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two years of Acts 28:, may foreshadow the length of time during which Israel's
blindness will last, and the length of time during which the dispensation of the Mystery
will fill the gap. Israel's blindness has lasted nineteen hundred years, and there is every
reason from Scripture and from history to believe that the two days of Hos. 6: indicate
two days of 1,000 years each, harmonizing with the Day that must come, the Millennium
which Rev. 20: affirms will last 1,000 years.
It is a healthy sign when men of God submit all teaching and all theories to the
touchstone of all Scripture, but with human nature as it is, we must be prepared to submit
their objections to the same test.
We have considered the question "Acts thirteen or Acts twenty-eight", and now
briefly consider two other propositions that infringed upon the teaching of the epistles to
the Ephesians.
Was Paul a prisoner, in Acts 28: 30, 31?
A serious and reverent examination of the teaching that Acts 28: 28 is the
Dispensational Boundary, has included in its objections, two terms used in
Acts 28: 30 and 31, which it is incumbent upon us to examine. This objection has
been expressed as follows:
"The direct evidence of Scripture indicates that Paul was neither in prison nor in
bonds during the time covered by Acts 28: 30, 31."
The first objection is based upon the words "his own hired house", the second on the
words "no man forbidding him". There is "direct evidence" that Paul was a prisoner
when he reached Rome. Scripture says so: "I was delivered prisoner from Jerusalem into
the hands of the Romans . . . . . I appeal(ed) unto Caesar . . . . . for the hope of Israel I am
bound with this chain" (Acts 28: 17-20). While Paul was in this condition, he
received a deputation of Jews to his "lodging". It has been put forward that there is a
difference intended between a "lodging" and a "hired house" which should lead us to
deny that Paul was a prisoner.
What essential difference we may well ask is there between a "lodging" and "an hired
house"? Is it outside the realm of possibility that Acts 28: 23 and 30 are two ways of
speaking of the same place? How is it possible to argue that Paul could be a prisoner and
bound with a chain in his "lodging", but that he must, of necessity be conceived of as
being free, if he receives visitors in his own "hired house"? The lodging xenia, means a
place for the accommodation of strangers, and xenizo is used in Acts 28: 7 where we
read that Paul was "lodged" for three days courteously. It seems that if an "hired house"
makes prison impossible then most certainly Paul was never a prisoner in Rome at all.
But if a Roman prisoner could have a "lodging" then he could also have a "hired house",
the two passages stand or fall together. It will be observed in Acts 28: 16 that:
"Paul was suffered to dwell by himself with a soldier that kept him",