SHIPWRECKED

Now get to your feet! For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my under-rower and witness. You are to tell the world what you have seen and what I will show you in the future.

-Acts 26:16

In America, we often read the Bible during quiet times. Images often depict those as dreamy moments under trees, in the golden sun of window nooks, or peaceful mornings with open Bible and an aromatic cup of coffee.

In those quiet times, we tend to pan for bits of personal theological gold or extract gems of encouragement to boost our mood, lift our spirits, and energize our souls.

Rarely do we stop to determine, or even consider, the historical, cultural, and political context of our private excavation projects. Accordingly, the resulting treasures are typically miscarriages of divine truth and instruction.

Gaius Julius Caesar was instrumental in the demise of the Roman Republic and its transformation into the Roman Empire. In March of 44 BC, Gaius was attacked and assassinated by a group of Roman Senators, including his friend and protege’ Marcus Brutus. Gaius supposedly uttered the famous last words, “Et tu Brute?”

Three of Caesar’s generals (his grandnephew, Octavian, along with Mark Antony, and Marcus Lepidus) formed a Triumvirate and quelled the senatorial rebellion. As human history commonly attests - victory rarely leads to harmony. In his song, If I Ever Lose My Faith in You, Sting sings, “I never saw no military solution that didn’t always end up as something worse.”

The demise of countless empires and nations throughout ancient and modern history can be distilled to one salient point: the transition of power.

Octavian (aka Augustus), the heir-apparent, clashed with the combined forces of Marc Antony and Egypt’s Cleopatra. The pivotal moment was a battle of the naval variety - the Battle of Actium in 31 BC. Antony and Cleopatra’s forces were defeated. They subsequently fled to Egypt where both committed suicide.

Caesar Augustus’ reign ushered in a relatively peaceful era, known as the Pax Romana, or Roman Peace, (27 BC to 180 AD); the backdrop upon which Jesus’ advent, life, ministry, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension all took place.

The book of Acts was written around 63 AD at the height of this Roman Peace. The peace Roman citizens enjoyed was a universal aspect of cultural awareness and literacy. The Battle of Actium would have been akin to something like the Alamo for Texans, 9/11 for Americans, or the Singing Revolution for the people of Estonia.

Therefore, when Luke, the author of Acts, wrote in Acts 26:16, “Now get to your feet! For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my ὑπηρέτην and μάρτυρα. You are to tell the world what you have seen and what I will show you in the future,” God was NOT simply saying “...as my servant and witness” as most English translations render it.

The first Greek word above from Acts 26:16, ὑπηρέτην, literally means under-rower. Roman warships were designed with both an upper deck (for soldiers and the captain), and a lower deck (where the invisible men worked in instantaneous and harmonious unison responding to their captain’s every command).

The Apostle Paul likely understood he was near the end of his life when he appeared before King Agrippa in Acts 26. At the time of Paul/Saul's conversion, Jesus had previously told Ananias, “I will show him (Paul) how much he must suffer for my name.”  In preparing to recount his gloriously divine encounter with the risen Christ to King Agrippa - the color, depth, and detail of Paul's account flooded back in. The level of detail in Acts 26 eclipses that of chapter 9, which merely recalls Jesus saying to Saul, “But get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”

Is this an inconsistency or textual error? Certainly not. The Bible is literature and must be read accordingly. If one’s desire is to uncover the Bible’s apparent discrepancies (rather than encounter its Author), it will certainly allow you that freedom.

As Paul sat in his cell, awaiting a potentially fateful audience with King Agrippa, he likely replayed the Damascus Road Encounter on an endless loop. Like cognitive interviews conducted by the FBI’s criminal profilers on the TV show Criminal Minds, Paul may have recalled previously obscure detail. In reading the additional detail of 26 we note clarity rather than inconsistency:

Now get to your feet! For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my under-rower and martyr. You are to tell the world what you have seen and what I will show you in the future.

As we reflect on what the risen LORD commanded Paul to do on the Damascus road, consider the context of Rome’s military history: the wars and battles, the violence, the struggles and suffering, and the harmonious obedience of under-rowers amid a civil war - a war that ultimately brought about an era of peace.

Consider the imagery: not of private quiet times under trees shedding fall leaves, not relaxing in the warm sunlight of a bay window, not blissfully mining Scripture for gems of individual felicity, not autonomously derived ministerial endeavours... but rather imagery of invisible, unheard, and unappreciated laborers - listening intently, responding immediately, and grinding obediently toward a common goal.

If our approach to Scripture is unwittingly rooted in gleaning bits of private treasure for personal consumption and bliss, then, tragically, we overlook depth, detail, and beauty in Christ’s revelation.

Now get to your feet! For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my under-rower and martyr. You are to tell the world what you have seen and what I will show you in the future.

That imperative command from Jesus is not exclusive to Paul. Jesus desires commands and desires the same for us. Maybe not preaching in synagogues and public squares. Not necessarily traveling extensively, enduring beatings, experiencing shipwrecks, cold, hunger, and prison. But as under-rowers, listening intently to the voice of our Captain, straining at the oars of blessing in collaborative grace communities, and thereby testifying to the world what Jesus has revealed thus far - and what we eagerly anticipate in the future!

Are you busy row, row, rowing your own boat on some private endeavor of personal bliss? Or are you an under-rower on His? Are you willing to be shipwrecked for Him?

Blessings,

-Kevin M. Kelley

aMostUnlikelyDisciple.com