Paul Preaches in Rome

What happens when Paul goes on trial before Caesar? Was he able to continue travelling westward like he’d hoped?

Acts 28:17-31

The work of the Holy Spirit to fulfill the great commission continues today!

The book of Acts (28:17-31) ends with Paul finally arriving in Rome. It has been an arduous two and a half years since the Lord told Paul he would testify about Jesus in Rome (Acts 23:11). He has survived assassination plots, imprisonment, shipwrecks and a venomous snake bite to get there.

The Holy Spirit has been at work. Even though under house arrest, Paul freely shares the gospel with a great number of local Jewish leaders, (with a mixed response), and then the gentiles. The gospel has come powerfully, all the way from Jerusalem to Rome - the centre of the most politically powerful nation in their world. This seems to fulfill the great commission that was given at the beginning of Acts (1:8).

However, the story ends abruptly here. What happens when Paul goes on trial before Caesar? Was he able to continue travelling westward like he’d hoped? Unsatisfyingly, Acts doesn’t tell us. Of course, there is nowhere satisfying to end the story of the work of the Holy Spirit. Did it end with the conversion of Emperor Constantine in 312? Or with the canonisation of the bible at the end of the 4th Century? Did it end with the outpouring on Azusa St in 1906? Of course not. Today there are over 2 billion Christians in the world, and Christianity is the major religion in 157 countries around our world. The work of the Holy Spirit to fulfill the great commission continues today!

Pastor Ben