Acts 17:28

My Notes

What Does Acts 17:28 Mean?

Paul quotes pagan poets to the Athenian philosophers: "in him we live, and move, and have our being" and "we are also his offspring." The first quotation is attributed to Epimenides of Crete; the second to Aratus of Cilicia (Paul's home region). Paul uses non-biblical, non-Jewish sources to communicate biblical truth to a non-Jewish audience.

The theological content is genuinely Christian despite the pagan source: all human existence depends on God. Living, moving, and having being are not independent human capacities — they're sustained by the God who made everything. The poets stumbled onto truth that the Bible teaches explicitly.

Paul's willingness to quote pagan poetry demonstrates a missional principle: truth is truth regardless of who speaks it. When a Greek poet says something accurate about God, Paul doesn't dismiss it because the source is pagan. He uses it as a bridge to the fuller truth the poets didn't know.

Reflection Questions

• 1.How does Paul's use of pagan poetry model engagement with non-Christian culture?
• 2.What fragments of truth can you find in your own culture's art, literature, or philosophy that point toward God?
• 3.What's the difference between using culture as a bridge and compromising with culture?
• 4.How does 'in him we live, and move, and have our being' change your understanding of daily dependence on God?

Devotional

Paul quotes pagan poets to preach the gospel. In Athens. To philosophers. Using their own literature to teach about the God they don't yet know.

The audacity of this strategy can't be overstated. Paul is in the intellectual capital of the ancient world, surrounded by Stoic and Epicurean philosophers who have spent their lives studying truth through reason. And instead of dismissing their entire tradition as worthless paganism, he finds the fragments of truth within it and builds a bridge to Christ.

"In him we live, and move, and have our being" — written by a Cretan poet about Zeus, repurposed by Paul for the true God. The poet was closer to the truth than he knew. The breath you're breathing, the movement your body makes, the existence you take for granted — all sustained by a God who is not far from any of you (verse 27).

"We are also his offspring" — from a poem by Aratus, a fellow Cilician. Paul heard this growing up. He knew his culture's literature. And when the moment came to preach in Athens, he reached into the pagan library and pulled out the truth he found there.

This is how genuine missionary engagement works: you learn the culture's language, read the culture's literature, find the fragments of truth the culture already possesses, and build from there toward the fuller revelation they're missing. Paul didn't arrive in Athens with contempt for Greek thought. He arrived with a gospel big enough to embrace what was true in their tradition and complete what was missing.

Commentary

Trusted original commentary from respected historical Bible scholars and theologians.

Cross References

Related passages throughout Scripture