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ACTS 28. THE DISPENSATIONAL BOUNDARY
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Acts 28 ends with the apostle dwelling for two years in his own hired house preaching and teaching `no man
forbidding him'.
During Paul's early ministry, the Jew had consistently opposed the preaching of the gospel to the Gentiles, and
this, said the apostle, was their climax sin.
They `killed the Lord Jesus' but forgiveness was given and a new opportunity to believe and repent was granted.
They had earlier `killed their own prophets' and had more recently `persecuted' the apostle and his helpers
`forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved', reaching however a climax `TO FILL UP their sins
alway; for the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost' (1 Thess. 2:15,16).
`To the bitter end,' reads Moffatt. `In its severest form', reads Weymouth. This same word `forbidding' found
in 1 Thessalonians 2:16 is the word used by Paul, `No man forbidding him' - Israel, the opposer, had gone. They
had filled up their measure of sin to the brim, and the very Gentiles that they had `forbidden' now entered into
blessings hitherto unrevealed. (See THREE SPHERES OF BLESSING5).
ADAM. The name of `the first man' (1 Cor. 15:45), who, according to the chronology of the Bible, was created 4004
B.C. by God, subsequent to the overthrow of the world (Gen. 1:2), (See OVERTHROW7).
Commentators and lexicographers with a few exceptions since the days of Josephus explain the word `Adam' as
being derived from the Hebrew Adamah `the ground' (Gen. 2:7). In the first place we must remember that while the
name Adam does not occur in the English Bible until Genesis 2:19, the Hebrew word has already occurred nine
times, namely in Genesis 1:26,27; 2:5,7,8,15,16,18 where it is translated `man' or `the man'. The beasts were also
formed out of the `ground' the adamah (Gen. 1:25; 2:19) yet no beasts appear to have been given a name that
associated them with their earthy origin. When we consider the first occurrence of the word `Adam', namely, in
Genesis 1:26, we have the following context:
`And God said, Let us make man in our IMAGE, after our LIKENESS ... so God created man in His own image'
(Gen. 1:26,27).
It seems strange to name the first man after the `ground' before the record even alludes to the adamah from
which he was taken. Parkhurst in his Hebrew Lexicon refers the word `Adam' to the Hebrew damah, which
primarily means `to be equal' (Isa. 46:5) and then in the feminine form damuth `likeness' (Isa. 40:18). In the book
of the generations of Adam, it is this aspect of his creation, not that of Genesis 2:6,7 that is perpetuated.
`In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made He him' (Gen. 5:1).
The purpose for which man was created is expressed in the three terms `image', `likeness' and `dominion'. The
word `image' tselem, is from the Hebrew root tsel, meaning `shadow'.
The first occurrence in the Old Testament is in Genesis 19:8, `the shadow of my roof'. The LXX translates tsel
by the Greek skia some twenty-seven times. The latter is found in the New Testament seven times as follows:
`The shadow of death' (Matt. 4:16; Luke 1:79).
`The shadow of it' (a tree). (Mark 4:32).
`The shadow of Peter' (Acts 5:15).
The word is also used figuratively of the ceremonial law: `a shadow of things to come, and not the very image'
(Heb. 10:1; Col. 2:17); and in Hebrews 8:5, `the example and shadow of heavenly things'.
Adam was not the `very image' but he in great measure shadowed forth the Lord; and Romans 5:12-14 indicates
that in other ways than those suggested in Genesis 1:26,27 Adam was a `figure of Him that was to come'.
By creation, man is `the image and glory of God' (1 Cor. 11:7); but this image is, after all, `earthy':
`The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from heaven ... as we have borne the image of
the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly' (1 Cor. 15:47-49).