John Wesley

God intended that they would seek Him and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us.

“If haply - The way is open; God is ready to be found. But he will lay no force upon man; they might feel after him - This is in the midst between seeking and finding.”

‘For in Him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are His offspring.’

“As certain also of your own poets have said - Aratus, whose words these are, was an Athenian, who lived almost three hundred years before this time.”

Therefore, being offspring of God, we should not think that the Divine Being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by man’s skill and imagination.

“We ought not to think - A tender expression especially in the first per son plural. As if he had said, Can God himself be a less noble being than we who are his offspring?”

Although God overlooked the ignorance of earlier times, He now commands all people everywhere to repent.

“But now - This day, this hour, saith Paul, puts an end to the Divine forbearance, and brings either greater mercy or punishment.”

For He has set a day when He will judge the world with justice by the Man He has appointed.

“Whereof he hath given assurance to all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead - God raising Jesus demonstrated hereby, that he was to be the glorious Judge of all.”

When they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some began to mock him, but others said, “We want to hear you again on this topic.”

“Some mocked - Interrupting him thereby. They took offense at that which is the principal motive of faith, from the pride of reason. And having once stumbled at this, they rejected all the rest.”

But some joined him and believed, including Dionysius the Areopagite, a woman named Damaris, and others who were with them.

“Among whom was even Dionysius the Areopagite - One of the Judges of that court: on whom some spurious writings have been fathered in later ages, by those who are fond of high sounding nonsense.”

After this, Paul left Athens and went to Corinth.

“Paul departing from Athens - He did not stay there long. The philosophers there were too easy, too indolent, and too wise in their own eyes to receive the Gospel.”

and he stayed and worked with them because they were tentmakers by trade, just as he was.

“They were tent makers by trade - For it was a rule among the Jews (and why is it not among the Christians?) to bring up all their children to some trade, were they ever so rich or noble.”

And when Silas and Timothy came down from Macedonia, Paul devoted himself fully to the word, testifying to the Jews that Jesus is the Christ.

“But now at length both Silas and Timotheus came to the apostle at Corinth. Paul was pressed in spirit - The more probably from what Silas and Timotheus related.”

But when they opposed and insulted him, he shook out his garments and told them, “Your blood be on your own heads! I am innocent of it.

“He shook his raiment - To signify he would from that time refrain from them: and to intimate, that God would soon shake them off as unworthy to be numbered among his people.”

While Gallio was proconsul of Achaia, the Jews coordinated an attack on Paul and brought him before the judgment seat.

“When Gallio was proconsul of Achaia - Of which Corinth was the chief city. This Gallio, the brother of the famous Seneca, is much commended both by him and by other writers, for the sweetness and generosity of his temper, and easiness of his behaviour.”

But since it is a dispute about words and names and your own law, settle it yourselves. I refuse to be a judge of such things.”

“But the question concerning the name of Jesus is of more importance than all things else under heaven. Yet there is this singularity (among a thousand others) in the Christian religion, that human reason, curious as it is in all other things, abhors to inquire…”

At this, the crowd seized Sosthenes the synagogue leader and beat him in front of the judgment seat. But none of this was of concern to Gallio.

“Then they all took Sosthenes - The successor of Crispus, and probably Paul's chief accuser, and beat him - It seems because he had occasioned them so much trouble to no purpose, before the judgment seat - One can hardly think in the sight of…”

Paul remained in Corinth for quite some time before saying goodbye to the brothers.

“Paul continued many days - After the year and six months, to confirm the brethren. Aquila having shaved his head - As was the custom in a vow, chap. xxi, 24;”

But as he left, he said, “I will come back to you if God is willing.” And he set sail from Ephesus.

“I must by all means keep the feast at Jerusalem - This was not from any apprehension that he was obliged in conscience to keep the Jewish feasts; but to take the opportunity of meeting a great number of his countrymen to whom he might…”

Meanwhile a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was an eloquent man, well versed in the Scriptures.

“An eloquent man, mighty in the Scriptures - Of the Old Testament. Every talent may be of use in the kingdom of God, if joined with the knowledge of the Scriptures and fervour of spirit.”

He had been instructed in the way of the Lord and was fervent in spirit. He spoke and taught accurately about Jesus, though he knew only the baptism of John.

“This man had been instructed - Though not perfectly, in the way of the Lord - In the doctrine of Christ.”

And he began to speak boldly in the synagogue. When Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him in and explained to him the way of God more accurately.

“Probably he returned to live at Alexandria, soon after he had been baptized by John; and so had no opportunity of being fully acquainted with the doctrines of the Gospel, as delivered by Christ and his apostles.”

When Apollos resolved to cross over to Achaia, the brothers encouraged him and wrote to the disciples there to welcome him.

“Who greatly helped through grace - It is through grace only that any gift of any one is profitable to another. Them that had believed - Apollos did not plant, but water. This was the peculiar gift which he had received.”

and asked them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?” “No,” they answered, “we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.”

“Have ye received the Holy Ghost? - The extraordinary gifts of the Spirit, as well as his sanctifying graces? We have not so much as heard - Whether there be any such gifts.”

Paul explained: “John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance. He told the people to believe in the One coming after him, that is, in Jesus.”

“John baptized - That is, the whole baptism and preaching of John pointed at Christ. After this John is mentioned no more in the New Testament. Here he gives way to Christ altogether.”

On hearing this, they were baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus.

“Paul only laid his hands upon them. They were baptized - They were baptized twice; but not with the same baptism. John did not administer that baptism which Christ afterward commanded, that is, in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.”

But when some of them stubbornly refused to believe and publicly maligned the Way, Paul took his disciples and left the synagogue to conduct daily discussions in the lecture hall…

“The way - The Christian way of worshipping God. He departed - Leaving them their synagogue to themselves.”

This continued for two years, so that everyone who lived in the province of Asia, Jews and Greeks alike, heard the word of the Lord.

“All who desired it among the inhabitants of the proconsular Asia, now heard the word: St. Paul had been forbidden to preach it in Asia before, chap. xvi, 6. But now the time was come.”