Only Human

Acts 13:49-14:28

Good morning! Today we continue our study of the book of Acts, looking at the end of chapter 13 and chapter 14. Over the past two weeks, we have looked at how Paul and Barnabas were staying at the church of Antioch, teaching and equipping and encouraging the believers there. As they were worshiping together, they sensed the Holy Spirit calling Paul and Barnabas to end their time there and go to even more unreached areas to spread the gospel. The church fasted, prayed, and laid hands on them, and then they sent them off.

 

They went by ship to the island of Cyprus, and there, God’s message was proclaimed in the synagogues, a sorcerer was confronted and struck with blindness, and the proconsul came to faith. Then they sailed to Perga in Pamphylia, and from there they went inland to the Antioch in Pisidia. Once again, they went to the synagogue, and were invited to speak. Paul’s speech to them is recorded in Acts 13. Paul gives them a history of the Jewish people, and then he explains that the Jewish leaders did not recognize Jesus for who He was, but in persecuting Him they fulfilled the words of the Old Testament prophets. He explains that Jesus was condemned and died on a cross, but then God raised Him from the dead and He was seen for many days instructing His followers who are now proclaiming Him as witnesses to what He has done. Paul explains the gospel, that those who believe in Jesus find forgiveness from sin, and he warns them not to become scoffers. 

 

After the service, many people come up to them and ask them to come back on the next Sabbath to teach them more about Jesus. Paul and Barnabas indeed return, but this time they find that almost the entire city has gathered. This includes Gentiles, who make up most of the people in the city. This makes a number of the Jews jealous, presumably including the leaders, and they begin to contradict Paul and “heap abuse upon him.”  Paul and Barnabas respond by saying that since they reject the words leading to eternal life, they now turn to the Gentiles of that city. This makes the Gentiles very glad but further infuriates the Jews. As Paul and Barnabas reach out to the Gentiles, large numbers of them came to believe.  This brings us to today’s passage.

 

The word of the Lord spread through the whole region. But the Jewish leaders incited the God-fearing women of high standing and the leading men of the city. They stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them from their region. So they shook the dust off their feet as a warning to them and went to Iconium. And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit. – Acts 13:49-52

 

And so we see that the Jewish leaders didn’t just stand by and allow Paul and Barnabas to continue. They go to the “God-fearers” in their city, people who believed some measure of what the Bible teaches about God but were unwilling to begin the long and difficult process of actual conversion to Judaism. The passage is clear that both women and men were contacted; in each case, these were among the city’s most influential people. Why did the Jews go to them? Because they had power, in the case of the men, or their husbands did, in the case of the women. And so they knew who to talk to, and although we don’t know the details of what was said, we know the results – they were successful. Paul and Barnabas were expelled not only from the city, but the surrounding area as well. 

 

Now the “shaking the dust off your feet” was a powerful symbol in ancient times. Jesus spoke of it in the gospels. When He sent off the twelve to spread the news of His coming in Matthew 10, for example, He said that if people will not welcome them or listen to them, they are to leave that place and shake the dust off their feet. What does it mean? It means that you will no longer have anything to do with them; you won’t even bring their dust with you going forward. It means that they have done their part, bringing the good news, but that the rejection of this news is solely the responsibility of those who are doing the rejecting. The symbolism goes deeper in that it implies that God sees this action, the shaking the dust off their feet. Based on the idea that Jesus taught what you bless will be blessed and what you curse will be cursed, God not only sees these people, but He also will judge them for their refusal to believe.

 

Now what started all this? As we have already discussed, and as we saw last week, the answer is jealousy. Now our culture tends to minimize jealousy, or even makes light of it, with a common movie plot device being a woman doing something to make the man she wants to be with jealous so that he takes action to pursue her. But the Bible has very serious things to say about jealousy.

 

In Galatians 5, a list of the acts of the flesh are given and followed by a list of the fruit of the Spirit. The acts of the flesh include both jealousy and envy, as well as hatred and discord and fits of rage, all of which were present among those opposed to the gospel at Antioch in Pisidia. In I Corinthians 13, the so-called “love chapter,” we are told that love does not envy. This means that envy, which is jealousy, is the opposite of love. In I Timothy 6, when talking about false teachers, Paul notes that envy, strife, and malicious talk all stem from such people. This chapter identifies conceit, which is pride, as the root of all these behaviors. Romans 1 lists it among other terrible behaviors as a mark of unbelievers who reject the clear evidence of God. And James 3 tells us the following:

 

But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. Such “wisdom” does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice. – James 3:14-16

 

And so jealousy is evil, satanic. In the case of the Jewish leaders, it is blinding them from seeing and responding to the gospel. It is costing them salvation! We should be careful to watch for jealousy in our own hearts and repent of it when we find it. We should ask God to fill our hearts with the opposite of jealousy—a longing for the success of others, even if, in comparison, our status or position within our own minds or in public is diminished.  

 

The disciples could have been discouraged about what had happened in Pisidian Antioch. They could have decided this journey was a mistake and turned around to go back to “their” Antioch. Or they could have become bitter about the betrayals they experienced there. They could have held grudges against those in the synagogue who turned against them. But they had shaken the dust off their feet, as it says, “as a warning to them.” The “ceremony” was not for their own benefit; it was for the benefit of those who opposed to the gospel. They cared about those who persecuted them, those who rejected the message of forgiveness found through Jesus Christ.  But it was time to follow the leading of God and move on to Iconium, trusting God to help the new body of believers in Pisidian Antioch to grow in faith and in numbers even though Paul and Barnabas could not stay there. And they were filled with joy and the Holy Spirit.

 

At Iconium Paul and Barnabas went as usual into the Jewish synagogue. There they spoke so effectively that a great number of Jews and Greeks believed. But the Jews who refused to believe stirred up the other Gentiles and poisoned their minds against the brothers. So Paul and Barnabas spent considerable time there, speaking boldly for the Lord, who confirmed the message of His grace by enabling them to perform signs and wonders. The people of the city were divided; some sided with the Jews, others with the apostles. There was a plot afoot among both Gentiles and Jews, together with their leaders, to mistreat them and stone them. But they found out about it and fled to the Lycaonian cities of Lystra and Derbe and to the surrounding country, where they continued to preach the gospel. – Acts 14:1-7

 

At Iconium, Paul and Barnabas continue their pattern of going to the Jews first. They did this out of love and concern for their own people, and because they had a background in the Scriptures that would enable them to understand who Christ was and put their faith in Him quickly. We are told that many Jews as well as Greeks believed. 

 

But once again, we see the pattern of opposition rising up after an initial success. One could almost say that opposition is a sign that you are doing something right. But they didn’t immediately kick Paul and Barnabas out – perhaps the size of the city made this impossible, as it just took a much longer time for people to even be aware of what was going on. But it appears that as the gospel spread, pretty much everyone became aware of Paul and Barnabas and at least something about what their message was about, so much so that it says that the people of the city were divided – the Greek word used here is the vivid “schizo,” which means cleaved or split, as in how an axe splits wood. This was just not a difference in opinion; emotions were running high.

 

And those opposed to the gospel now made plans to have them stoned to death. But thanks to God, their plan was discovered by the believers, and so Paul and Barnabas went immediately from Iconium the area of the cities of Lystra and Derbe. And once again, they began to share the gospel in their new location.

  

In Lystra there sat a man who was lame. He had been that way from birth and had never walked. He listened to Paul as he was speaking. Paul looked directly at him, saw that he had faith to be healed and called out, “Stand up on your feet!” At that, the man jumped up and began to walk. – Acts 14:8-10

 

Note that in Lystra it appears that Paul and Barnabas did not first go to a synagogue. Why? Most likely, because there was no synagogue here. Instead they went to the busiest location, almost certainly the marketplace, the agora. It makes sense that this would so be where the lame man sat, in part so that there was something for him to watch, but also likely in part so that he could make money from begging there. 

 

And so Paul is there, presenting the gospel in a way that Gentiles could understand. We don’t know the details of this presentation, but it is unlikely that Paul was focusing on Old Testament Scripture, as this would not be known to them. We do have an example of one of Paul’s messages to Gentiles later in Acts, but I won’t get ahead of myself and present that here. In any case, the lame man was listening intently to Paul’s message, and Paul noticed this. Presumably it was the Holy Spirit that helped Paul to see that this man had blossoming faith not only in the area of salvation, but also in believing the impossible, that God could heal him, making it possible for him to do something, walk, that he had never been able to do his entire life. 

 

And what did Paul do? Did he stop and pray for this man? No. Did he perform some special incantation or ritual? No. Shockingly, he simply told the man to stand up! And the man, we are told, jumped up! I mean, I don’t think even I can jump up from the floor. And then he walked. 

 

Now, what would you think might happen next? Or if you were making up this story for the purpose of showing how great your god was, what would you have happen next? I can tell you what I would do. I would have the whole town come running to Paul and Barnabas, professing faith in their God, and basically have an explosion of faith like what we saw happen in Jerusalem in Acts 2. I would have the whole town get saved, share their possessions, love one another, gather daily for prayer and fellowship, etc. But what actually happened? Let’s read on. 

 

When the crowd saw what Paul had done, they shouted in the Lycaonian language, “The gods have come down to us in human form!” Barnabas they called Zeus, and Paul they called Hermes because he was the chief speaker. The priest of Zeus, whose temple was just outside the city, brought bulls and wreaths to the city gates because he and the crowd wanted to offer sacrifices to them. – Acts 14:11-13

 

Um, this is not what I envisioned. Now, we have found several inscriptions from the third century AD verifying that Zeus and Hermes were worshiped in Lystra. And in fact, we know about a local legend believed there. The legend was that Zeus and Hermes had once visited the area disguised as ordinary men. They were looking for somewhere to stay, but home after home turned them away. Finally, one poor elderly couple made them welcome. In response, the gods tuned their home into a temple with a roof of gold and columns of marble. But then the gods destroyed the homes of all the people who had turned them away. 

 

So when Paul healed the man who had been lame from birth, and given that Paul was one of two men, the people of Lystra remembered the legend and concluded that it was actually true. They also concluded that Paul and Barnabas must have been Zeus and Hermes coming in disguise once again. But which was which? To answer this, we need to go a bit deeper into the Greek legends of their gods. 

 

Zeus was king of the gods, residing on Mount Olympus, and Hermes was one of his sons. His mother was a nymph named Maia who hid from the other gods in a secret cave. This cave was where Hermes was born. On his first night since being born, Hermes was able to sneak out of his cave. He killed a turtle and used its shell to make the first lyre. He also stole the prized cattle of his half-brother Apollo. Apollo was able to track the thief to Maia’s cave. Finding only Maia and the baby god there, he told Maia that Hermes had to be the thief. Maia said that was ridiculous, as he was only a newborn infant and of course he could not yet do any of the things he had been accused of. Apollo took the baby to Mount Olympus to be judged by Zeus. To everyone’s shock, Hermes stood up and eloquently repeated his mother’s words that he was far too young to do any of the things that he had been accused of. Apollo was furious, but Zeus was delighted in his new son. Zeus offered Hermes a seat of honor at Mount Olympus, and Hermes agreed, far preferring this to a boring cave. Seeing Hermes’ mischievous streak, Zeus knew that Hermes would have to be kept busy to stay out of trouble, so he made him his messenger and herald. That is, Hermes became the spokesperson for Zeus. In the presence of mortals, it would be Hermes who spoke, not Zeus, when they were together. And so now you can see why the people of Lystra immediately “knew” that Paul had to be the mischievous Hermes, and the silent Barnabas had to be Zeus. Again, this is not what I would have envisioned!

 

I also want to point out that this kind of misinterpretation, not to the details, but to the essence, still can occur today in some parts of the world. The idea that Jesus is God’s Son, fully God but also fully man, is a difficult concept for everyone to grasp. But to people who believe in multiple gods, it is easy to misunderstand the gospel message to conclude that it is just one more occurrence of a god coming to earth in human form so as to hide their godhood and perhaps test people, just like we heard in the legend of Zeus and Hermes looking for somewhere to stay. When sharing the gospel with people with absolutely no Bible background, it is important to understand that misinterpretation, especially in the early stages, is likely. Practically speaking, one should expect that the gospel message will not be properly understood at first, especially when sharing it with people who have false presumptions about what God (or gods) are like. Paul tries to do this next: 

 

But when the apostles Barnabas and Paul heard of this, they tore their clothes and rushed out into the crowd, shouting: “Friends, why are you doing this? We too are only human, like you. We are bringing you good news, telling you to turn from these worthless things to the living God, who made the heavens and the earth and the sea and everything in them. In the past, He let all nations go their own way. Yet He has not left Himself without testimony: He has shown kindness by giving you rain from heaven and crops in their seasons; He provides you with plenty of food and fills your hearts with joy.” Even with these words, they had difficulty keeping the crowd from sacrificing to them. – Acts 14:14-18 

 

Barnabas and Paul begin by tearing their clothes. This is a well-known cultural convention that even the people of Lystra understand. It communicates powerfully that what is happening right now is not only wrong, but catastrophically so. I also note the strong contrast between what is happening here and how in Acts 12 Herod welcomed worship from the crowd. Paul explains that they are human beings just like them, and then pulls no punches in describing their beliefs as “worthless things.” This may seem harsh, but it is entirely accurate. You may hear people who say that there are good things in all religions, but that all religions are also wrong about some things. This is doubly false. Any religion that sets itself up in opposition to the true historical events of the Bible and the doctrines of Christianity has no good thing in it, because it leads people away from Christ instead of towards Him. The people of Lystra have been seriously harmed by these myths and legends. It is making it harder for them to believe the gospel! And you can see this, in how Paul and Barnabas have are not only having difficulty sharing the gospel with this people, they are also even struggling to prevent them from sacrificing to them, worshiping them as gods!

 

I really like Paul’s approach here. Despite the horrifying change in events, Paul still calls them friends. He calls God the living God, in part to contrast Him with the imaginary gods they worship. He is alive – He is real. And He is not just some superhero-like character with a mix of good and bad character qualities – He is the Creator of everything and everyone. And He is the giver of every good thing. He testifies to His existence, His goodness, His power, and His kindness by the fact that they have experienced His blessings whether they knew Him or not.  

 

Then some Jews came from Antioch and Iconium and won the crowd over. They stoned Paul and dragged him outside the city, thinking he was dead. But after the disciples had gathered around him, he got up and went back into the city. The next day he and Barnabas left for Derbe. – Acts 14:19-20 

 

Let me first point out that the real bad guys in this account are not the Gentiles, although they are responsible for their own actions. But prior to the coming of the Jews from Antioch and Iconium, the Gentiles of Lystra were certainly confused, but they were not hostile. We don’t know what the Jews said to foment the crowd into such a state that they would stone Paul, but it seems likely to me that they manipulated the people of Lystra into seeing Paul as someone who thought their beliefs were rubbish. They might have even used Paul’s own words about “worthless things” against him. I say this because I cannot see how the crowd would care either way about whether Paul was saying controversial things within the context of Judaism. Perhaps they portrayed him as some kind of evil sorcerer, as some explanation was needed for how the lame man was healed.

 

In any case, what happened next was awful. Paul was stoned – and stoning was usually a death sentence, as rocks to the head would cause critical brain damage. They then dragged, not carried, his seemingly lifeless body unceremoniously out of the city, dumping him like garbage.

 

Now there are some questions about the timing of this. We are told that the disciples gathered around him. What disciples are these? Are they disciples that came from Antioch and Iconium to warn him what was coming? Were they disciples who had come from Antioch and Iconium at the same time as Paul? Or did the events described in these two verses occur a significant amount of time later than the preceding verses, and the disciples were Christ-followers in Lystra? I do not think we can answer this question.

 

But the far more important observation is that Paul is, miraculously, not dead! And did he flee? No! He – amazingly – went back into the city, presumably to receive medical treatment. But he did not stay – it was clear that the Jews from Iconium and Antioch had a severe corrupting influence on the people of Lystra, and it was certainly unsafe to stay there. And so he and Barnabas went to Derbe.   

 

Now although Paul was able to survive the stoning and go to Derbe, there is no reason to think he wasn’t affected significantly and permanently by the event. You get the impression in his letters that he had multiple physical problems, including perhaps eyesight problems and maybe disfigurement and scarring. It would be easy to despair over such things, but Paul simply pressed on for the sake of the gospel. He called his body a “tent” – as in a temporary dwelling – and an interesting choice of wording for one who worked as a tentmaker – and he said that to live is Christ and to die is gain, so he was willing to be a martyr for Christ, if that was the Lord’s will. He maintained a positive outlook because he knew that eternal life awaited him, an eternal life with Christ Himself. 

 

They preached the gospel in that city and won a large number of disciples. Then they returned to Lystra, Iconium and Antioch, strengthening the disciples and encouraging them to remain true to the faith. “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God,” they said. Paul and Barnabas appointed elders for them in each church and, with prayer and fasting, committed them to the Lord, in whom they had put their trust. After going through Pisidia, they came into Pamphylia, and when they had preached the word in Perga, they went down to Attalia. – Acts 14:21-25 

 

And so at this point, we see Paul and Barnabas retracing their steps, returning to the places they had already spent time at. Encouragingly, this included Lystra, the place where it seemed like so much had gone so wrong. At each location, the gospel had taken hold, and despite the absence of Paul and Barnabas, they had met together to encourage one another with the truths of the gospel and they lived life together, presumably in the style of what we saw early in the book of Acts in Jerusalem.

 

From the perspective of Christian ministry, it is telling to see the importance Paul and Barnabas placed on revisiting each group of believers. These actions were not without danger. If the goal was just to get back to their starting point of Antioch, there were faster ways to go. They could have even revisited Paul’s home of Tarsus. At each location, there were Jews strongly opposed to them, and although they might have tried to keep a low profile, it is hard to believe that they weren’t found out. But God protected them, and in each location they encouraged the believers and also identified in each location those who were most mature in the faith and appointed them as elders.

 

Now, the books of Timothy and Titus give details into what Paul and Barnabas were looking for as they identified these people. We don’t have time to go into that today, but we can say they were looking for people not only with faith, but also with character qualities we would associate with “maturity.” And all indications are that they were appointing multiple elders in each location. The idea, like what is so widespread in Christianity today, that each church has one pastor and that’s it is foreign to the structure of the early church. The position did not seem to have any limit on the number of “slots,” and it was generally an unpaid, what we today might call part-time position. That is, the responsibility of ministry was shared, and people “kept their day jobs.” Now Paul was not opposed to people – especially those more in full-time missionary kinds of roles – receiving support to do this work. But for the more common role of “elder,” financial support was not normally part of the position. 

 

We are only given one sentence of what Paul and Barnabas told them, and it is an interesting selection: “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God.” Nowadays, not a lot of people who say they have a “life verse” would make that selection. The Greek words are common words, but they also would apply to the idea of a doorway – you must go through a doorway before you can enter the home. But I like this analogy because you don’t spend a lot of time in a doorway – just a moment or two, and then you can spend the vast majority of your time enjoying the home. In the same way, each of us must go through many hardships, and although it does say “many,” all together they are like a doorway – in the eternal perspective, it is just a fleeting moment, and then, in the kingdom, we will be forever home.   

 

From Attalia they sailed back to Antioch, where they had been committed to the grace of God for the work they had now completed. On arriving there, they gathered the church together and reported all that God had done through them and how He had opened a door of faith to the Gentiles. And they stayed there a long time with the disciples. – Acts 14:26-28 

 

And so they safely returned to Antioch. And there, after reporting on the amazing spread of the gospel that was happening, even the establishment of churches in each city, they – for a time – remained in Antioch, living life, building up the church that was there. And so the church universal continued to grow in more cities than ever before: not just in Judea and Samaria, but now even beginning to spread “to the ends of the earth."