Part 74

Then the brothers at once sent Paul and Silas away by night to Beroea. When they arrived there, they went to the Jewish synagogue, where the people were of a nobler spirit than at Thessalonica, for they were very ready to hear the teaching about Jesus, and studied their scriptures daily to see if what Paul said was true. Many of the Jews believed and also prominent Greek women and many men.

As soon as the Jews at Thessalonica learned that God's message was being proclaimed by Paul at Beroea, they came there also to stir up the people to riot. Then the brothers at once sent Paul on his way to the sea-coast, but Silas and Timothy stayed at Beroea. The friends who escorted Paul went with him as far as Athens, and left him there, after receiving instructions that Silas and Timothy were to come to him as soon as possible.

PAUL'S GREAT SPEECH AT ATHENS

While Paul was waiting at Athens for Silas and Timothy, his anger was aroused when he saw that the city was filled with idols. So he argued in the synagogue with the Jews and with the Greeks who joined in their worship, and every day with those whom he happened to meet in the market-place. A few of the philosophers also met him. Some of them said, "What has this picker-up of scraps of learning to say?" Others said, "He seems to be a herald of some new deities." This was because he had been telling the good news about Jesus and how he rose from the dead. And they took him to the Court of Areopagus and said, "May we hear what this new teaching of yours is? For the things you are saying sound strange to us; so we want to know what they mean." (For all the Athenians and the foreign visitors spent their time doing nothing but telling or hearing something new.)

So Paul stood in the middle of the Court and said, "Men of Athens, I see wherever I go that you are very religious, for as I passed along and looked at your objects of worship, I found an altar with the inscription,

TO AN UNKNOWN GOD

Whom, therefore, you worship without knowing, him I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and all things in it is Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples made by men. He is not served by men's hands, as though he needed anything, for he it is who gives to all men life and breath and all things. He has made all nations from one family that they may live over the whole earth. He has also fixed for them when and where they are to live, that they should seek God in the hope that, as they feel after him, they may find him, for he is not far from each one of us; for it is in him that we live, and move, and have our being, as in fact, some of your own poets have said, 'We also are his children.'

Painted by Raphael]

"Therefore, as the children of God, we ought not to think of the divine nature as being like gold or silver or stone, carved by man's art and invention. God overlooked the ages of ignorance, but now he commands all men everywhere to repent, for he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world justly by the one whom he has appointed, and he has given proof of this to all mankind by raising him from the dead."

When they heard of raising one from the dead, some sneered, but others said, "We will hear what you have to say about that some other time." So Paul went out from among them. Some men, however, joined him and believed, among whom were Dionysius, a member of the Court of the Areopagus, a woman named Damaris, and several others. After this Paul left Athens and went to Corinth.

PAUL WRITES TO HIS FRIENDS AT THESSALONICA

Paul and Silas and Timothy to the church of the Thessalonians which lives in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

May good-will and peace be granted to you.

We thank God always for you all and mention you in our prayers, for we constantly remember before our God and Father your active faith and loving service and firm hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.

You yourselves know, brothers, that our visit to you was not without results. At Philippi, as you remember, we had the courage through divine help to tell you the good news of God even though we had been ill treated and insulted. We loved you so much and you had become so dear to us that we would gladly have given to you not only God's good news, but also our very lives.

Brothers, you remember our hard labor and toil, how we worked at our trade night and day so as not to be a burden to any of you, while we told you God's good news. You are witnesses, and so is God, that our dealings with you who believe in Christ were pure, just, and beyond reproach, and that we treated each of you as a father treats his own children, persuading and encouraging you, and appealing to you to live so that you would be worthy of the God who calls you to his own Kingdom and glory.

We thank God constantly for this also, that when you received God's message from us you accepted it not as a mere word of man but for what it really is, the message of God, which even now is doing its work in the hearts of you who believe. You have begun to follow the example of the churches of God in Judea which are united with Jesus Christ, for you have suffered the same things from your own countrymen as they have suffered from the Jews who killed the Lord Jesus.

Brothers, when we were torn away from you for a little time (out of sight but not out of mind!), we were exceedingly eager to see you face to face. We did want to come to you--I, Paul, did more than once, but Satan put difficulties in our way. For who is "our hope, our joy, our crown" of which we have a right to be proud? Is it not you? For you are our glory and our joy!

So when I could stand it no longer, I decided that it was best to remain alone at Athens and send Timothy, our brother and God's servant in telling the good news about Christ, to strengthen your faith and so to encourage you that none of you might be disturbed by the troubles through which you are passing, for you know that we must have them.

But now that Timothy has just come back and brought me the good news of your faith and love and how you always remember me lovingly, longing to see me as I long to see you, I have been comforted, brothers, in all my distress and trouble by your faith.

How can we thank God enough for all the joy that comes to us through you? Night and day we pray most earnestly that we may see your faces and supply whatever is lacking in your faith. May our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus direct our way to you, and may the Lord make your love for one another and for all men grow ever greater, even as does our love for you, so as to make your hearts strong and your characters without fault in the sight of our God and Father.

I solemnly charge you in the name of the Lord to have this letter read aloud to all the brothers. The love of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.

PAUL'S WORK AT CORINTH

And Paul left the place and went to the home of Titius Justus, who worshipped God, whose house was next to the synagogue. Crispus, the president of the synagogue, and all his family, believed in the Lord; and many of the Corinthians when they heard Paul, believed and were baptized. One night the Lord said to Paul in a vision, "Do not be afraid, but speak and do not stop, for I am with you and no one shall harm you; I have many followers in this city." So Paul lived there a year and a half and taught them the word of God.

But when Gallio was governor of Greece, the Jews joined in an attack on Paul and brought him before the court on the charge that he led people to worship God contrary to the law. But just as Paul was about to speak, Gallio said to the Jews, "If it were something about wrong-doing or a serious crime, there would be some reason for my listening to you, O Jews; but if these are only questions about names and your own law, take care of them yourselves. I do not wish to be a judge of matters like these." And he drove them out of the court. Then all the people caught hold of Sosthenes, the president of the synagogue, and beat him in front of the court; but Gallio paid no attention to these things. Paul, after staying some time longer in Corinth, said good-by to the brothers and with Priscilla and Aquila, sailed for Syria.

PAUL WRITES TO HIS FRIENDS IN CORINTH

Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and brother Sosthenes to the church of God at Corinth.

I thank God continually for the blessing which he has given you through Jesus Christ. Through him you have been so richly and fully gifted with every kind of speech and knowledge that you have proved the truth of the testimony which I bore to Christ when I was with you.