You Must Also Testify in Rome

IIT UBF - University Bible Fellowship at IIT

You Must Also Testify in Rome

Date: Oct. 27, 2025

Passage

Acts 22:30-23:11 (ESV)

30 But on the next day, desiring to know the real reason why he was being accused by the Jews, he unbound him and commanded the chief priests and all the council to meet, and he brought Paul down and set him before them.

1 And looking intently at the council, Paul said, “Brothers, I have lived my life before God in all good conscience up to this day.” 2 And the high priest Ananias commanded those who stood by him to strike him on the mouth. 3 Then Paul said to him, “God is going to strike you, you whitewashed wall! Are you sitting to judge me according to the law, and yet contrary to the law you order me to be struck?” 4 Those who stood by said, “Would you revile God’s high priest?” 5 And Paul said, “I did not know, brothers, that he was the high priest, for it is written, ‘You shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people.’”

6 Now when Paul perceived that one part were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, he cried out in the council, “Brothers, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees. It is with respect to the hope and the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial.” 7 And when he had said this, a dissension arose between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the assembly was divided. 8 For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, nor angel, nor spirit, but the Pharisees acknowledge them all. 9 Then a great clamor arose, and some of the scribes of the Pharisees’ party stood up and contended sharply, “We find nothing wrong in this man. What if a spirit or an angel spoke to him?” 10 And when the dissension became violent, the tribune, afraid that Paul would be torn to pieces by them, commanded the soldiers to go down and take him away from among them by force and bring him into the barracks.

11 The following night the Lord stood by him and said, “Take courage, for as you have testified to the facts about me in Jerusalem, so you must testify also in Rome.”

The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV) is adapted from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. All rights reserved.

For information on how the ESV can be quoted, please visit our permission site.

Daily Bread

Key Verse: 22:23:11

And as they were shouting and throwing off their cloaks and flinging dust into the air,

It had been Paul’s vision to preach the gospel in Rome (Acts 19:21; Rom. 1:15). Paul was a great mission strategist; he planted churches in large cities to serve as strategic centers from which the gospel radiated out to the surrounding areas. A good example was his ministry in the city of Ephesus, where he spent at least two years and three months teaching the Bible and raising disciples (19:8-10).

There was no other city more important than Rome from Paul’s mission strategic point of view. His prayer for the gospel mission in Rome was so earnest that the Holy Spirit inspired him to author the book of Romans, to which there would be no comparison in its importance of affecting human history.

Paul probably did not have the whole picture of what his mission to Rome would mean to Christendom. What he did was to simply obey Jesus’ world mission command, “Go; …you must also testify in Rome” (11b) and teach the Bible in a rented house for two years (28:30).

Prayer: Father, thank you for Paul’s example of simple but absolute obedience to Jesus’ world mission command. I am one of those who have benefited from his obedience. Help me follow his example of obedience. Amen.

One Word: Obey Jesus’ world mission command and “Go!”

Jotham Walked Before the Lord

2 Chronicles 27:1-9

Key Verse: 27:6

So Jotham became mighty, because he ordered his ways before the LORD his God.

Today's Question

See answer and references