Acts Chapter 20 verse 32 Holy Bible

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 32. - Now for now brethren, A.V. and T.R.; the inheritance for an inheritance, A.V. and T.R.; that for which, A.V. I commend you to God (παρατίθεμαι ὑμᾶς). A most beautiful and significant phrase! The apostle is leaving for ever the flock which he had fed with such devoted care and loved with such a fervent love. He was leaving them with a strong impression of the dangers to which they would be exposed. To whom could he entrust them? to what loving hands could he consign them? He gives them to God, to take watchful custody of them. He brings them to him in the prayer of faith. He commits to him the precious deposit (παραθήκη), to be preserved safe unto the day of Christ. So the Savior of the world, when dying on the cross, said, "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit "(Luke 23:46), and then trustingly gave up the ghost (see too Acts 14:23). No less beautiful are the words which follow: And to the word of his grace. He was thinking of the grievous wolves, and of their pernicious doctrine; of the deceivers that should arise, and their soul-destroying heresies; and so he turns to the one source of safety "the Word of God's grace in Jesus Christ." If they are kept in that Word of truth, if they nourish their souls with that sincere milk, they will be safe. The gospel which he had preached would be their safety unto the end. It would build them up on the one Foundation which never can be moved; it would preserve them holy to take possession of the inheritance of the saints in light. The inheritance (τὴν κληρονομίαν); comp. Ephesians 1:14, 18; Ephesians 5:5; and Ephesians 1:11, ἐκληρώθημεν. In Acts 26:18 it is κλῆρον (as in Colossians 1:12), and the ἡγιασμένοι are further defined by the addition of πίστει,  ῞τῇ εἰς ἐμέ, "by the faith which is in me" (for the use of ἀγιάζεσθαι, comp. Hebrews 10:10, 14; 1 Corinthians 1:2; 1 Corinthians 6:11, etc.).

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(32) And now, brethren, I commend you . . .--The Greek verb and its derivatives are characteristic of St. Paul's phraseology. Teachers are to "commit" the truth they have received to others (2Timothy 2:2), and the truth so committed is the depositum fidei which they thus hold, as it were, in trust (2Timothy 1:14).The word of his grace, which is able to build you up . . .--It can hardly be said that the "word" here is used, as it is by St. John, for the person of Christ as the Logos. (See Notes on John 1:14; John 1:16; 1John 1:1.) There is, however, a quasi-personal character ascribed to it, "able to . . . give an inheritance," which suggests the thought of something more than the written or spoken word. The true explanation is probably to be found in the thought of the "engrafted (or better, the implanted) word" of James 1:21, the "word of God, quick and powerful" of Hebrews 4:12; and in so far as this is identical with the "Light that lighteth every man" of John 1:9, we may find in these passages a preparation for the more fully developed teaching of St. John as to the Logos. We cannot pass over the word "build" without noting the recurrence of the same thought and word in Ephesians 2:20-21; Ephesians 4:12; Ephesians 4:16; Ephesians 4:29; Colossians 2:7. The figure was a natural one anywhere (comp. 1Corinthians 3:10), but it would gain additional vividness from the stately architecture of Ephesus, perhaps also from the presence of one among St. Paul's companions who may have been himself an architect. (See Note on Acts 20:4.) . . .