God’s Word for You

Acts 21:1-3 A quiet passage

by Pastor Timothy Smith on Tuesday, December 15, 2020

21 After we left them we set sail, and made straight for Cos. The next day we proceeded to Rhodes, and from there to Patara. 2 There we found a ship crossing over to Phoenicia, so we went aboard and set sail. 3 When we came in sight of Cyprus, we passed by with it to our left and sailed to Syria. We made landfall at Tyre, where the ship was to unload its cargo.

In chapter 20, I compared Asia Minor to your hand, palm toward you, fingers splayed to the left. Paul and his companions had been sailing their way down these ‘fingertips’ of Asia Minor. From Miletus, the tip of the ring finger, they sailed to the island of Cos, and on to Rhodes, the big island off the tip of the pinky. Patara was a city on the tip of the pinky itself. This was the last stop for coasting vessels plying their trade up and down the fingertips of Asia Minor. But there at Patara the travelers found a big ship heading for Phoenicia, a long way away (about where your wrist meets your hand).

Phoenicia was the name at this time for the Old Testament’s Lebanon, known for excellent lumber, olives, and wine (Hosea 14:5-7). The Hivites had once been the native people there in the pine-covered mountains (Judges 3:3), and both David and Solomon enjoyed profitable trade with the kings of the cities of Tyre and Sidon in Lebanon (Song of Solomon 3:9). The Hivites were related to the Israelites by marriage (Genesis 36:2), and they spoke a language similar to Hebrew. However, it isn’t clear whether the Phoenicians who lived there in New Testament times as sailors (and pirates) had conquered the Hivites or intermarried with them or a little of both (as had happened when Greek sailors encountered the Philistines). Phoenician colonies and ports dotted the Mediterranean Sea, from Carthage in North Africa and Little Carthage (Cartagena) in southeastern Spain to the Lebanese coast of Palestine. The skill of the Phoenicians as navigators and sailors is evident in this passage, since they chose to sail through the center of the Mediterranean with the big island of Cyprus “to our left” rather than skirting the safer waters to the north of the island. Losing sight of land was not the usual method of sailing in those days, but the Phoenicians bound for Syria knew what they were doing. With the constellation Lepus the Hare (once called “the Throne of Jawza”) rising to the left of Orion ahead, they made their way, and Luke reports landfall at Tyre without any troubling incidents—the hallmark of an uneventful and therefore happy voyage.

An uneventful trip is a little like an uneventful life. It is peaceful, but it doesn’t make for exciting reading. For readers of Acts, I promise that there will be a very exciting sea story yet to come, the kind that was terrifying to live through but fun to read about. The same could be said for any human lifetime. The more blessed we are by God with “a quiet life” (1 Thessalonians 4:11), the more we should thank him. I’m reminded of King David’s children. Many of his sons are famous to us: Absalom, Amnon, Adonijah, Solomon, and his beautiful daughter Tamar. But some of his children led quiet and uneventful lives, including Daniel the son of Abigail (1 Chronicles 3:1, called Kileab in 2 Samuel 3:3). We know nothing at all about this man, and therefore we can be pretty certain that he led a peaceful, uneventful life, avoiding the bloodshed and the intrigue of his hot-blooded brothers.

God encourages us to seek a quiet life, to mind our own business and to work at our jobs, “so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody” (1 Thessalonians 4:12). Whatever path your life takes, through open seas or through regular daily routines, pray that God will bless your course, that he will supply your daily needs, and that he will give you contentment and the confidence of being his dear child through faith in Jesus our Savior.

In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith

 

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