Acts 21:31-22:29

I feel sorry for the Roman commander. He was not political and he was not religious; he was just an ordinary man with a job to do. It was his responsibility to keep the peace in Jerusalem. This was a difficult job; civil unrest and outright rebellion was common among the Jewish population.

Before the riot that involved Paul, there was a revolt led by an Egyptian Jew. King Felix put down the revolt, but the Egyptian prophet had escaped. Because of all the contradictory shouting by the crowd, the commander thought he had captured the Egyptian leader. This would have been very good for him and might have resulted in a promotion. When he heard Paul speak perfect Greek, his chance of a promotion disappeared. Paul impressed him enough that he was willing to let Paul speak to the crowd.

Paul told the crowd how the gospel and his belief in Christ changed his life. He explained how he had gone from persecuting Christians to becoming one. He explained that the gospel was for everyone and that God sent him away to take the gospel to the gentiles.

The crowd listened until Paul said that salvation was also for the gentiles. It was then that they became extremely angry and called for Paul’s death. The Roman commander could not understand why the Jews were acting in such a riotous manner so he blamed Paul. He ordered his soldiers to flog and interrogate Paul. The commander was alarmed when he discovered that Paul was a Roman citizen. He had paid a lot of money for the citizenship that was Paul’s by birth.

I do not feel sorry for the commander because his job was hard or his hope of promotion vanished and he overpaid for citizenship. I feel sorry for the commander because he did not speak Aramaic and did not understand what Paul preached.

Today there are over 2,200 different language translations of the New Testament, but approximately 2,000 languages are still waiting for translation projects to begin. Wycliffe Bible Translators