Acts 27:18-44 - Homiletics

The escape from shipwreck.

The particular feature in this part of the narrative of the shipwreck to which attention is now invited is the sacrifices by which the final escape was effected. The eighteenth verse finds the whole party on board the ship in an encounter with a furious tempest. We can easily picture to ourselves the sea running high, the vessel crouching as it were before the wind, the waves breaking over the side of the ship, and the water beginning to fill her. At this moment the relative value of things in the mind of the master and crew undergoes a great change. The freight of the ship—so precious in the owner's eyes, acquired at great cost, put on board with much labor, and on which was set the hope of great gains when the vessel should reach the Italian shore—now loses all its value in his eyes. Something more precious is at stake—the ship itself, and the lives of those on board; and so the sacrifice must be made. They throw the freight overboard in order to lighten the ship, that it and all that are in it may not go down to the bottom of the deep. Some relief from the pressing danger seems to have followed this step. For a time the vessel was relieved, and rode more buoyantly upon the troubled waves. But the relief was only temporary. The ship began again to fill with water, and the danger was greater than ever. Some fresh sacrifice must be made if she was to be kept afloat. And so with their own bands they cast all the tackling into the sea (note on Acts 27:19 ). Things which once seemed necessary to their comfort, things without which the ship could never have started on her way, are now ruthlessly destroyed. They stand in the way of saving something more precious than themselves—the ship and its freight of human life—and so they are cast into the sea. But the needful sacrifices are not yet complete. For eleven more days the ship keeps afloat, though every hour might seem to be her last. But on the fourteenth night a new element of danger appeared. They were close upon a lee shore, and so their only chance of safety was to run her upon the soft beach. But how could this be done? There still remained in her the precious cargo of wheat which she was carrying from Alexandria to Italy. Lightened of this heavy load, there was a hope that she might run upon the beach, so that they might jump out and be saved. And so this sacrifice was made too. They threw out the wheat into the sea, for their lives were more precious than even the golden grain; and they escaped all safe to the land. This account exactly illustrates the Christian's career. There is a time when the things of this world—wealth, or reputation, or the world's friendship, or certain habits and opinions—are of supreme importance in his eyes. By-and-by some conjuncture arises in which he has to choose between them and the salvation of his soul. There is a struggle at first, and an unwillingness to part with them. But as the things of God rise in their immensity before his eyes, and it becomes clear that the sacrifice must be made if he would enter into life, his mind is made up. What things were gain to him, those he counts but loss for Christ, for whom he suffers loss of all things, and counts them but dung that he may win Christ. He makes the calculation, "What shall it profit me, if I gain the whole world and lose my own soul?" and the decision is not uncertain. Thus the Hebrew Christians took joyfully the spoiling of their goods, knowing that they had in heaven a better and enduring substance. Thus Levi at the receipt of custom, at the call of Jesus, left all, and rose up and followed him. But it often happens that the whole sacrifice is not made at once, nor does the necessity for it become apparent at once. Some lighter loss is sustained at first, and the lightened soul moves easier on her spiritual way for a while. But then some new danger arises. This time it is the sacrifice of the man's self, some part as it were of his very being, that has to be made. The right hand has to be cut off, or the right eye plucked out, if he would enter into life. But still the decision is the same. There is nothing that he can give or take in exchange for his soul. The sufferings and losses of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed; and even in those extreme eases where the choice has to be made between life itself on the one hand, and faithfulness to Christ on the other, the true believer falters not. He well knows that the things that are seen are temporal, but the things that are not seen are eternal; and so he cheerfully lays down his life on earth that he may not make shipwreck of eternity. So the blessed Paul himself was led on from loss to loss, but through loss to eternal gain His legal privileges, his blameless righteousness, his high standing as a Pharisee among Pharisees, his consideration among his equals, his rabbinical learning, his boasted superiority, all fell one by one before the excellency of Christ. Desiring to be the honored benefactor of his race, he found himself the off-scouring of all things, hunted down and persecuted as one not worthy to live. But still his views of Christ's gospel kept enlarging; his conceptions of the blessedness of being in Christ kept brightening; the righteousness of Christ, and the glory of Christ, kept growing in the intensity of their all-absorbing interest, and so he was led on to suffer loss upon loss, and to heap labor upon labor, and to endure affliction upon affliction; till from being the prisoner of the Lord he became the faithful martyr of Jesus Christ, and laid down his very life in sure anticipation of receiving the crown of righteousness at the hand of the righteous Judge, when he should plant his foot in triumph upon the shore of eternal life.