Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary Acts 28:31

"preaching the kingdom of God, and teaching the things concerning the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness, none forbidding him." — Acts 28:31 (ASV)

This summary statement has often been viewed as only an amplification of v.30, indicating the nature of Paul’s ministry during his two years of detention at Rome. But to judge by Luke’s practice in the other five summary statements in Acts (6:7; 9:31; 12:24; 16:5; 19:20), we should take it as the summary statement for the whole of Panel 6 (19:21–28:31). In all of his prison experiences at Jerusalem, Caesarea, and Rome, Luke is saying, Paul “boldly... preached the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ.” And he did this “without hindrance” (GK 219)—the last word in the Greek text of Acts, which thus closes this work on a victorious note. This word shows the tolerance of Rome at that time toward Christianity—a tolerance Luke was passionately promoting throughout these last chapters and hoped would continue.

In seeming to leave his book unfinished, Luke was implying that the apostolic proclamation of the Gospel in the first century began a story that will continue until the consummation of the kingdom in Christ (Acts 1:11).