Acts chapter 21, and we'll read
from verse one. And it came to pass that after
we were gotten from them, that's the elders from Ephesus, and
had launched, we came with a straight course unto Kos, and the day
following unto Rhodes, and from thence unto Patera, And finding
a ship sailing over onto Phoenicia, we went aboard and set forth. So you can see Phoenicia right
over there on the right hand side. That was the large journey
number nine. Now, when we had discovered Cyprus,
we left it on the left hand and sailed into Syria and landed
at Tyre, for there the ship was to unlaid her burden. And finding
disciples, we tarried there seven days, who said to Paul through
the Spirit that he should not go up to Jerusalem. And when
he had accomplished those days, we departed and went our way,
and they all brought us on our way with wives and children till
we were out of the city. And we kneeled down on the shore
and prayed. And when we had taken our leave
one of another, we took ship and they returned home again. And when we had finished our
course from Tyre, we came to Tullimas and saluted the brethren
and abode with them one day. And the next day that we that
were of Paul's company departed and came unto Caesarea. And we
entered into the house of Philip the evangelist, which was one
of the seven, and abode with him. The same man had four daughters,
virgins, which did prophesy. And as we tarried there many
days, there came down from Judea a certain prophet named Agabus. And when he was come unto us,
he took Paul's girdle, and bound his own hands and feet, and said,
That saith the Holy Ghost. So shall the Jews at Jerusalem
bind the man that owneth this girdle, and shall deliver him
into the hands of the Gentiles. And when we heard these things,
both we and they of that place besought him not to go up to
Jerusalem. Then Paul answered, What mean
ye to weep and to break mine heart, for I am ready not to
be bound only, but also to die at Jerusalem, for the name of
the Lord Jesus. And when he would not be persuaded,
we ceased, saying, The will of the Lord be done. And after those
days, we took up our carriages and went up to Jerusalem. And there went up, and there
went with us also certain of the disciples of Caesarea, and
brought with them one Nason of Cyprus, an old disciple, with
whom we should lodge. And when we were come to Jerusalem,
the brethren received us gladly. Amen. May God bless this reading
also. There we are. We have the opportunity here
to continue with the Apostle Paul on his journey as he concludes
this third missionary journey. But it must have been hard for
Paul to leave the Ephesians as he did. It seems clear that both
parties knew that this was the last time that they would meet
upon earth. and at the same time there was
all of this anxiety swirling around as to what Paul would
meet when he got to Jerusalem. But Paul was determined that
he would go there for the feast, and that's what he set out to
do. So he and his friends took ship.
They went from Miletus to Kos, from Kos to Rhodes, from Rhodes
to Patera, and there they headed to Jerusalem from there. And
it's interesting to see the way that the writer Luke speaks about
getting the ship to go to Tyre. It's almost as if he feels it
had been providential that they suddenly discovered that here
was a ship that would, as it were, take them all the way,
all the way to Tyre. because that was a long journey
and it's pretty obvious as we see them moving from Miletus
to Kos to Rhodes and down through these various other towns that
they're pretty much just hopping in perhaps little coastal boats
all the way along the coast from port to port. But this ship that
they find now is going to take them all the way to Tyre, so
perhaps a larger boat and they're able to go on that south side
of Cyprus as it makes its way directly to the port of Tyre. It was a long journey and perhaps
here we can see that there is good precedent for gospel preachers
to be travelling to minister between these different places
and we know that increasingly For some congregations, that
is something which is now just part and parcel of their church
experience because there are fewer preachers, it seems today,
than there are congregations who wish to hear the gospel preached. That's a subject as well for
prayer. If the Lord would be gracious to raise up men and
commit unto them the abilities and the gifts of preaching the
gospel for Him. Here we see that the apostle
travelled and no doubt he was a blessing to all that were met
along the way, although nothing is actually mentioned about the
individual ports that they went to at this stage. Until they
get to Tyre, and this is a notable stop because here the believers
are obviously part of this general anxiety that is felt for the
well-being of the Apostle, knowing that if he continued on this
journey to Jerusalem, then trouble would meet him there. And yet
it seems that all of these warnings merely come to reinforce the
Apostle's own commitment and dedication to this task because
it seems that the Apostle having been spoken to by God the Holy
Spirit in a vision about the fact that he would be blessed
in his ministry in all the cities where he preached took that as
a word of promise that if he could go to Jerusalem also that
was a city and if the Holy Spirit said that his ministry would
be blessed in all the cities where he preached then to press
on that that message would be blessed also in Jerusalem. So it's very obvious that Paul
as well as these other prophets knew that there was danger in
Jerusalem for him and of course we will come to that in subsequent
weeks, God willing. But there was such courage and
boldness on the part of the Apostle, such confidence in the Lord that
he took these warnings more as confirmations of the blessing
of God upon the ministry than deterrence. And I want to point
something else out to you, which I thought was just delightful
as I read it and sort of meditated upon it a little. And that is
in verse five. Isn't that a lovely picture there
of family worship? I'm not so sure that there's
very many places in the Word of God where we see so clearly
the way in which the Lord's people, the disciples that were found
here at Tyre, so involved and included their children. We read about Eutychus and it
seems that he was a young man but here it speaks about children
and their wives and children were involved in the worship
there so that these brothers and sisters, they gathered their
whole household together in order to commune and fellowship and
worship with Paul and his party. And we're told that they journeyed,
as Paul was due to leave, they journeyed together to the seashore
where Paul and the party would take a ship and sail further
down the coast. And there they prayed with him.
They knelt down on the sand together. What a beautiful prayer meeting
that must have been, with these disciples joining Paul, kneeling
in the sand and hearing him pray. for their well-being and them
praying for his onward journey and what he would meet in Jerusalem. And they took their children
with them. They took their children with
them. Those children would grow up knowing that they had heard
the apostle Paul preach the gospel. They had heard him pray for them
and call upon the great apostle, call upon God to pour down his
blessing upon them. It's an encouragement to us,
surely, to bring our children into the experience of fellowship
with us, to share with them in prayer and have them share with
us in our honouring of God, to observe the worship that is going
on and learn in that worship what it is to be a follower and
see from the example of their parents what it is to be a follower
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And God knows we cannot save
our children, but God has blessed us here with a pattern that we
can bring our children under gospel truth. From Tyre they
sailed to Ptolemies and on to Caesarea. And to the house of
Philip the Evangelist. Here's another delightful connection
in the Word of God. For it seems very likely that
this Philip the Evangelist, he wasn't an apostle, but yet he
had this gift of evangelism. And he was surely the preacher
here in Caesarea. And it seems as if he may have
been that same man who was involved in the episode with the Ethiopian,
you know, for he too was Philip the Evangelist. And if it's the
same Philip as it seems to be, then perhaps it was here that
Luke got all the information because Luke is present with
the Apostle here. We can see that that What does
it call it? The second person plural, the
we, is being used by Luke as he writes this passage. So it
may well be that this is where Luke got all the information
about the incident of the Ethiopian eunuch. I would like to think
that that was a first-hand account that Luke was able there to enter
into his text. And Philip's daughters were told
were present. These were unmarried girls. It
wasn't that they had necessarily taken a vow of chastity or virginity
or anything like that. They were just unmarried girls.
And yet they had the gift of foretelling the future. I don't
imagine that that was that they would stand up in church and
preach or anything like that but here was a gift as indeed
the Old Testament had prophesied that your sons and your daughters
would be able to speak in prophecy and foretell the future. and
they too are involved in this foretelling of danger. All compelling Paul to restate
his determination to witness in Jerusalem even if death should
befall him. And it seems then if that was
not enough, here comes another man and this man is recognised
by his name. His name is Agabus and he too
comes up out of Judea. or down out of Judea, if he's
coming to Caesarea, because Caesarea was on the coast, so he must
have come down to Caesarea. And so he comes and he too, he
uses a graphic description. He takes Paul's girdle, his belt,
that piece of cloth that he wore around his tunic to pull it together
around his waist, and he ties ties his hands with this tunic
or this cloth, this belt and he says this is what is going
to happen in Jerusalem to the man who owns this belt. Paul undoubtedly was grieved
with all of these warnings and there's a lesson here perhaps
for us. While We are anxious and eager
to support and help one another and pray for one another when
trouble comes. There was perhaps just an overstepping
with all of these people and no doubt Paul's compatriots,
his travelling friends as well, when they kept on saying to Paul,
You mustn't go up, you mustn't go up. They had a passion for
him, a heart's desire for his well-being. But Paul has to say
to them in verse 13, what mean you to weep and break my heart? Such was the emotion here that
Paul himself was feeling this great emotion, this great weight
upon him, even to the point of breaking his heart. they were
aggravating with their warnings the trouble ahead. Let us learn
a lesson here. There may come a time when we
have to warn one another about what it is that's happening,
but once we have warned, once we have said our piece, there
is a time to leave these matters in the Lord's hand and to say
as was agreed upon in the end, the will of the Lord be done. We can take our precautions,
we can do that which is wise and appropriate, we can wash
our hands, we can maintain our distance, we can endeavour to
be aware of the needs of one another, whether that's wearing
masks or not, and then we let the will of the Lord be done. Finally, we are told that Paul
and the party take carriages for the last part of their journey.
Somebody asked me a few weeks ago, they wondered how these
journeys were taken. Well, here we're told that carriages
were used and probably some beasts of burden were employed either
to pool individuals or at least that stuff that had been carried
hitherto in ships all the way through this third missionary
journey is terminated, is finalised with the carriages being used
and there's a reference to an old man here, Nason of Cyprus
and I think it's delightful again that Luke takes a moment to give
us this man's name this old disciple, this old believer in the Lord
Jesus Christ. And he reminds us in so doing
that though one might be old, there are still opportunities
to serve the Lord. Such things as hospitality, which
was what Nason's role was to be. He had a house in Jerusalem
and in that house, which was big enough apparently to house
the apostle and his party, Nason would have the privilege of providing
care and attention to these preachers of the Gospel in Jerusalem. Such
things are done as unto the Lord. It's as if they're inviting,
people are inviting the Lord himself into their homes when
these offerings of graciousness are provided and what a wonderful
service it is. that the Lord gives us to be
able to care for the needs of one another in these ways. So
we are delighted to make mention of Nathan of Cyprus here in just
this little work that was done but a little work is unto the
Lord and his testimony resonates hundreds thousands of years later,
as the Lord's people note and remark and remember the nation
of Cyprus and the hospitality that he was able to show to the
Apostle Paul. May the Lord bless these few
thoughts to us upon this passage this morning. Amen.