Acts 14:8-28 Evangelizing central Asia Minor

Acts 14:8-18 Paul and Barnabas in Lystra. Under Paul's prayer, a man who had been lame since birth gets up and begins to walk. The response to this is electrifying, just as when a similar miracle occurred in the Temple in Jerusalem after Peter's words in Acts 3:1-10. In that case the response to Peter's sermon was that five thousand people believed, and Peter and John were thrown in prison. In this instance, the crowd's reaction was pagan; being steeped in Greek mythology, they called Paul Hermes and Barnabas Zeus and wanted to offer sacrifice to them as being Greek gods descended to earth. The upshot of this was that Paul and Barnabas had great difficulty in preventing this from happening. Seeing a bona fide supernatural miracle triggered a response in the Gentiles but there is no mention of any synagogues or Jews in the story in Lystra.

Acts 14:19-25 Verse 19 leaves us in a bit of a quandary. Jews came from  Antioch and Iconium came to Lystra and won over the crowd, and then stoned Paul, thinking they had killed him. Was the crowd easy to persuade because Paul and Barnabas had rejected worship by them? Why were Jews able to win over what appeared to be Gentile crowds? Why did Paul's gospel message (presuming that is what Paul was delivering before the healing of the lame man) get no response? The gospel is sometimes rejected and Jesus had warned it would be, but these circumstances are peculiar. After being stoned, the crowd thought Paul was dead, but evidently The Lord healed him and raised him up to continue his ministry. Paul later refers to this in 2 Corinthians 11:25, and one has to wonder if this is when he was caught up to the third heaven to hear inexpressible words (arreta rhemata) (2 Corinthians 12:2-4).

          Paul got up and entered the city; we have to wonder what the people in Lystra thought when they saw Paul shortly after they thought they had stoned him to death. The next day he & Barnabas went to Derbe. This marks the turning point in this first missionary journey of Paul. They made many disciples there, no details given on duration of stay or notable events. They then retraced their steps and returned to Lystra, then Iconium, then (Psidian) Antioch, then Perga, encouraging the the disciples and appointing elders in every church, and praying for them. It it possible to read into this passage that there were some believers in Lystra, but we never really heard of any in the passage earlier. When they left, it must have gone through their minds that they would never see these people again, so the instructions they gave them must have been quite thorough.

Acts 14:26-28 Then Paul and Barnabas sail back to Antioch (on the Orontes) and report to the church there. They set sail from Attalia, a seaport in Pamphylia about 15 km from Perga, and returned to Antioch, presumably landing at Seleucus, the seaport near Antioch. Their report to all the church together must have been quite a site; the first report of a missionary upon his return to his home church. So many things had happened, it took a long time.