If Ananias and Sapphire were the first church members to die during the contribution, then Eutychus was the first to die during the sermon.Troas is well known to Christians as the place that Paul and Luke worshipped with the saints specifically on a Sunday. Luke records in his travel log: “On the first day of the week we came together to break bread” (Acts 20:1). It is at this point that some of my brethren leave the text as if the rest of the worship service has little to do with 21st century worship. (I’m sure that you have heard good brothers say in worship, “Now we come to the most important time of our worship, the Lord’s Supper.” I’m not going to take issue with the centrality of Communion to everything that is Christian, but I have to ask where in the Bible is that specific quote found?)The Troas Sunday worship had a guest preacher, the apostle Paul. He was not going to waste a minute. He “talked on and on” (Acts 20:9).A young guy by the name of Eutychus had propped himself up on the open window frame to set in for the meat of the word. Being late in the evening and in the path of the heat and fumes of the lamps, he was overcome with sleep. The inevitable happened when a young man falls from the third floor in the depth of slumber—he hit the ground dead! What else is an apostle to do than to do what apostles are supposed to do at times like this? Paul didn’t miss a beat: He just continued his message in the form of a real-time illustration of the power that confirms the truth of the gospel he is preaching. He raised the boy from the dead in front of everybody present.What did he do next? He preached on! My guess is that they waited until midnight to make sure that all the brethren were present to take the Lord’s Supper together (1Cor.11:33).
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