He reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath and persuaded Jews and Greeks. But when Silas and Timothy came down from Macedonia, Paul was compelled by the Spirit, testifying to the Jews that Jesus was the Christ. When they opposed him and blasphemed, he shook out his clothing and said to them, “Your blood be on your own heads! I am clean. From now on, I will go to the Gentiles!”
He departed there, and went into the house of a certain man named Justus, one who worshiped God, whose house was next door to the synagogue. Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue, believed in the Lord with all his house. Many of the Corinthians, when they heard, believed and were baptized. The Lord said to Paul in the night by a vision, “Don’t be afraid, but speak and don’t be silent; for I am with you, and no one will attack you to harm you, for I have many people in this city.”
He lived there a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11 4. He disputed in the synagogue It is a…
4. He disputed in the synagogue It is a wonder how that crept in which is in the Latin books, that Paul put in the name of Christ: unless it were because some reader would supply the want of the general sentence. For Luke setteth down two things in this place: to wit, that Paul disputed among the Jews; secondly, that he began more plainly to profess Christ after that Silas and Timotheus were come. And though it be likely that he began to speak of Christ even at the first entrance, because he could not omit the principal point of the heavenly doctrine, yet that doth not hinder but that he might use some other manner of disputation. Therefore I take [πειθειν] that is, to persuade, for to induce by little and little. For, in my judgment, Luke doth signify, that forasmuch as the Jews did handle the law coldly and foolishly, Paul spake of the corrupt and wicked nature of man, of the necessity of grace of the Redeemer which was promised, of the means to obtain salvation, that he might awake them; for this is a fit and brief preparation unto Christ. Again, when he saith that he was forced in spirit to teach that Jesus was Christ, his meaning is, that he was enforced with greater vehemency to intreat and speak of Christ freely and openly. So that we see that Paul did not utter all things at one time, but he tempered his doctrine as occasion did serve.
And because like moderation is profitable at this day, it is convenient for faithful teachers wisely to consider where to begin, lest a preposterous and confused order do hinder the proceeding of doctrine. Furthermore, though there were ferventness enough in Paul, yet it is no inconvenient thing that he was made more courageous by some new help, not that he was encouraged by shame, or the hope which he reposed in his fellows, but because he considered that this help was sent him, as it were, from heaven. But this forcing in the spirit is not taken for a violent or external impulsion, (as they say, ) as those which were called Phoebades and frantic men were wont to be carried away with devilish madness; but there was more ferventness added unto the wonted inspiration of the Spirit which was in Paul, so that he was moved with new power of God, and yet did he of his own accord follow the Spirit as his guide. Whereas Paul did testify that Jesus is Christ, I expound it thus: when he had thoroughly taught the Jews concerning the office of the Redeemer, he declared by testimonies of Scripture that this is he which was to be hoped for, because all those things agree to him which the law and the prophets attribute to Christ. Therefore, he did not simply affirm, but using a solemn testification, he proved Jesus, the Son of Mary, to be that Christ who should be the Mediator between God and men, that he might restore the world from destruction to life.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv4, 5, 6, 9, 11 The truth ought always to be freely uttered, yet…
The truth ought always to be freely uttered, yet notwithstanding the doctrine may be so moderated, as occasion of the profit that the people take thereby, shall require.
Exhorted so that he persuaded, and so the word signifieth.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv4–11 4 And he reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath,…
4 And he reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks.
Ver. 4. Persuaded the Jews] Men may speak persuasively, but God only can persuade. Gen 9:27, Japheth’s children were to be won by persuasion. Therefore Christ sent forth to them not soldiers, but fishers, who might work upon them docendo non ducendo, monendo non minaudo, by informing them, not by enforcing them.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv4–11 He reasoned in the synagogue; or argued and disputed,…
He reasoned in the synagogue; or argued and disputed, giving his reasons out of Scripture, and answering their objections.
And persuaded the Jews; not only using cogent arguments, but, as some understand the verb, such as did prevail upon them.
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And the Greeks; not such as were of the Jewish race, and after the dispersion used the Scripture in the Greek tongue; but such as were Gentile Greeks, Greeks by descent.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On vv4, 7 Observe here, How vehemently desirous the holy apostle was…
Observe here, How vehemently desirous the holy apostle was to plant a Christian church at Corinth, and to bring the Jews of Corinth to embrace the gospel: He was pressed in spirit, and testified, that is, reasoned with them with great vehemency and earnestness of affection, as well as with great judgment, concerning the Messias.
Observe, 2. That the Jewish synagogue at Corinth was the preaching place that St. Paul made choice of, hoping to gather the beginnings of his Christian church out of the converted Jews: He reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath-day. Still the apostle kept to his commission, to preach the gospel first to the Jews, and afterwards, upon their rejection, to the Gentiles.
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Observe, 3. The blasphemous opposition which the Jews made to the doctrine of the gospel: They opposed themselves, and blasphemed; that is, they opposed his doctrine, reviled his person, and blasphemed Christ, whom that apostle preached.
Observe, 4. How the holy apostle clears himself of the blood of those Jews, whom he had now preached the gospel unto: He said, your blood be upon your own hands; I am clean.
The faithful ministers of Christ shall never have the blood of a perishing people laid to their charge; they having warned them of their damnable state, and discovered the way of life and salvation to them, deliver their own souls; whilst the people which they preached to, die in their sins, and for their sins.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v7 Here we are told,
Here we are told,
I. That Paul changed his quarters. Christ directed his disciples, when he sent them forth, not to go from house to house (Luk 10:7), but there might be occasion to do it, as Paul did here. He departed out of the synagogue, being driven out by the perverseness of the unbelieving Jews, and he entered into a certain man's house, named Justus, Act 18:7. It should seem, he went to this man's house, not to lodge, for he continued with Aquila and Priscilla, but to preach. When the Jews would not let him go on peaceably with his work in their meeting, this honest man opened his doors to him, and told him he should be welcome to preach there; and Paul accepted the proposal. It was not the first time that God's ark had taken up its lodging in a private house. When Paul could not have liberty to preach in the synagogue, he preached in a house, without any disparagement to his doctrine. But observe the account of this man and his house. 1. The man was next door to a Jew; he was one that worshipped God; he was not an idolater, though he was a Gentile, but was a worshipper of the God of Israel, and him only, as Cornelius. That Paul might give the less offence to the Jews, though he had abandoned them, he set up his meeting in this man's house. Even when he was under a necessity of breaking off from them to turn to the Gentiles, yet he would study to oblige them. 2. The house was next door to the synagogue, it joined close to it, which some perhaps might interpret as done with design to draw people from the synagogue to the meeting; but I rather think it was done in charity, to show that he would come as near to them as he could, and was ready to return to them if they were but willing to receive his message, and would not contradict and blaspheme as they had done.
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II. That Paul presently saw the good fruit of his labours, both among Jews and Gentiles. 1. Crispus a Jew, an eminent one, the chief ruler of the synagogue, believed on the Lord Jesus, with all his house, Act 18:8. It was for the honour of the gospel that there were some rulers, and persons of the first rank both in church and state, that embraced it. This would leave the Jews inexcusable, that the ruler of their synagogue, who may be supposed to have excelled the rest in knowledge of the scriptures and zeal for their religion, believed the gospel, and yet they opposed and blasphemed it. Not only he, but his house, believed, and, probably, were baptized with him by Paul, Co1 1:14. 2. Many of the Corinthians, who were Gentiles (and some of them persons of bad character, as appears, Co1 6:11, such were some of you), hearing, believed, and were baptized. First, they heard, for faith comes by hearing. Some perhaps came to hear Paul under some convictions of conscience that the way they were in was not right; but it is probable that the most came only for curiosity, because it was a new doctrine that was preached; but, hearing, they believed, by the power of God working upon them; and, believing, they were baptized, and so fixed for Christ, took upon them the profession of Christianity, and became entitled to the privileges of Christians.
III. That Paul was encouraged by a vision to go on with his work at Corinth (Act 18:9): The Lord Jesus spoke to Paul in the night by a vision; when he was musing on his work, communing with his own heart upon his bed, and considering whether he should continue here or no, what method he should take here, and what probability there was of doing good, then Christ appeared very seasonably to him, and in the multitude of his thoughts within him delighted his soul with divine consolations. 1. He renewed his commission and charge to preach the gospel: "Be not afraid of the Jews; though they are very outrageous, and perhaps the more enraged by the conversion of the chief ruler of their synagogue. Be not afraid of the magistrates of the city, for they have no power against thee but what is given them from above. It is the cause of heaven thou art pleading, do it boldly. Be not afraid of their words, nor dismayed at their looks; but speak, and hold not thy peace; let slip no opportunity of speaking to them; cry aloud, spare not. Do not hold thy peace from speaking for fear of them, nor hold thy peace in speaking" (if I may so say); "do not speak shyly and with caution, but plainly and fully and with courage. Speak out; use all the liberty of spirit that becomes an ambassador for Christ." 2. He assured him of his presence with him, which was sufficient to animate him, and put life and spirit into him: "Be not afraid, for I am with thee, to protect thee, and bear thee out, and to deliver thee from all thy fears; speak, and hold not thy peace, for I am with thee, to own what thou sayest, to work with thee, and to confirm the word by signs following." The same promise that ratified the general commission (Mat 28:19, Mat 28:20), Lo I am with you always, is here repeated. Those that have Christ with them need not to fear, and ought not to shrink. 3. He gave him a warrant of protection to save him harmless: "No man shall set on thee to hurt thee; thou shalt be delivered out of the hands of wicked and unreasonable men and shalt not be driven hence, as thou wast from other places, by persecution." He does not promise that no man should set on him (for the next news we hear is that he is set upon, and brought to the judgment-seat, Act 18:12), but, "No man shall set on thee to hurt thee; the remainder of their wrath shall be restrained; thou shalt not be beaten and imprisoned here, as thou wast at Philippi." Paul met with coarser treatment at first than he did afterwards, and was now comforted according to the time wherein he had been afflicted. Trials shall not last always, Psa 66:10-12. Or we may take it more generally: "No man shall set on thee, tou kakōsai se - to do evil to thee; whatever trouble they may give thee, there is no real evil in it. They may kill thee, but they cannot hurt thee; for I am with thee," Psa 23:4; Isa 41:10. 4. He gave him a prospect of success: "For I have much people in this city. Therefore no man shall prevail to obstruct thy work, therefore I will be with thee to own thy work, and therefore do thou go on vigorously and cheerfully in it; for there are many in this city that are to be effectually called by thy ministry, in whom thou shalt see of the travail of thy soul." Laos esti moi polus - There is to me a great people here. The Lord knows those that are his, yea, and those that shall be his; for it is by his work upon them that they become his, and known unto him are all his works. "I have them, though they yet know me not, though yet they are let captive by Satan at his will; for the Father has given them to me, to be a seed to serve me; I have them written in the book of life; I have their names down, and of all that were given me I will lose none; I have them, for I am sure to have them;" whom he did predestinate, those he called. In this city, though it be a very profane wicked city, full of impurity, and the more so for a temple of Venus there, to which there was a great resort, yet in this heap, that seems to be all chaff, there is wheat; in this ore, that seems to be all dross, there is gold. Let us not despair concerning any place, when even in Corinth Christ had much people.
IV. That upon this encouragement he made a long stay there (Act 18:11): He continued at Corinth a year and six months, not to take his ease, but to follow his work, teaching the word of God among them; and, it being a city flocked to from all parts, he had opportunity there of preaching the gospel to strangers, and sending notice of it thence to other countries. He staid so long, 1. For the bringing in of those that were without. Christ had many people there, and by the power of his grace he could have had them all converted in one month or week, as at the first preaching of the gospel, when thousands were enclosed at one cast of the net; but God works variously. The people Christ has at Corinth must be called in by degrees, some by one sermon, others by another; we see not yet all things put under Christ. Let Christ's ministers go on in their duty, though their work be not done all at once; nay, though it be done but a little at a time. 2. For the building up of those that were within. Those that are converted have still need to be taught the word of God, and particular need at Corinth to be taught it by Paul himself; for no sooner was the good seed sown in that field than the enemy came and sowed tares, the false apostles, those deceitful workers, of whom Paul in his epistles to the Corinthians complains so much. When the hands of Jewish persecutors were tied, who were professed enemies to the gospel, Paul had a more vexatious trouble created him, and the church more mischievous damage done it, by the tongue of judaizing preachers, who, under colour of the Christian name, undermined the very foundations of Christianity. Soon after Paul came to Corinth, it is supposed, he wrote the first epistle to the Thessalonians, which in order of time was the first of all the epistles he wrote by divine inspiration; and the second epistle to the same church was written not long after. Ministers may be serving Christ, and promoting the great ends of their ministry, by writing good letters, as well as by preaching good sermons.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv4–11 And he reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath,.... In…
And he reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath,.... In Corinth there was a synagogue of the Jews, in which they met together for worship on the seventh day of the week, which was their sabbath; and hither Paul went, and took the opportunity of reasoning with them out of the Scriptures, concerning Christ, his person, and offices, his incarnation, obedience, sufferings, and death, and about redemption and salvation by him: we may observe the diligence, industry, and indefatigableness of the apostle; on the sabbath day he went to the synagogue, and preached Christ to those who there attended; and on the weekdays he laboured with his own hands. Beza's most ancient copy, and the Vulgate Latin version add here, "interposing the name of the Lord Jesus"; frequently making mention of his name, or calling upon it, and doing miracles in it.
And persuaded the Jews and the Greeks; this was the effect of his reasoning, and the success that attended it; some, both of the Jews, who were so by birth, as well as religion, and of the Greeks, or Gentiles, who were Jewish proselytes, and attended synagogue worship, were convinced by his arguments, and were induced to believe the truth of his doctrine, and to embrace it; or at least he endeavoured to persuade them that they were lost sinners, and that there was salvation for them in Christ, and in him only.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11 And when Silas and Timotheus were come from Macedonia…
And when Silas and Timotheus were come from Macedonia - Silas seems to have stayed a considerable time at Berea: but Timotheus had come to the apostle while he was at Athens, and been sent by him to comfort and confirm the Church at Thessalonica, 1 Thess. iii, 1-5. But now at length both Silas and Timotheus came to the apostle at Corinth. Paul was pressed in spirit - The more probably from what Silas and Timotheus related. Every Christian ought diligently to observe any such pressure in his own spirit, and if it agree with Scripture, to follow it: if he does not he will feel great heaviness.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv4–11 Verse 4. He reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath]…
Verse 4. He reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath] Discoursed at large concerning Jesus as the Messiah, proving this point from their own Scriptures, collated with the facts of our Lord's life, c.
And persuaded the Jews and the Greeks.] Many, both Jews and proselytes, were convinced of the truth of his doctrine. Among his converts was Epenetus, the first fruit of his labour in Achaia, Ro 16:5 and the family of Stephanas was the next; and then Crispus and Caius, or Gaius; all of whom the apostle himself baptized, 1Co 1:14-16. See Clarke on Ac 18:8.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv4, 5, 7, 9 Act 18:4. And he reasoned in the synagogue, &c.…
Act 18:4. And he reasoned in the synagogue, &c. — The Jews being numerous in Corinth, Paul, according to his custom, began his ministry in the synagogue; and persuaded — That is, endeavoured to persuade; the Jews and Greeks — It is probable that most of these Greeks, since they attended the Jewish synagogue, were a kind of proselytes. It is possible, however, that some of them might not be such, but Gentiles, who were drawn out of curiosity to attend in the synagogue (though they did not commonly worship there) to hear such an extraordinary preacher as Paul was, especially considering the miracles which he wrought at Corinth, and to which he so often refers in the two epistles afterward written to the church formed there.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv4–11 And he reasoned ... - See the notes on…
And he reasoned ... - See the notes on Act 17:2.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv4–6 Introducing the name of the Lord Jesus. These words…
Introducing the name of the Lord Jesus. These words are found in few Greek copies, and so are omitted in the Protestant translation. (Witham)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv4–11 the Greeks--that is, Gentile proselytes; for to the heathen,…
the Greeks--that is, Gentile proselytes; for to the heathen, as usual, he only turned when rejected by the Jews (Act 18:6).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv4–11 4. Persuaded—Fresh from his disheartening failure at Athens, and…
4. Persuaded—Fresh from his disheartening failure at Athens, and burdened with the uncertainty lest his first three Churches in Europe, namely, Philippi, Thessalonica, and Berea, should also prove failures, and so his whole ministry turn out a failure, the apostle on his first entrance into the formidable city of Corinth is in spirit intimidated and lifeless. So he describes his own feelings to the Corinthians (1Co_2:1-4) and to the Thessalonians, (1Th_3:6-8.) Residing with Aquila, he goes to the synagogue and there, under depression and alone, rather persuades with gentle reserve, and conciliates the kindly feelings of the Jews.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv4–11 4. and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks] There…
4. and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks] There are no articles in the original and they are omitted in the Revised Version. No doubt, as in other Gentile cities, the religion of the Jews in Corinth gained the attention of many among the Gentiles, who as proselytes or inclining thereto would form part of the Sabbath audience in the synagogue. According to his rule St Paul addressed himself to the Jews first.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv4–11 (4) He persuaded the Jews and the Greeks.—It is…
(4) He persuaded the Jews and the Greeks.—It is necessary to remind the reader that the latter word does not mean Greek-speaking Jews, or proselytes in the full sense of the word, but, as elsewhere (see Note on Act_11:22), is used for those who were Gentiles by birth, and who, though worshipping in the synagogue, had not accepted circumcision.
(4) So far we have found reasons for the vow. But taken by itself, the vow would seem to have involved a continuous growth of hair rather than cropping it. How was that act connected with the vow? A probable answer to the question is found in the Apostle’s language as to social customs in matters of this kind, in 1Co_11:14. He condemns long hair as effeminate. But the Nazarite vow led to long hair as its natural consequence, and there was, therefore, the risk that while practising a rigorous austerity, he might seem to outside observers to be adopting an unmanly refinement. At Corinth men would, perhaps, know what his act meant, but in the regions to which he was now going it was wise to guard against the suspicion by a modification of the vow, such as Jewish law allowed.
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Cenchreæ was, as has been said, the eastern harbour of Corinth on the Saronic Gulf. Rom_16:1 indicates the existence of an organised Church there. The warm language of gratitude in which St. Paul speaks of Phœbe, the deaconess of the Church there, is best explained by supposing that she had ministered to him as such when he was suffering from bodily pain or infirmity, and this, in its turn, may afford another probable explanation of the vow.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv4–11 Jews and Greeks for the Jews and the Greeks,…
Jews and Greeks for the Jews and the Greeks, A.V. Observe again the influence of the synagogue upon the Greek population. Reasoned. (see Act_17:2, Act_17:17, note)
Vers. 4-17. The testimony.
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The kernel of the gospel is the truth that Jesus was the Christ. He was the Person spoken of by all the prophets as to come. Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Mary, born in the reign of Augustus Caesar, and crucified in that of Tiberius; known to his contemporaries in Judaea and Galilee as a Teacher and a Prophet, known to later ages by the Gospels which record his life and death and resurrection from the dead; is God"s Christ. He came into the world, in accordance with the eternal purpose of God, to be the Teacher, the Savior, the Judge, the Lord, the King of the whole earth, the Head of the human race. He fulfilled in his own person all the predictions of the prophets; he accomplished by his work all that God had in store for the redemption of the sons of men. Whatever the Holy Ghost spoke of the Godhead, of the priesthood, of the sacrifice, of the reign, of the glorious kingdom of Messiah, has its fulfillment in the Lord Jesus. The truth, therefore, that Jesus was the Christ is the kernel of the whole gospel. But further, this is either a fact or it is not a fact. There is no cloudland of uncertain existence, no matter of doubtful disputation or of fluctuating opinion. Those who have told us these things are witnesses of what they knew, not disputers about what they thought. What they have delivered to us is their testimony. We must either accept it as true or reject it as false. It has met with both treatments in the world, and, whether believed or disbelieved, has been a potent factor in men"s behavior. When believed, it has made the kind of man that Paul was, the kind of men and women that Aquila and Priscilla were. It has made men pure, holy, upright, patient, meek, kind, unselfish, self-denying, laboring for the good of others rather than for their own gain; with affections set on heavenly more than on earthly things; conscientious, true, faithful to their word; to be trusted and relied upon; great benefactors to their race, full of love to mankind. When disbelieved, it has not simply been set aside as a thing unworthy of credit, but it has set in action the most malignant passions in the human breast. Envy and jealousy, hatred and malice, have blazed up in all their fury against the authors and abettors of this testimony. You would think, judging by the fierce rage of the opponents, that there could not be a greater crime against humanity than to teach men to love God, to abstain from all evil, and to live in peace and good will towards one another. Judging by the rage of the opponents, you would think that a greater wrong could not be done to men than to tell them of life and rest and happiness in the eternal reach beyond the grave, as encouragements to patient well doing on this side the grave. Jews and heathens, so unlike one another in everything else, were exactly alike in their reception of this testimony. The Jews blasphemed and cursed and persecuted, and brought for punishment before the Roman tribunals those who gave testimony for Christ; the heathen, tolerant of every form of idolatry, let loose fire and sword and wild beast against the harmless disciples of the Lord Jesus. The accomplished philosopher, Marcus Aurelius, gave Justin Martyr to the executioner and Polycarp to the flames, with as little scruple as Nero tortured his Christian subjects at Rome. The scornful hatred of Tacitus for the pestilential superstition of the Christian was as bitter as the scurrilous wit of Lucian. In our own day many tongues are let loose against the testimony. New philosophers, new exponents of the physical laws by which the world consists, new pretenders to superior wisdom and wider intelligence in the various departments of human knowledge, however differing among themselves in the fundamental principles of their several schemes, agree in the scornful rejection of "the testimony of Jesus Christ." The Church meanwhile pursues her unwavering course. She holds in her hand the lamp of that truth which she did not invent, but which she received from God. That lamp sheds forth its heavenly light, whether men receive it or whether they shut it out from their hearts and walk on in darkness. For that truth the Church is ready now, as she ever was, to endure the scorn and hatred of mankind or to suffer imprisonment and death. Her office is to testify that Jesus is the Christ. By the grace of God she will continue that testimony until the Lord comes, and her witness to the absent is swallowed up in her adoration of the present, in visible power and glory.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv5, 9 And when Silas and Timotheus were come from Macedonia,…
Act_18:5-8
And when Silas and Timotheus were come from Macedonia, Paul was pressed in the spirit (R.., By the Word).
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Enthusiasm justified
1. Different effects are produced in different minds by the proclamation of the same truths. Some may accept it with a languid spirit, assured of its verity, but wholly indifferent to its real import; others may receive it with all gladness, rejoicing to repeat it with enthusiastic delight. A lighted match falling on a granite rock or pile of sand is extinguished; but the same, when applied to wood, kindles a genial glow, or, to powder, creates a flame and explosion. So with truth. Even Christian minds are affected by the same truth very differently at different times.
2. Paul was familiar with these varying experiences. When he was at Athens his spirit was stirred within him as he saw the prevailing idolatry. At Rome he felt the power of her imperial greatness, and was not ashamed of the gospel of the Son of God. But now at Corinth, though he preached in the synagogue, it does not seem that he was putting forth any special effort to reach the people. He may have been disheartened. But the vision was at hand, and with it the emphatic command, Speak! Even now was he straitened. The same word is used by the Saviour (Luk_12:50) and by Paul (Php_1:23), when he says that he is in a strait betwixt two. Now that the help brought him by Silas and Timotheus released him from labour, he yielded to an urgent and imperative impulse, testifying that, Jesus was Christ. Opposition did not deter. When the Jews blasphemed, he shock his robe, and said (Act_18:6).
3. We are apt to regard the great apostle as a flaming star that burned incessantly. We forget his human moods, though he records them. We rejoice in these recorded imperfections of the good, so far as they show the triumphs of Divine grace, for they encourage us to trust in the same ennobling and overruling grace in the midst of our own infirmities. Rising from his apparently passive condition, urged by the assurance, I am with thee, and no man shall set on thee, he boldly and ardently proclaimed the truth as it is in Jesus.
I. This enthusiasm was justifiable; his inertness was not. Moods like this might have led him to say that he was not meet to be an apostle; but when he reflected upon the truth, it filled and thrilled him. Now he was ready to preach to prince or peasant. Man was great in his possibilities. Sin was a terrific evil. He saw, too, the power of the gospel to save man. He believed that eternal life and death hinged on the acceptance or rejection of Jesus Christ. These were the springs of his enthusiasm, and they justified it. A man drops from an ocean steamer into the sea. You shout aloud for help to save him. The occasion justifies your excitement. A trivial occurrence would not warrant an outcry. Fanaticism is sometimes shown in its disproportionate zeal for unimportant matters; but Paul was pressed by an imminent and awful truth that menaced the ungodly. His enthusiasm would be ours if his convictions were.
II. There is an enormous power in such an enthusiasm.
1. So it proved at Corinth when Pauls soul flamed forth in eager utterance. The power of truth is measured oftentimes by the resistance it awakens. So bitterly did the Jews hate him, they were ready to invoke the aid of Rome--another hated power--to crush Paul. We ought not to be cast down because today atheists assault Christianity. This is but the answer of mans rebellious will to Gods authoritative voice. Were there no opposition to the Bible we might think that there was no power in it.
2. The work Paul did at Corinth showed that his enthusiasm had a vital energy. Even in that wicked city Paul gained much people to the Lord. Did we feel the pressure he felt, we, too, would be eloquent in our advocacy of the truth. The burden of the spirit is relieved by earnest speech; and this secret, subtle power of soul is contagious. Rome felt it, as thousands of martyrs gave up their lives for the Lord Jesus. Mediaeval ages felt it, as Christian missionaries carried to savage tribes the gospel that became the seed of Christian commonwealths. Germany and England felt this intrepid and heroic enthusiasm of the Reformers. Puritan civilisation, modern missionary enterprises--in short, all self-sacrifice founded on conviction of the truth of God, illustrate the abiding and triumphant power of this element of life.
III. We infer, then, what is our great lack. It is the pressure of the Word. We do not have it as we ought. We are trying to push a steamer across the sea, only using tepid water. Without this full and mighty pressure of consecrated enthusiasm, our example, teaching, and giving are all defective in impulse and in power.
IV. Therefore we see the duty of prayer for the holy ghost. Kindled as at Pentecost, out love will then make our life vocal with a Divine message. Our inertness will be rebuked as we contemplate the devotion of Paul under the pressure of his illuminated sense of truth and duty. Baptized anew, the Church will go on from conquest to conquest. (R. S. Storrs, D. D.)
Encouragements--Divine and human
1. In Act_18:5 we read that Paul was pressed in the spirit; in chap. 17:16 we read that Pauls spirit was stirred in him. In both cases it was not a little transient excitement, it was agony. Would God we could recall our early enthusiasm, our first burning hate of sin. We are familiar with it; we pat its black head. Paul was a man of conviction. He really believed that there was no other name given under heaven among men whereby they could be saved but the name of Christ. That faith will not lodge in the same heart with indifference.
2. In Act_17:6 we read, From henceforth I will go unto the Gentiles. Paul was not the man to lay hold upon the plough and to turn back; Paul would not even keep company with a young man who had broken faith with him in the Christian work. He went clear through with it to the end. Let us never give up the work. We may turn in vexation of soul from stolid unbelief and preach to ignorant and bewildered heathenism, but do not let the work have less of our energy because we have been disappointed in this or that particular circle.
3. A little encouragement would cheer us now. Here it is in Act_17:7-8. Paul entered into a certain mans house, named Justus, one that worshipped God--is there any greater phrase in all human speech? And Crispus, the chief ruler of the synagogue, believed, and many of the Corinthians thought they would believe too. Great men are the looking glasses into which ordinary men look to see what they ought to be like. What we want, then, is courage on the part of those whose influence is extensive. If you, the head of the house, could say, Let us worship God, many within the house might respond So be it. We must have leadership--may that leadership always be in an upward direction.
4. We have encouragement in Act_17:9 in another form. These words were not spoken once for all; they are spoken every day to every earnest labourer. God took the census of Corinth from a religious point of view. Apparently there was not a saint in the whole place. As Athens was wholly given to idolatry, so Corinth was, apparently, wholly given to sensuality. We cannot tell where Gods people are. The ancient prophet thought that he alone was left; but God told him that He knew of seven thousand who had not bowed the knee to Baal. God is looking for His own; and one of the most gracious surprises in store for the Church is that there will be more people in Gods pure home than it may have entered into the most generous human heart to conceive.
5. But Act_17:12 seems to contradict the vision. What a violent transition! At night, lost in the ecstasies of Divine fellowship, in the morning dragged before the judgment seat by an incensed mob! Is it thus that Providence contradicts itself? Apparently so, but not really. Evil shall be overruled for good; for the outcome was the Church at Corinth.
6. But we are told by Mr. Buckle, e.g., that Christian missions have failed. He sets side by side with missionary reports the testimony of impartial, independent, well-instructed travellers, who say that whilst many heathen populations have taken upon themselves Christian forms of worship, they are destitute of the spirit of Christianity. It is beautiful to notice the verdant simplicity of men who have just discovered that nominally converted and baptized people are not angels. Many of the Corinthians hearing, believed and were baptized; but impartial and independent travellers testify that even after that they were not so good as they might have been. Did Paul set them forth to be perfect men? Read his Epistles to the Corinthians. We must not give up missionary work simply because some impartial and independent travellers interrupt their geographical business by little scrutinies into the spirit and manners of people who had been baptized into the name of Christ. We do not expect a man to grow in a night. If they have been arrested; if their attention has been turned in the right direction; if they have expressed a desire to enter even into the veriest elementary lines of discipleship, let us be glad, and report at home that the battle is moving towards victory. Things are seen most by contrast. What is black is blackest when seen upon a white surface, and so many of our shortcomings and failures look very black because of the background of the holy Name which we profess to have accepted as our symbol and our hope--the spotless name of the Son of God! (J. Parker, D. D.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv4–7 4. He reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath. While…
4. He reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath. While toiling six days in the week in this strange city, on the Sabbath, according to his custom, he preached.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v5 Act_18:5. Pressed in spirit.—According to the oldest authorities this…
CRITICAL REMARKS
Act_18:5. Pressed in spirit.—According to the oldest authorities this should be was held together by the word, συνείχετο τῷ λόγῳ—i.e., either earnestly occupied with the business of preaching (Bengel, Holtzmann, and others), or wholly seized upon and constrained by the word within him (R.V.).
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Act_18:6. Your blood be upon your own heads.—Compare 2Sa_1:16; 1Ki_2:33; Eze_3:18; Eze_3:20; Eze_33:4; Eze_33:6; Eze_33:8.
Act_18:7. Justus.—The oldest MSS. waver between Titus Justus (R.V.), Titius Justus, and simply Justus, who, however named, is not to be identified with Titus (Wieseler).
Act_18:9. By a vision.—Compare Act_16:9; Act_23:11. The words addressed to Paul remind one of Isa_62:1.
Act_18:11. A year and six months.—Paul’s whole sojourn in Corinth was three years (Act_19:31).
HOMILETICAL ANALYSIS.—Act_18:5-11
A Year and Six Months in Corinth; or, Three Significant Experiences
I. Renewed activity in preaching.—
1. Brought about by the coming of old friends. Though Paul was of more heroic mould than to sink beneath the pressure of external circumstances, however severe (Php_4:13), though he could testify for Christ without other aid than that Christ extended, whether in the Areopagus before Athenian philosophers (Act_17:22), or at Cæsarea before Festus and Agrippa (Act_26:1), or at Rome before Nero (2Ti_4:16), he was nevertheless in a high degree dependent on the sympathy of others. During the absence of Timothy and Silas he felt lonely both in Athens and in Corinth, while there is good ground for thinking that his strength was at this time somewhat weakened through his thorn or stake in the flesh (1Co_2:3), and perhaps also through the severe privations he chose to endure rather than accept support from his friends in Corinth, where his enemies were numerous (2Co_11:8; 2Co_12:13 et seq.; 1Co_9:12). Consequently, though he never for a moment dreamt of abandoning his holy work of preaching, he nevertheless toiled along as if a heavy burden lay upon his spirit. Accordingly when, after the lapse probably of some weeks, or it might be months, Timothy and Silas arrived from Macedonia, the former from Thessalonica bringing cheering tidings of the faith and charity of his dear friends in that city and perhaps also such material assistance from them as helped to relieve him from the necessity of manual labour (1Th_3:6), and the latter from Berœa (Act_17:14), possibly with equally cheering intelligence about the Church there, and with gifts of love from Philippi (Php_4:15; 2Co_11:9), the load lifted from his heart so that he bounded forward in his work with revived alacrity and zeal, as if the word had seized upon him (see “Critical Remarks”) and constrained him with a holy violence, impelling him to greater diligence, fervour, and prayerfulness than before (compare 1Co_9:16).
2. Manifested in special efforts to gain his countrymen. Though designated specially as the minister of Christ to the Gentiles, Paul never could forget the fact that the Jews were his kinsmen according to the flesh, or neglect an opportunity of seeking their salvation. Hence this fresh outburst of missionary zeal which seized upon him was directed specially to them. With redoubled energy and impassioned earnestness he laid before them the proofs from Scripture that Jesus was the Christ. (For the manner of his preaching see 1Co_2:4; and for its matter 1Co_15:3.) Not that he neglected others; but these were his first care (Luk_24:47; Rom_1:16).
II. Renewed opposition by the Jews.—
1. Its secret spring. Nothing local, or accidental, or personal to Paul such as his “contemptible presence or speech” (2Co_10:10); but the innate hostility of the human heart to a gospel of salvation by grace and through faith without works (1Co_2:14), and the irreconcilable antagonism of the Jewish heart to everything and every one that challenged the validity of Moses’ law, as understood and practised by them, or accused them of ignorance and sin in rejecting Jesus as Messiah.
2. Its bitter violence. Like defeated controversialists generally when they cannot answer their opponents, and like their co-religionists at Antioch (Act_13:45) and afterwards at Ephesus (Act_19:9), they betook themselves to abusive language, railing against the apostle and blaspheming God and Christ (compare 1Co_12:3).
3. Its necessary consequence. Paul discontinued his efforts to persuade them.
(1) His symbolic action. “He shook,” or shook out, “his raiment”—i.e., shook out the dust from its folds, as in Antioch of Pisidia he had shaken the dust from his feet (Act_13:51), for a testimony against them.
(2). His solemn declaration. “Your blood be upon your own heads; I am pure; from henceforth I will go unto the Gentiles.” By this he gave them to understand that the responsibility for their destruction, both as a people and as individuals, would rest entirely with themselves, that he regarded himself as in no way involved in their guilt, and that henceforth he would preach exclusively to the Gentiles (compare Act_20:6; Eze_33:5-9).
(3) His public withdrawal. From that day forward he no more frequented their synagogue, no more proclaimed to them the words of eternal life, no more invited them to believe. Having made their election, they were now by him left to the tender mercies of Heaven. So far from being again pressed to accept salvation, they would no more be troubled. Practically by Christ’s ambassador they were judicially abandoned.
III. Renewed consolation from God.—
1. The opening of a new door. When the synagogue was closed against the apostle, the house of a Greek proselyte, Justus, or Titus Justus (R.V.), opened to give him welcome, as afterwards at Ephesus the school of Tyrannus was placed at his disposal, when excluded from the synagogue (Act_19:9). There does not appear to be sufficient ground for identifying this individual who befriended the apostle in Corinth with Titus, or supposing that Paul left Aquila’s house and went to lodge with Justus. What Luke designs to say is rather this, that while Paul continued lodging and working with Aquila, he preached on the Sabbaths in the house of Justus, who resided hard by the synagogue, so that the Jews and proselytes, if they chose, might still come to hear him. In the action of Justus Paul would undoubtedly delight to see the guiding hand of his glorified Master (Rev_3:7).
2. The accession of a new friend. Whether Justus was at this time a believer or not cannot with certainty be inferred from Luke’s words. If, as is most likely, he was not, the probability is that he ultimately became a convert. But the withdrawal or exclusion of Paul from the synagogue led to the decision of Crispus its ruler to cast in his lot with the new cause, in which act he was followed by his whole house. Already Paul had gathered converts in Corinth, “of humble and most probably of slavish origin,” the first of these being—not Epænetus (Rom_16:5), where the true reading is of Asia—but the household of Stephanas (1Co_16:15). The conversion, however, of one so prominent as Crispus and of his family, whom, as well as the household of Stephanas, Paul baptised with his own hand, either because of their importance or because of the absence of his assistants (1Co_1:15-16), could not fail to exert a powerful and happy influence on the side of the gospel and on the heart of Paul. Most likely this contributed to the success of Paul’s ministry in Justus’s house, many of the Corinthians who heard him there having believed and been baptised, which again led to the prolongation of his ministry in Corinth for a year and six months.
3. The enjoyment of a new vision. In some respects this differed from each of the other visions granted to Paul. The vision at Damascus (Act_9:12), like that in the temple at Jerusalem (Act_22:18), occurred at midday; this, like the vision at Troas (Act_16:9), took place at night. In the vision at Troas a man of Macedonia appeared; whereas in this, as in the Damascus and Jerusalem visions, it was the form of the glorified Redeemer that was seen. The purpose of the Jerusalem vision was to counsel Paul to flee from the city; the object of this was to make him stay in Corinth.
(1) The Lord exhorted him to banish fear and preach the gospel with all boldness: “Be not afraid, but speak,” etc., a suitable word for one whose ministry had been up till then carried on “in weakness and in fear and in much trembling” (1Co_2:3).
(2) The Lord assured him of His constant presence and protection, saying, “I am with thee, and no man shall set on thee to hurt thee,” or if they do their purpose shall be defeated (compare Act_18:12-17). The like promise had Christ given to the twelve (Mat_28:20).
(3) The Lord revealed to him that many would be converted by his ministry: “I have much people in this city,” not already, but about to be converted, a cheering announcement for one who was probably beginning to think his labours in the gospel might be in vain.
Learn.—
1. The impassioned earnestness with which the word of God should be preached.
2. The certainty that a faithful minister, should he not convert others, will at least clear himself.
8. The fearful retribution that will eventually overtake those who oppose themselves and blaspheme.
4. The justification of preachers in leaving those who persistently refuse to accept the gospel.
5. The extreme unlikelihood of faithful preaching having no saving result.
6. The consolation God can give His discouraged servants.
7. The assurance that such have of God’s presence with, and assistance of them in their work.
HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS
Act_18:6. “I am Clean”; or Thoughts About Ministerial Responsibility.—A minister may hold himself free from responsibility for his hearers.
I. When he has faithfully preached the gospel to them.—
1. Clearly, so that they can understand it.
2. Fully, so that they are made acquainted with the whole counsel of God contained in it.
3. Fervently, so that they are impressed with a sense of its importance and urgency.
II. When he has solemnly warned them of their danger in rejecting it.—When he has reminded them—
1. Of their guilt in refusing to believe.
2. Of their certain condemnation unless they do believe.
3. Of the possibility of being abandoned because of declining to believe.
III. When he has exhausted every available means for securing their acceptance of the truth.—Though Paul turned himself to the Gentiles he did not entirely desert the Jews. They were still at liberty to visit the house of Justus. Doubtless many of them did this. So ministers should never cease to labour even for those who reject and oppose the truth.
Act_18:8. The Conversion of Crispus.
I. Unexpected.—Because of his being a Jew and its occurring after Paul had left the synagogue.
II. Scriptural.—Brought about by the preaching of the word.
III. Influential.—Leading to the conversion of all his house and of many of his neighbours.
IV. Sincere.—Proved by being baptised and opening his house to Paul.
Act_18:10. God’s Hope for His Workers.—“For I have much people in this city.” It is very evident that the apostle came to Corinth in a state of great depression. His work had seemed almost a failure in Athens; and should he fail likewise at Corinth? He says afterwards, writing of his entrance among them, “I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling” (1Co_2:3). Nor was his early experience in that city calculated to dispel his fears; for the Jews, to whom first he preached the gospel, bitterly opposed, and blasphemed. It was, therefore, with a heavy heart that he turned to the Gentiles—such Gentiles as had mocked at the gospel in the city which he had just left.
I. Both human instinct and Divine guidance had led the apostle Paul to concentrate his efforts on the populations of great cities.—Damascus, Antioch, Philippi, Thessalonica, Athens—these had already been his spheres of labour; and Ephesus, Jerusalem, and Rome were to feel his power. Meanwhile, the great city of Corinth was to absorb his time and care for some eighteen months. Great cities have played a very important part in the history of the world, both in ancient and in modern times. Nineveh and Babylon, Memphis and Thebes, Athens, Carthage, Rome—how much do these names stand for, as representative of the changing fortunes of the world in the ages of the past! And to-day great cities are of more and more account, as affording home and industry and power to the thronging populations. Great cities have had, and have still, their various objects of interest and wonderment, affording almost inexhaustible material for the entertainment of the curious, and the research and study of more serious minds. So Corinth had its Isthmus—called “the bridge of the sea,” and “the gate of the Peloponnesus”—across which, about the time of the apostle’s visit, the Emperor Nero attempted to cut the canal which, left incomplete through all the centuries, has just been opened from sea to sea; the great rock Acropolis, rising abruptly from the shore to the height of two thousand feet; the two harbours, of Cenchreæ and Lechæum; the temple of Neptune, hard by; and all that beauty of situation and structure which led to its being called “the Star of Greece.”
II. But though the apostle would not be insensible to these things, the attraction of Corinth, as of the other great cities that he visited, was not in any way external or adventitious greatness or charm.—Nor is it any such attraction that makes the great cities of to-day of so absorbing an interest to the thoughtful mind. Said Dr. Johnson, of the London of a hundred and thirty years ago, “If you wish to have a just notion of the magnitude of this city, you must not be satisfied with seeing its great streets and squares, but must survey the innumerable little lanes and courts. It is not in the showy evolutions of buildings, but in the multiplicity of human habitations which are crowded together, that the wonderful immensity of London consists.” And his biographer, commenting on the remark, says, wisely enough, “I have often amused myself with thinking how different a place London is to different people. They whose narrow minds are contracted to the consideration of some one particular pursuit view it only through that medium. A politician thinks of it merely as the seat of government in its different departments; a grazier, as a vast market for cattle; a mercantile man, as a place where a prodigious deal of business is done upon, ’Change; a dramatic enthusiast, as the grand scene of theatrical entertainments; a man of pleasure, as an assemblage of taverns. But the intellectual man is struck with it, as comprehending the whole of human life in all its variety, the contemplation of which is inexhaustible.” So it was the quick, busy, eager, multifarious human life of Corinth that made the city of such interest to the apostle; that made it, if we may say so, of such interest to Him who spoke to Paul of the “much people” there.
III. It was not, however, even the human interest of Corinth, under such aspects as would present themselves to other visitors, that made the supreme demand on the apostle’s regard and care; nor, vast and various as they were, did these more secular interests of the city call forth the emphatic declaration of the Lord Christ. But there was one interest which was indeed supreme, in the regard alike of Christ and of Paul; an interest which, wherever men do congregate, is still so paramount in the eyes of all who have learned anything of the true import of human history and human destiny—the relation of men to duty, to God, to eternity. And it is the vision of these invisible but so real relations, men’s relations to the infinite, that invests with so thrilling an interest all the doings, and aims, and desires of the multitudes that make up the teeming life of our great cities.
IV. This brings us to what is indeed God’s hope, as held forth in gracious encouragement to all who work in behalf of the gospel of the kingdom for their fellow-men.—God’s hope? And who but the Divine Christ could have had hope of Corinth? So busy, so wealthy, so gay—and so utterly wicked, in its unblushing sensuality of sin, that “to Corinthianise” meant to give one’s self up to the worst abominations of immorality! But, “I have much people here,” said Christ; for, through all their eager alertness of industry and commercial enterprise, and beneath their superficial gaiety, and even deep down in the reeking corruption of the people’s sin, did He not see that many hearts were weary of self-seeking, and aching despite their gaiety, and sick of the sin to which, nevertheless, they were selling themselves body and soul? Ah, their very despair of any good was the secret of Christ’s hope for that people. For over against their utmost sin and shame the apostle was to set forth God’s utmost and most holy love, as manifested in the Cross. Nor could any inferior power avail to move them. “Christ for England, and England for Christ”—this must be our watchword, and we shall not watch, and work and wait in vain. And in like manner, when we look out upon the seething millions of the great cities of the world, and equally when we regard the needs of those who live in smaller towns, and in villages, and in remote, solitary places, we must listen, as Christ says, “I have much people here.”—T. F. Lockyer, B.A.
Act_18:5-10. Great Things in Corinth.
I. Fervent preaching.—Constrained by the word Paul testified.
II. Violent unbelief.—On the part of the Jews.
III. Solemn judgment—Pronounced against the opposers. They were self-destroyed.
IV. Glorious mercy.—The gospel offered to the Gentiles.
V. Unexpected deliverance.—Justus’s house opened.
VI. Marvellous success.—“Many hearing believed, and were baptised.”
VII. Heavenly consolation.—Paul’s vision of the Lord by night.
Act_18:9-10. Thoughts for the Night of Ministerial Despondency.
I. The heavenly master from whom the faithful minister holds his commission. The Lord (compare Act_27:23).
II. The holy duty which that Master has imposed on His servants. To speak and hold not their peace (compare Act_5:20; Isa_58:1).
III. The encouraging arguments against fear supplied by the Master to His servants.
1. His presence with them (compare Mat_28:20).
2. His protection of them (Mat_16:18).
3. His preparation for them. Having souls waiting to receive their word.
4. His prospering of them. Promising their labours should be successful.
Paul’s Midnight Vision at Corinth; or, The Lord’s interview with His servant.
I. A sublime manifestation: The Lord’s appearance to Paul.—
1. The reality of this appearance. Unless on à priori grounds of objection to the supernatural the historic credibility of what is here narrated cannot be assailed.
2. The timeliness of this appearance. It came when Paul was in some degree depressed. Man’s extremity is ever God’s opportunity.
3. The object of this appearance—to cheer the heart and embolden the spirit of the apostle.
II. A magnificent exhortation: the Lord’s commandment to Paul.—
1. Not to be afraid. Either of himself suffering injury or of his cause suffering defeat. Paul, though habitually courageous and hopeful, obviously laboured at the moment under some apprehension as to both of these contingencies.
2. But to speak. Manfully, openly, continuously, holding not his peace, but, like an old Hebrew prophet, crying aloud and sparing not, lifting up his voice like a trumpet, showing the Jews their transgression and the Gentiles their sins (Isa_58:1).
III. A cheering consolation: the Lord’s assurance to Paul.—
1. Of companionship. “I am with thee”: a promise which had been given of old to Abraham (Gen_26:3), to Isaac (Gen_26:24), to Jacob (Act_28:15), to Moses (Exo_33:14), to Joshua (Jos_1:5), to Israel in exile (Isa_43:2); a promise which had been renewed to the disciples by Christ before His ascension (Mat_28:20).
2. Of protection. “No man shall set on thee to harm thee.” This promise also had been given to ancient Israel collectively (Psa_46:1; Pro_2:7; Isa_32:2; Isa_32:18; Isa_33:16; Isa_33:20; Zec_2:5; Zec_2:8), was renewed to the Church of Christ (Luk_21:18), and is now repeated to the apostle.
3. Of success. “I have much people in this city.” As Elijah of old, in a time of despondency, had been assured that Jehovah had seven thousand faithful adherents who had never bowed the knee to Baal (1Ki_19:18), so is Paul now informed that Jesus had many souls in Corinth who were only waiting to be gathered into His kingdom by the preaching of His gospel.
Act_18:11. The Secret of Ministerial Success.
I. Much prayer.
II. Much patience.
III. Much trust in God.
IV. Much diligence in work.—Quesnel.
The Word of God.
I. “In complete sense the Word of God is alone the living, historical person, Jesus Christ, understood and explained in the Divine spirit, and according to His own word and will. On this account are also the words and discourses of Jesus, since these are inseparable from His person and activity, to be included and considered as the Word of God.
II. “Whilst, however, Jesus Himself in His person, in His works and words, as in His sufferings and death, is the Word of God, at the same time also in a derived sense is the proclamation of Him the Word of God. That is, the gospel of Christ and of His kingdom (Act_28:31), at first only orally diffused, later also laid down in writing, becomes recognised in Christendom as the Word of God in a special sense, in distinction from all preparatory, prophetic words of God as from all sorts of subordinate revelation. In this sense has Jesus Himself often and clearly spoken, and the whole New Testament agrees therewith. This gospel is, in its contents, firm and unassailable, homogeneous and all-embracing; in its formulation manifold and many-formed, as every really living, spiritual great thing is; and exactly, because it is homogeneous and living, also in every individual part somehow germinally contained. Hence it can be shortly described as the divine and gracious will which has appeared in Christ, as the proclamation of God’s salvation work, as the Word of Christ the crucified (1Co_1:23), as the Word of grace (Act_14:3; Act_14:7; Act_20:24; Act_20:32), as the Gospel of grace and repentance (Act_20:21), as the Word of reconciliation (2Co_5:19), or as the Revelation of the divine mystery (1Co_4:1; Eph_6:19); or otherwise designated according to some one particular item of its contents. According to its peculiar contents, therefore, is it not so much a theoretic doctrine, as a joyous message adapted to the actualities of life, and consists principally of promises and assurances of heavenly rights and possessions, conjoined with admonitions and serious warnings which correspond to those gifts and promises.”
III. “Consequently in derived sense is every oral and written proclamation, which teaches men to understand the person and work of Christ, inasmuch as it prepares them for this, speaks of it, leads to it, and teaches men to use it, Revelation or the Word of God. Hence also of preaching in public worship, as of every written or printed exposition of the gospel, the expression Word of God can be used. But above all does the title Word of God belong both to the whole of the Old and New Testament Scriptures, and, according to its inner sense or its understanding in graduated fashion, to particular scriptures or to their particular expositions. This meaning of the Biblical canon also becomes through this clear and practical, that in the public church doctrinal preaching the Holy Scriptures must in some way be constantly assumed asits basis.”—Bornemann, §47.
Act_18:5-11. Paul’s preaching at Corinth.
I. The place of his preaching.—
1. The Jewish synagogue. According to his custom. Dictated probably by three motives.
(1) To find a proper starting ground for his work. The Jews knew the Scriptures, and were looking for the Messiah.
(2) To secure the conversion of his countrymen. Paul loved his kinsmen, and longed for their conversion.
(3) To prevent misunderstanding of the nature of Christianity. Christianity not antagonistic to, but development and completion of Old Testament religion.
2. The house of Justus. To this Paul withdrew when expelled from synagogue. In so doing Paul
(1) followed the example of Christ;
(2) showed that Christianity was not confined to special places (Joh_4:21); and
(3) kept within earshot of his countrymen.
II. The subject of his preaching.—That Jesus was the Christ, Jesus Christ and Him crucified (1Co_3:2), which signified—
1. That Jesus of Nazareth had been the Messiah promised to the fathers—to Abraham as a seed, to David as a son, to Israel as the Lamb of God.
2. That salvation was attainable only through His Cross. Not through his teaching alone, though “Never man spake like this man” (Joh_7:46), or through His example alone, though “He left us an example that we should walk in His steps” (1Pe_2:21), but through His blood (Eph_1:7).
III. The manner of his preaching.—
1. Biblical. Out of the Scriptures. The proper basis of all right preaching.
2. Reasoning. Addressing himself to the intellect. Paul knew the value of great ideas. The road to the heart lies through the understanding.
3. Fervent. Paul was no drone or dullard, no merely formal talker or polite essay reader, but a speaker aglow with holy enthusiasm.
4. Fearless. Resulting from
(1) his confidence in the message he delivered;
(2) his reliance upon God’s promise of protection; and
(3) his hope of ultimate success.
IV. The result of his preaching.—Twofold.
1. Opposition. Jews resisted. Not difficult to see why. If Paul was right then Jesus had been their Messiah, and they had been guilty of awful sin in rejecting Him.
2. Success.
(1) He gained a friend in Justus.
(2) He secured a large number of converts, amongst whom were Aquila and Priscilla, Titus Justus, Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue, Sosthenes, Crispus’s successor, Stephanas and his house, Gaius, Paul’s host, Erastus, the city chamberlain.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain On vv4, 5, 6, 8, 9 4. Felicitously, there is a large synagogue of Jews…
4. Felicitously, there is a large synagogue of Jews at Corinth, and it is too far from Northern Greece for his persecutors to follow him. So he works all the week and preaches every Sabbath in the synagogue.
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv5–6
Acts
PAUL AT CORINTH
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‘CONSTRAINED BY THE WORD’
Act 18:5.
The Revised Version, in concurrence with most recent authorities, reads, instead of ‘pressed in the spirit,’ ‘constrained by the word.’ One of these alterations depends on a diversity of reading, the other on a difference of translation. The one introduces a significant difference of meaning; the other is rather a change of expression. The word rendered here ‘pressed,’ and by the Revised Version ‘constrained,’ is employed in its literal use in ‘Master, the multitude throng Thee and press Thee,’ and in its metaphorical application in ‘The love of Christ constraineth us.’ There is not much difference between ‘constrained’ and ‘pressed,’ but there is a large difference between ‘in the spirit’ and ‘by the word.’ ‘Pressed in the spirit’ simply describes a state of feeling or mind; ‘constrained by the word’ declares the force which brought about that condition of pressure or constraint. What then does ‘constrained by the word’ refer to? It indicates that Paul’s message had a grip of him, and held him hard, and forced him to deliver it.
One more preliminary remark is that our text evidently brings this state of mind of the Apostle, and the coming of his two friends Silas and Timothy, into relation as cause and effect. He had been alone in Corinth. His work of late had not been encouraging. He had been comparatively silent there, and had spent most of his time in tent-making. But when his two friends came a cloud was lifted off his spirit, and he sprang back again, as it were, to his old form and to his old work.
Now if we take that point of view with regard to the passage before us, I think we shall find that it yields valuable lessons, some of which I wish to try to enforce now.
I. Let me ask you to look with me at the downcast Apostle.
‘Downcast,’ you say; ‘is not that an unworthy word to use about a minister of Jesus Christ inspired as Paul was?’ By no means. We shall very much mistake both the nature of inspiration and the character of this inspired Apostle, if we do not recognise that he was a man of many moods and tremulously susceptible to external influences. Such music would never have come from him if his soul had not been like an Aeolian harp, hung in a tree and vibrating in response to every breeze. And so we need not hesitate to speak of the Apostle’s mood, as revealed to us in the passage before us, as being downcast.
Now notice that in the verses preceding my text his conduct is extremely abnormal and unlike his usual procedure. He goes into Corinth, and he does next to nothing in evangelistic work. He repairs to the synagogue once a week, and talks to the Jews there. But that is all. The notice of his reasoning in the synagogue is quite subordinate to the notice that he was occupied in finding a lodging with another pauper Jew and stranger in the great city, and that these two poor men went into a kind of partnership, and tried to earn a living by hard work. Such procedure makes a singular contrast to Paul’s usual methods in a strange city.
Now the reason for that slackening of impulse and comparative cessation of activity is not far to seek. The first Epistle to Thessalonica was written immediately after these two brethren rejoined Paul. And how does the Apostle describe in that letter his feelings before they came? He speaks of ‘all our distress and affliction.’ He tells that he was tortured by anxiety as to how the new converts in Thessalonica were getting on, and could not forbear to try to find out whether they were still standing steadfast. Again in the first Epistle to the Corinthians, you will find that there, looking back to this period, he describes his feelings in similar fashion and says: ‘I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling.’ And if you look forward a verse or two in our chapter you will see that a vision came to Paul, which presupposes that some touch of fear, and some temptation to silence, were busy in his heart. For God shapes His communications according to our need, and would not have said, ‘Do not be afraid, and hold not thy peace, but speak,’ unless there had been a danger both of Paul’s being frightened and of his being dumb.
And what thus brought a cloud over his sky? A little exercise of historical imagination will very sufficiently answer that. A few weeks before, in obedience, as he believed, to a direct divine command, Paul had made a plunge, and ventured upon an altogether new phase of work. He had crossed into Europe, and from the moment that he landed at the harbour of Philippi, up to the time when he took refuge in some quiet little room in Corinth, he had had nothing but trouble and danger and disappointment. The prison at Philippi, the riots that hounded him out of Thessalonica, the stealthy, hurried escape from Beroea, the almost entire failure of his first attempt to preach the Gospel to Greeks in Athens, his loneliness, and the strangeness of his surroundings in the luxurious, wicked, wealthy Greek city of Corinth-all these things weighed on him, and there is no wonder that his spirits went down, and he felt that now he must lie fallow for a time and rest, and pull himself together again.
So here we have, in this great champion of the faith, in this strong runner of the Christian race, in this chief of men, an example of the fluctuation of mood, the variation in the way in which we look at our duties and our obligations and our difficulties, the slackening of the impulse which dominates our lives, that are too familiar to us all. It brings Paul nearer us to feel that he, too, knew these ups and downs. The force that drove this meteor through the darkness varied, as the force that impels us varies to our consciousness. It is the prerogative of God to be immutable; men have their moods and their fluctuations. Kindled lights flicker; the sun burns steadily. An Elijah to-day beards Ahab and Jezebel and all their priests, and to-morrow hides his head in his hands, and says, ‘Take me away, I am not better than my fathers.’ There will be ups and down in the Christian vigour of our lives, as well as in all other regions, so long as men dwell in this material body and are surrounded by their present circumstances.
Brethren, it is no small part of Christian wisdom and prudence to recognise this fact, both in order that it may prevent us from becoming unduly doubtful of ourselves when the ebb tide sets in on our souls, and also in order that we may lay to heart this other truth, that because these moods and changes of aspect and of vigour will come to us, therefore the law of life must be effort, and the duty of every Christian man be to minimise, in so far as possible, the fluctuations which, in some degree, are inevitable. No human hand has ever drawn an absolutely straight line. That is the ideal of the mathematician, but all ours are crooked. But we may indefinitely diminish the magnitude of the curves. No two atoms are so close together as that there is no film between them. No human life has ever been an absolutely continuous, unbroken series of equally holy and devoted thoughts and acts, but we may diminish the intervals between kindred states, and may make our lives so far uniform as that to a bystander they shall look like the bright circle, which a brand whirled round in the air makes the impression of, on the eye that beholds. We shall have times of brightness and of less brilliancy, of vigour and of consequent reaction and exhaustion. But Christianity has, for one of its objects, to help us to master our moods, and to bring us nearer and nearer, by continual growth, to the steadfast, immovable attitude of those whose faith is ever the same.
Do not forget the plain lesson which comes from the incident before us-viz., that the wisest thing that a man can do, when he feels that the wheels of his religious being are driving heavily, is to set himself doggedly to the plain, homely work of daily life. Paul did not sit and bemoan himself because he felt this slackening of impulse, but he went away to Aquila, and said, ‘Let us set to work and make camel’s-hair cloth and tents.’ Be thankful for your homely, prosaic, secular, daily task. You do not know from how many sickly fancies it saves you, and how many breaches in the continuity of your Christian feeling it may bridge over. It takes you away from thinking about yourselves, and sometimes you cannot think about anything less profitably. So stick to your work; and if ever you feel, as Paul did, ‘cast down,’ be sure that the workshop, the office, the desk, the kitchen will prevent you from being ‘destroyed,’ if you give yourselves to the plain duties which no moods alter, but which can alter a great many moods.
II. And now note the ‘constraining word.’
I have already said that the return of the two, who had been sent to see how things were going with the recent converts in the infant Churches, brought the Apostle good tidings, and so lifted off a great load of anxiety from his heart. No wonder! He had left raw recruits under fire, with no captain, and he might well doubt whether they would keep their ranks. But they did. So the pressure was lifted off, and the pressure being lifted off, spontaneously the old impulse gripped him once more; like a spring which leaps back to its ancient curve when some alien force is taken from it. It must have been a very deep and a very habitual impulse, which thus instantly reasserted itself the moment that the pressure of anxiety was taken out of the way.
The word constrained him. What to do? To declare it. Paul’s example brings up two thoughts-that that impulse may vary at times, according to the pressure of circumstances, and may even be held in abeyance for a while; and that if a man is honestly and really a Christian, as soon as the incumbent pressure is taken away, he will feel, ‘Necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is me if I preach not the Gospel.’ For though Paul’s sphere of work was different from ours, his obligation to work and his impulse to work were such as are, or should be, common to all Christians. The impulse to utter the word that we believe and live by seems to me to be, in its very nature, inseparable from earnest Christian faith. All emotion demands expression; and if a man has never felt that he must let his Christian faith have vent, it is a very bad sign. As certainly as fermentation or effervescence demands outgush, so certainly does emotion demand expression. We all know that. The same impulse that makes a mother bend over her babe with unmeaning words and tokens that seem to unsympathetic onlookers foolish, ought to influence all Christians to speak the Name they love. All conviction demands expression. There may be truths which have so little bearing upon human life that he who perceives them feels little obligation to say anything about them. But these are the exceptions; and the more weighty and the more closely affecting human interests anything that we have learned to believe as truth is, the more do we feel in our hearts that, in making us its believers, it has made us its apostles. Christ’s saying, ‘What ye hear in the ear, that preach ye on the housetops,’ expresses a universal truth which is realised in many regions, and ought to be most emphatically realised in the Christian. For surely of all the truths that men can catch a glimpse of, or grapple to their hearts, or store in their understandings, there are none which bring with them such tremendous consequences, and therefore are of so solemn import to proclaim to all the children of men, as the truth, which we profess we have received, of personal salvation through Jesus Christ.
If there never had been a single commandment to that effect, I know not how the Christian Church or the Christian individual could have abstained from declaring the great and sweet Name to which it and he owe so much. I do not care to present this matter as a commandment, nor to speak now of obligation or responsibility. The impulse is what I would fix your attention upon. It is inseparable from the Christian life. It may vary in force, as we see in the incident before us. It will vary in grip, according as other circumstances and duties insist upon being attended to. The form in which it is yielded to will vary indefinitely in individuals. But if they are Christian people it is always there.
Well then, what about the masses of so-called Christians who feel nothing of any such constraining force? And what about the many who feel enough of it to make them also feel that they are wrong in not yielding to it, but not enough to make their conduct be influenced by it? Brethren, I venture to believe that the measure in which this impulse to speak the word and use direct efforts for somebody’s conversion is felt by Christians, is a very fair test of the depth of their own religion. If a vessel is half empty it will not run over. If it is full to the brim, the sparkling treasure will fall on all sides. A weak plant may never push its green leaves above the ground, but a strong one will rise into the light. A spark may be smothered in a heap of brushwood, but a steady flame will burn its way out. If this word has not a grip of you, impelling you to its utterance, I would have you not to be too sure that you have a grip of it.
III. Lastly, we have here the witness to the word.
‘He was constrained by the word, testifying.’ Now I do not know whether it is imposing too much meaning upon a non-significant difference of expression, if I ask you to note the difference between that phrase and the one which describes his previous activity: ‘He reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and tried to persuade’ the Jews and the Greeks, but when the old impulse came back in new force, reasoning was far too cold a method, and Paul took to testifying. Whether that be so or no, mark that the witness of one’s own personal conviction and experience is the strongest weapon that a Christian can use. I do not despise the place of reasoning, but arguments do not often change opinions; they never change hearts. Logic and controversial discoursing may ‘prepare the way of the Lord,’ but it is ‘in the wilderness.’ But when a man calls aloud, ‘Come and hear all ye, and I will declare what God hath done for my soul’; or when he tells his brother, ‘We have found the Messias’; or when he sticks to ‘One thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see,’ it is difficult for any one to resist, and impossible for any one to answer, that way of testifying,
It is a way that we can all adopt if we will. Christian men and women can all say such things. I do not forget that there are indirect ways of spreading the Gospel. Some of you think that you do enough when you give your money and your interest in order to diffuse it. You can buy a substitute in the militia, but you cannot buy a substitute in Christ’s service. You have each some congregation to which you can speak, if it is no larger than Paul’s-namely, two people, Aquila and Priscilla. What talks they would have in their lodging, as they plaited the wisps of black hair into rough cloth, and stitched the strips into tents! Aquila was not a Christian when Paul picked him up, but he became one very soon; and it was the preaching in the workshop, amidst the dust, that made him one. If we long to speak about Christ we shall find plenty of people to speak to. ‘Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord.’
Now, dear friends, I have only one word more. I have no doubt there are some among us who have been saying, ‘This sermon does not apply to me at all.’ Does it not? If it does not, what does that mean? It means that you have not the first requisite for spreading the word- viz. personal faith in the word. It means that you have put away, or at least neglected to take in, the word and the Saviour of whom it speaks, into your own lives. But it does not mean that you have got rid of the word thereby. It will not in that case lay the grip of which I have been speaking upon you, but it will not let you go. It will lay on you a far more solemn and awful clutch, and like a jailer with his hand on the culprit’s shoulder, will ‘constrain’ you into the presence of the Judge. You can make it a savour of life unto life, or of death unto death. And though you do not grasp it, it grasps and holds you. ‘The word that I speak unto him, the same shall judge him at the last day.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain On vv4–11 4, 5. Notwithstanding all the discouragements of his situation,…
4, 5. Notwithstanding all the discouragements of his situation, he devoted the Sabbaths, and whatever portion of the week his manual labor would permit, to the great work. (4) " But he discoursed every Sabbath in the synagogue, and persuaded both Jews and Greeks. (5) And when Silas and Timothy came down from Macedonia, Paul was pressed in spirit, and testified to the Jews that Jesus is the Christ. " It will be recollected by the reader, that Silas and Timothy, whose arrival is here mentioned, had tarried in Berea, and that Paul had sent back word to them, by the brethren who conducted him to Athens, to rejoin him as soon as possible. He had also "waited for them in Athens," before his speech in the Areopagus. We would suppose, from Luke's narrative, that they failed to overtake him there, and now first rejoined him in Corinth. But Paul supplies an incident in the First Epistle to the Thessalonians, which corrects this supposition. He says: "When we could no longer forbear, we thought it good to be left alone in Athens, and sent Timothy to establish you and to comfort you concerning your faith." This shows that Timothy, at least, had actually rejoined him in Athens, and had been sent back to learn the condition of the congregation in Thessalonica. His present arrival in Corinth, therefore, was not from his original stay in Berea; but from a recent visit to Thessalonica. Probably Silas had remained till now in Berea.
The arrival of Silas and Timothy brings us to a new period in the life of Paul, the period of his letter-writing. We have already made some use of his epistles to throw light upon the somewhat elliptical narrative before us; but we shall henceforth have them as cotemporary documents, and will be able to fill up from them many blanks in Paul's personal history. The First Epistle to the Thessalonians was written from Corinth soon after the arrival of Timothy, as is proved by the concurrence of the two facts, that, on the return of Silas and Timothy, as seen in the text, just quoted, they found Paul in Corinth, and that, in the epistle itself, Paul speaks of their arrival as having just taken place at the time of writing. Several statements in this epistle throw additional light upon the state of Paul's feelings during his first labors in Corinth. He was not only "pressed in spirit," as stated by Luke, "in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling," as he himself says to the Corinthians but he was racked with uncontrollable anxiety concerning the brethren in Thessalonica, for whom he would have been willing to sacrifice his own life, and who were now suffering the severest persecution. The good report brought from them by Silas and Timothy gave him much joy, but it was joy in the midst of distress. He says: "When Timothy came to us from you, and brought us good tidings of your faith and love, and that you have remembrance of us always, desiring greatly to see us, as we also to see you, therefore, brethren, we were comforted over you in all our affliction and distress by your faith: for now we live, if you stand fast in the Lord." It was, therefore, with a zeal newly kindled from almost utter despair, by their good report from Thessalonica and the arrival of his fellow-laborers, that he now so "earnestly testified to the Jews that Jesus is the Christ."
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv5, 7 Or, constrained by the Word. Cf. 2Co 5:14.
pressed
Or, constrained by the Word. Cf. 2Co 5:14.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v7 Success in preaching to the Gentiles:
Success in preaching to the Gentiles:
v. 7. And he departed thence, and entered into a certain man’s house named Justus, one that worshiped God, whose house joined hard to the synagogue.
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v. 8. And Crispus, the chief ruler of the synagogue, believed on the Lord with all his house; and many of the Corinthians hearing believed, and were baptized.
v. 9. Then spake the Lord to Paul in the night by a vision, Be not afraid, but speak, and hold not thy peace;
v. 10. for I am with thee, and no man shall set on thee to hurt thee; for I have much people in this city.
v. 11. And he continued there a year and six months, teaching the Word of God among them.
Having gone out from there, from the synagogue, having departed, removed himself, from the midst of the blaspheming Jews, Paul was not long at a loss for a suitable meeting-place. He entered at once into the house of one Titus Justus, a God-fearing man, a proselyte, evidently a Roman citizen of some influence and means, through whom Paul could gain access to the educated classes of the city. The action of the Jews, therefore, instead of harming the apostle, redounded to the benefit of the Gospel, as often happens. The location of the house of Justus was also favorable, since it adjoined the synagogue, and was thus convenient of access to both Jews and Greeks. And that not all the Jews joined in blaspheming the Gospel-message is apparent from the fact that the ruler of the Corinthian synagogue, Crispus, in this crisis came forward boldly for the cause of the Lord; he believed on the Lord with his entire house, with all the members of his family and his household, his children and his servants, 1Co 1:14. And the movement gained in force, for many of the Corinthians, Gentiles, when they heard the Word, believed on the Lord Jesus Christ and were baptized. The spread of the new faith was gradual, but continuous. The decisive action of Paul in confessing his Lord had not hindered, but furthered the course of the Word. And he was now strengthened in his aggressive labor by a vision by night in which the Lord told him not to be afraid of the continued malicious opposition of the Jews nor of any other danger, but to continue speaking and testifying, and by no means to hold his peace, never to stop. And this command the Lord reinforced by the encouraging promise that He Himself, the almighty God, was with him, and that no one would lay hands upon him to do him harm. Anyone under the protection of the Lord is more secure than if all the armies of the world were summoned and arrayed in his defense. And in Corinth, as the Lord said, He had a great many people who were yet to be gained by the preaching of the Gospel. God knew that His merciful will in their case would be carried out, that they would learn to believe in their Savior Jesus Christ. Thus the Lord, in the midst of the Corinthian people, whose moral plane was as low as that of any city in the empire, had chosen a congregation to be sanctified through the blood of Christ, by faith in His salvation. Christianity here wrought its miracle, as one commentator has it, for in Corinth the Gospel was put to a supreme test, and nowhere did it triumph more gloriously. And though God chiefly chose the lowly among the people, 1Co 1:26-27, His call included also men of high station, a Crispus, a Gaius, a Stephanas, and an Erastus, the public treasurer of the city, Rom 16:23. With such splendid success attending his labors, Paul dwelt, settled, in Corinth for the time being; he carried on a quiet and settled work of establishing the congregation and seeing it grow in faith and sanctity, his entire stay consuming a year and six months. The Word of the Lord he preached, no foolish fancies of his own imagination or of man’s philosophy; for the latter will never build the Church of Christ, no matter how attractively it may be presented.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv4, 7, 9 General Information:
General Information:
Silas and Timothy rejoin Paul.
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So Paul reasoned
"So Paul debated" or "So Paul discussed." He gave reasons. This means that rather than just preaching, Paul talked and interacted with the people.
He persuaded both Jews and Greeks
Possible meanings are 1) "He caused both Jews and Greeks to believe" or 2) "He kept trying to persuade the Jews and the Greeks."
Paul was compelled by the Spirit
This can be stated in active form. AT: "the Spirit compelled Paul" (See: Active or Passive)
shook out his garment
This is a symbolic action to indicate that Paul will no longer try to teach the Jews there about Jesus. He is leaving them to God's judgment. (See: Symbolic Action)
May your blood be upon your own heads
Here "blood" stands for the guilt of their actions. Here "heads" refers to the whole person. Paul tells the Jews they are solely responsible for the judgment they will face for their stubbornness if they refuse to repent. AT: "You alone bear the responsibility for your punishment for sin" (See: Metonymy and Synecdoche)
translationWords
Paul
synagogue
Sabbath
Jew
Greek
Silas
Timothy
Macedonia
Holy Spirit
testimony
Jesus
Christ
blood
head
innocent
Gentile
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv4, 7, 9 18:4-6 Once again Paul followed his custom of preaching…
18:4-6 Once again Paul followed his custom of preaching to the Jews first, and then reaching out to Gentiles after he met with rejection and opposition (13:42-49; see 3:25-26; 26:20; Rom 1:16; 2:10; 3:29, 30; 4:9-12). • Paul probably wrote his letters to the Thessalonian Christians after Silas and Timothy came down from Macedonia with a report of how things were going there (see 1 Thes 3:6; 2 Thessalonians Book Introduction, “Setting”).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.