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Acts 16:19–24
“When [the slave girl’s] owners saw that their hope of gain was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace before the rulers. And when they had brought them to the magistrates, they said, ‘These men are Jews, and they are disturbing our city. They advocate customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to accept or practice’” (vv. 19–21).
Ministering in Philippi on the second missionary journey, Paul and his fellow travelers were used of God to bring salvation to Lydia and her household and to free a slave girl from demonic possession (Acts 16:11–18). Paul’s exorcism of the girl in Philippi, however, led to legal problems for the Apostle and Silas. As Luke reports in today’s passage, the girl’s owners brought Paul and Silas before the rulers of the city and charged them with breaking the law (vv. 19–21).
Before Luke explains the charges actually laid against the missionaries, he tells us that the girl’s owners seized Paul and Silas because they “saw that their hope of gain was gone” (v. 19). Her demonically inspired fortune-telling had made them a good living (v. 16), but now the income from that activity would be gone, since the girl had been released from the source of her oracles and people would not be paying to hear from her anymore. The girl’s owners cared nothing for her well-being but took an interest in her only inasmuch as she could make money for them. As one commentator notes, the owners of the girl serve as an example of the biblical truth that “the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils” (1 Tim. 6:10).
The Roman authorities would have cared little that the owners lost their source of income and would have likely written off their complaint altogether as superstition if they mentioned the exorcism specifically. Thus, the girl’s owners made accusations that the city leaders were sure to take seriously. We see in Acts 16:20–21 that the owners accused Paul and Silas of being Jews who disturbed the city and who were calling Roman citizens to do things that they should not practice. The city of Philippi took great pride in its status as an official Roman colony, so its leaders would have frowned on anything that diluted its Roman character, including conversion from Roman paganism to the worship of God. Moreover, Emperor Claudius had expelled the Jews from Rome not long before the episode that Luke records. By emphasizing the Jewishness of Paul and Silas, the owners of the slave girl were tapping into any xenophobia that the proud Roman leaders of Philippi might have had toward the Jews.
Hearing the charges, the crowds joined in the attacks on Paul and Silas, and the authorities had the two men beaten, arrested, and jailed (vv. 22–24). Paul and Silas, we will see, would not be in the Philippian prison for long.
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
Money itself is indifferent and can be used either for good or for evil. The love of money, however, can and does lead to many kinds of evils (1 Tim. 6:10). Let us pray that the Lord would keep us from the love of money. Let us also seek to be generous with what we do have because generous giving is one good way to keep ourselves from loving our possessions too much.
For further study
- Ecclesiastes 5:10
- Luke 16:14–15
The bible in a year
- Psalms 31–33
- Acts 21:17–36
- Psalms 34–38
- Acts 21:37–23:11