Acts 21:8-22
One of the joys of this life is to reconnect with an old
friend, or to meet someone who you have a kindred spirit with. I was not able to find any account of the two
men meeting until Paul’s third trip, but we do know that both men had
ministries in Caesarea, and that Paul came to Caesarea on his second missionary
journey and again on his third missionary journey, and Philip, it seems, had
lived there shortly after his encounter with the Ethiopian Eunuch. So we have Philip in Caesarea maybe before
Paul’s conversion, if not very shortly
there after, so it seems very likely they knew each other at that time, and Philip
may have been on Saul’s hit list. Now it
is the third and last missionary trip where we find Paul staying in Philip’s
home and Philip has four daughters who are not married who we are told
prophesied. From Caesarea to Jerusalem
is about 53 miles as the crow flies, and doctor Luke tells us that a prophet
named Agabus came down from Judea. This
is the account from Acts 21:11, “And coming to us, he took Paul's belt and bound his own
feet and hands and said, “Thus says the Holy Spirit, ‘This is how the Jews at
Jerusalem will bind the man who owns this belt and deliver him into the hands
of the Gentiles.’”
It matters not the time you have known a person, you want to
keep them from harms way and that is what the people and doctor Luke tried to
do, but this was Paul’s reply: “Then Paul answered, “What are you doing, weeping and
breaking my heart? For I am ready not only to be imprisoned but even to die in
Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.” And since he would not be persuaded,
we ceased and said, “Let the will of the Lord be done.”
(Acts 21:13-14 ESV)
If you have falsely believed that (Spin) was created by Bill
Clinton, you are so wrong, it began in the garden of Eden with the master of
lies, and those who serve him just do what they see and hear from their father
the devil. It seems like the brothers in
Jerusalem were encountering lies about Paul long before he came to Jerusalem,
and this was one of them: “You see, brother, how many thousands there are among the
Jews of those who have believed. They are all zealous for the law, and they
have been told about you that you teach all the Jews who are among the Gentiles
to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children or walk
according to our customs. What then is to be done? They will certainly hear
that you have come. Do therefore what we tell you. We have four men who are
under a vow; take these men and purify yourself along with them and pay their
expenses, so that they may shave their heads. Thus all will know that there is
nothing in what they have been told about you, but that you yourself also live
in observance of the law. (Acts 21:20-24)
What application can we apply to our lives from this teaching;
first and foremost we should stand with our Christian friends in what they
believe God has called them to do. It
gets much harder if that friend is our child or grandchild, in that we want them
to do the will of God, but we want that to be without any hardship or pain, but
often the will of God looks past the pain as the Father did that with His Son,
so that all who would put trust in the work of the cross would be saved by the
blood of His Son and our Lord.
From the Back Porch,
Bob Rice
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