Having been driven out of Pisidian Antioch, they went to a town called Iconium and preached. Many turned to Jesus. But the few who didn’t? They created as many problems as they could, working to get Paul and Barnabas killed.
Regardless, Paul and Barnabas spent considerable time there. They didn’t just preach the gospel and move on, but they worked hard to give the new believers a foundation. ,
Eventually the plot to have them killed materialized to the point that they had to escape. So next they went to Lystra.
Lystra was wild.
As Paul and Barnabas preached, they prayed for a man and he was healed. This was part of their ministry to confirm the Word.
Preach the gospel + pray and see someone healed = Open hearts for people to receive Jesus.
But this time it all went south. Instead of attributing the miracle to Jesus, the people saw the miracle as coming from Paul and Barnabas and they began to worship them.
Paul and Barnabas immediately reacted and with much strength of words tried to correct their error. But the crowds continued to try to sacrifice to them much to their dismay.
It only turned around when people from the previous cities who were stalking the spoke to the crowds. Then the crowds all of a sudden turned against Paul and Barnabas and stoned Paul.
He lived. Barely.
It’s a good reminder don’t trust crowds. Their opinions sway from one extreme to the next.
They then went to another small town not so far way and preached Jesus again. There was much fruit.
Now here’s where it gets interesting.
After this you think they would return back to Antioch, their home base area and area of their supporting church. They were relatively close and they could come back heroes. After all they had preached, they had been persecuted and they had fulfilled their task.
But it wasn’t about being super hero Christians who could boast on their hardships. They were more concerned about what God had done and was doing. So what was next?
They went back to all the cities they had preached to and that had tried to kill them. They went back, met with the disciples, strengthened and encouraged them and made sure they had good leadership. They did this with prayer and fasting.
It wasn’t about their being persecuted. It was about making sure Jesus was preached.
Yes, there were hardships. Remember, Paul had been stoned and almost killed. It’s likely he had some broken ribs at the very least. But his only comment about all that happened was,
“We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22).
With this comment it might be easy to be triggered right away. Is Paul teaching works based salvation?
It isn’t the context of salvation. What he is referencing is the kingdom life. It’s as is said elsewhere.
“In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Tim 3:12).
If we are truly living for God, we will be persecuted. We will face troubles. Because if Jesus faced hardship, so will his followers.
Eventually Paul and Barnabas return to their church. It’s not the hardship and persecution that captured their hearts so that they would come back as heroes, it’s what God had done through them. Both Jews and Gentiles came to the Lord. Church gatherings were started. And people were following Jesus even in the midst of persecution.
That’s worth celebrating. Because in matters such as these, it is God who is glorified. No one else.
Acts 14
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.