Acts 27

It is not with us as with passengers in a ship, who are carried to the end of their voyage, and they sit still in the ship; or as it is with noblemen, who have their rents brought in without their toil or labor; but we arrive at salvation in the use of means, as a man comes to t…

And that was the means of their deliverance. He brought Paul to shore by a contrary wind, and upon the broken pieces of the ship (Acts 27:44). Thirdly, Question: When are the times and seasons that God usually delivers his people out of the bondage of affliction?

Is there not mercy in this? Every cross to a child of God is like Paul's crosswind, which though it broke the ship, it brought Paul to shore upon the broken pieces (Acts 27:44). 8. God shows mercy in pardoning us (Micah 7:18): Who is a God like you, that pardons iniquity?

God had a mind to save Jonah when he was cast into the sea, and he lets the fish swallow him up, and so bring him to the shore. God would save Paul, and all that were in the ship with him, and there was no way to save them but the ship must break, and they all came safe to land…

They will not forgive their enemies: they will not part with their carnal profits for Christ; they would have the Kingdom of Heaven, but they will not come up to the price: If you would have this Kingdom, do not article and indent with Christ, but accept of his terms; say, Lord,…

Correction shall be a corrosive, to eat out sin; it shall cure the swelling of pride, the fever of lust, the dropsy of avarice: it shall be a refining fire to purify grace, and make it sparkle as gold; ([illegible].) Chrysostom. Every cross-providence to a pardoned soul shall be…

Now a soul that has true grace in it, and goes on to obey God, may also lack light to see these his graces, and look upon his own heart as empty of all. And as they in the storm (Acts 27:20), so he in temptation may come to have neither sunlight nor starlight — no light, as in t…

For, we must not only believe, when we feel comfort in our consciences concerning GOD'S mercies; but even then when God seems to stand against us, and when we feel in our souls the very gall of hell, then (I say) we must believe. In Paul's dangerous voyage towards Rome, when he…

When Paul and 276 souls with him suffered shipwreck, and were all in present danger of drowning, God saved Paul, and for his sake all the rest. God gave him the lives of all that were with him in the ship, Acts 27:24. And so here Noah's children, and their wives, are spared for…

Yes undoubtedly: for, so we may read, that for Paul's sake, all the Mariners and Soldiers that were in the Ship, were saved from drowning. Acts 27:24. This point must persuade every one of us, to make choice of the godly for our society, and company, with whom we live and conver…

Therefore it is said (Psalm 102:23): "He weakens the strength of the people in the way." He has sundry trials with which to exercise our faith, and sometimes by sharp necessities: Paul and his companions had continued fourteen days and had taken nothing (Acts 27:33). Many times…

We serve such a master, as has authority over the holy angels, to employ them at his pleasure, and in their darkest condition his people feel the benefit of it. As the angel of the Lord appeared to Paul in a dreadful storm (Acts 27:23-24): There stood by me this night the angel…

The Lord would have spared Sodom and Gomorrah, had there been found but ten righteous persons there (Genesis 18:32). All those which were in the ship with Saint Paul, to the number of 276 persons, were given him of God, and saved from shipwreck; that so the power which he showed…

Now whereas it is said, they kept silence; we need not understand it so strictly, as if for seven days and seven nights, they never spoke a word. It is usual likewise in all languages, and very frequent in Scripture, that what is but seldom done, or done but a little, is said no…

There can no more be two chief delights in one heart, than two suns in one firmament. Those spirits are winding and crooked, that are like that haven we read of (Acts 27:12), lying directly towards two opposite points of heaven. Cyrus took Babylon, by dividing the river; the Dev…

O let me never say, God has promised it shall persevere, and therefore I need not be so solicitous to preserve it; for as this inference is quite opposite to the nature of true grace and assurance, which never encourage carelessness, but provoke the soul to an industrious use of…

(1) In not exposing them to, till he have prepared them for their tryals, Luke 24. 49. Tarry you at Ierusalem until you be endued with power from on High. He gives them sometimes eminent discoveries of his love immediately before, and as a preparative to their sufferings; in the…

The City of Geneva gave this for a Motto, Post tenebras lux, After darkness, light; implying, that the return of the Gospel was as light after a long darkness; as the coming of the Sun again to those Northern people. While Paul and his company were in that great storm at Sea, wh…

Use 2. To persuade you to become the servants of God, you will have a good master if you be what you profess to be. Every Christian should say as Paul did (Acts 27:23), "The God whose I am, and whom I serve." He is God's, and serves God.

3. A man may let one sin go to hold another the faster; as a man that goes to sea, would willingly save all his goods, but if the storm arises that he cannot, then he throws some overboard to lighten the vessel, and save the rest. So did they (Acts 27:38). So the sinner chooses…

Persecution can but take away my life; an ague or fever may do as much; now faith giving the soul a right notion of sufferings, and taking (as it were) a just measure of them, enables a Christian to prostrate his life at the feet of Christ. 5. Faith reconciles providences and pr…

There may be some too lengthy security under sad falls, when he is not soon missed (2 Samuel 11:1-3; Psalm 26:15). Indeed a spiritual soul having regard to all the commandments misses the Spirit's acting in all the ways — in eating (Proverbs 3:6; Acts 27:35; 1 Corinthians 10:31;…

His main aim is to deter from the thing, rather than to signify that it may be. When Paul told the soldiers (Acts 27) that if the mariners fled away in the boat they could not be saved, he did not intend to signify to them that in respect of the event they should be drowned; for…

But whether Faith or Repentance go first, sure I am, Repentance is of such importance, as there is no being saved without it. After Pauls shipwrack, he did swim to shore on planks, and broken pieces of the ship, (Acts 27:44). So in Adam we all suffered shipwrack, and Repentance…

God will not bring us to heaven sleeping, but praying: The Lord told Paul, all in the Ship should come safe to shore, but it must be in the use of means, Acts 27:21. Except you abide in the Ship, you cannot be saved. So the Saints shall certainly arrive at Salvation, they shall…

The same Paul also, although in one place he says, that God is not to be sought far off, as one that dwells within us: yet in another place reaches to what end that nearness avails. In the ages past (says he) God suffered the nations to walk in their own ways: yet he left not hi…

So has Christ taken bones, and sap, and strength from the devil, and made him as fruitless, as the feathers that serve to sport children (1 John 3:8). For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, [illegible] that he might dissolve the works of the Devil: The word in Scripture…

It is true, a Christian can but reach to the outward man, but he will do what he can. What a wonder is it, to see how the faith of Paul wrought in this particular, for all the people that were with him in the ship (Acts 27:25, 34), which shows you, that a man that does believe,…

Christ is supposed to have been born at the feast of tabernacles; so at the commencement of that glorious day, Christ shall be born; then above all other times shall the woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, that is in travail, and pained to be delivered, bri…