It was so important for Paul and his friends to be in the right place that the Spirit even stopped them preaching in areas that seemed promising.
There are some points of particular interest in this passage:
The ministry of the Holy Spirit is seen here in both restraining (16:6-7) and constraining the Christian missionaries. The verbs used indicate clearly the Spirit’s personality and his intimate association with the person of Jesus (especially 16:7: a unique description, but it is hinted at in John 14:16).
Guidance came in the form of a human voice, heard in Paul’s night-time vision. The circumstances of this encounter with the Macedonian “man” whom Sir William Ramsay suggested was Luke himself, and the clear direction given in the call to cross over the Aegean Sea led Paul to the firm conviction that this was the guidance he sought. In fact, he needed such guidance, because the way ahead was blocked. Why?
At this point in the narrative the literary form changes, and 16:10 introduces a new, unheard-of feature in Luke’s history. Can you spot it?
Few sections of the Bible hold such useful teaching on the theme of guidance. Re-read the passage in the light of the following suggestions:
We may confidently expect a guided life as the children of God. He will direct us away from the second-best, if we are faced with a choice.
He may lead us through some fellow-believer, some “man of Macedonia” whose word comes to our prepared and responsive minds; but we must cultivate a sensitivity to hear.
When circumstances combine to indicate a course of action, we are expected to use a God-given faculty of common sense and perception (16:10).
Notes 16:6: the “South Galatian” view interprets this phrase as meaning the region of Phrygia Galatica, evangelized by Paul on his earlier journey (13:14ff.) and inhabited by the readers addressed in the epistle to the Galatians. Paul was checked from turning west towards Ephesus (16:6) and north-eastward into Bithynia (16:7). 16:9: the first extended “we” section, indicating the presence of Luke. 16:10: the verb normally means “to put together” (cf. our colloquial “putting two and two together”—ie concluding).
