Acts 17:16-34 (NIV84) While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, he was greatly distressed to see that the city was full of idols. So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Greeks, as well as in the marketplace day by day with those who happened to be there. A group of Epicurean and Stoic philosophers began to dispute with him. Some of them asked, "What is this babbler trying to say?" Others remarked, "He seems to be advocating foreign gods." They said this because Paul was preaching the good news about Jesus and the resurrection. Then they took him and brought him to a meeting of the Areopagus, where they said to him, "May we know what this new teaching is that you are presenting? You are bringing some strange ideas to our ears, and we want to know what they mean." (All the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there spent their time doing nothing but talking about and listening to the latest ideas.) Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: "Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you. "The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 'For in him we live and move and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.' "Therefore since we are God's offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone-- an image made by man's design and skill. In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead." When they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some of them sneered, but others said, "We want to hear you again on this subject." At that, Paul left the Council. A few men became followers of Paul and believed. Among them was Dionysius, a member of the Areopagus, also a woman named Damaris, and a number of others.

Learning From Paul at Athens

When Paul comes here, it does not appear that he was intent initially to proclaim. He was after all waiting for Silas and Timothy. But wherever we are it is the opportunity to witness. So we see Paul busy at the work that must be done while it is day before the night comes when no man can work.

• In the synagogue we find Paul yet again announcing that the long awaited Messiah has come and it is Jesus of Nazareth. There is no reaction recorded, but likely there were those like Simeon and Anna looking for Him as at the first.
• In the market place "every day" he argued with those who chanced to be there. Here Paul gives us the idea that even in places of commerce the Gospel is to be heralded. Where there is sin, there must be grace. His encounters in the market led to his invite to the Areopagus.
• Don't we pray that one contact and witness encounter will lead to another as this one did for Paul? It was on this mount that we see some techniques that can well be used today in our witnessing. Paul's love for these who worshipped many gods led him to go where he would be mocked. For example Paul quotes the profane Greek literature by Epimenides and Aratus, "'In him we live and move and have our being' as even some of your poets have said, 'For we are indeed his offspring.'" Using this he then moves on to the message of Christ. Paul capitalizes on the desire to hear something new on the hill to proclaim Jesus. And notice that in vv. 30-31 he uses Law and Gospel. These two great teachings naturally are current in any age as this is how we know we sin and have the Savior. We should like Paul take advantage of any chance to speak from what people know to what they don't know, the Word. We see that some joined, while others mocked. This we expect from the worldly-wise who despise the simple Word.