Unknown
Commentaries and Other Bible Study Helps - Prayer Tents - Prayer Tents
11:27-30 The Offering for Jerusalem. Paul and Barnabas represented the Antioch church by conveying its offering to the Jerusalem church in a time of need. This offering may have inspired Paul for his own organizing of an offering for Jerusalem sometime later (see notes on 20:3; Rom. 15:25-28). Paul says in Gal. 2:1 that this second visit to Jerusalem (Acts 11:30) took place "after " (presumably after his conversion), which would place this visit in either . Most commentators believe that these calculations of years were not made according to modern standards of counting (which would require ) but by ancient "inclusive" methods, in which part of a year was still counted as a year. Paul's "" could have been as little as a from the first year, plus , plus a from the final year, giving about by modern reckoning. Likewise, the "after " of Gal. 1:18 could be as little as .
11:27 Christian prophets are mentioned elsewhere in Acts (13:1; 15:32; 21:9). Their role involved edification and encouragement as they spoke things that had been revealed to them by the Holy Spirit. Sometimes such prophecies foretold the future, as Agabus did here (see also 21:4, 10-11). On the gift of prophecy, see note on 1 Cor. 12:10 and other notes on 1 Corinthians 12-14.
11:28 a great famine. There were several famines in various parts of the Roman Empire during the reign of Claudius () including several in Judea in the early years of his reign. Historians believe that this famine took place in the years or else . Over all the world is a general prediction of the many regional famines that took place during Claudius's reign.
