Albert Barnes Commentary Acts 18:10

"for I am with thee, and no man shall set on thee to harm thee: for I have much people in this city." — Acts 18:10 (ASV)

For I am with you. I will attend, bless, and protect you. See Barnes on Matthew 28:20.

No man shall set on you. No one who shall rise up against you will be able to hurt you. His life was in God's hands, and God would preserve him, so that his people might be gathered into the church.

For I have. In Greek, this is "There is to me"; that is, I possess, or there belongs to me.

Much people. Many who should be regarded as his true friends, and who should be saved.

In this city. This refers to that very city which was so voluptuous, so rich, so effeminate, and where there had already been such decided opposition shown to the gospel.

This passage evidently means that God had a design or purpose to save many of those people. For it was given to Paul as great encouragement for him to labor there, evidently meaning that God would grant him success in his work.

It cannot mean that the Lord intended to say that the great mass of the people, or the moral and virtuous part, if there were any such, was then regarded as his people. Rather, he intended to convert many of those guilty and profligate Corinthians to himself, and to gather a people for his own service there.

We may learn from this:

1. That God has a purpose in regard to the salvation of sinners.
2. That this purpose is so fixed in the mind of God, that he can say that those in relation to whom it is formed are his. There is no chance, no hap-hazard, no doubt in regard to his gathering them to himself.
3. This is the ground of encouragement to the ministers of the gospel. Had God no purpose to save sinners, they could have no hope in their work.
4. This plan may refer to the most self-indulgent, and guilty, and abandoned population; and ministers should not be deterred by the amount or degree of wickedness from attempting to save them.
5. There may be more hope of success among a dissolute and profligate population than among proud, and cold, and skeptical philosophers. Paul had little success in philosophic Athens; he had great success in dissolute Corinth. There is often more hope of converting a person openly dissolute and abandoned than one who prides himself on his philosophy, and is confident in his own wisdom.