AP

Studies in Acts

The Gospel Comes to Philippi (Acts 16:11-18)

Verses 11-15: Very soon, a ship sailed from the harbour of Troas heading for the mainland of Greece. Aboard this ship were Paul, Silas, Timothy, and Luke the physician. They were the ones who laid the foundation of the Christian church in Europe (1 Corinthians 3:10). The crossing over the Aegean Sea (about 140 miles; 230 km) normally took about five days (see Acts 20:6). But Paul and his companions encountered such fine weather and wind conditions that they made it in two days. The first day they had already reached the island of Samothrace, and the next day they disembarked in Neapolis, the port of Philippi. From there they travelled another 16 km to Philippi, an important cosmopolitan garrison city in that part of Macedonia.

Philippi was a colony of the Roman Empire. These colonies had a transplanted populace of farmers and citizens located in strategic places in occupied territory. Many of these “colonists” were decommissioned veterans, who had led successful military campaigns. They received a portion of land from the emperor, possessed Roman citizenship, and enjoyed tax advantages. The many Latin inscriptions found in Philippi are indicative that Latin was the predominant language. Administratively this kind of “Rome abroad” was organized according to Rome’s model. The highest authority rested with the “triumvirate” (a government of three officers or magistrates functioning jointly), who had the rank of praetor (an elected magistrate charged chiefly with the administration of civil justice). In public they were accompanied by a bodyguard of “praetorian guards,” who also supported them in maintaining public order.

The missionaries found no synagogue in the city, so they looked for a place of prayer by the river, as the exiles had done in Babylon (Psalm 137:1). They found only a group of women (ten men were required to have an ‘official’ service). This is where Paul started his proclamation of the gospel. One of those women listened with special attention. She was a businesswoman who dealt in purple materials, a luxury item that was highly sought after by wealthy Romans on account of its royal colour. It was obvious that she was a capable woman who lived in a large house. Later she would provide lodging for the four gospel ministers and provide a meeting place for the church (vv. 15, 40). She had been born in Thyatira in Lydia; a city famous for its purple dye industry. She worshipped God and belonged to the God-fearers who were acquainted with the Scriptures and met on the Sabbath.

We read next that “the Lord opened her heart.” Her faith was simply still an incomplete, Old Testament faith. She knew that Israel was expecting the Messiah, but she did not yet know that he had already come. Or who it was. But at this point, the Lord Jesus brought her to a fuller understanding of this by means of Paul’s preaching, when he proclaimed the crucified and risen Christ. As Jesus had done for the disciples, Paul explained the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms, and showed them with the help of these Scriptures that the Messiah first had to suffer and only then could enter into his glory. In this way, “he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures” (Luke 24:45). Jesus was now doing the same thing with Lydia.

Luke writes that the Lord opened her heart, but the words “heart” and “mind” are often used synonymously in Scripture. Opening Lydia’s heart is equivalent to opening her mind. She knew and believed the Law and the Prophets already, but now new light shone on them for her. Her faith-insight was illuminated and strengthened, so that she perceived that the Scriptures were testifying about Jesus. She also acted on this new faith: she was baptized. Thereby she was confessing her sin and accursedness, but also her faith that she was saved by the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus. She accepted him publicly as Messiah and Mediator. But she did not do this by herself but did so in concert with her entire house. We may see here first a reference to her children, for in New Testament linguistic usage they continued to be seen as belonging to someone’s “house,” although it cannot be proved that Lydia had children. As a competent businesswoman, however, she would have had male and female slaves, which may indicate that the children of these slaves belonged to Lydia’s house. Those belonging to her house were also baptized.

Because Lydia believed that the Lord Jesus had given his life for her, she gave herself entirely to him. She offered hospitality to Paul and his helpers (cf. Luke 10:5-7). And she persuaded them to accept her invitation, presumably also because ancient inns were hardly places for pleasant lodging. They were dirty, dangerous, expensive, and often little more than brothels. This is partly why hospitality became a Christian virtue and a duty par excellence, especially for office bearers who set the example (cf. Romans 12:13; Hebrews 13:2; 1 Timothy 5:9-10; Titus 1:7-8; 1 Peter 4:9).

From the pressure she exerted on Paul and his companions, we get the impression that initially they had declined Lydia’s invitation. After all, God had called them to Macedonia, and that included more than the single city of Philippi. But he yielded to Lydia’s heartfelt urging, and so he remained in Philippi perhaps longer than he intended. And this would have significant consequences under Jesus’ guidance.

Verses 16-18: Paul’s continued preaching in Philippi led to other events. Because he drove out a soothsayer’s spirit from a slave girl, Paul and Silas were sent to jail. And because of that, the jailer with his family came to faith. Lydia and the jailer were not the main characters in this episode, but only the Lord Jesus. The main issue was how Jesus was establishing his church in Philippi through his Word and Spirit. Lydia and her house were “delivered from the domain of darkness and transferred to the kingdom of God’s beloved Son,” certainly as the first fruits of pagan Europe.

The prince of darkness, however, was not about to tolerate this invasion of his territory. He embarked upon his counterattack with his two primary weapons: deceit and violence. Satan sent one of his demons to go after those who were proclaiming the gospel. This demon had overpowered a slave girl and given her a kind of clairvoyance. By means of her speaking, this demon disclosed so-called mysteries or future events. The owners of that poor girl earned lots of money with her soothsaying. Whenever Paul and the other brothers went to the Jewish place of prayer, she came out to meet them.

She followed Paul and the others, and that evil spirit in her kept on screaming: “These men are servants of the Most High God and they are showing you the way to be saved!” These notions were familiar to Gentiles as well, for they too acknowledged a “most high god,” from whom they expected “salvation.” However, they were not thinking of the living God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, but of one or another of their dead idols who was supposedly above all other gods and goddesses. This spectacle was repeated for days on end. At one stage, Paul couldn’t listen to it anymore. What the soothsaying devil was saying through the girl was the truth. Although it was remarkable that he didn’t say a word about Jesus Christ, whom he undoubtedly knew to be the Son of the Most High God and for whom he certainly harboured a kind of demonic fear, as we see in the Gospels (cf. Matthew 8:28-29; Mark 1:23-27; Luke 4:31-37; 8:28).

Led by the Holy Spirit, the apostle discerned that approval of this would signify an attack upon the gospel. The impression was being cultivated that the girl and Paul were drawing from the same murky fountain. The gospel would then come to be viewed as equivalent to the message of all those hundreds of fortune tellers in the world, for street preachers all belonged to the same class of people, in the public eye. They all proclaimed a form of “salvation,” though not from the guilt and power of sin. But there was no equivalence or similarity between Christ and Belial (2 Corinthians 6:15), and that had to be made clear. Therefore, Paul spoke directly to the evil spirit in the slave girl: “In the name of Jesus Christ I command you to depart from this girl!” At that moment the demon left her. She stopped screaming, and she was suddenly in her right mind. This is an encouraging sign that Satan’s tyranny has been broken and is ending. (The drama continues in the next study!)

Questions:

How does this passage confirm the importance of the Old Testament for understanding the New Testament?

Why did Paul not call for the immediate abolition of slavery? (See Philemon)

How are we in the 21^st century to understand any reference to “demon possession”?

– Alida Sewell