Acts 28:30-31

A final summary statement, 28:30-31

Verses 30 and 31 provide a summary statement to conclude the account. It began in the Jewish capital of Jerusalem and ends in the Gentile capital of Rome, taking Acts 1:8 to its logical “conclusion.” Yet there is no conclusion, for the witness still goes forth.

Verse 30: in his own hired house (εν ιδιω μισθωματι, a place of lodging that is hired, or rented).[1]

The word of God cannot be bound. What might have seemed to be a setback and stumblingblock in Paul’s ministry was so ordered and arranged by God. Paul acknowledged “that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel” (Philippians 1:12). Often we do not at first see clearly what God has designed for our good, the good of others, and his glory. While here Paul would not only preach freely, but he also wrote what are commonly called “The Prison Epistles.” The term “Prison Epistles” refers to the four letters written while Paul was under house arrest in Rome – Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and Philemon. The “we” section of 27:1-28:16 indicates that Luke travels with Paul from Cæsarea to Rome. Paul mentions Luke’s presence when writing to the saints at Colosse (Colossians 4:14), and to Philemon (v. 24). Previously, Paul had most often dwelt with others; now he has a dwelling place of his own. He had been on the move in the Roman empire; now he is settled in Rome. He had gone out with the gospel message to others; now others come to him to hear the message.

In the end of this chapter, soldiers guard Paul. He receives visitors, and freely shares the gospel (Acts 28:16, 20, 30-31). In the letters, Paul mentions being with “they that are of Cæsar’s household” (Philippians 4:22), his bonds (Ephesians 6:20; Philippians 1:7, 12-16; Colossians 4:3-4, 4:18; Philemon 10-13), and refers to himself as a prisoner (Ephesians 3:1; 4:1; Philemon 1, 9, 23). This was not Paul’s only incarceration, of course. He was bound in Philippi (Acts 16:23-40), Jerusalem (Acts 21:33), Cæsarea (23:23-24; 24:27), and Rome (Acts 28:16) – as well as when transported as a prisoner from Jerusalem to Cæsarea to Rome. Paul made it to Rome, as he believed, and was able to preach concerning “the Lord Jesus Christ, with all confidence, no man forbidding him.”

“…the narrative ends as it does because it had caught up with history, and at the moment there was nothing more to record.”[2]

“Yet it is a pleasure to us (for we are sure it was to him) that, though we leave him in bonds for Christ, yet we leave him at work for Christ, and this made his bonds easy that he was not by them bound out from serving God and doing good.”[3]

The open ending!

Alexander MacLaren said the book of Acts “stops rather than ends.”[4] The work of the Lord through his churches is not finished. God the inspirer pulls the curtain on “Act 28,” but his show goes on.

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[1] Josephus, Antiquities, Book XVIII, 6.10 mentions the circumstance of Agrippa, while “still in custody,” going to live in “that house where he lived before.” This might be a situation comparable to that of Paul.
[2] Ladd, Wycliffe Commentary, p. 1178.
[3] Matthew Henry’s Commentary, Volume VI, page 361. “Luke is with me” again when Paul is in prison in Rome the second time (II Timothy 4:11).
[4] MacLaren, The Acts of the Apostles, Expositions Of Holy Scripture, p. 383. He further suggests, like Ladd, “that nothing more is said for nothing more had yet been done.” That is, simply, the book stops at the point in history when it is written. There are many dreams and nightmares recounted by the unbelieving and misbelieving scholars, when instead a simple explanation is quite sufficient. It ended where the Holy Spirit ended it.