Acts chapter 28 and I'm going
to read from verse 11. Just a short reading again. Today
we're going to read just a few verses together from Acts chapter
28 and verse 11. So Paul is on the island of Crete, Miletus, Milita. And he is, I'm sorry, I said
Crete there, Malta. And he is getting ready to leave
and head into Italy from Malta. And he says, after three months,
we departed in a ship of Alexandria, which had wintered in the isle,
whose sign was Castor and Pollux. And landing at Syracuse, we tarried
there three days. And from thence we fetched a
compass and came to Regium. And after one day, the south
wind blew, and we came the next day to Piteoli, where we found
brethren and were desired to tarry with them seven days. And so we went toward Rome. And from thence, when the brethren
heard of us, they came to meet us as far as Appii, Forom, and
the three taverns, whom, when Paul saw, he thanked God and
took courage. And when we came to Rome, the
centurion delivered the prisoners to the captain of the guard,
but Paul was suffered to dwell by himself with a soldier that
kept him. So Paul has finally reached Rome. And these few verses that we
have before us today see him on this final part of his journey. And I would say that perhaps
with me, you enjoy the detail that we find in these passages. the durations and the directions
and the towns that are visited, and even in this case, the ship
names and distances travelled. It reads almost like a travel
journal. And we might forget that Paul
is a prisoner and heading to Rome for trial in a way that
could determine his life and death. And yet it is good for
us, is it not, to remember that while the day-to-day events in
Paul's life, as in our own, follow a natural progression, we move
from one place to another, one stage to another, one set of
circumstances to another. Nevertheless, though there is
that natural progression, The supernatural hand of God is in
it all, directing events, and the Lord Jesus Christ is with
his servants. So it proved with the apostle
Paul. Now, let me just take a moment
here and if I can show you another one of these little maps. And
as I say, just because I can. And there you'll see we've got
a picture here of Italy. And this is the boot or the leg
of Italy, the boot of Italy, of course. And there it is in
the Mediterranean Sea and the Tyrrhenian Sea there. Now, you'll
see right at the very bottom in the smallest of writing is
the island of Malta. And so this was the island that
Paul was shipwrecked on. And he stayed there for three
months amongst those people, Milita, as it was called then.
And then they were able to sail on the ship of Alexandria, a
large ship that had also overwintered there on the island. And they
sailed to Cilicia, or we call that Sicily now. And there you
can see Syracuse on the bottom right-hand corner of the island.
And we're told that Paul took a compass. That's a lovely way
of saying they walked from Syracuse up to that top point where it
says Messina. And there they crossed a little
straight into Regium. there they were in Regium and
then very quickly they were able to sail right up the coastline
there. They just sailed right up the
coast until you get to the sort of centre of the map there and
you can see one or two little town names and These are the
names of the towns that the Apostle, they went by boat and then they
were able to put in and they walked the rest of the journey
up to Rome. And there you can see the three
taverns and the Appius Forum, which are towns on that road
between Petolie and Rome, where the Apostle's last stage was
walking. So let us just sort of think
about this journey that the apostle took all the way up the side
there of the boot of Italy. And it shows us, does it not,
the way in which just the normal course of events had to take
place. And we discover that as the apostle
was making this journey, that at different points along the
way, he received from various groups some encouragement. They provided him with his necessities. They encouraged him to pause
and to wait and to stop. Not, of course, without the permission
of the centurion. But it seems clear from the way
in which Luke writes of this account that The Centurion was
amenable to just recognising that these people were being
careful for the well-being of Paul and that they were benefiting,
the whole group was benefiting, not of course the whole ship's
company that had been shipwrecked, the hundreds of people, but just
that little group now of prisoners that were being taken up to Rome. And these groups even came out
from Rome when they heard that Paul was making this final part
of the journey by foot and came and met him at different towns
along the way, no doubt to provide for his needs and to give him
comfort and encouragement on this stage of his journey. And
I imagine that this must have impressed the centurion who spent
so much time with Paul in these recent months. I'm sure had been
introduced to the Christian faith by Paul, perhaps even for the
first time during this period. He had watched Paul's life, he
had heard Paul's doctrine, and now he was witnessing the effect
of faith in the lives of Paul's fellow believers. You see, how
we act matters. And this is one of the lessons
that we have from these few verses before us today. That here were
people who had heard the Gospel and had believed the Gospel,
not at the mouth of Paul probably, but through some other preacher.
But knowing of the need of Paul, and having respect to him, desired
to help him, to comfort him, to do him good on his journey,
and went out of their way, travelling perhaps 30 miles to that three
taverns town, or 50 miles to the Appii Forum, in order to
be there when Paul arrived to do him some good. You see, believers
don't live their lives by a set of do's and don'ts. Yet neither
do we live without purpose and principle. We live to glorify
God and we live to honour the Lord Jesus Christ by the things
that we do and by the things that we say, by the way that
we act and by the way that we deal with one another. We endeavour
to follow Christ's example, his example of kindness one to another,
his example of respect one for another, and indeed love for
one another. And that's what these brethren
were doing now for Paul and this little party. And I don't know
whether this centurion was ever converted, we're not told that,
and anyway that's God's business, not mine. But the apostle and
the followers of the Lord Jesus Christ gave witness to the words
of the Lord Jesus Christ when he said, by this shall all men
know that ye are my disciples if ye have love one to another. And the centurion was left in
no doubt that Paul and these brethren were Christ's disciples. Paul reached Rome. and he reached
Rome through many trials, many troubles, but he reached Rome
as God had promised he would. The Lord had promised to take
him there, that he would preach there, and now at last the apostle
had arrived. Our Lord has promised that he
will lead his people home to glory. And I don't know what
our experiences will be at the different stages, in the different
places, at the different times along that journey, but I know
that the Lord Jesus Christ will not lose one of his people, that
he will bring all safely home to glory. And though we are challenged
and we find difficulties along the way, although there are many
trials to encounter, yet we see here in this story of Paul a
beautiful metaphor of the life of all of God's people. May we
learn from this story. May we learn from the journeys
of the Apostle Paul and from the acts of the Apostles to trust
our God and to rely upon the Lord Jesus Christ, even in the
face of the challenges that we have. And may we learn also to
do one another good, with respect, with kindness, and with love
for the brethren. For by this shall all men know
that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another. May the Lord bless these thoughts
to us.