Acts Chapter 27

We are reading from Acts chapter 27 today. When it was decided that we would sail, for Italy, Paul, and some other prisoners were handed over to a centurion named Julius who belong to the Imperial regiment. We boarded a ship from from a dream, idiom about the sale for ports along the coast of the province of Asia. And we put out to sea aristarchus a Macedonian from thessalonica was with us. The next day we landed at sidon and Julius and kindness to Paul allowed him to go to his friends. So they might provide for his needs. From there. We put out to sea again and pass to the leaf Cyprus because the winds were against us. When we have sailed across the Open Sea off the coast of cilicia and pamphylia. We landed at Myra and Lycia. There's a centurion found. An alexandrian ship sailing for Italy and put us on board. We made slow Headway for many days and had difficulty. Arriving off nitus. When the wind did not allow us to hold our course, we sailed to the leave creat, opposites the Moana, we moved, along the coast with difficulty and came to a place, called fairhaven's near the town of Listia. Much time has been lost and sailing had already become dangerous. Because by now, it was after the day of atonement soap, all warned them men. I can see that our Voyage is going to be disastrous, and bring great loss to ship and cargo into our lives. Also but the centaurian instead of listening to what Paul said, follow the advice of the pilot and if the owner of the ship, Since the harbor was unsuitable to Winter in the majority decided that we should Sail on hoping to reach Phoenix and winter their this was a harbor in Crete facing both Southwest and Northwest. When a gentle South Wind began to blow, they saw their opportunity, so they weighed anchor and sailed along the shore of Crete before, very long of wind of hurricane Force called the northeaster. What down from the island, the ship was caught by the storm and could not head into the wind. So we gave way to it and we're driven along. As we pass to the Lee of a small island called cata, we were hardly able to make the lifeboats if you are, so The Men Who wasted it aboard, then they pass ropes under the ship itself to hold it together. Because they were afraid they would run aground on the same, sand bars of service. They lowered, the sea anchor, and let the ship be driven along. We took such a violent battering from the storm that the next day, they began to throw the cargo overboard. On the third day, they threw the ships tackle overboard with their own hands. We neither Sun nor Stars appeared for many days in the storm. Continued raging we finally gave up all hope of being saved After they had gone a long time without food, Paul stood up before them and said, man, you should have taken my advice not to sail from Crete. Then you would have spared yourself this damage and lost. But now I urge you to keep up your courage because not one of you will be lost. Only the ship will be destroyed last night and Angel is the god to whom I belong and whom I serve Stood Beside Me and said, do not be afraid. Paul. You must stand trial before Caesar. And God has graciously, given you the lives of all, who sail with you. So, keep up your courage meant for. I have faith in God that it will happen. Just as he told me, never the last, we must run aground on some Island. On the 14th night. We were still being driven across the Adriatic Sea. When about midnight the Sailor, since they were approaching land, they took soundings and found that the water was 120. Ft deep a short time later they took soundings again and found, it was 90 ft deep. Fearing that we would be dashed against the Rocks. They dropped four anchors from the stern and prayed for daylight in an attempt to escape from the ship. The sailors. Left the Lifeboat down into the sea pretending. They were going to lower some anchors from the bow. Then Paul said to the Centurion in the soldiers unless these men stay with the ship, you cannot be saved. So the soldiers Cut the Ropes that held the Lifeboat and let it Drift Away. Just Before Dawn, Paul urged them all to eat for the last 14 days, he said, you have been in constant suspense and have gone without food you haven't eaten anything. Now, I urge you to take some food, you need it to survive, not one of you will lose a single hair from his head. After he said this, he took some bread and gave thanks to God in front of the mall, then he broke it and began to eat. They were all encouraged and ate some food themselves altogether, there were 276 of us on board. When they had eaten as much as they wanted, they lighten the ship by throwing the grain into the sea. when daylight came, they did not recognize the land, but they saw a bay with a sandy beach where they decided to run the ship aground if they could Cutting Loose, the anchors, they left them in the sea and at the same time, untied the rope that held the Rudders, then they hoisted the four sail to the wind and made for the beach but the ship struck a sandbar and ran aground. The ball stuck fast and would not move. And the stern was broken to Pieces by the pounding of the surf. The soldiers plan to kill the prisoners to prevent any of them from swimming away and escaping, but the Centurion wanted to spare Paul's life and kept them from carrying out their plan. He ordered those who could swim to jump overboard first and get to land. The rest were to get there and Planks on other pieces of the ship in this way. Everyone reached land safely.

Awesome. Thank you.

What a story. What? A great story. All right, there's so much there, a 44 vs that, you know, it just takes a while to read it. We don't have time to to get like a fine-tooth comb out, and look, super close like that at all. So, I picked out some pieces and let's start with a map. This is the kind of story where you need a map to story starts in. Cesery has a right to their the Ship Sails along this Coast. If there's two ships for Ship Sails along this Coast in the wind is just not cooperating at this town. There is they get on a second ship and they want to go to nidus right here, but don't succeed really at getting there. They let the wind. Take them down below Creed. And then at this point, there's a northeaster. So here's Northeast. A Northeast direction, would be from the north east's going Southwest and it blows him off course. And then the end of the story is a shipwreck on the island of Malta. So let's just take some pieces of that story to we boarded a ship from a dramatic. I am about to sell for ports along the coast of the province of Asia and we put out to seat Paul is a prisoner. And he has appealed his case to Caesar and therefore the governor in Sesser Rhea is putting him on a ship with a Centurian over him and some other prisoners to successfully. Get them all to Rome where they're headed and they are just taking the available transport of the day. So the first ship is a ship that makes stops along that immediate Coast. But when they get to Myra they get on another ship and this is a fascinating ship that they get on they get on a an alexandrian ship sailing for Italy and weary later on that there are two hundred and Seventy-Six passengers on this ship. So this is a huge vessel. I did a little bit of research and found out that just as there are other pieces of the ancient world archaeological sites that we see where we're impressed at how how technically Advanced they are. There were some large grain vessels that the Roman Empire supported that may Journeys from Rome to Egypt and then from Egypt back to Rome, they brought to Egypt things. Out of the Roman Empire is not so much evidence about what that was but what the Roman Empire needed that Egypt had along that fertile Nile, Valley with easy access to the Mediterranean Sea was grain. And there were large grain vessels that in the short selling season would be heading to Egypt and then back to Rome that problem here is that we're going to see that in a minute. The time of year, this journey is happening at the end of the season. This could easily be a time when you would put that big vessel in some Safe Harbor somewhere to write out the winter. But this owner is trying to squeeze one more journey to Rome in and they pick that ship up in Myra. It was after the day of atonement, the day of atonement is end of September, beginning of October. So maybe this is about October 15 as they're getting on this ship and this ship is wanting to get to Italy to Rome in particular but as we just saw, it's it's a difficult time of year and it's a risky call on the part of the owner and the pilot of the ship.

Excuse me, my phone was talking to me but the Centurian followed the advice of the pilot and the owner of the ship. The Bible doesn't say that Paul had a vision from God, you get the impression that Paul's observing and giving his opinion. It's not a surprise to me that the Centurion would not take the advice of a prisoner, but instead take the advice of the pilot of the ship and the owner of the ship, although they should take all the advice because it's it's good advice. And that happens not up there in in in Myra where they were. But now it happens down here at the bottom of Crete and there's a blown up map at the bottom there, on the south side of the island of Crete. Whoops. As we okay so what happens is they decide having stopped at 1 Harbor on the south side of the island of Crete that they really should find a safe place to Harbor for the winter and about 60 miles away in Phoenix which is also on the south side of the island of Crete. There is a safe harbor that a ship this size could be parked in for the winter season so they leave intending to make it to that Harbor. But there is a northeaster that's blowing strong and as soon as they pull away the winds start to push them to the South. So they go around a little island. There's it occurs in two places. It's right there up and on the main map and I don't know if you can see it. It's in the blow up that's down there at the bottom that they find this little island. And then the few minutes of time, That they have when they're passing on the Wind protected side of that little island, they pull the Lifeboat in which would have been towed by a rope and which is going to be in danger in a storm. They pull that in and they store it on the deck of the ship and this is kind of a surprise to historians that went. When they look at this story days, they put ropes all the way around the exterior of the ship. I don't know. How did they did that? They would drop them from the front, I guess in, and let them float along and then since them up, and this is the way that they held the structure of this ship together in a violent storm. It's not something you do regularly. It's a, it's an emergency kind of plan. The surprise of historians is that they used this kind of device on a ship this size. There's There's historical evidence of it happening on smaller ships, but these are Big Freighters and they obviously use that on this large freighter. So this is terrific storm and they're taking Desperate Measures here to keep themselves alive. 3 days of this terrible storm. And on the third day, they're throwing stuff overboard. Hoping to keep the ship afloat. And they what they throw overboard is the ships tackle, which is the police, the beams, the sales, maybe some of the sales, the stuff that you need to Pilot your ship, they throw that overboard because they just want to keep it floating but it's like Taking the steering wheel off of your car and throwing it out the window because you, you're just trying to make your car lighter. You're not going to be able to maneuver this boat to where you wanted to go over more. They've given up on that, they're just trying to stay alive when neither Sun, nor stars appear for many days in the storm continued raging. We finally gave up all hope of being saved. They got to that moment. That people get in. I've seen stories of somebody that in the wintertime who gets caught in, like the Colorado mountains, and Des, Peres that, anybody will ever be able to find them until they leave their car. Right? Those kinds of stories, this is that kind of story. They arrived at the point where they are despairing that they will be able to be saved.

In that time, Paul gets visited by an Angel. And he tells the crew, how how he has a conversation with them during a storm with 276 people? I don't know. But he somehow does. There's this maybe it's a low in the, in the storm and they have a conversation and he says last night, an angel of God, to whom I belong and whom, I serve Stood Beside Me and he said, do not be afraid. Paul, you must stand trial before Caesar. She, you're going to make it to Rome. And God has graciously, given you the lives of all, who sail with you. So keep up your courage, man. For I have faith in God that it will happen. Just as he told me. Nevertheless, we must run aground on some Island. The interesting thing about this part of the story is Paul's just a prisoner on the ship but he's becoming the leader of the voyage and it reminds us of the Jesus story in the Book of John. When Jesus is having a conversation with Pontius, Pilate pilate is, is interrogating. Jesus trying to understand what's going on. You get the impression. When you read that story in the Book of John, that Jesus is really in charge of the situation not pilot and you get the impression in this story that Paul is really in charge because God is in charge, not the century and not the pilot, not the owner of the ship,

While this is happening. The sailors. Say we're going to just get in the Lifeboat. We're going to go check out some stuff on the front of the ship that they have a plan, which is there the smartest guys on the ship, they're the ones who know how to sail a ship. They know what, danger they are in and they've decided this is the moment where it's every person for himself. So they're going to they're going to get on the Lifeboat and they're going to roll away from the ship and yes, a bunch of people are going to die but they're going to live, that's their thinking. I don't imagine that 276. People could fit on this Lifeboat Paul, for some reason, is the one. Who knows what's going on? And he says, to the soldiers look We need those guys as a part of our story, there's going to come a moment when we need to figure out how to guide this ship to, however it's going to go down and and we've got to have them. So the soldiers are in a spot. Do we trust? Ourselves think they could have ice bows gotten in the Lifeboat with the sailors and it would have been the Soldier's and sailor's escaping, they choose to trust Paul. And so they they cut off the only means of Escape that they have besides Paul and his God and His God's story.

Later on Paul speaks to the group again. And he says, you guys haven't eaten for 2 weeks and we need to revive ourselves. So let's eat some food and it's really curious to me how he introduces the food. He took some bread and gave thanks to God in front of them all, then he broke it and began to eat it. Craig does that remind you of anything.

yes, and

Yes, so crazy. Is the guy who's always coaching me to get the communion words in the right order. I appreciate that about him in the Book of Luke.

You hear these words by Jesus several times. And Luke is the same person who's the author of the book of Acts. So, it seems that Luke is not just talking about the way that Emil got introduced, but there's some evoking of of the communion story. When you have a meal together in the presence of God, there's something special that God is doing among you as a group of people, that seems to be what's happening here. This group of people are having this meal, finding this calm moment replenishing their bodies. In the presence of God and you don't eat a meal. When you're just trying to stay alive, you why would you eat food? You eat food, because there's something tomorrow or later on today that you want to do that, you need to have you eat food to live. And Paul engages them. In this active living altogether, there were 276 of us on board. They file and they decide we're going to try to beach this big green ship on one on this beach that we see but they never make it there. Because there's a sandbar, the bow get stuck in the Sand Bar, the waves are smashing the ship apart from behind and the soldiers because in the Roman Empire, a soldier who allows a prisoner to escape receives the punishment that the prisoner would have had. So they may very well die if they let the prisoners Escape, but the Centurian has come to trust. Pauline wants to save Paul, so he doesn't let them kill the prisoners orders. Everybody can swim to jump overboard first and get the land and then everybody who can't swim, you find yourself a plank or a piece of the ship that floats and you use that to get on board. And the end of this episode is everybody. arrives safely, every human being on that ship arrives safely at land just as God said it would be

So, we're going to finish the story next week, but let's think about what some takeaways might be for today. So, how did I get there? That's where I wanted to be.

Start with this one. I wonder who you. And by the way, number for is you. So start thinking about whether you might have something you'd like to share, but three from me first, who do you identify with, do you identify with Paul? You have a sense that God is closed and you have lots of faith. Or do you identify with the Centurian, you're in charge, but you need to know the way to go or do you identify with the soldier soldiers? You're committed but you're really hoping somebody in charge. And how's the weather doing? Or are you like the sailors? You're one of the smartest people in the room and, you know it, but you haven't really learned to trust other people very much. So you're always a little bit in danger of the every person for himself moment. Or are you like the stupid? We haven't talked about much Luke and aristarchus, who are Paul's companions your on God's team and you're ready for an adventure? Wherever that Adventure might call you to go. Pick one. If you had to pick one. Which one would you pick?

Number two. God's calm voice could lead to your convoys, which could lead to conus in your circle. God's Convoy speaks to Paul. Paul with the calmness of a word from God, stands up and he speaks calmness to the 276 275 other passengers on the ship. You can be that person. God's calm voice speaks to you, your calm voice speaks to your family or to your circle of influence.

And number three, maybe it's time to cut loose the Lifeboat. I really like this question. What Lifeboat are you maintaining in case Jesus turns out not to be reliable.

That my friends is a million-dollar question right there. and the point is, No Lifeboat. But Jesus. Maybe that's the way it's supposed to be. The only Lifeboat you have is for this Jesus thing to turn out to be true, you got some Ace in your back pocket that is your planned on Lifeboat just in case Jesus didn't turn out to take good care of you. If there is, maybe it's time. To cut that Lifeboat. Oops.

Okay. Those are my thoughts and it's not fair cuz I had lots of time to think about what mine were but I wonder what might be on your mind. Do you want to anybody want to finish one of these senses? I think I feel I wonder

God is great. That's Thank you, Bob.

Who owns about anybody on a boat?

Anybody ever been in danger in your boat? Is 1. Kfu hands. I've never, I've never been out on the water afraid. I was going to die, but it sounds terrible. Anybody else?

Oh, probably didn't have life vests. Craig says.

yeah, Dave says My wave. I'll try to put it in my words. You get there gradually. You become that person through experience Paul. Paulding become this person. Immediately he's been through a lot by now.

At an awesome question. June to their wonder what happened to the 275 other ones did. Their that their God get ahold of them through this?

The only data we have is next week's episode which has a little bit of info but not a lot.

We're not singing again, are we Karen? Okay. Alright, let's end the sea. I had some oh, I know, hello everybody who's here on live stream and Marilyn's ozma was here in person last week, but she's usually here on Livestream, she's somewhere older than 90 years old. We don't know exactly how old because her son wasn't exactly sure. Anyhow, if you're watching, happy birthday to you, in fact on the count of three, this whole room is going to shout out to you, happy birthday 1, 2 3. Happy birthday. All right, Alice print. Lord, thank you for this community of people today. We were just anxious When We Gather to see how you are at work. and we heard a little bit of it, you inviting us to think about things and we Yeah, we agree with what Bob said. You are great.

So thank you for your word and thank you for how it makes us Think and Grow and calmer and stronger on this day in Jesus name, amen.

let's all stand up together and let's receive a blessing and audible call it a morning.

May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face shine upon you, and be gracious to you. May the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace and everybody said amen. Thank you for being here. Have a good day, you're dismissed.