick in bed, suffering from fever and dysentery. Paul went in to see him and, after prayer, placed his hands on him and healed him. 9When this had happened, the rest of the sick on the island came and were cured. 10 They honored us in many ways and when we were ready to sail, they furnished us with the supplies we needed. 11After three months we put out to sea in a ship that had wintered in the island. It was an Alexandrian ship with the figurehead of the twin gods Castor and Pollux.
The travelers wintered for three months on Malta, where the islanders showed “unusual kindness” and where Paul was a blessing to everyone. He survived a snakebite, changing his reputation in the eyes of the Maltese people, and healed many people. As a result, the islanders sent the passengers off well stocked for the rest of their voyage. How have you noticed God’s blessing in your life often coming on the heels of your efforts to be a blessing in the lives of others?
2) V12-16 – 12We put in at Syracuse and stayed there three days. 13From there we set sail and arrived at Rhegium. The next day the south wind came up, and on the following day we reached Puteoli. 14There we found some brothers who invited us to spend a week with them. And so we came to Rome. 15The brothers there had heard that we were coming, and they traveled as far as the Forum of Appius and the Three Taverns to meet us. At the sight of these men Paul thanked God and was encouraged. 16When we got to Rome, Paul was allowed to live by himself, with a soldier to guard him.
The following spring (60-61 AD), everyone made it safely to the Bay of Naples, and to the Italian port city of Puteoli (v13; modern day Pozzuoli), where Paul and companions stayed for a week with local Christians. Then they walked the rest of the way to Rome. Christians came from Rome to greet and walk with Paul along the Appian Way (Via Appia) for some 30-40 miles outside the city. Though Paul had yet to visit Rome before this trip, he had obviously won the favor of the Roman Christians, probably from his letter to them, written around 57 AD, and his decade plus of mission work throughout the Empire. And so they came to Rome (v14), and Julius delivered Paul to the captain of the guard, or some sort of camp commander, in Rome (v16), where he was allowed to live at his own expense, by himself, though constantly guarded by a soldier (house arrest).
3) V17-25 – 17Three days later he called together the leaders of the Jews. When they had assembled, Paul said to them: “My brothers, although I have done nothing against our people or against the customs of our ancestors, I was arrested in Jerusalem and handed over to the Romans. 18They examined me and wanted to release me, because I was not guilty of any crime deserving death. 19But when the Jews objected, I was compelled to appeal to Caesar – not that I had any charge to bring against my own people. 20For this reason I have asked to see you and talk with you. It is because of the hope of Israel that I am bound with this chain.” 21They replied, “We have not received any letters from Judea concerning you, and none of the brothers who have come from there has reported or said anything bad about you. 22But we want to hear what your views are, for we know that people everywhere are talking against this sect.” 23They arranged to meet Paul on a certain day, and came in even larger numbers to the place where he was staying. From morning till evening he explained and declared to them the kingdom of God and tried to convince them about Jesus from the Law of Moses and from the Prophets. 24Some were convinced by what he said, but others would not believe. 25They disagreed among themselves and began to leave after Paul had made this final statement:
After getting settled in under house arrest, Paul invited the leaders of the Roman Jews to speak with him. Are you surprised that they had not heard anything negative about him from the Judean Jews? What do you think of their response to Paul in v22, especially in light of Acts 17:11? They considered Christianity a sect and had heard discrediting remarks about the Way (v22). For some 8-12 hours, Paul “tried to convince” the Roman Jews of the truth of Jesus Christ. He used the Law and the Prophets, just as Jesus had done with the disciples on the Road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13-32). What was it that he “explained and declared”? The Kingdom of God, just what Jesus proclaimed throughout His ministry! What is the significance of that? Have you ever set a meeting to discuss with such vigor the Kingdom of God with an unbeliever, or a group of unbelievers? V24 says, “Some were convinced…but others would not believe.” Paul’s audience reached no agreement, as was often the case with Jesus’ audience (John 7:40-43).
4) V25-31 – 25They disagreed among themselves and began to leave after Paul had made this final statement: “The Holy Spirit spoke the truth to your forefathers when he said through Isaiah the prophet: 26“‘Go to this people and say, “You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.” 27For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.’ 28“Therefore I want you to know that God’s salvation has been sent to the Gentiles, and they will listen!” [29After he said this, the Jews left, arguing vigorously among themselves.] 30For two whole years Paul stayed there in his own rented house and welcomed all who came to see him. 31Boldly and without hindrance he preached the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ.
“They disagreed among themselves and began to leave after Paul had made [his] final statement” (Acts 28:25a), and so he spoke against them the words of Isaiah 6:10 from the Septuagint (Greek Old Testament), which had become a widespread rebuke of Jews from Christian interpretation of the passage (John 12:37-43; Matthew 13:10-17). Paul said finally to them, “Take knowledge, then, that this salvation of God has been sent to the Gentiles; they will listen to it” (v28). Notice v29, concluding that the Jews left arguing vigorously among themselves. Finally, Luke tells us, for “two whole years” Paul lived in Rome (60-62, or 61-63 AD), and he was able to receive visitors and continue his preaching of the Gospel (v30-31).
Scholars suggest that Paul was released from this particular imprisonment only to be re-imprisoned and executed under Roman Emperor Nero some 3 years later. We simply don’t know. But we are told to imitate Paul (1 Corinthians 4:16), who “welcomed all who came to see him and proclaimed the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus – with all boldness and without hindrance!”
So we come to the end of Acts, but not exactly the end of Paul’s life, which came in Rome by beheading. Some scholars suggest he died on the heels of these two years under Roman house arrest. There is no certainty that his trial ever came before Caesar, though, and many credit court congestion or think the Sanhedrin never showed up to prosecute. Records of the Roman judicial system don’t reveal a specific statute of limitations, but they do show that prosecutors were given 18 months from an assigned court date to appear for the trial or face a stiff fine. If prosecutors still didn’t show up within 2 years, there’s no evidence that Rome would simply release a prisoner. Neither Luke nor Paul tell us specifically what happened, but we can speculate from Paul’s pastoral epistles, especially 2 Timothy, that he was released for a time – perhaps visiting Crete and/or Nicopolis (Titus 1:5; 3:12) and even Spain (Romans 15:28) – and then re-imprisoned in a harsher condition, until he was executed.
A fire broke out in Rome on July 18-19, 64 AD. Nero was away but returned to provide relief. Rumors spread that he had set the fire so he could rebuild the way he wanted, but to avoid this stereotype, according to Tacitus, Nero blamed the Christians. One author said, “Christians were generally disliked for what their neighbors regarded as anti-social attitudes.” Christians, then, under Nero in 64-65 AD, were sportingly executed until public pity kept Nero from continuing this strategy. But what happened to Paul? Was he dead by this time? Had he left Rome only to be brought back in the midst of this persecution? Clement of Rome, writing in vague language to the Corinthians in the mid-to-late 90s AD, some 30 years after his death, said that Paul was exiled, but also that he reached the limit of the west, bore testimony before the rulers, and so departed as “the greatest example of endurance.” In 2 Timothy 1:16-18, Paul was obvious struggling in his prison environment. Onesiphorus, an Ephesian Christian, labored to find him in Rome. Paul’s final words appear in 2 Timothy 4:6-8, “For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time has come for my departure. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day – and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for His appearing.”
Well after his death, Paul’s legacy lives on. The apocryphal Acts of Peter, likely composed around 180 AD, describes Paul’s departure from Italy by sea for Spain. The Roman Presbyter Gaius, quoted by Eusebius, in response to a claim that one could visit the tombs of Philip the evangelist and his daughters in Asia, said, “I can point out the trophies (tombstones) of the apostles (Peter and Paul, who are traditionally recognized as the founders of the Roman Church, though neither actually did): [on] the Vatican Hill (Peter) [and] the Ostian Way (Paul).” There are churches at those sites today. A memorial chapel was built on the Ostian Way at Aquae Salviae (now called Tre Fontane), near the third milestone, where, tradition asserts, Paul was beheaded. They say his head bounced three times, forming the three fountains after which the place is named. Excavations of the site revealed two concrete slabs which had engraved on them, “To Paul, Apostle and Martyr.” Though the writing dates only back to the fourth century, the location is in what was a pagan necropolis, not a place pious people would have chosen to commemorate such a legacy if they were inventing the tale.
In time, Peter’s value to Rome was more and more greatly appreciated, while “Paul’s contribution to early Christianity was in practice increasingly overlooked. To be sure,” Bruce says, “Paul with the sword of the spirit stands in the forecourt of St. Peter’s Basilica, alongside Peter with the keys of the Kingdom, just as Peter faces Paul in front of St. Paul’s Outside the Walls – more congenial associates in death, perhaps, than they were in life. But there may be a symbolical fitness, it has sometimes been said, in the location of St. Paul’s Outside the Walls. Paul might have understood and approved; he was well accustomed to being odd man out.” Paul’s pride and joy was found in his converts. People mattered most to Paul, and that may have been the case because Paul mattered most to Jesus. Jesus humbled Paul, not by removing his pride, but by changing the things he would boast in. Taming his impetuousness, Jesus made Paul meek. And it didn’t happen by rules or regulations, but by the power of the Holy Spirit.
2 Timothy 1:15 shows that people in Asia turned away from Paul; this happened as Paul spent time in prison, and no one was there to adequately take his place. John and Philip made their way into Asia and stabilized things by the mid-to-late 60’s AD. The Jewish revolt against Rome in 66 AD put an end to Jerusalem’s authority, at least until 135 AD, and Paul’s legacy was rightly restored. Early in the second century AD, an unknown Christian (either Onesimus or someone from Alexandria) compiled ten of Paul’s letters into one volume and circulated them throughout the known world, resulting in both orthodox and heterodox authors using Paul’s letters to make their points. Marcion, for a heterodox example, said in 144 AD that Paul’s ten letters and Luke’s gospel made up the New Testament. In response, orthodox church fathers named thirteen letters of Paul, four gospel accounts, Acts, Peter’s letters, James, and John’s letters as authoritative. Even Hebrews was included – as Paul’s – by 180 AD. Around 150 AD, an Asian presbyter recorded, out of love for Paul, a fictional account of his ministry – the Acts of Paul. Some believed it to be true, even the part where Paul was put in the arena to be killed by a lion, but he befriended and baptized the lion instead. Paul’s legend was often embellished, but his message never changed, which proves his abiding greatness. Augustine, Luther and the Reformers, the Wesleys in the Great Awakening, and even American democracy relied heavily on Paul’s teaching that grace changes people; grace without change (antinomianism) and attempts to change without grace (legalism) always fail.
Bruce concludes, “Although he was rabbinically trained, his reappraisal of the whole spirit and content of his earlier training was so radical that many Jewish scholars have had difficulty in recognizing him as the product of a rabbinical education. They have found it easier to appreciate the Prophet of Nazareth (who, indeed, was not rabbinically trained) than the apostle to the Gentiles. Paul presents an enigma with which they cannot readily come to terms… Paul looked forward to the day when the racial, religious, sexual, and social prejudices or discrimination to which on principle he denied any place in the Christian fellowship would be banished from the whole new creation. And he placed a higher valuation on human personality than social or political democracy could ever do when he insisted that the weaker members of the community should received special consideration because each of them, however insignificant in other respects, was ‘the brother (or sister) for whom Christ died’ (1 Corinthians 8:11). Campaigner for spiritual liberty that he was, he gave one thing precedence even over liberty, and that one thing was love. But spiritual liberty is not really diminished by love; both together are imparted by the Spirit, and to serve in love is perfect freedom. In this, as in so many other respects, Paul has remained unsurpassed in his insight into the mind of Christ.”
Footnotes
- 28:27 Isaiah 6:9,10
- 28:28 Some manuscripts listen!" 29 After he said this, the Jews left, arguing vigorously among themselves.
Bible text from Gospelcom.net. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society.