Atos 20
Kent Hughes · Citado em PreceptAustin
Atos 20
Hughes illustrates the root idea of parakaleo "to come alongside and encourage" with the following example - I see this exemplified every time my church has a roller skating party, and the parents put their little ones on skates for the first time. Mom and Dad skate with their child, holding on to his or her hands, sometimes with the child’s feet on the ground and sometimes in the air. But all the time the parents are alongside encouraging....[exhortation] is a wonderful gift, and we are to place it at Christ’s feet and be willing to be worn out in its use. See Six Ways You Can Encourage Someone Today Taken his leave (782)(aspazomai from a + spao = draw out as a sword, pull, breathe) means to enfold in arms, to welcome, to embrace. In classical literature aspazomai can also be used of physical expressions of welcome, such as “embrace” and “kiss.” Aspazomai in this verse means to draw to oneself in embrace in farewell. Taken his leave of them, he left to go to Macedonia - "Only after charging the Ephesian believers did Paul take his leave of them to begin his planned trip to Jerusalem via Macedonia and Achaia (cf. Acts 19:21)." (MacArthur) A T
Atos 20
Hughes adds - It is comforting for any preacher to think that people might fall asleep during the preaching of even the Apostle Paul. Yet, Paul taught for many hours and after a long day of work for most of his audience. There is also some evidence that Eutychus fought the sleep the best he could: “The tenses of the Greek verbs portray poor Eutychus as being gradually overcome despite his struggle to remain awake. Yet in the end, sleep got the best of him: “The word translated ‘sleep’ is the word from which we derive our English word hypnosis.” (Preaching the Word - Acts) And as Paul kept on talking: The present tense pictures this as going on an on. For Talking see notes on dialegomai He was overcome: The causes of the drowsiness of Eutychus (the heat, the crowd, the smell of the lamps, the late hour, the long discourse).Cf. Lu 22:45 Overcome is same word kataphero translated above as sinking. Deep sleep and fell down from the third floor: From treis (three) and stegê (roof), adjective tristegos having three roofs. Bob Deffinbaugh - When I was in Jr. High School, we had a fellow fall asleep in our class. As I remember, the teacher decided to teach the student a lesson by having the class silently slip out at the end of the period. The next class was also instructed to slip into their seats quietly. The student slept peacefully on—until about half way through the next period. Everyone was waiting and watching for him to wake up, which he did, of course. He opened his eyes, looked around the class, and came to the realization that it was another class, and not his own. He quietly gathered up his books and left class, as inconspicuously as possible.Sleeping in class has happened for centuries. In our text, we are told of a young man named Eutychus, who fell asleep during Paul’s lengthy sermon, and then fell three stories down to his death. As you know, this young man was raised to life, and so the story is a happy one in the end. I am inclined to entitle the section which describes the death and raising of Eutychus, “Eutychus Drops Out of Paul’s Class.” (Ed: Source of my title to this section) It is indeed and interesting story, and in time I believe we will see why the story was included in Luke’s account. It would be an amusing exercise to swap “falling asleep in church” stories this morning. I only wish that there was time. Over the years I have seen a few of you fall asleep. I am frankly tempted to use this account as a proof text for lengthy sermons. A. T. Robertson makes this comment about Paul’s extended sermon: “Paul’s purpose to leave early next morning seemed to justify the long discourse. Preachers usually have some excuse for the long sermon which is not always clear to the exhausted audience.” But I am afraid that if I did preach any longer you would insist that I would have to be able to raise the dead, like Paul, or at least promise to leave the following day. (Paul's Parting Words) And was picked up dead: The people considered him dead and Luke the physician seems to agree with that view. Peter had earlier raised Tabitha to life (Acts 9:40). Now Paul raises Eutychus. Luke on a number of occasions draws parallels between the ministries of the two apostles to show God's blessing was equally upon both. Liberal theologians, attempting to explain away the supernatural, suggest that this man was not actually dead but was stunned from the fall. Paul merely gave him mouth to mouth resucitation and he was revived. However, the Bible says he was dead, and Luke, being a doctor, confirmed his death. What we have here is supernatural phenomena. Picked up (142)(airo) literally means to lift up something (a dead body Mt 14:12) and to carry it (Lxx - Ge 44:1, Ex 25:28 = the Ark).