In Peter Allison's sermon 'Leading in the Absence of Authority,' he explores Acts 27 and the journey of Paul to Rome as a prisoner. Despite lacking formal authority, Paul's character, wisdom, and experience gradually earn him respect and a form of leadership among the ship's crew and the centurion. The sermon highlights how Paul's insights, based on his past experiences with shipwrecks, were initially ignored but later proved valuable, reflecting the importance of humility, patience, and character in leadership. The narrative also emphasizes the significance of the process in our life journeys, illustrating how we can grow through challenges and adversities. The centurion's reliance on the majority and his initial dismissal of Paul's advice serve as a lesson on the potential pitfalls of leadership based on convenience and crowd-following. Throughout the sermon, the importance of self-discipline, trust, and kindness is underscored, demonstrating how Paul navigated his circumstances with grace and perseverance.

Our scripture reading is Acts 27. And we will begin at verse 1. So Paul's presentation to Agrippa has been completed and the verdict is rendered that because he's appealed to Caesar he will go even though he had not done anything worthy of a deserving death or chains. Verse 1, and when it was decided that we should sail to Italy, they delivered Paul and some other prisoners to one named Julius, a centurion of the Augustan regiment. So entering a ship of a drometrium we put to sea, meaning to sail along the coasts of Asia.

Aristarchus, a Macedonian of Thessalonica, was with us, and the next day we landed at Sidon. And Julius treated Paul kindly and gave him liberty to go to his friends and receive care. And when we had put to sea from there, we sailed under the shelter of Cyprus because the winds were contrary. And when we had sailed over the sea, which is off Cilicia and Pamphylia, we came to Myra, a city of Lycia. There the centurion found an Alexandrian ship sailing to Italy and he put us on board.

When we had sailed slowly many days and arrived with difficulty off Nidus the wind not permitting us to proceed we sailed under the shelter of off of Crete off Salome passing it with difficulty we came to a place called Fair Havens near the city of LaSia Now when much time had been spent and sailing was now dangerous because the fast was already over, Paul advised them saying, then I perceive that this voyage will end with disaster and much loss, not only of the cargo and ship, but also our lives. Nevertheless, the centurion was more persuaded by the helmsman and the owner of the ship than by the things spoken by Paul. And because the harbor was not suitable to winter in, the majority advised to set sail from there also, if by any means they could reach Phoenix, a harbor of Crete, opening toward the southwest and northwest and winter there." May the Lord revive our hearts according to His loving kindness. Heavenly Father, please grant that we may inwardly digest Your Word. Receive it with faith and meekness this morning.

And lay it up in our hearts, that we may walk in a way that is pleasing to you. And please sanctify, O my sinful lips, that from a vessel of clay these riches may be proclaimed. Through Christ we ask, Amen. Amen. Well, in about the year 2000, an Alaskan couple, Kathy and Tom, who had two successful careers, who had two successful careers, two houses, cars, motorcycles, and all that go with that success, made a decision.

They were raising three children and instead of adding, you know, family dinners and game nights to their schedule, they decided to sell everything that they had and live at sea for seven years. Other people have done this too. And they shared a life together in a boat called the Nueva Vida, New Life, without the conference of television or cell phones and the other things that they had sold. And Kathy told the reporters that the family decided to live in a cabin the size of a minivan because she and Tom wanted real relationship with their children. She said, I really wanted to know who they were.

To know them and they to know us. Not the babysitter or the nanny or somebody else. And so she said that while many children focus on their social lives, their children learned every day in more than 20 countries that they visited. Along with these relationships in their family and their education, they focused on work, rotating chores such as mending, fishing, and other tasks that were necessary to sustain their life at sea. And both of them, Tom and Kathy, said that one of the benefits of this time together was a lack of family fights.

Despite seven years of five people living in such tight quarters, Kathy says, we don't fight, we don't raise our voice, there's just no tolerance for it. Well as one who has lived at sea with 150 other people for many months in close quarters, I can tell you that there are few other environments that require people to live together in such close quarters, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, waking, sleeping, eating, and everything else that life involves. You work together, you eat together, you relax together, you go through extreme stresses together, and you have to trust and rely on strangers. And you learn a lot about such people from these kinds of close quarters living. You see how they handle stresses of every kind.

You see how they handle themselves in humbling defeats as well as in the triumphs and the winds And this is I think a little bit of what we see in this chapter. We didn't read it all it's an incredible story But what we see emerge in this Victoria, in this adventurous and very harrowing sea journey that took over six months from probably August into February, and much of it at sea under very adverse conditions. What we see is the godly, mature, and discerning character of Paul shining through. Paul starts and ends this journey as a prisoner. And in the beginning, nobody listens to him.

He has respect, but they respect his person, but they don't take his advice. He's a nobody to them. What would he know? But by the end, Paul, this prisoner, is in basically virtual command of the ship and the sail, sailing. And he doesn't do that because someone gave him a title and a piece of paper and put him in charge.

And put him in charge. He does it as a prisoner whose humility is ignored. Who shows humility. So that even when he is ignored, even when his insight and clear thinking, even in his clear thinking in emergency conditions, even his patience in adversity, and his encouragement and hope when everyone else had given up hope. They saw all this.

They saw him be humble when he was ignored. They saw his insight and clear thinking when everybody else was in a bit of a panic. They saw his patience through some very adverse conditions that we will look at. And they saw someone who could give encouragement and hope to other people. And this earned him a very real authority that by the end of this trip, everyone is following his directions.

But in the portion that we read this morning, Paul starts this journey without any real authority. The centurion respects him personally, but just ignores his device. And so as we go through this chapter, not just today, but in the next coming weeks, Lord willing, notice Two things. Notice, one, how even as a prisoner, Paul leads. And secondly, look out for how he responds when he is ignored, when his advice is disregarding, when people don't listen to him.

How does he handle that? Luke opens this account with a decision to sail to Italy and the transfer of Paul from the custody of the captain of the Praetorian Guard in charge of prisoners to the custody of the Centurion, responsible for their transport to Rome. Several other prisoners, Luke says, were also transferred. But these other prisoners are of a different kind than Paul. Greek has two different words for another or for other.

One means another of the same kind, And the other word means another of a different kind. So what's that mean? Well, when a mom or dad needs another diaper for their little one, they mean another of a different kind from the dirty one. So Paul was a political prisoner in change for the sake of the Gospel. He wasn't a criminal.

He hadn't done anything worthy of death or change. Even all the Romans so far that have heard him have reached this verdict. But the other prisoners were of a different kind of prisoner. Probably criminals or slaves being sent to Rome for execution in the Colosseum. That was a...

Rome consumed a lot of bodies providing their entertainment in the Colosseum. And so there are a number of other prisoners that are coming with Paul. Now in transferring custody of Paul to the centurion heading to Rome. Paul is moving one step closer to fulfilling his calling to bear witness in Rome. And this assignment, you remember, had specifically been given to him in Jerusalem after the hearing at which Lysias had to send the Roman troops in to rescue Paul from the Sanhedrin because he was afraid they were about to tear him to pieces.

And it was the following night that the Lord stood by him at this low point in his life. He's in Roman custody. People are trying to kill him. They're not listening to anything he's saying. There are no conversions that we read of.

But it's right at this time that the Lord stood beside him and told him that just as he had testified for the Lord in Jerusalem, so he must also bear witness at Rome. So Paul had this knowledge that everything that was happening to him was happening for a purpose. It was happening to bring him closer to fulfilling this mission that the Lord had given him. Paul didn't have any voice in this decision. Luke says it was decided.

It was decided by other people. Undoubtedly, Festus and his staff. Paul didn't have any choice in the route or in the boat they took. They could have taken an overland route as Paul had done on some of his trips and as sometimes was done, especially over the winter, when sailing on the sea was not possible. There was a period from roughly near the beginning of November through February where sailing wasn't possible.

It was winter. But it was decided that they would sail to Italy. There was still a little window there where it was possible to make the trip, although it was more dangerous. Luke also says that it was decided that we would sail to Italy, implying that Festus's decision included Luke and Paul's other travel companions, Aristarchus, in some way. But I don't think that Luke and Aristarchus were prisoners like Paul.

Because When Luke records the transfer of prisoners, he doesn't say we were transferred. It was decided that we would sail to Italy, but he doesn't say that we were transferred. He says Paul was transferred, along with some other prisoners. So I think he was excluding himself and Aristarchus from the prisoners that were transferred. So he wasn't going along as a prisoner, he was going along as company for Paul.

He seems to have been authorized to accompany Paul and help him, just like Felix allowed Paul's friends to visit and care for him during his two year in prison meant in the praetorium in Caesarea. Felix said he didn't stop the visitors, friends from coming and visiting Paul and ministering to him. So I think this is a similar situation. These men have been authorized or allowed to accompany Paul on this trip and they seem to be included in the party of the centurion. In other words, they weren't just traveling along as independent passengers who booked passage on the same ship, which would have been another possibility.

And so the centurion, now having been given charge of these people and their mission to conduct them to transport them to Rome, he found the ship from Adramitium and it's presumably returning there. He found this ship and Adramitium is a coastal city on the Aegean Sea. It's about 50 or 60 miles south of Troas. And It's on the western coast of what we would call Turkey today. And this was an area Paul has been through many, many times in his various trips around Macedonia.

And so even though Adramitium is not really where they want to go, The first half of the route to Adramitrium is identical with the typical sea route to Rome. And so this route will take them past the major ports on the southern coast of Asia Minor, of Turkey today. Like Myra or Petara, where they could easily find a ship heading to Rome. And so Myra was a waypoint on the major shipping route for wheat from Alexandria to Rome. And in Egypt, and since Egypt was a major supplier of wheat for Rome there would typically be ships at Myra that are that are headed to Rome and so this is a very a very standard way to proceed.

Now the shortest path back to Adramitium would have been the exact reverse of the route that Paul followed when he went to Jerusalem from Miletus in Acts 20 and 21. And Luke in that voyage specifically states that they went south of the island of Cyprus. South of Cyprus. And that would have been the shortest or the quickest route. But that's not the typical route when you're traveling west.

It's the typical route when you're traveling east but not west. The typical route when traveling west is to sail past Cyprus on the east and on the north. And in verse four, Luke says that the reason for this route is that the winds were contrary. I'd hoped to have a nice map, but I wasn't able to get it ready in time. A map that would be helpful.

But Hopefully your Bible will have a map in the back of it that has Paul's journey to Rome here. And I think it will be very helpful to kind of keep a finger back there if you have one. It will help provide some perspective about what's going on in this chapter. This chapter is an incredibly detailed account of a sea voyage. So Luke says that the reason that they're going to go on the east side of Cyprus and around the north is because the winds were contrary.

And the fact that he added this little explanation that they were going to do this because the winds were contrary has led some commentators to conclude that Luke writes as a stranger to the seas. To the seas. William Mitchell Ramsey is one example. He says in his book, Paul the Traveler and Roman Citizen, that quote, a sailor or a person accustomed to these seas would not have thought of making any explanation for the course of the ship was the normal one." And the New King James translation here that they put to see meaning to sail along the coast of Asia also tends to support that idea to the casual reader. It sort of lends itself to the idea that Luke was surprised that they weren't going the way that they had come when they came from Miletus.

But I think the ESV is a better translation. And this is what it says, And embarking in a ship of Adramitium, which was about to sail to the ports along the coast of Asia we put to sea. You see, it gives you a little different understanding. He's not saying they intended to sail along the coast. He's saying they boarded a ship that was about to sail to points on the coast of Asia.

And so they put to sea from Caesarea, beginning this trip to Rome that's going to total well over 2, 000 miles, probably 2, 300 miles or so. And Luke uses the first person we put to sea indicating he's accompanying Paul, and along with Aristarchus, the Macedonian from Thessalonica. But this phrase, put to see, is worth a comment, because it's the first of many examples in this chapter of Luke's very precise and specific language that is a mark of a man who is highly educated and very knowledgeable about nautical matters. He's well known for being a physician and using precise technical language when he describes medical conditions and illnesses that people had. But what's not as commonly talked about is Luke's precise use of technical nautical language in describing in the New Testament books in describing their sea voyages.

Luke uses at least 11 technical nautical terms that apply exclusively to sailing in the New Testament. And 10 of those words are only used by Luke. Nobody else uses them. Many of them are single uses in the New Testament. Seven of these technical words for sailing are used in this chapter.

And five of those words, of those seven, are used only in this chapter. So, sail from is a technical nautical term that conveys in one word that they got underway and were sailing from some place to some place. We need in English a few more words, it's a little clumsier. It's one word in Greek. James Smith in his famous work titled The Voyage and Shipwreck of Paul, says of Luke, as a voyage writer, Luke is thoroughly versed in nautical matters and describes them in the appropriate language of seamanship.

No man could by any possible means attain to so complete a command of nautical language who had not spent a considerable portion of his life at sea." Now that's just his assessment, but he is an experienced yachtsman, sailor. He did extensive research on this particular voyage and wrote a whole book about just this voyage and all that's going on in this passage and how Luke describes it in these precise nautical terms and how other people have made this trip, the very similar trip, and encountered the very similar things that Luke describes. And how Luke describes things that people didn't know, generally know, until much later. And the only way he could have known it is to have experienced it. Of course, unless God revealed it to him, people always forget about that.

God can reveal things to the writers of Scripture that no one else knows. And so this is a very precise account of an incredible sea journey. And many knowledgeable people have marveled at how consistent his account is with all these other accounts. And I think this just one more time demonstrates the inerrancy and infallibility of the Scriptures, even when they talk about what we call technical scientific matters like sailing or farming. The Bible is inerrant.

Some have said that he writes as a landman because of the things that he includes or doesn't include. Sometimes called a land lover. But no one can question the authenticity and the accuracy, the technical accuracy and precision of every nautical detail that he records on this journey. And so they put the sea in verse 3, heading north to Sidon, where they arrived the following day. And at Sidon, the centurion treats Paul kindly.

But the word that Luke uses here for kindness is the word from which we get philanthropic. It's kindness, but it's not the same word that's used for the fruit of the Spirit, kindness. This is a kindness in the power of the flesh that even unbelievers can demonstrate. Wealthy people often engage in these displays of kindness as a way of paying back to society the societal debt they feel they owe. But philanthropic efforts can do a lot of good that does benefit the church and believers, even when it is done in the flesh, God can use that.

And so in this case, Paul greatly benefits from Julius' philanthropy in being allowed to visit his friends. And this philanthropic gesture shows that Paul has the respect of the centurion. He may have been at the presentation Paul gave to Agrippa, probably was. He may have been stationed at Caesarea, at the Praetorium, and have known Paul better, we don't know. He may have just made his own observations and formed his own conclusions based on the time.

Or he may have been informed in some way about the conditions under which Paul lived in the Praetorium or some combination. But anyways, he trusted Paul enough to give him liberty to visit friends. John Bunyan received similar liberty from the jailer when he was in prison. In his autobiography, Grace Abounding, he recounts one of those occasions when he was permitted to go and visit his family, and he intended to spend the night with them. But long before morning, he became very uneasy.

And so he went back to the prison. And it turns out that very night, the clerical magistrate sent a messenger to the jail to try and trap the jailer in his kindness. And the messenger arrived about midnight and asked the jailer if all the prisoners were safe. And the jailer said yes. And then the messenger asked, well, is John Bunyan safe?

To which the jailer also replied that he was. At which point then the messenger who thought that he wasn't there demanded to see John Bunyan. And so John Bunyan was brought and shown to this astonished witness and all was well. But his kind-hearted jailer said to him, You may go out when you will, for you know much better when to return than I can tell you." And so Paul was obviously well regarded by this unbelieving centurion. See, Paul always had a respect for and a kindness for unbelievers.

He didn't mock unbelievers, he didn't speak disrespectfully to them, or about them. In all his interactions, think of Athens, think of all the Roman times, all the times he's before Roman rulers, he's polite, he's direct, but not in any way obnoxious or dismissive or resisting. He reserves his harsh language and condemnation for those in the church, those Jews who had rejected the light and preached another gospel, another of a different kind of gospel. And so the Centurion recognized this mature leadership in Paul, and that begins with self-control. Someone's not qualified to lead others if they don't have self-discipline to lead themselves.

And Centurion trusted Paul's self-control to return at the appropriate time and not miss the sailing. And see, when a person has this kind of self-discipline to govern themselves, they don't need constant supervision to tell them what to do or to keep them on task. So you little ones, if you don't want constant supervision, then learn to govern yourself. And then you won't have to be told what to do all the time. We see workers who have self-control and ability to direct their labor and manage their own time, often find themselves given more and more freedom in their work and are given more and more responsibility.

And they earn the trust of their leaders. And this is a significant trust that Paul has even in this short time. Because if Paul as a prisoner were to escape or run away, Julian's life would be at risk in the Roman world. So Paul is given liberty to go to his friends and receive care. Receive care.

Luke's wording here means that Paul received some special attention for some particular need beyond just fellowship and a food or meal or mutual education. It might have been related to his health, but it's hard to know. This phrase is only used in this place in the New Testament. But in other literature it's not limited to physical or medical needs. But the Greek Phrase here, one of the words, means careful attention displayed in discharge or obligations or responsibility.

Displayed in discharge of obligation or responsibility. So it's to be cared for, it's to obtain care. It's what you might expect if you go to visit a doctor, or you go to visit a professional who you're paying to render them advice. They have a duty, an obligation to render care. But I think secondly, And more importantly, these friends in Sidon didn't abandon Paul because he was a prisoner.

And that's very common, even today. If someone is arrested and charged with a crime, Many people avoid them or treat them differently. And I've seen that happen here in this very town. And it did happen to Paul. Everyone did abandon him when he was initially tried before Felix.

But These believers are not afraid to take Paul in and render this care, this special care for him. Moving on in verse 4, when they set sail then from Sidon, The crew had to pass on the east side of Cyprus. As we said, the shortest route would have been south of Cyprus. That's the route they took when they went east to Jerusalem. But westerly winds that prevail throughout the summer create a headwind that makes that impossible.

They can't sail that way. See, these boats didn't have ability to tack. They didn't have ability to run into the wind like boats today do and it's because their sail didn't, wasn't, they couldn't tighten it enough to get the kind of airfoil that you need to do that. So they're much more limited, but The best they can do is put the wind on their beam and maybe try and make some progress that way. And so Luke says that they sailed under Cyprus because the winds were contrary.

That doesn't mean they sailed south of Cyprus. This is another technical word that means to sail in the Lee. That's the side, the Lee is the side of a boat that's shielded from the wind. Or in the case of this island, it's a side of the island that is shielded from the wind. And so the New King James translates it as they sailed under the shelter of Cyprus, not south of it.

And so for a westerly wind, the lee side of Cyprus is on the east side. So Luke is saying they sailed up the east side of Cyprus until they reached the coast of Asia Minor, where there is more favorable land winds and where there is also a current that runs along to the west. And So they can use this current and hopefully get a little help from some land winds and it's slow going, but they can make progress. And this is confirmed in the next verse where Luke specifies that they sailed through the sea, which is off Cilicia and Pamphylia. And if you look on your map you'll see that those are regions that Paul traveled through extensively planting churches in on the southern coast of Asia Minor.

So they're sailing along there. And so far I think this journey is going as expected. They're following the normal route that sailors typically use, but progress is slow, but they expect that. And so they are making their way to Myra. And then at Myra they change ships to a ship that's going to be going to Rome.

And they find this Centurion finds an Alexandrian ship in Egypt heading a ship from Alexandria which is in Egypt heading for Italy. And we learn later on in this chapter, Luke tells us that they were carrying wheat. And so these ships commonly went from Alexandra to Myra on their way to Rome for the very same reason that Paul's first ship sailed north, to handle these westerly winds that prevail across the Mediterranean. And the way Luke describes this, he says the centurion found the ship and put them on it. I think it also is another clue that leads us to believe that even though Paul's companions aren't classed as prisoners, the centurion is including them in the group that he's responsible for.

Now, Luke doesn't give us exact dimensions, but we know from history that typically these drain ships were around 150 feet long and probably about 40 feet wide. And Luke does tell us, though, that there were 276 souls on board. They had a square sail, but as he said earlier, because they weren't able to tighten that sail, They couldn't sail into the wind. And they had a rather crude rudder. It was just a trailing oar that they anchored to the stern to be able to control the direction of the ship somewhat.

So very much more primitive than what we have today in terms of a sailing vessel, in terms of capability, in terms of just technical capability on the sea. Not to mention all of the navigation aids that we have today that they didn't have. They depended on being on site of the coasts or in site of land or having a clear sky to see the North Star. And so they continue going west. If you look on your map, they're going to come out of Myra and continue this westward path along the southern coast of Asia Minor.

But they're going directly into this westerly wind, and so it's slow going. And Luke here uses another technical nautical term, which means to sail slowly. It's arduous. It's hard. It's hard and it takes a number of days to reach Nidus.

And at Nidus, they want to continue going west, but again these westerly winds are blocking them. And once they get past Nidus, they lose the shelter of the land, and they lose that favorable western current that was helping them a little bit as they made their way along the coast. And so they're not able to continue going west because of this wind. And they have to go south to take advantage of the protection of the westerly winds provided by Crete, just like they did with Cyprus when they left Sidon. And so now they're getting farther from land.

Waves are going to start to be a problem. Strong winds can produce very significant waves, and with waves comes seasickness and wetness. Everything's wet. When waves crash over the bow, everything gets wet. Nothing is dry, and it can be miserable, just in the normal course of sailing.

I know the sailing team in my college, when they would go to a place like Bermuda on a sailboat, they would take ziplock bags and put every piece of underwear and every piece of cloth in a separate ziplock bag so they could have some hope of keeping dry clothes. Now Luke goes on to tell us that when much time had been spent and sailing was now dangerous because the fast was over, Paul offers some advice. The fast would be the day of atonement in the fall. So this is probably the beginning of October, depending on what year this is exactly. First week in October, if this is 59 or 60.

And He offers some advice. He says, man, I perceive that this voyage will end with disaster and much loss, not only of the cargo, but also of our lives. Now remember, here's Paul, a prisoner, presuming to give some advice to the centurion and the captains and the owner of the ship. His advice, though, is not just the advice of an ignorant man. It's based on years of experience.

Remember, he's already been shipwrecked three times. He's spent a day and a half in the deep. And like Luke, Paul knows a thing or two about sailing. You see, Paul didn't say there, well, I'm just a prisoner. I don't have authority to do anything or telling anyone what to do.

Besides, I'm not getting paid to advise the crew. I'm going to go enjoy myself or do something else. He's not like Jonah, you know, who went down in the hold and went to sleep while the boat is foundering. Paul is actively involved here as a prisoner. He's offering his insights and perceptions as somebody who has experienced as a traveler on the sea, who knows what shipwreck is, who recognizes the conditions when that's likely to happen, who recognizes the risks that are involved.

And he offers some advice that they should stay there. Now, but this is not a prophecy, because he says, I perceive that this will end in disaster and much loss, the cargo, the ship, but also lives. So no lives were lost. This is not a prophecy. This is just what he expected based on his experience.

Okay, so Paul's not, you shouldn't accuse or think Paul is making an error or a false prophecy. Nevertheless, though, Paul's counsel is rejected. The centurion was more persuaded by the helmsman and the owner of the ship than the things spoken by Paul. And so they make a very bad decision. They decide to proceed.

Now they have come to this place called Fair Havens. It's not fair. It's not a good place for them to spend the winter. There's nothing there. And so the centurion is thinking about the difficulties of staying there and the hardships that would be to stay in a harbor that's not really well suited for them to winter in.

He's probably also thinking about delays. They were trying probably to get to Rome that year. This voyage normally doesn't take six months. More like five to six weeks. And so he makes a mistake.

He didn't listen to people, to somebody who had wisdom, because he didn't have the credentials. He listened to the owner, and he didn't want to hear an inconvenient truth. It was inconvenient to him and to his plan. Maybe to his promotion. Maybe to his performance.

He didn't want to hear that they had to stay there all the rest of the winter. He didn't really want to alter his plan in the light of the circumstances in front of Him, in the light of God's providential dealings, and what God providentially brought to pass in this circumstance. He wasn't willing to alter His plans in the light of those facts. And it led him to take some unacceptable risks. He also followed the crowd.

He listened, it says, to the majority. There's always a danger in Following the crowd, right? It's the contrarian investor that usually succeeds. If we follow the crowd, just think about all the things that the crowd has done, the majority have done in our country in the last five years or more. Following the crowd can be, it can be, it keeps you from sticking out, but it may not be safe.

And so we're going to leave them here at this harbor, Fairhavens, having made the decision to move on and try to find a better harbor. But there are two lessons here. And the first is to appreciate the process. Because often in God's working in our lives, it's the process that's more important than even the destination. I know I always wanted to get to the destination, and yet I've had to learn it's in the process that we grow.

It's in the process that we have opportunities to exercise patience and godliness and all these other virtues. And oftentimes, it's in the process of things that we are blessed through that process. And so, appreciate that process. You know, Luke could have said in one sentence, we decided to go to Rome and we went. But he didn't.

He takes a lengthy chapter and gives us very detailed description of this process of getting to Rome. And there's a lot of lessons that we can learn from this. The Scriptures give us two kinds of teaching. They give us doctrine, didactic instruction, commands, but they also give us examples. And this is how we as parents are to teach our children, but it's how the Lord teaches us.

He gives us commands and instructions. He gives us a word, rejoice in everything, in everything give thanks, be anxious for nothing. These are commands that we're to follow. But he also gives us these examples in his word of what that means. And here's a situation, a process that's unfolding, that's adverse, that's difficult, that's hard, It's grueling.

And he spells out in detail just all of the challenges in this situation. But we see Paul. Paul, secondly, he doesn't withdraw because his advice is not followed. He doesn't go up and say, well, they don't like me, and they don't like what I'm saying, so I'm just going to go over here and do my own thing. He doesn't do that at all.

I believe as we'll see in the next section, Paul remains actively engaged doing what he can, but he also prays. He also begins to pray. And so I trust that to be able to see more of these lessons that the Lord has for us in this account of Paul's journey from Caesarea to Rome in these coming weeks. May God bless this example to our lives. Heavenly Father, You are a master teacher.

Is there a great privilege to learn in the school of Christ? To learn all the things that You have commanded us to do. Help us, Lord, to appreciate your work through the process of our lives, through the process of raising food, through the process of learning skills, through the process of all the tasks that you call us to do. Lord, may we not just remember the goal, but also grow through that process. And recognize that your hand is working through that process to instruct us, to test us, to strengthen us, and to give us opportunities to testify of Your mercy and kindness and truth in all of that.

We ask this in Jesus' name, Amen.