Albert Barnes Commentary Acts 27:31

"Paul said to the centurion and to the soldiers, Except these abide in the ship, ye cannot be saved." — Acts 27:31 (ASV)

Paul said to the centurion and to the soldiers. The centurion had, it appears, the general direction of the ship (Acts 27:11). Probably it had been pressed into the service of the government.

Except these. These seamen. The soldiers and the centurion were unqualified to manage the ship, and the presence of the sailors was therefore indispensable to the preservation of any.

Abide in the ship. Remain on board.

Ye cannot be saved. You cannot be preserved from death. You will have no hope of managing the ship so as to be secure from death. It will be remembered that Paul had been informed by the angel, and had assured them (Acts 27:22–24), that no lives should be lost. But it was only in the use of the proper means that their lives would be safe; yet this did not, in his view, prevent the use of the proper means to secure it. From this we learn:

1. That the certainty of an event does not render it improper to use means to obtain it.
2. That though the event may be determined, yet the use of the means may be indispensable. The event is rendered no more certain than the means requisite to accomplish it.
3. That the doctrine of the Divine purposes or decrees, making certain future events, does not make the use of human agency unnecessary or improper. The means are determined as well as the end; and the one will not be secured without the other.
4. The same is true in regard to the decrees respecting salvation. The end is not determined without the means; and as God has resolved that his people shall be saved, so he has also determined the means. He has ordained that they shall repent, shall believe, shall be holy, and shall thus be saved.
5. We have in this case a full answer to the objection that a belief in the decrees of God will make people neglect the means of salvation and lead to licentiousness. It has just the contrary tendency. Here is a case in which Paul certainly believed in the purpose of God to save these men, in which he was assured that it was fully determined; and yet the effect was not to produce inattention and unconcern, but to prompt him to use strenuous efforts to accomplish the very effect which God had determined should take place.

So it is always. A belief that God has purposes of mercy, that he designs and has always designed to save some, will prompt to the use of all proper means to secure it. If we had no evidence that God had any such purpose, effort would be vain. We should have no inducement to exertion. Where we have such evidence, it operates as it did in the case of Paul, to produce great and strenuous endeavours to secure the object.