Acts 17:28

Peter Pett's Commentary on the Bible - Acts 17:1-34

The Mission to Europe (16:6-19:20). Paul’s plans now seemed to begin to go awry. All doors seemed to be closing to him as in one way or another he was first hindered from going one way, and then another. But unknown to him it was to be the commencement of the mission to Europe. Why then does Luke emphasise these negative responses? It was in order to underline that when the move to go forward did come it was decisively under God’s direction. He was saying, ‘the Spirit bade him go’. We need not... read more

Peter Pett

Peter Pett's Commentary on the Bible - Acts 17:15-34

Effective Ministry in Athens (17:15-34). His Berean guides saw Paul safely to Athens. This had not been where he was originally aiming for. After Thessalonica his intention had probably been to proceed along the Via Egnatia towards Rome. But God had had other ideas. He had had Berea in His sights, and then Athens where a certain Areopagite was waiting (Acts 17:34), followed by Corinth. The whole of the province of Achaia had cause to be grateful to the persecutors. With regard to the... read more

Peter Pett

Peter Pett's Commentary on the Bible - Acts 17:26-28

“And he made out of one every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed seasons, and the bounds of their habitation, that they should seek God, if haply they might feel after him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us, for ‘in him we live, and move, and have our being’, as certain even of your own poets have said, ‘for we are also his offspring’.” Furthermore he points out that God has made all mankind of every nation out of one man... read more

Arthur Peake

Arthur Peake's Commentary on the Bible - Acts 17:22-31

Acts 17:22-Obadiah : . Paul’ s Speech to the Areopagus.— He opens with a compliment to the religiosity of the Athenians. He has walked up and down the city and marked the many objects of worship; he has also found an altar with the inscription “ To the Unknown God” (the argument that follows calls for the definite article). There are various instances in antiquity of such an inscription; though always, it is true, in the plural, not the singular number. Jerome says the inscription in the... read more

Matthew Poole

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible - Acts 17:28

In him we live, &c.; he is the God that made us, that preserves us, and not we ourselves; he keeps us as in the hollow of his hand, and compasseth our paths. Our breath is in our nostrils, and when we send it forth we have none to take in again, unless God furnish us with it, as out of his own hand. As certain also of your own poets; Aratus, a Greek poet: not that St. Paul thought to derive any authority from these poets unto what he had said, but that he might shame them the more by the... read more

Joseph Exell

Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary - Acts 17:22-34

CRITICAL REMARKSActs 17:22. Too superstitions.—Somewhat superstitious (R.V.); better, more god-fearing, more religious (sc., than others)—i.e., unusually religious; though the word has both senses. Your devotions should be objects of devotion, as temples, images, altars, and the like.Acts 17:23. To the (or, an) unknown God.—Not a singular for a plural as Jerome (ad. Tit., i. 12) asserts: “Inscriptio aræ non ita erat ut Paulus asseruit: ignoto Deo; sed ita: Diis Asiæ et Europæ et Africæ, Diis... read more

William Nicoll

Sermon Bible Commentary - Acts 17:26-31

Acts 17:26-31 St. Paul at Athens. I. The Jewish nation had existed to be a witness for this universal fellowship among the nations. It had existed as a witness against that which tended to divide them and set them at war. It existed to say, "The living and true God has created you all to be one." No one thought has been awakened in your minds without His teaching and guidance. I, the Jew, the child of Abraham, stand forth to make that claim on behalf of the God whom I worship. I, the Jew, the... read more

William Nicoll

Sermon Bible Commentary - Acts 17:28

Acts 17:28 I. Since God is everywhere, we move, speak, act, think in God. We rise up, we lie down, we eat, we drink, we work, we rest, we speak, in God, we pray to God, or men forget God; not only with God's eye ever upon us, as much upon us as if in the whole circuit of created beings there were, besides God, no other living being but our one self; not only with that all-beholding Eye resting upon us, seeing every motion of our frames, every emotion of our hearts, every thought before it is... read more

C.I. Scofield

Scofield's Reference Notes - Acts 17:28

For we Found in the sritings of Aratus and Cleanthes. read more

Chuck Smith

Chuck Smith Bible Commentary - Acts 17:1-34

Now when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews ( Acts 17:1 ):Now Luke passes that off in one verse. From Philippi to Amphipolis was thirty miles. Another thirty miles on to Apollonia. And another thirty-seven miles on to Thessalonica. So it, no doubt, took them several days to travel almost a hundred miles to Thessalonica.And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them [that is into the synagogue], and reasoned them... read more

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