Bible Reading Plan – Day 331

₁From Paul, a prisoner for the sake of Christ Jesus, and from our brother Timothy —

To our friend and fellow-worker Philemon, ₂and the church that meets in your house, and our sister Apphia, and our fellow-soldier Archippus:

₃May God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ give you grace and peace.

₄Brother Philemon, every time I pray, I mention you and give thanks to my God. ₅For I hear of your love for all God's people and the faith you have in the Lord Jesus. ₆My prayer is that our fellowship with you as believers will bring about a deeper understanding of every blessing which we have in our life in union with Christ. ₇Your love, dear brother, has brought me great joy and much encouragement! You have cheered the hearts of all God's people.

₈For this reason I could be bold enough, as your brother in Christ, to order you to do what should be done. ₉But because I love you, I make a request instead. I do this even though I am Paul, the ambassador of Christ Jesus, and at present also a prisoner for his sake. ₁₀So I make a request to you on behalf of Onesimus, who is my own son in Christ; for while in prison I have become his spiritual father. ₁₁At one time he was of no use to you, but now he is useful both to you and to me.

₁₂I am sending him back to you now, and with him goes my heart. ₁₃I would like to keep him here with me, while I am in prison for the gospel's sake, so that he could help me in your place. ₁₄However, I do not want to force you to help me; rather, I would like you to do it of your own free will. So I will not do anything unless you agree.

₁₅It may be that Onesimus was away from you for a short time so that you might have him back for all time. ₁₆And now he is not just a slave, but much more than a slave: he is a dear brother in Christ. How much he means to me! And how much more he will mean to you, both as a slave and as a brother in the Lord!

₁₇So, if you think of me as your partner, welcome him back just as you would welcome me. ₁₈If he has done you any wrong or owes you anything, charge it to my account. ₁₉Here, I will write this with my own hand: I, Paul, will pay you back. (I should not have to remind you, of course, that you owe your very self to me.) ₂₀So, my brother, please do me this favour for the Lord's sake; as a brother in Christ, cheer me up!

₂₁I am sure, as I write this, that you will do what I ask — in fact I know that you will do even more. ₂₂At the same time, get a room ready for me, because I hope that God will answer the prayers of all of you and give me back to you.

₂₃Epaphras, who is in prison with me for the sake of Christ Jesus, sends you his greetings, ₂₄and so do my fellow-workers Mark, Aristarchus, Demas, and Luke.

₂₅May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.

₁When it was decided that we should sail to Italy, they handed Paul and some other prisoners over to Julius, an officer in the Roman regiment called “The Emperor's Regiment”. ₂We went aboard a ship from Adramyttium, which was ready to leave for the seaports of the province of Asia, and we sailed away. Aristarchus, a Macedonian from Thessalonica, was with us. ₃The next day we arrived at Sidon. Julius was kind to Paul and allowed him to go and see his friends, to be given what he needed. ₄We went on from there, and because the winds were blowing against us, we sailed on the sheltered side of the island of Cyprus. ₅We crossed over the sea off Cilicia and Pamphylia and came to Myra in Lycia. ₆There the officer found a ship from Alexandria that was going to sail for Italy, so he put us aboard.

₇We sailed slowly for several days and with great difficulty finally arrived off the town of Cnidus. The wind would not let us go any further in that direction, so we sailed down the sheltered side of the island of Crete, passing by Cape Salmone. ₈We kept close to the coast and with great difficulty came to a place called Safe Harbours, not far from the town of Lasea.

₉We spent a long time there, until it became dangerous to continue the voyage, for by now the Day of Atonement was already past. So Paul gave them this advice: ₁₀“Men, I see that our voyage from here on will be dangerous; there will be great damage to the cargo and to the ship, and loss of life as well.” ₁₁But the army officer was convinced by what the captain and the owner of the ship said, and not by what Paul said. ₁₂The harbour was not a good one to spend the winter in; so most people were in favour of putting out to sea and trying to reach Phoenix, if possible, in order to spend the winter there. Phoenix is a harbour in Crete that faces south-west and north-west.

₁₃A soft wind from the south began to blow, and the men thought that they could carry out their plan, so they pulled up the anchor and sailed as close as possible along the coast of Crete. ₁₄But soon a very strong wind — the one called “North-easter” — blew down from the island. ₁₅It hit the ship, and since it was impossible to keep the ship headed into the wind, we gave up trying and let it be carried along by the wind. ₁₆We got some shelter when we passed to the south of the little island of Cauda. There, with some difficulty, we managed to make the ship's boat secure. ₁₇They pulled it aboard and then fastened some ropes tight round the ship. They were afraid that they might run into the sandbanks off the coast of Libya, so they lowered the sail and let the ship be carried by the wind. ₁₈The violent storm continued, so on the next day they began to throw some of the ship's cargo overboard, ₁₉and on the following day they threw part of the ship's equipment overboard. ₂₀For many days we could not see the sun or the stars, and the wind kept on blowing very hard. We finally gave up all hope of being saved.

₂₁After those on board had gone a long time without food, Paul stood before them and said, “Men, you should have listened to me and not have sailed from Crete; then we would have avoided all this damage and loss. ₂₂But now I beg you, take heart! Not one of you will lose your life; only the ship will be lost. ₂₃For last night an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I worship came to me ₂₄and said, ‘Don't be afraid, Paul! You must stand before the Emperor. And God in his goodness to you has spared the lives of all those who are sailing with you.’ ₂₅So take heart, men! For I trust in God that it will be just as I was told. ₂₆But we will be driven ashore on some island.”

₂₇It was the fourteenth night, and we were being driven about in the Mediterranean by the storm. About midnight the sailors suspected that we were getting close to land. ₂₈So they dropped a line with a weight tied to it and found that the water was forty metres deep; a little later they did the same and found that it was thirty metres deep. ₂₉They were afraid that the ship would go on the rocks, so they lowered four anchors from the back of the ship and prayed for daylight. ₃₀Then the sailors tried to escape from the ship; they lowered the boat into the water and pretended that they were going to put out some anchors from the front of the ship. ₃₁But Paul said to the army officer and soldiers, “If the sailors don't stay on board, you have no hope of being saved.” ₃₂So the soldiers cut the ropes that held the boat and let it go.

₃₃Just before dawn, Paul begged them all to eat some food: “You have been waiting for fourteen days now, and all this time you have not eaten anything. ₃₄I beg you, then, eat some food; you need it in order to survive. Not even a hair of your heads will be lost.” ₃₅After saying this, Paul took some bread, gave thanks to God before them all, broke it, and began to eat. ₃₆They took heart, and every one of them also ate some food. ₃₇There was a total of 276 of us on board. ₃₈After everyone had eaten enough, they lightened the ship by throwing all the wheat into the sea.

₃₉When day came, the sailors did not recognize the coast, but they noticed a bay with a beach and decided that, if possible, they would run the ship aground there. ₄₀So they cut off the anchors and let them sink in the sea, and at the same time they untied the ropes that held the steering oars. Then they raised the sail at the front of the ship so that the wind would blow the ship forward, and we headed for shore. ₄₁But the ship hit a sandbank and went aground; the front part of the ship got stuck and could not move, while the back part was being broken to pieces by the violence of the waves.

₄₂The soldiers made a plan to kill all the prisoners, in order to keep them from swimming ashore and escaping. ₄₃But the army officer wanted to save Paul, so he stopped them from doing this. Instead, he ordered those who could swim to jump overboard first and swim ashore; ₄₄the rest were to follow, holding on to the planks or to some broken pieces of the ship. And this was how we all got safely ashore.

₁When we were safely ashore, we learnt that the island was called Malta. ₂The natives there were very friendly to us. It had started to rain and was cold, so they lit a fire and made us all welcome. ₃Paul gathered up a bundle of sticks and was putting them on the fire when a snake came out on account of the heat and fastened itself to his hand. ₄The natives saw the snake hanging on Paul's hand and said to one another, “This man must be a murderer, but Fate will not let him live, even though he escaped from the sea.” ₅But Paul shook the snake off into the fire without being harmed at all. ₆They were waiting for him to swell up or suddenly fall down dead. But after waiting for a long time and not seeing anything unusual happening to him, they changed their minds and said, “He is a god!”

₇Not far from that place were some fields that belonged to Publius, the chief official of the island. He welcomed us kindly and for three days we were his guests. ₈Publius' father was in bed, sick with fever and dysentery. Paul went into his room, prayed, placed his hands on him, and healed him. ₉When this happened, all the other sick people on the island came and were healed. ₁₀They gave us many gifts, and when we sailed, they put on board what we needed for the voyage.

₁₁After three months we sailed away on a ship from Alexandria, called “The Twin Gods”, which had spent the winter in the island. ₁₂We arrived in the city of Syracuse and stayed there for three days. ₁₃From there we sailed on and arrived in the city of Rhegium. The next day a wind began to blow from the south, and in two days we came to the town of Puteoli. ₁₄We found some believers there who asked us to stay with them a week. And so we came to Rome. ₁₅The believers in Rome heard about us and came as far as the towns of Market of Appius and Three Inns to meet us. When Paul saw them, he thanked God and was greatly encouraged.

₁₆When we arrived in Rome, Paul was allowed to live by himself with a soldier guarding him.

₁₇After three days Paul called the local Jewish leaders to a meeting. When they had gathered, he said to them, “My fellow-Israelites, even though I did nothing against our people or the customs that we received from our ancestors, I was made a prisoner in Jerusalem and handed over to the Romans. ₁₈After questioning me, the Romans wanted to release me, because they found that I had done nothing for which I deserved to die. ₁₉But when the Jews opposed this, I was forced to appeal to the Emperor, even though I had no accusation to make against my own people. ₂₀That is why I asked to see you and talk with you. As a matter of fact, I am bound in chains like this for the sake of him for whom the people of Israel hope.”

₂₁They said to him, “We have not received any letters from Judea about you, nor have any of our people come from there with any news or anything bad to say about you. ₂₂But we would like to hear your ideas, because we know that everywhere people speak against this party to which you belong.”

₂₃So they fixed a date with Paul, and a large number of them came that day to the place where Paul was staying. From morning till night he explained to them his message about the Kingdom of God, and he tried to convince them about Jesus by quoting from the Law of Moses and the writings of the prophets. ₂₄Some of them were convinced by his words, but others would not believe. ₂₅So they left, disagreeing among themselves, after Paul had said this one thing: “How well the Holy Spirit spoke through the prophet Isaiah to your ancestors! ₂₆For he said,

₂₈And Paul concluded: “You are to know, then, that God's message of salvation has been sent to the Gentiles. They will listen!”

₃₀For two years Paul lived in a place he rented for himself, and there he welcomed all who came to see him. ₃₁He preached about the Kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ, speaking with all boldness and freedom.