ACTS 27:33-38 - Thanksgiving on the Titanic

Introduction

On April 15th, 1912, the largest passenger liner then in service, the RMS Titanic, sank after colliding with an iceberg in the North Atlantic. Of the 2,224 souls on board, only around 700 or so survived. In the roughly 2 hours and 40 minutes that elapsed from the time the ship struck the iceberg to the final moments when Titanic sank beneath the waves, the passengers and crew went from misplaced confidence that the ship was “unsinkable” to fear and helplessness and finally (for many) an abandonment of hope and acceptance of their pending death.

According to the accounts of some of the survivors of the wreck, the ship’s two bands joined together to play the hymn “Nearer My God, To Thee” as the last of the lifeboats were lowered from the decks. Some accounts dispute that that hymn was actually played, but all of the survivors agree that the musicians did play music that evening—it was customary for musicians to play music to distract and calm passengers during any kind of shipboard emergency, whether or not that hymn was actually one of the songs played. In the terror and hopelessness of that moment, no piece of music—religious or secular—would be sufficient to distract those doomed passengers from the inevitability of their fate.

The passage that I read a moment ago is an account from the Apostle Paul’s journey to Rome that bears more than a passing resemblance to the sinking of the Titanic. The ship that Paul was on was nowhere near as large as the Titanic, though it was a large vessel for its time. The text tells us that the Roman centurion that had custody of Paul

Acts 27:6 (LSB)

6 …found an Alexandrian ship sailing for Italy, and he put us aboard it.

Archaeologists have identified this type of vessel as a cargo ship that transported grain from north Africa to Rome (cp. Acts 27:38). These ships were designed to carry somewhere in the neighborhood of 2,000 tons of wheat across the Mediterranean—about 150 feet long and 50 feet wide. To get an idea of the size, imagine that we took two copies of our church building and set them end-to-end lengthwise. We read in verse 37 that there were 276 souls on board—so not anywhere near as big as the Titanic, but one of the largest vessels of Paul’s day.

In the passage I read a moment ago, we read about the storm that began assaulting the ship—a nor-east’er that went on for almost two weeks, causing them to jettison their cargo (v. 18), then the stores of cargo (v. 18), and finally the ship’s tackle itself (v. 19)—they were tearing the functionality of the ship apart in order to try to lighten the load and survive the storm—they had come to the realization that whatever happened from this point on, this ship would never sail again. Finally, in verse 20, we see that they had lost the ability to navigate even if they did still have the ship’s tackle on board:

Acts 27:20 (LSB)

20 And since neither sun nor stars appeared for many days, and no small storm was assailing us, from then on all hope of our being saved was gradually abandoned.

Without the ability to see the sun by day or stars by night, they were completely lost in the storm. They came to the point where, like the hapless passengers of the Titanic, where they simply gave up hope of survival (v. 20). In order to combat that despair, the dance band on the Titanic played ragtime, vaudeville tunes and hymns—and in a similar way we see the Apostle Paul calling on the passengers and crew of their sinking ship to “be cheerful”--

Acts 27:22 (LSB)

22 “And now I advise you to be cheerful, for there will be no loss of life among you, but only of the ship.

Acts 27:25 (LSB)

25 “Therefore, be cheerful, men, for I believe God that it will turn out exactly as I have been told.

But the remarkable difference between the Titanic shipwreck and Paul’s shipwreck here in Acts 27 (other than everyone surviving the shipwreck in Acts) is that the passengers in Paul’s account really did cheer up!

Acts 27:36 (LSB)

36 And all of them became cheerful and they themselves also took food.

Two hundred seventy-six souls aboard that ship (v. 37), all of them having given up hope. They knew they were going to die; they did not believe they would ever see land or their loved ones again. And yet one man—Paul the Apostle—so affected them by his words and his behavior that he restored hope where it had been lost. How did he do that? What was it about him that gave them hope when all hope was lost?

Look one verse back, Acts 27:35--

Acts 27:35–36 (LSB)

35 And having said these things, he took bread and gave thanks to God in the presence of all. And he broke it and began to eat. 36 And all of them became cheerful and they themselves also took food.

I want to argue from this passage that it was Paul’s act of thanksgiving to God that acted as a beacon of hope to people who had given up all hope. And so, on this Thanksgiving Sunday, I hope you can see why we need to learn this from God’s Word this morning. Because we live in the midst of a people who are giving up hope. Like a ship in a storm, our friends and our neighbors and classmates and co-workers and family members are being thrown around in a culture and a nation that is continuing to disintegrate around us. Our political system is breaking down, our economic lives are in turmoil as inflation and empty shelves become more and more a daily occurence, even our safety in our own communities is becoming ever more fragile (while I was researching this sermon I got a text from Jodee that she and the kids were on lockdown for a domestic violence shooting).

Beloved, there are a lot of people around you who are giving up hope in this world. They see the waves, they are clinging to a ship that they know is going down, and they don’t see a way out. And so for their sakes, Christian,

Mark your Thanksgiving with CHEERFUL, GOSPEL-grounded HOPE in a SINKING culture

Make your celebration this Thursday a beacon of hope, a call to joy in the middle of this societal hurricane that we are living through. The testimony of your life that points to your cheerful hope in God is powerful to give Gospel-grounded hope to desperate souls.

Where does this cheerful, Gospel-grounded hope come from? Paul was in the same doomed ship as the other 275 people on board; he saw the same storm, was buffeted by the same waves, he helped throw the ship’s cargo and tackle overboard right along with everyone else—yet he was cheerful while they were despairing. As we move through this account, consider with me how Paul came to be grounded in this cheerful hope. You can be grounded in this kind of Gospel-grounded hope when you

I. Reckon on the PROMISES of God (Acts 27:21-24)

Look starting in verse 21 of Acts 27--

Acts 27:21–24 (LSB)

21 And when they had gone a long time without food, then Paul stood up in their midst and said, “Men, you ought to have followed my advice to not set sail from Crete and to avoid this damage and loss. 22 “And now I advise you to be cheerful, for there will be no loss of life among you, but only of the ship. 23 “For this very night an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I serve stood before me, 24 saying, ‘Do not be afraid, Paul; you must stand before Caesar; and behold, God has granted you all those who are sailing with you.’

Paul was able to reckon on the promises of God in the midst of that storm—and in the same way, Christian, you can exhibit this same cheer in the storm we are weathering in this country because

He has FREED you from FEAR (v. 24; cp. Psalm 139:9-10)

The first thing that God’s angel said to Paul is actually the first thing any angel says to any human being in the Scriptures— “Do not be afraid!” Typically this is because of the terrifying holiness of God’s angelic messenger, but in this case there were some very specific additional circumstances. Keep in mind here that Paul was being transported on this ship as a prisoner—he was the absolute lowest priority on that ship; he would be the last person anyone would be concerned to rescue. And yet Paul had nothing to fear—because he belonged to God! Surely it is not too far-fetched to think that, while he was being tossed and battered by the angry sea, he recalled the words of Psalm 139--

Psalm 139:9–10 (LSB)

9 If I lift up the wings of the dawn, If I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, 10 Even there Your hand will lead me, And Your right hand will lay hold of me.

Paul was free from fear because he knew that he belonged to God—as the beautiful opening words of the Heidelberg Catechism would put it centuries later, our only hope in life and death is that we are not our own but belong, body and soul, both in life and death, to God and to our Savior Jesus Christ.

Paul was freed from fear because he belonged to God, and because he served God (Acts 27:23-- “the God to whom I belong and whom I serve…)”

You are free from fear when you reckon on the promise that you belong to God—and on the fact that you serve Him. And Christian, as you are serving God you have the assurance that

He will ACCOMPLISH His PURPOSES through you (v. 24; cp. Eph. 2:10)

The angel tells Paul

Acts 27:24 (LSB)

24 ...‘Do not be afraid... you must stand before Caesar; and behold, God has granted you all those who are sailing with you.’

Paul knew that he would survive this storm, because he knew that it was God’s will for him—he couldn’t drown in a nor’easter, he had an appointment to get to!

Christian, you are freed from the fear of what the storms of our disintegrating culture and nation might do to you, because you belong body and soul, in life and in death, to God through Jesus Christ. And you are free from fear because you cannot leave this world until you have done everything God has set out for you to do:

Ephesians 2:10 (LSB)

10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

Henry Martyn, missionary to India and Persia in the early 1800’s, faced the dangers and hostilities and threats of disease and persecution of his work among the peoples of the subcontinent—and his famous reply should be the battle cry of every faithful Christian seeking the same kind of Gospel-grounded cheerfulness in the midst of the storm we are living through: “I am immortal until the work God has for me to do is done—the LORD reigns!”

Christian, this Thursday at your Thanksgiving table, mark your celebration with cheerful, Gospel-grounded hope on the deck of our cultural Titanic. Reckon on the promises of God, and

II. Rest in the PROVIDENCE of God (Acts 27:25-32)

Look with me at the next two verses of this account:

Acts 27:25–26 (LSB)

25 “Therefore, be cheerful, men, for I believe God that it will turn out exactly as I have been told. 26 “But we must run aground on some island.”

There’s the second time Paul tells his shipmates to take heart, be of good cheer—but read those verses carefully, and it comes across in a very arresting manner: “Cheer up, boys—we’re going to run aground!” “Good news, fellas; we’re about to wreck!” This would sound like the ravings of an individual who had lost his grip on reality—unless he was grounded in confidence in God’s providential control! Here is how you demonstrate cheerful hope in God in the midst of the chaos of a cultural ship that’s going down—because

He governs all of the CIRCUMSTANCES that surround you (vv. 25-26)

Years ago we took a CSF missions trip to Pearlington, Mississippi to assist in the cleanup and rebuilding after Hurricane Katrina. We worked replacing a roof for an elderly couple who had been living in a FEMA trailer next to their devastated home for seven months. The husband was talking with one of our students one day and said something the student has never forgotten— “Son, if you belong to God and are trusting Him, you are in the safest place you can ever be—even if it is in the eye of a hurricane!” Paul could rest in the knowledge that God would “see to it” that he was delivered safely to Rome, even if He had to smash that massive grain ship he was in against the rocks to do it! He will deliver you safely, Christian, even if the culture and nation you’re in are dashed against the rocks of His judgment—you can believe God that you will never be out of His hand!

He governs all the circumstances that surround you, and in verses 27-32 there is a turn of events recorded in this account that illustrate also that

He governs all of the WICKEDNESS that surrounds you (vv. 27-32)

Two weeks have gone by, and the ship is still being driven mercilessly through the Adriatic Sea. The ship’s crew, with the intuitive sense of seasoned sailors, sensed that they were coming close to land. They take soundings and realize they are indeed being driven into shallow water, and began fearing the very thing that Paul was cheerful about:

Acts 27:29 (LSB)

29 And fearing that we might run aground somewhere on the rocks, they cast four anchors from the stern and were praying for daybreak.

The sailors did not share Paul’s cheerful hope in God’s providential care, and so they freaked out and tried to abandon ship:

Acts 27:30 (LSB)

30 But as the sailors were trying to escape from the ship and had let down the ship’s boat into the sea, on the pretense of intending to lay out anchors from the bow,

For sailors to abandon ship and leave hundreds of people to a violent, watery grave was (and is) the height of cowardice and treachery—but their wickedness did not go unnoticed. In God’s providence, Paul realized what they were up to, that they weren’t just trying to lay out anchors, they were trying to escape. And so he alerted the Roman authorities on board:

Acts 27:31 (LSB)

31 Paul said to the centurion and to the soldiers, “Unless these men remain in the ship, you yourselves cannot be saved.”

And in another remarkable turn of events, the Roman authorities obeyed the word of their prisoner!

Acts 27:32 (LSB)

32 Then the soldiers cut away the ropes of the ship’s boat and let it fall away.

The providence of God not only extends to keeping Paul safe through a shipwreck; His governing hand also restrains the wickedness of others! Their treachery against Paul and the passengers was not permitted to succeed—God saw to it that the sailors would stay aboard to guide the ship to such safety as they could. God saw to it that Paul the prisoner was in a position to command his captors, and they obeyed his word!

So you see how such complete confidence in God’s governing of all things is a comfort to you in the midst of this sinking ship of American culture you live in? Mark your Thanksgiving Day celebration with cheerful, Gospel-grounded hope in the midst of this sinking culture. Yes, we’re taking on water, yes, the storm doesn’t seem about to break, yes, we’re starting to throw overboard elements of our culture that have been part of the ship for a long time--marriage, family, industry, patriotism, and the like—yes, we’re surrounded by increasingly treacherous and wicked individuals who would gladly see us drown in order to save their own skins. Yes to all of it—but Christian—you have real hope in the midst of all of it! You can reckon on the promises of God, you can rest in the providence of God, and

III. Rely on the PRESERVATION of God (Acts 27:33-35)

Look at verses 33-34:

Acts 27:33–34 (LSB)

33 Until the day was about to dawn, Paul was encouraging them all to take some food, saying, “Today is the fourteenth day that you have been constantly watching and going without eating, having taken nothing. 34 “Therefore I encourage you to take some food, for this is for your salvation, for not a hair from the head of any of you will perish.”

“Not a hair from the head of any of you will perish”—Paul’s expression here is a quintessential Hebrew saying that means

He will completely DELIVER you from DESTRUCTION (v. 34)

Paul is in the position now of sharing the Good News that he had received from God back in verse 24:

Acts 27:24 (LSB)

24 saying, ‘Do not be afraid, Paul; you must stand before Caesar; and behold, God has granted you all those who are sailing with you.’

Think for a moment about the people who were on this ship—there were the travelers who were just trying to get to Rome, who found themselves in fear for their lives simply because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Then there were the Roman soldiers, who were keeping Paul in custody as their prisoner. Then there were the crew members of the ship who had been willing to betray all of them to death in order to save their own skins by abandoning ship in the middle of a storm. And all of them were recipients of God’s grace to deliver them! Not only had they done nothing to deserve this grace; many of them had actually acted as enemies of Paul and his God.

And yet Paul had the same message for all of them: God has determined to save you! There is an escape from the destruction that is threatening you—not based on anything you’ve done to deserve it, but out of His own grace and kindness! In the Old Testament book of Jonah, Jonah jeopardized the lives of the sailors in the ship he was in by his disobedience; here in our text the Apostle Paul rescues the lives of the people in the ship he was in by his obedience.

Paul had declared this Good News to his shipmates, but in verse 35 is where his words came home to them:

Acts 27:35 (LSB)

35 And having said these things, he took bread and gave thanks to God in the presence of all. And he broke it and began to eat.

It wasn’t just that Paul said there was deliverance from the peril and destruction all around them—he acted like there was! He not only said that they would all survive, he showed that he really believed it! He went to the ship’s cupboard, got some bread, sat down, thanked God for His blessings and—while the seas still raged and the wind still howled and the sea still came in through the hatch—sat down and ate!

And Paul’s cheerful confidence in the promises and providence of God was such that he had an appetite in the midst of that storm—he could sit down to dinner in the hold of a doomed and sinking ship as peacefully and contentedly as if he were sitting in the comfort and safety of his own table in his own home among friends.

And the effect of his cheerful hope in God on his shipmates was remarkable:

Acts 27:36 (LSB)

36 And all of them became cheerful and they themselves also took food.

As Matthew Henry puts it in his commentary on this passage:

They then ventured to believe the message God sent them by Paul when they plainly perceived that Paul believed it himself, who was in the same common danger with them (Henry, M. (1994). Matthew Henry’s commentary on the whole Bible: complete and unabridged in one volume (p. 2186). Hendrickson.)

There in the midst of that doomed Alexandrian grain-ship, after two weeks of continuous gales and dangerous seas, with the beams and planks of the ship groaning and straining and the prospect of running aground any minute and being dashed on the rocks of an unknown shore, Paul and his shipmates had a feast together! They could “be of good cheer” because of the hope that Paul proclaimed to them that there was salvation for them!

Christian, do you realize the potency of your Thanksgiving celebration this week? The once-grand ship of our Western secular experiment is leaking at the waterline, the storms have battered and rolled the hull, and we see all around us the seasickness of a people staggering back and forth in the darkness of moral relativism and outright rebellion against God. Everything that we are accustomed to hanging on to at times like this—trust in the economy, trust in our government, trust in our elections, trust in our medical experts, trust in our law enforcement, trust in our courts, trust in our religious institutions, trust in education—it is all getting jettisoned these days as we become ever more desperate to keep this secular ship afloat. But the sea is getting in; the waterproof compartments are all flooded, and there aren’t enough lifeboats. And a few old sea-hands are getting the distinct intuition that we are rushing toward a rocky shoal that will grind what’s left of our ship to pieces.

So Christian—how will you then celebrate on Thursday? Will you take on the hopelessness and despair of the climate around you, staring listlessly at the table, picking at your mashed potatoes and complaining about how inflation has made everything so expensive? Will your conversation be filled with griping about the idiots in Congress (or studiously avoiding political talk because of certain family members around the table)? Will you be one of the ones shaking your head and saying, “Yeah, I just don’t know what’s going to happen, it’s all in pretty bad shape, I sure hope the election turns out good or else we’ll really be in for it...”

Or will you celebrate Thanksgiving like a Christian? Will you fill your Thanksgiving table with Gospel-laden gratitude for everything God has done for you? Will you be full of that cheerful hope born of your reckoning on God’s promises to you, His remarkable providence that governs every single element of your existence, and His promise to preserve you and keep you and stay with you no matter what happens with the economy or the election or the war or anything else? Will your table be surrounded by the laughter and cheer of a people who rejoice in God because

He has utterly PROVIDED for your SALVATION

Some commentators look at Acts 27:35 and suggest that the wording that Luke uses to describe Paul eating that meal is also used to describe the observance of the Lord’s Supper:

Acts 27:35 (LSB)

35 ...he took bread and gave thanks to God in the presence of all. And he broke it and began to eat.

Now, in light of Paul’s teaching in 1 Corinthians 11 (which we read every time we celebrate the Lord’s Supper), I don’t believe Paul was actually celebrating Communion on the ship—he did this in the presence of unbelievers, and offered it to them, which he makes clear in 1 Corinthians 11 is absolutely forbidden, as eating and drinking unworthily can bring sickness or death on an unbeliever.

But at the same time, I do believe that God the Holy Spirit chose every word of the Scriptures carefully and deliberately. I think that we are meant to think back at this point in the story to what the Lord’s Supper represents—the broken body and shed blood of Jesus Christ for His people. After all was said and done, the ultimate comfort and cheer that Paul demonstrated in this meal of thanksgiving was grounded in the sure promise of God that Jesus Christ died and rose again to save sinners.

Christian, this is the pinnacle of the cheerful hope that you have—this Gospel-grounded hope that should mark your celebration of Thanksgiving this week. Because of all of the reasons you have to be thankful this week, this is the greatest of all—that no matter what else happens in your life; whether this country sinks or floats, whether the economy crashes or recovers, whether the wars in this world are won or lost, whether you keep your job or lose it, whether your health improves or deteriorates—that no matter what happens, you belong to God through Jesus Christ and have an immoveable reason for cheer!

The bright beacon of cheer that comes from your Thanksgiving celebration this week is not borne of denial, it is not some weird, twisted black humor that whistles past the graveyard, it is not some sullen, contrarian refusal to be cowed by a hostile culture. It is a genuine, cheerful celebration of the unbroken and unending goodness of God to you in Christ! No matter how the gales howl and the deck underneath your feet pitches, no matter how bad the news out of Washington or Harrisburg, you can laugh more loudly, feast more fully, delight more deeply than anyone else because you know that

you are not your own, but belong with body and soul, both in life and in death, to your faithful Saviour Jesus Christ.

You know that He has fully paid for all your sins with His precious blood, and has set you free from all the power of the devil.

And you are convinced that He also preserves you in such a way that without the will of your heavenly Father not a hair can fall from your head; indeed, all things must work together for your salvation.

And by the work of His Holy Spirit in you He also assures you of eternal life and makes you heartily willing and ready from now on to live for Him. (Adapted from the Heidelberg Catechism, Q1)

And for you who are storm-tossed by fear and doubt and despair today, you who have come here not because you know Christ but because you know you need to have something to hold on to and you hoped that you would find it here; you have come to the realization that you are as lost as those sailors who had no sun or stars to navigate by, and you feel like the lookout in the crow’s nest of the Titanic—pitch black, with no way to see anything but you know there are icebergs out there and it’s only a matter of time before you slam into something that will take you down. But the darkness you grope through is nowhere near as black as the darkness inside you. You need some kind of hope, you need some way to know that you can go on.

This is the Good News for you today: That Jesus Christ, though He had no debts to pay and no sin of His own to suffer for, came down to earth to be born as a man, live as a man, suffer as a man and die as a man under the wicked hatred of sinful men so that the blood that He shed on that Cross would atone for all of the black midnight of sin and hatred and rebellion and wickedness in you. You stagger on the decks of a cultural ship on the brink of being dashed against the reef of God’s holy wrath, but He has made an escape for you—Romans 10:13 is your assurance

Romans 10:13 (LSB)

13 for “WHOEVER CALLS ON THE NAME OF THE LORD WILL BE SAVED.”

There is hope for you; there is forgiveness, there is assurance of salvation for you—salvation from all of the storms in the world outside and all of the storms that rage inside you. Don’t put it off; don’t wait for a tomorrow that may never arrive. Cry out for forgiveness and receive this cheerful, Gospel-grounded hope from the loving hand of your Savior, Jesus Christ!

BENEDICTION

Jude 24–25 (LSB)

24 Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, 25 to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, might, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION:

How do you think the storms of cultural and moral upheaval that we are living through in our nation will affect the atmosphere of your family’s Thanksgiving dinner this year? What sorts of conversations do you suppose will take place?

What are some of the reasons that people you know may be giving up hope that our way of life will survive the cultural storms we are experiencing? How does a grounding in the truths of the Gospel provide hope for that despair?

How did the Apostle Paul demonstrate his reliance on God’s promises during that storm? How did he rest in God’s providence? How can you demonstrate that same kind of cheerful hope this week during your Thanksgiving celebration?

What was the response of Paul’s fellow passengers to his prayer of thanksgiving and breaking bread? How does this help you understand the importance of your demeanor in troubled times?