On the first day of the week the believers at Troas gathered to break bread, and Paul, intending to depart the next day, talked with them and prolonged his message until midnight. Many lamps burned in the upper room where they met.

The subject, a young man, was sitting in a window. As Paul talked on and on, he sank into a deep sleep, and overcome at last by slumber, he fell from the third story and was taken up dead.

Paul went down, bent over him, and took him in his arms, saying they should not be alarmed, for his life was in him. The panic gave way to wonder.

Then Paul went back up, broke bread and ate, and continued to speak with them until daybreak, and so departed. The interruption did not end the fellowship of the word.

They took the young man away alive, and were greatly comforted. The subject is remembered not for any deed of his own, but as one whom God restored, a living sign of mercy in the midst of the church's long night of teaching.