Acts 20:7-12: Eutychus & Paul

Paul went down, threw himself on the young man and put his arms around him. “Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “He’s alive!” Acts 20:10 (NIV)

Paul was delivering a message to the church at Troas. The meeting was taking place on the first day of the week, and the disciples were celebrating the Lord’s supper together. The Bible says that Paul kept talking until midnight: it was a long message because he was going to leave the next day.

The Word of God tells us that there was light in the upper room, while there was darkness outside. Euthycus was sitting at the window, neither inside the upper room, nor outside.  He fell asleep and then fell from the window down three stories to the ground and died.

Paul went after him, threw himself on the young man, revived him, and came up again to continue with the meeting. The people were comforted because the young man was alive – he had been resurrected from the dead.  This is an example of how the Word that was preached by the apostles was accompanied by signs and wonders.

The meeting which took place on the first day of the week was characteristic of the church that started as a result of the resurrection of Christ. That was a church that celebrated victory over death, and they were in the habit of meeting on the first day of the week because it was the same day of the week that Jesus himself resurrected.

The Church, including those at Troas, was established by a covenant in the body and blood of Jesus Christ, the New Covenant of life in the Spirit. To break bread was to celebrate this new covenant.

The light that was present in the upper room was not only physical, it was a symbol of something spiritual. Jesus is the light of the world and His light was also shining there, in the midst of the Church, through the operation of the Spirit, who was revealing the Word and performing signs and wonders. At the same time, there was also spiritual darkness in the world outside.  Today, the Church is a worldwide group of faithful believers who live each day in the spiritual Light of Jesus Christ.  The world is in spiritual darkness, but the Church has light.

Eutychus, of course, was sitting on the window, the boundary between the light and the darkness.   Many people today are spiritually like Euthycus: they are on the fence, undefined, with one foot in the church and the other in the world.  They like the Light of the Lord, but they also like the things of the world and they’re not committed to the Lord’s project.

Eutychus was sleepy.  Sometimes there are people that literally sleep during services: maybe because they worked extra hours or stayed up late the night before.  But Paul warned that many so-called Christians were weak and that some had already fallen asleep spiritually (see 1 Corinthians 11:30).  The physical sleepiness of Eutychus speaks of this spiritual sleepiness.  Those who sleep spiritually are those who have drifted away from the Lord’s project, who are not watching  for His return (I Thess. 5:4-10). These are the ones who end up falling, and when they fall, it is never towards the church, but always towards the world.  When Eutychus fell, it wasn’t toward the church, it was toward the darkness outside.  And – both with Eutychus and with the spiritually sleepy – the result is death.

When Eutychus died, Paul went after him, just as Jesus does when one of His sheep goes astray.  He came to seek that which was lost.  The joy experienced by the church in Troas because of the revival of Eutychus is also experienced in the heavens among the angels of God when a sinner repents. Death has no victory over the church of the resurrection.

We live today in a world of spiritual darkness. Soon the Lord Jesus will rapture His Church.  He will gather those who have His light, and we have His light through the operation of His Holy Spirit in our midst.  If you’ve become sleepy in your spiritual walk, return to the Lord’s project.  If, like Eutychus, you’ve fallen asleep, now is the time to repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.  When the Rapture comes, let us be found in the light!