Now when the meeting of the synagogue had broken up, many of the Jews and of the God-fearing proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who, speaking to them, were urging them to continue in the grace of God. The next Sabbath nearly the whole city assembled to hear the word of the Lord. But when the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy and began contradicting the things spoken by Paul, and were blaspheming (Acts 13:43–45).

Notice how there was a change in attitude from one Sabbath preaching to the next. The Jews were favorable toward Paul while he was preaching to the Jews and the proselytes (i.e. Gentile converts to Judaism) in the synagogue; however, when Paul's preaching began to draw a large interest even from the non-proselyte Gentiles, the Jews became jealous and started to contradict and attack what he taught. Their interest in the truth was overshadowed by their ethnocentric attitude against the Gentiles. This ethnocentrism was not based on Scripture but on their own man-made traditions and biases.

Friends, we must guard against this ourselves. We too can allow our personal feelings, biases and traditions to overshadow the priority of God's truth.

I remember sitting in a congregation, where a pastor I know gave a sound exposition of Scripture. I turned to my companion and commented that he had given a really good message. My companion commented, "How can you say that? After all that he's said and done against you behind your back, how can you compliment him?" I remember responding to my companion, "He gave a clear and sound message. Why shouldn't I compliment him? What he has done or said about me is nothing to me. God will judge him for those things. But it's right for us to recognize and praise God when His Word is preached well."

Friends, I am reminded of these words from Paul. He was languishing in a Roman prison, and some preachers of the Gospel were taking advantage of his situation. They were preaching the Gospel, but they were doing it with wrong motives and in a self-serving way. But listen to Paul's perspective:

It is true that some preach Christ out of envy and rivalry, but others out of goodwill. The latter do so out of love, knowing that I am put here for the defense of the gospel. The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains. But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice (Philippians 1:15–18).

Paul's words are a sobering reminder to us of what is truly important. Christ is preached! When a pastor gives a sound exposition of Scripture, I will praise God. Now, if he distorts the Scriptures, he must be called out for this, but the realm of motives and selfish interest are the realm of God's sovereign insight and judgment, not ours.

The Jews of Pisidian Antioch did not judge Paul's words on the soundness of his teaching but on the basis of their jealous ethnocentrism against the Gentiles. They were the complete opposite of the Berean Jews, who examined the Scriptures daily to test Paul's teaching with the truth of God's Word. Of them we are told,

Now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true (Acts 17:11).

Friends, let us be like the Berean Jews and not the Jews of Pisidian Antioch. Let us not allow our personal biases and man-made traditions to overshadow the priority of God's Word being rightly proclaimed and embraced by many.

AI-Expanded Reflection

Acts 13 describes an initially receptive response among Jews and devout converts, followed by opposition when a much larger crowd gathers the next Sabbath (13:43–45). Luke names jealousy as a feature of the hostile response. The original observes how concern for status or group boundaries can interfere with attention to a message. Yet the distinction among hearers matters: receptive Jewish people remain part of the story, as do the Jewish missionaries themselves. The episode should not be retold as a uniform ethnic rejection of truth.

The wider speech helps explain what is at stake. Paul announces fulfillment in Jesus and the forgiveness and justification offered through him. The expansion toward Gentiles is defended from Israel’s own Scriptures (13:46–47). The conflict therefore concerns how God’s promises are being fulfilled, not a simple contest between people who possess Scripture and people who do not. The narrative exposes resistance within a particular setting while continuing to honor the scriptural witness through which the mission is understood.

The personal anecdote brings the issue close to ordinary church life. Someone who has wronged us may nevertheless say something true. Recognizing that truth need not amount to approving the wrong. Philippians 1:15–18 provides a strong example: Paul can rejoice that Christ is proclaimed even while identifying envy and selfish ambition in some preachers. He refuses to make his personal treatment the sole criterion by which the message is assessed. That freedom is a substantial expression of humility and devotion to Christ.

The passage does not, however, place all motives and conduct beyond human accountability. Paul actually names the problematic motives, and elsewhere he gives requirements for leaders and instructions for addressing misconduct. We should distinguish an unwarranted claim to know a person’s heart from an evidence-based judgment about harmful behavior. A sound sermon does not cancel dishonesty, exploitation, or abuse. Conversely, a personal conflict does not automatically make every statement by the other person false. Truth and accountability must remain together rather than being forced into a choice between uncritical approval and total dismissal.

The Bereans model receptive examination: eagerness to hear accompanies testing by Scripture (Acts 17:11). That combination is more demanding than either suspicion of everything or acceptance of a favored speaker. We can ask whether resentment has made us unwilling to acknowledge a valid point, whether affection has made us excuse a distortion, and whether the text is actually being allowed to correct our judgment. The goal is not emotional detachment from every relationship. It is freedom for the gospel to remain greater than our rivalries. We honor Christ when we can rejoice in what is true, address what is wrong fairly, and refuse to let either personal injury or personal loyalty become the final authority over what we are willing to hear.

When the Gentiles heard this, they rejoiced and glorified the word of the Lord, "and as many as were appointed to eternal life believed" (Acts 13:48).

The simplest and plainest way to read this verse is to see a causal relationship between the divine appointment to eternal life and the Gentiles' belief. In other words, those whom God first chose for salvation are the very ones who then believed. The perfect tense of the participle translated "appointed" indicates an action completed in the past with a continuing effect. This is certainly not the only verse that teaches this. Paul writes that God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless, and in love predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of His will (a paraphrase of Ephesians 1:4–5; cf. Revelation 13:8; 17:8).

We also find God's foreordination to eternal life affirmed in Romans 8: those God foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son; those He predestined He called, those He called He justified, and those He justified He glorified (a paraphrase of Romans 8:29–30). And again in Romans 9, where Paul speaks of the vessels of mercy God prepared beforehand for glory — even us, whom He called not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles (a paraphrase of Romans 9:23–24).

It is because God first predestined us for eternal life that we came to believe the Gospel. From Adam to this day, I believe no one except Christ — called the "last Adam" — has chosen God of his own free will. This is Paul's assessment: "None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God" (Romans 3:10–11).

When Paul preached the Gospel to the Gentiles, many believed, rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord. But the biblical witness makes clear that not everyone believed so as to be saved — only those who "were appointed to eternal life."

God's predestination does not negate the activity or necessity of our faith. On the contrary, it ensures the genuineness and effectiveness of our faith. For though the Gospel was preached in times past, people still did not believe. I believe faith does not come simply by the preaching of the Gospel; it comes by God's decree. Paul writes that not all have obeyed the gospel, for Isaiah asks, "Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?" So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word (I believe meaning "decree") of God (a paraphrase of Romans 10:16–17).

If faith is by God's decree, then it is not by our free will. For our will, apart from the regenerating work of God's Spirit, can neither understand nor accept the things of God: the natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned (a paraphrase of 1 Corinthians 2:14). As Jesus also taught, unless one is born again — born of the Spirit — he cannot see the kingdom of God (cf. John 3:3).

Now we can understand why there is absolutely no room for boasting (Ephesians 2:8–10). Not only has God accomplished salvation through the substitutionary death of Christ; He has also enabled the faith to understand and accept it as personal truth. And He did not leave any of this to chance, but ordained it before He founded the world.

As a disclaimer, this is not to say that He predestined everything; I do not believe the Bible teaches this. What it does teach is that God predestined everything concerning our salvation. We can freely choose our jobs, our spouse, and the color of socks we wear each morning. But being spiritually dead (cf. Ephesians 2:1–3), we cannot freely choose the Lord. He must first choose us (cf. John 6:44, 65; Ephesians 1:4).

Friends, if you can understand and accept this, it is one of the most liberating and comforting truths in the Bible!

AI-Expanded Reflection

Acts 13:48 comes at a turning point in Acts. Paul and Barnabas had preached in the synagogue at Pisidian Antioch, and when many of the Jewish leaders rejected the message, Paul quoted Isaiah 49:6 — "I have made you a light for the Gentiles," to bring salvation to the ends of the earth (13:47). The Gentiles' rejoicing in 13:48 is their response to discovering that they, too, were included in God's promises. Luke then adds that "the word of the Lord was spreading throughout the whole region" (13:49).

The comment's reading of "appointed" (tetagmenoi) reflects the Reformed understanding and is how most translations render the word. Christians in other traditions have understood the verse differently — some reading the form as "disposed" or "ready" for eternal life, others emphasizing that Luke often holds divine appointment and human response side by side (Acts 2:23; 4:27–28; 13:46, where the Jewish leaders "thrust it aside" and "judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life"). The comment's own disclaimer — that it does not believe God predetermined everything — shows that questions of sovereignty and freedom are nuanced even within a single view. See the note at #1779 for the broader range of positions held in good faith.

What all traditions share is the verse's note of joy: the Gentiles "began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord." Whatever one's view of election, the fitting response to God's saving grace is the one the comment ends with — liberation, comfort, and praise.

Acts 12:21–23 records that on an appointed day Herod put on his royal robes, took his seat on the throne, and delivered an oration; the people shouted that this was the voice of a god and not of a man; and immediately an angel of the Lord struck him down because he did not give God the glory, and he was eaten by worms and died.

The death of Herod Agrippa I has been variously explained — poisoning or a stroke among the suggestions. One reference work describes his sudden death at the games in Caesarea in AD 44 as a political matter, notes that his death in the full vigor of his years was deeply lamented by his people despite the concessions he had made to foreign customs, and observes that Christians regarded it as a judgment for his hostility toward their community.

AI-Expanded Reflection

The parallel account is worth knowing, because it is unusually close. Josephus describes the same event at Caesarea — the silver garment catching the sunlight, the crowd hailing him as a god, Herod failing to rebuke them, and a sudden onset of severe abdominal pain followed by death several days later. He also reports that Herod accepted the flattery and interpreted the illness as connected to it. Two independent sources describing the same occasion, the same acclamation, and the same medical trajectory is a stronger convergence than most events of the period enjoy.

The chapter's structure is Luke's own commentary. It opens with Herod killing James and imprisoning Peter, moves through Peter's release, and ends with Herod's death. The last line is the point: the word of God continued to spread and flourish. A king who arrested the church is dead by the end of the chapter, and the thing he was trying to stop is what Luke reports as still growing.

Acts 13:27 says that the people of Jerusalem and their rulers did not recognize Jesus, yet in condemning Him they fulfilled the words of the prophets that are read every Sabbath.

Notice that even as they were condemning Him, they were fulfilling what the prophets had foretold. They were actors in a script they possessed but did not perceive they were performing.

It is unclear whether they would not recognize Him or could not. Paul writes that the gospel is veiled to those who are perishing, and that the god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ (a paraphrase of 2 Corinthians 4:3–4). On that account, unbelievers cannot understand unless the blinders are removed.

Here is a remarkable passage suggesting that even the disciples did not understand the gospel Jesus preached to them: He took the Twelve aside and told them everything written by the prophets about the Son of Man would be fulfilled — He would be delivered to the Gentiles, mocked, insulted, spit on, flogged, and killed, and on the third day rise again. And the disciples did not understand any of this; its meaning was hidden from them, and they did not know what He was talking about (a paraphrase of Luke 18:31–34).

AI-Expanded Reflection

The precision matters here, and Luke's own wording supplies it. Acts 13:27 names the residents of Jerusalem and their leaders, which is narrower than a people. The setting makes the point clearer still: Paul is speaking inside a synagogue in Pisidian Antioch, to a Jewish congregation, as a Jew — and Luke reports that many of them followed Paul and Barnabas afterward and urged them to continue. The same chapter records Jewish belief and Jewish opposition within a few verses of each other.

That framing has been noted several times in this project, and it applies with particular force here because the speaker and much of the audience are on the believing side of the division being described.

On the substantive question the comment raises — would not, or could not — the two texts it pairs are the standard ones, and they pull in a useful direction together. The Luke passage is the striking one: the men closest to Jesus, hearing a plain statement in advance, did not understand, and Luke says the meaning was hidden from them. Whatever account one gives of unbelief, it cannot be simple hostility, since the same incomprehension afflicted the Twelve.

Paul and Barnabas are preaching in Antioch to both Jews and Gentiles. As they were leaving the synagogue the people invited them to speak further the next Sabbath, and many followed them, and they urged them to continue in the grace of God. On the next Sabbath nearly the whole city gathered to hear the word of the Lord. When some saw the crowds they were filled with jealousy and began contradicting Paul and heaping abuse on him. Paul and Barnabas answered boldly that they had to speak the word of God first to them, but since they rejected it, they would now turn to the Gentiles — for the Lord had commanded them, making them a light for the Gentiles to bring salvation to the ends of the earth. When the Gentiles heard this they were glad and honored the word of the Lord (a paraphrase of Acts 13:42–48).

The disciples have been going out from Jerusalem to Judea, Samaria, and now toward the ends of the earth, as Christ instructed in Acts 1:8. Tonight I was thinking about the obedience of the apostles and how they were filled with the Spirit. God called them to take the good news to all nations, and they shared the gospel boldly with people their own upbringing had kept them separate from. God will often call us out of our comfort zone.

AI-Expanded Reflection

The pattern in this chapter is worth reading carefully, because Luke repeats it throughout Acts and it is easy to flatten. Paul goes to the synagogue first in every city, and in every city the response divides — some believe and some oppose, and both groups are Jewish. The "many who followed them" in verse 43 are Jews and devout converts, and the opposition in verse 45 comes from others. This is not a story of one people accepting and another rejecting; it is a story of a message dividing a community, with Paul himself, a Pharisee, on the believing side.

Paul's own summary of the arrangement in Romans is worth setting alongside it: the gospel is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, first to the Jew and also to the Greek (Romans 1:16). The priority is not a grudging formality but a conviction he holds throughout, which is why he keeps returning to the synagogue in the next city after being driven out of the last one.

Friends, as I mentioned to you before, the tension between the Jews and Gentiles extends throughout the Book of Acts. This tension existed even among believers. So we read more about this today:

Now the apostles and brethren who were in Judea heard that the Gentiles had also received the word of God. And when Peter came up to Jerusalem, those of the circumcision contended with him, saying, You went in to uncircumcised men and ate with them! (Acts 11:1–3 NKJV)

But when they heard Peter's testimony, especially the part about how God gave the Holy Spirit in the same way that He gave the Spirit to them, then they were willing to accept the Gentiles as co-heirs with them of eternal life through Jesus Christ:

And as I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell upon them, as upon us at the beginning. Then I remembered the word of the Lord, how He said, John indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit. If therefore God gave them the same gift as He gave us when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God? When they heard these things they became silent; and they glorified God, saying, Then God has also granted to the Gentiles repentance to life. (Acts 11:15–18 NKJV)

God had to give these Jewish believers who questioned him a sign before they would embrace the Gentiles as Christian brothers. In fact, in another place, Paul argues that unlike Gentiles Jews always seek after signs (1 Corinthians 1:22). And what sign was given to them so that they would recognize that God had granted salvation to Gentiles? It was the sign of "tongues" (1 Corinthians 14:22–23). This was the sign that convinced the Jews, who were with Peter in Cornelius the Gentiles' house, that God had accepted the Gentiles as He had the Jews (Acts 10:44–46). By this, they also recognized that God also accepted the despised Samaritans (Acts 8:14–17). And by this means even those that only knew John's water baptism was accepted (Acts 19:1–6).

I mentioned this before but the inclusion of Gentiles with Jews as one body in Christ was a "mystery" in the Old Testament. It was only revealed in the New Testament through visions (e.g. Peter and his vision of unclean animals in Acts 10) and the baptism of the Holy Spirit through the sign of tongues. Paul writes extensively about this mystery:

For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for you Gentiles if indeed you have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which was given to me for you, how that by revelation He made known to me the mystery (as I have briefly written already, by which, when you read, you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ), which in other ages was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to His holy apostles and prophets: that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, of the same body, and partakers of His promise in Christ through the gospel, of which I became a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given to me by the effective working of His power. (Ephesians 3:1–7 NKJV)

Notice that Paul says that the mystery was not know before but was "now" (that is, in the 1st century) revealed by the Holy Spirit to the apostles and prophets by divine revelation. And notice the content of that mystery: "that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, of the same body, and partakers of His promise in Christ through the gospel."

This is a magnificent revelation, because by it both you and I are included with a remnant of Jews in the hope of eternal life. Praise God! Hallelujah!

AI-Expanded Reflection

The objection to Peter concerns shared meals: he entered the home of uncircumcised people and ate with them. The dispute is therefore not merely about an abstract doctrine of inclusion. It concerns whether inherited boundaries will continue to determine whom believers can receive as family. Peter answers by recounting God's initiative, culminating in the Spirit's gift to Gentile hearers. He must not obstruct what God has done.

The Jewish Christians who question Peter should not simply be called unbelievers in Christ. Acts introduces them as apostles and brothers, and their response to the explanation is to glorify God. Their difficulty is recognizing the implications of Gentile inclusion. This makes the account especially searching for established believers: genuine faith does not automatically eliminate every inherited assumption about who belongs. Read Acts 11:1–18.

Tongues are expressly mentioned in the Cornelius account and in Acts 19, while Acts 8 does not specify the visible phenomenon associated with receiving the Spirit. A connection may be inferred, but it should not be described as an explicit report. Likewise, Paul's contrast between signs and wisdom in 1 Corinthians 1:22 characterizes patterns within his argument; it should not become an ethnic rule about what every Jewish or Gentile person always seeks.

Ephesians 3 describes the revealed mystery with three closely related privileges: Gentiles share the inheritance, belong to the same body, and participate in the promise in Christ. The Old Testament already anticipates blessing for the nations; the now-disclosed form of their equal participation gives the mystery its particular force. The application reaches beyond admiring the early church's progress. Communities must ask whether their fellowship, leadership, and hospitality reflect the equal belonging they confess, or preserve social barriers that God's grace has rendered inappropriate.