SURPRISE ATTACK!

A surprise attack took place soon after Paul and his friends were safe on the island of Malta (see Acts 28:3-5). The ship Paul was travelling on to Rome had not survived a terrible storm but all the passengers and crew had made it safely to land. Raging cold and rain plagued the shipwrecked survivors and friendly islanders were providing food and shelter for them. Paul was helping to arrange for their care as they struggled to get dry and stay warm. As he reached down to pick up an armload of firewood, a small, poisonous snake, a viper, popped out from the stack of wood and fastened itself on his hand.

Immediately the legalists, the Pharisees, said, “Oh, oh! This man has done something wrong; he has sin in his life; he is being judged by God.” And then, as spectators, they stood by to watch him suffer and die. Pharisees love to watch people suffer.

Paul’s response to the surprise attack was to walk over to the fire and shake the snake off his hand and into the fire. The startled onlookers watched to see what would happen to Paul but he suffered no ill effects.

What just happened and what does it mean to us?

This was not some random happening nor was it God’s judging Paul for “sin in his life.”  This was a direct attack on Paul, an ambush, meant to try and silence him once and for all. The devil did not want Paul going to Rome. While the enemy did not know what Paul would accomplish in Rome, he was very aware of what Paul had already done and he wanted no more of that. Paul had bludgeoned and severely crippled the enemy through his missionary travels, his teaching, and especially his writings. By this time Paul had already written the book of Romans, the Corinthian letters, the Thessalonian letters and Galatians. The enemy was sick of this and wanted to silence the apostle.

This viper was an emissary of hell sent to ambush and severely hurt or destroy Paul. The apostle knew right away what was happening and how to respond. He knew what Jesus had taught the disciples to do when they were ambushed (see Mark 16:17-18).

Paul did not give in to panic, because he knew he was walking on solid ground in the authority of the Lord. He calmly walked to the fire and shook the snake into the fire and straight back to the place of its origin.

The enemy loves to use “surprise” on God’s people, to come at you when he thinks you are not looking and not ready. He does so to try and gain the upper hand and to disgrace and attempt to destroy God’s work in your life. It was on a rooftop that the devil surprised King David with a spirit of lust and David ended up in adultery. David should not have been there but he was “taken” by the sight of a bathing woman and was captured by lust.

When the viper fastened itself onto Paul’s hand, I am sure there was a moment of surprise. Who wouldn’t be surprised if a snake jumped on you? But Paul immediately understood what was happening. Years earlier he had written to the Corinthians, “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13).

The word taken as it is used here means “to seize, to take by fraud, to possess or take by force.” This is the picture of an ambush when suddenly by deception and surprise the enemy tries to overwhelm its victim. But God says, “I have given you the tools to deal with any eventuality; you can handle this, you can triumph!”

And so when the enemy struck, while Paul may have been momentarily surprised, he knew exactly what to do. He did not go to pieces and run screaming into the night. He did not throw himself on the ground and begin to confess sin and cry out for mercy.

Paul knew he was on solid ground with the Lord; he knew that Christ’s death on Calvary had established forever our authority in Him. He knew that the enemy was trying to spoil God’s plan. Deep in his heart he knew what lay ahead, what letters he still had to write, what churches he needed to strengthen, and that God was not finished with him yet. I believe the words of the Lord echoed in Paul’s mind, “They will take up serpents; and if they handle anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them.” I think Paul looked down at the snake fastened on his hand and said to the snake, “I have a surprise for you, too,” and then he shook the snake off his hand and into the fire.

How do you handle surprises?