When Paul reached Jerusalem, he informed the elders about what had happened in his recent missionary journey. No apostles are mentioned as being present, apart from James the brother of Jesus, so probably by now they had left Jerusalem to take the gospel elsewhere. The elders were very glad to hear Paul’s report and praised God for the success of the gospel.
Yet there was a problem in the church in Jerusalem regarding Paul and his message that the Gentiles should not keep the ceremonial law. A false rumour said that he also taught Jews that they did not need to keep it. The elders knew that the rumour was false, but in order to show that it was false, they deemed it wise for Paul to participate in a “ceremony which was similar to the one he had made a few years earlier with regard to a Nazarite vow. Paul was happy to do so.
This seemed to be an answer to the dilemma until some Jews from the province of Asia saw Paul and his friend Trophimus together. Trophimus was a Gentile from Ephesus and those Jews assumed that Paul had taken his friend into the temple. When an occasion rose for pointing this out, they seized Paul and tried to have him executed. News of the attempt, however, reached the Roman garrison and soldiers brought an end to the show trial.
What lessons can we learn from this account? One is that sometimes common sense solutions don’t work. The strategy of the elders unravelled because of something they could not have foreseen. No doubt the devil instigated the Jews from Asia and the mob hysteria.
Yet we have to remember that Luke is describing the activities of the risen Christ. So where was Jesus and what was he doing at this time? He was on the throne, he ensured that the soldiers heard of the kidnap of Paul, and he used them to deliver his servant by arresting him. After all, his plan was for Paul to go to Rome, and here was a small step forward in that plan, although it may have seemed like a giant step backwards. But that is the way it often is.
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