Thursday, May 13, 2010

Paul's final journey begins

Good morning all,
After his hearing in front of Festus and Agrippa the two leaders agreed that Paul could have gone free except that he had appealed to the Emperor. So today Paul's journey to Rome begins. Of course in those days getting from the Middle East to Rome wasn't as simple as getting on a plane. In today's reading we mostly learn details of the travel, which gives us a sense for the difficulty of the journey. Since it's a geographical reading I've linked a map of Paul's journeys so we can see what we're reading.

The conclusion of this reading is a nice piece of foreshadowing. Paul warns his captors that their plan isn't a good one, but they continue on regardless. We will see how that choice turns out. Of course, it isn't really surprising that the centurion listened more to the pilot than to Paul, but since we've been following Paul all this time we know that he probably knows more than one would expect.

Blessings,
Sam

Acts 27:1-11
27When it was decided that we were to sail for Italy, they transferred Paul and some other prisoners to a centurion of the Augustan Cohort, named Julius. 2Embarking on a ship of Adramyttium that was about to set sail to the ports along the coast of Asia, we put to sea, accompanied by Aristarchus, a Macedonian from Thessalonica. 3The next day we put in at Sidon; and Julius treated Paul kindly, and allowed him to go to his friends to be cared for. 4Putting out to sea from there, we sailed under the lee of Cyprus, because the winds were against us.

5After we had sailed across the sea that is off Cilicia and Pamphylia, we came to Myra in Lycia. 6There the centurion found an Alexandrian ship bound for Italy and put us on board. 7We sailed slowly for a number of days and arrived with difficulty off Cnidus, and as the wind was against us, we sailed under the lee of Crete off Salmone. 8Sailing past it with difficulty, we came to a place called Fair Havens, near the city of Lasea. 9Since much time had been lost and sailing was now dangerous, because even the Fast had already gone by, Paul advised them, 10saying, “Sirs, I can see that the voyage will be with danger and much heavy loss, not only of the cargo and the ship, but also of our lives.” 11But the centurion paid more attention to the pilot and to the owner of the ship than to what Paul said.

No comments:

Post a Comment