If Philippi evokes images of the beaten Paul and Silas suffering in stocks, Thessalonica as a city in uproar, and the pervasive idolatry of Athens – what does Berea bring to mind? Not a lot. What we do know is that the town’s Jewish leaders “were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the message with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily to see whether the things Paul taught were true.” (Acts 17:11) All good.
We also know that many of them believed in Jesus, as did many Greek men and women of good repute. The only other thing we know about Berea is that the Jewish leaders of Thessalonica who went there to stir up trouble against the apostles appear to have done so without much difficulty.
The attentive daily bible study of the Berean believers may have been their singular virtue. Luke, who wrote the book of Acts, saw nobility in their desire to ‘get it right’ scripturally. But I do question why so many regard them as such paragons of virtue, nearly 2000 years later, that they identify themselves with the Bereans.
“Credit where credit’s due,” you may say, and I agree. Still, 2000 years of credit in the most-read book ever written seems sufficient; unless, of course, we are meant to see in the Berean an ideal which would, in my opinion, fall short of the biblical image of the Ideal, which is the power of the risen Lord Jesus as displayed in and modelled so well by Paul and Silas in Thessalonica.
The measure of Berean nobility was their “more noble” attention than the Jews of nearby Thessalonica. Making an argument from silence is a theological no-no, but although Paul penned two letters to the church in Thessalonica, he wrote none — as far as we know — to the Bereans. Just four words of commendation in regard to their contrasting nobility.
There’s no mention of a church in Athens, either. But Paul’s brief stopover in that great city and his address to some of its leaders on Mar’s Hill is recorded in nineteen verses in Acts chapter 17, and has been the stuff of many a good sermon. A sermon on the Bereans would be necessarily limited to the admittedly sound virtue of daily bible study.
Still, well done those Bereans for checking the scriptures to be sure that the apostle’s words were scriptural! But why is it that those who idealize them tend to be the same people who love to stigmatize the Corinthians? The latter had their problems, but none was catastrophic. (The biggest sinner in the church was not disciplined for being too charismatic but for being grossly immoral; and he did repent after being disciplined.)
There’s also the fact (not to put too fine a point on it) that the Corinthian Christians, like the Thessalonians, did receive two letters from Paul. (Three, according to scholars, but no copy of it has been found) Think what the Christian record would lack without the splendid chapters on Love (13) and the Resurrection (15).
Why are many enamoured with the Bereans? I believe it’s because the truth-seeking Bereans meet the requirements of certain staid believers in the matter of non-charismatic correctness. Sadly this is often at the expense of spiritual experience in the matter of spiritual gifts.
There’s something to be said for more inquiry into scripture that leads to biblical soundness in this age of dubious spiritual FX — so long as we don’t make that a convenient refuge for cultural conservatism. We can only be as free in the Holy Spirit as we are in our own spirit — any personal inhibition can block the free flow through us to others of the Spirit of God.
I would like to think that the Bereans went on to become known for more than their search for scriptural correctness. When you think about it, the Corinthian and Berean churches would both have benefitted from more contact with one another. But since “birds of a feather” do “flock together”, I know which fellowship of choice would have been my natural habitat.