¹³But we, going ahead to the ship, set sail for Assos, intending from there to take Paul on board; for so he had arranged it, intending himself to go by land. ¹⁴And when he met us at Assos, we took him on board and came to Mitylene. ¹⁵Sailing from there, we arrived the following day opposite Chios; and the next day we crossed over to Samos; and the day following we came to Miletus. ¹⁶For Paul had decided to sail past Ephesus so that he would not have to spend time in Asia; for he was hurrying to be in Jerusalem, if possible, on the day of Pentecost. ¹⁷From Miletus he sent to Ephesus and called to him the elders of the church.

While in Troas for seven days (Acts 20:5), Paul and Luke were reunited with the rest of the entourage. From there, Paul sent them all ahead by ship, while he himself traveled by land. No reason is given for this travel plan, though scholars have suggested he may have wanted to visit certain individuals. After joining back up with them in Assos, Paul traveled with the group to several cities (all on the western coast of present-day Turkey), eventually arriving at Miletus. Significantly, they skipped Ephesus, where Paul had spent some years teaching. While Luke does not mention it in this history of Paul’s ministry, we can piece together from the apostle’s writings that he was carrying a sizeable benevolence donation from the churches to Jerusalem. This is probably what Paul referred to in Acts 24:17.

His bypass of Ephesus was not meant as a slight, for Paul was in a hurry to get to Jerusalem before Pentecost. The port at Ephesus was not at that time one of the better harbors, so it may have taken too long to stop there. The on-and-off nature of their sea travel would surely have involved a variety of time-consuming interruptions, with many people wanting to spend time with Paul. The Ephesian believers had already sat under considerable teaching from the apostle, so he may have felt the need to speak only with the elders.

So Paul called for the elders to meet with him at Miletus, a forty-five-mile venture by land (mostly). For messengers to journey to Ephesus, and then for the elders in Ephesus to stop everything and travel to meet Paul, would have taken at least four or five days—an acceptable delay relative to travel in the ancient world. What now follows is Paul’s farewell message to the Ephesian elders. His talk is authoritative yet warm; he speaks as a spiritual father and seasoned church planter. His message provides elders and church leaders with foundational instructions about shepherding the people of God.

Finally it ended tearfully, for they all realized that this would be the last time they would see one another (Acts 20:37–38).

Lord, thank You for those who sacrificed to plant the church I now attend!