Acts, 13:1-43

Now, we'll be looking at the questions on chapter 13 verses 1-43 and then I'd like to go through a quick run through of some slides here and then we'll switch on to what's on the handout and the rest of 13 and all of chapter 14 in one swell foop. You ready?

Question number one there. Some have said that Antioch was a model church. Should we use the description of Antioch in this passage, and in subsequent passages in Acts, as the model church, simply on the basis of what Acts describes? What do you think? What you got there? Yes? No? You don't think so? Okay. Okay. Partially. All right. It's partway there, Bob says. Okay. Anybody else come up with anything different? Anything to add to that?

They had people who were prophets. Ah, okay, we don't have prophets now, right? The gift of prophecy was a gift that was given by God and of a specific use up until the time when the New Testament was available for people to study and to learn from and to teach from. Okay, so yeah, that was one shortcoming. Hi, all right.

So, yeah, as we keep seeing Acts as a transitional book, isn't it? Because of that transition, even though there may be things about the church of Antioch we look at and say, you know, that was a good thing. There are some things we would look at and say, you know, that was a good thing, but it was a good thing for the transition.

And so we can't look at what was happening there and say just categorically, hey, this is our model church, right? A part of what is happening in the Book of Acts, in the Antioch, is because it's a transition and not the final model, we're going to find some things that fit the model church, God's intent, and some things that don't. And some of those things will be things that are good for that time. So it's not a criticism to say that it isn't the model church on that basis. What else might be a reason why we wouldn't say, hey, this is the model church?

Any other thoughts on that? Ah, yes, there would have been the gift of tongues there. transitional gift. And really, as we saw earlier, there would be a number of possibly transitional era gifts that would no longer be valid for the church now. That would be another one.

May I suggest, too, that there are also things that are written in the epistles because they need to be there. What we have in the book of Acts about the church at Antioch Although there is much to commend, the things that are written in the epistles are written because we need to have them. The things that Paul wrote, the things that Peter wrote, the things that John wrote. Those are things that are there because we need to have them and pieces of information that are not found in the Book of Acts.

There is nothing, for example, in the Book of Acts, in the Church at Antioch, that describes it as the body of Christ. Christ the head. There's nothing to tell them in the context in Acts that they've been sealed with the Holy Spirit. There is nothing to tell them there that they are permanently indwelt by the Holy Spirit because they believe.

They're a piece of information as true as Acts is that are found in the epistles exclusively. So to simply focus in on Antioch as a model church and kind of be with the blinders on. There's a lot of good things going on there, but it's not enough. Let's take a look at question two.

The passage starts off with five men being presented as prophets and teachers. Did any of them have other roles in and outside the church that we know of? What were those other roles? There are five men listed as prophets and teachers. Barnabas is listed as the first. three other names given and then Paul or Saul at that time listed at the end. What do we know about other gifts that any of those men had aside from being prophets and teachers? Okay, that you're talking about Paul or Saul and Barnabas went out as missionaries and they exercised other gifts, essentially an evangelistic gift, right? because they went to a place where the gospel wasn't.

That's a good thing. How about Paul? Paul started his letters and what did he say he was? An apostle. Right. So here's Paul, he is an apostle as well. Does this passage say that? No. There are men who had the gift of teaching and they're listed here. And really an apostle is kind of a super gift in the sense that it includes teaching, it includes prophecy. Paul said that he also spoke in tongues. It includes evangelism. So there are other gifts that are involved. Other gifts that are involved here besides what we see.

That's another reason for saying, is this the model church? Yes. Is what we see described here sufficient by itself? No. See, we have other information that tells us that this is telling us things that are true, but it's not necessarily the whole story. There's more to it, isn't there? Just as James pointed out, Paul was an apostle. Does it say that here? No. Is it true? Yep.

Yeah, Art, can you start to raise your hand? An apostle, is there more to apostleship than the requirement that an apostle was a witness to the resurrection of the Lord? Yes, and your point is well taken. In other words, an apostle must be a witness to the resurrection of the Lord. So I can't be an apostle. It can't happen. I have not been a witness to the resurrected Lord.

There was that, but there was also, for example, the ability to suffer was one of the things explicitly given to an apostle to endure great suffering. Interestingly enough, as we saw in Acts chapter 9, Here was Ananias saying, Lord, this Saul guy, he's a bad dude, you know. And one of the key things that the Lord pointed out then is he is going to suffer many things in my name. So one of the things also is an ability to suffer.

An apostle also had the ability to perform miracles, signs and wonders. That was built into the gift of apostleship. Paul himself says that is a sign of an apostle. It's one of the things in Hebrews 2, verses 3 and 4. It talks about those signs and wonders as being testimony of the things that the apostles did. It's God's validation sign, if you will, of an apostle.

So yes, you're right, there are different aspects of being an apostle. There's a lot to it, isn't there? There are requirements for being an apostle. It's also a super gift. And anyone who says, I'm an apostle, better be ready to suffer a lot, because that's a part of it.

Alright, how about this last one here? Here's Bar-Jesus, that is a Limas, who is a magician. Magic was viewed negatively in this passage, and again in Acts. Therefore, should believers avoid anything that is called or related to magic? What should be our stance? Okay. Yeah, I think a part of it is we have to look at our definition of terms, right? Certainly, every time we see that show up here, In this passage, the answer is, yep, there's a problem with it.

It's because magic in those days was not looked upon as just sort of a slight of hand, a little visual trick. It wasn't just sort of chauvinship. It was instead, you're dabbling with things that are outside of the appeal to the power of the Lord. A lot of the magic was involved in incantations and calling upon angels and demons So the magic as we see described in here, in this passage and in subsequent passages we're going to encounter in Acts 19 particularly, those kinds of magic are certainly things that the Lord's not calling believers to get involved in, that we need to keep clear of. That doesn't however, you know, it's something that's slight of hand, that's kind of a fun trick, that it doesn't have any spiritual overtones, It's a different matter altogether.

So it really depends on how we define the word, doesn't it? If we define it as something with spiritual involvement of any kind, then yes, we need to stay away from it and stick with the spirituality that the Lord spells out. Otherwise it could be false spirituality. Yes? Yes, and it's because that's the way it is used in the scriptural context. And that's the way they would have understood it in those days.

Yep. Yep. Okay. Let me run through a slide series here. This is out of the Bible backgrounds. And so some of you are going to be familiar with it. Okay. This is just to kind of give us a timeline. I've got their AD 30 is the crucifixion of Christ. People who study history it's actually it's interesting, but it's also a fairly complex thing and I won't tie us down with that But because you also see dates like ad33 sometimes 32 and and the reason is you've got things that that have to do with things like the dates of the Passover and you know when the full moon is and various kinds of historical events One of the things we discussed in the Bible backgrounds class is the precise dates. These things rarely have any big spiritual significance. It's the sequence that is typically at issue here.

Given that, you have still roughly 30 and maybe a little bit more years in the book of Acts. We're covering here a period of time that's stretched over three decades. That's important to keep in mind. Lucas, going from chapter to chapter here, sometimes he's moving through some period of years. So when he's writing the Theophilus and summarizing these things, he's talking about things that have happened over a 30-year period of time. So it's important just as a time perspective. Here's Peter, his first couple of decades.

Interestingly, Peter drops off the scene in the Book of Acts after about Acts 15. Now, it doesn't mean that Peter's not somehow significant, but he is significant early on and then we get about to chapter 15, a little past the halfway point, and all of a sudden he drops off the pictures because the purpose and the focus of the book shifts. Then we see Paul, who in the early chapters he didn't even show up. In his first showing up, he was somebody against the church. And now we see him turning instead into the Apostle most prominent through the last part of the book of Acts.

So there's some overlap, isn't there? But interestingly, Peter, who is prominent at first, isn't mentioned towards the end. And Paul, who is prominent at the end, isn't mentioned at first. So we have that time of overlap. This is kind of the world of the Roman Empire. And I want you to take a look at one thing, because we're going to notice it here this morning. You see this little purple area?

That was an area that was not in the Roman Empire during the time that Paul was on this missionary journey. Why is that important? When Paul started running into trouble in Pisidian Antioch, he escaped into that area outside the Empire. He was going to get out of Dodge, because it was getting hot, and he was able to escape into that area and get out of the Empire and jumped political boundaries, and it wasn't until about 72 AD that the Romans went in and took that area as well.

So that's why we're going to see in the passage here, it's going to move to a different area. It isn't just a different area, it's out of the political realm. You have this chart print it out, which should kind of help us keep tabs in terms of time and space and things of that sort. Okay, I think we'll pause with the slides there. Okay, let's take a look at this handout that I had on the table just this morning.

Anybody in need of that right now? You got the acts 14, excuse me, 13 and 44, a couple of them? or what is one going to do? 1344 through 1428? Everybody covered there? Alright. Now, let's cover the ground. Here's what's happening. Paul and Barbas are in Sidi and Antioch. Remember, there's different Antiochs, and so that was the way of them making clear which one it is. So Sidi and Antioch, that is the one that we showed on the map that was in the Roman Empire. and in what is now central Turkey. So here he is. He had been to the synagogue on one Sabbath. I think it's important for us to get some background. He's in the synagogue.

The synagogues were sort of a Pharisees domain. The Pharisees, not the Sadducees, because the Sadducees kind of hung around the temple. The Pharisees were the ones who were kind of missionary about their Judaism, and they would go around you know, establishing synagogues in places outside of Israel. They went and they had a part, no doubt, in establishing this synagogue.

And so Paul and Barnabas had gone to the synagogue. There was both a structure as well as some latitude for people to say different things. So here Paul had this latitude to get up and to tell the gospel. And there was a lot of interest. But over the one week period of time, from then until the next Sabbath, not only interest had gotten stirred up, but some opposition. And it was the reaction that next Sabbath that changed the story here. Many of the Jews have gotten hardened to the gospel. Isn't that an interesting thing?

Initially, responding favorably among a number of them, but some of them over that period of time, they got harder against the gospel to the point that It drove Paul and Barnabas out of the area, out of the region. And so that's when they head off to, let me back up here. That's when they head off to this Cappadocia that we see, this region in here. It's over in here they head off, because they were in city in Antioch here, they move over into this area, they get outside the Roman Empire, and they say, get away from the heat. So that's what they were doing.

Now, they go over into these areas, and Paul heals a man who was lame from birth, and then what happens? They say, boy, these guys are great apostles, let's accept the gospel. What happens there? They get they get into these places where they're getting out of the Roman influence they heal this man and all of a sudden the reaction came up that disturbed them the people start saying Zeus and Hermes are with us these people are Zeus and Hermes they called Barnabas Zeus and they called Paul Hermes and it's interesting archaeological studies in that area have shown that those are the two gods that they that the people worshipped as pagans.

And so, here's Paul and Barnabas appointed to be Zeus and Hermes, and they loved it, right? No. What did they start doing? They said, No! And they did what was a Jewish custom, they start tearing their clothes as a sign of, you know, grief and distress. This is not at all what we want, okay? That is not at all what we're aiming at.

Then, Anyway, they get that riot settled down. They then head off to Derby, and then they begin a return loop through the same places that they had already been. And as they went, they appointed elders in each of the places where they had established churches. They come back to Antioch and share what the Lord has done in this first journey. And they didn't immediately go back out, as they stayed for a while in Antioch.

So that's the completion of the first journey. There's a few things we want to note under this background section here. There are a few things that have changed between this passage we've looked at here and the passage we just got through looking at.

First one there, Saul began to be referred to as Paul. In the Roman Empire you had you know, different names and they had names for the names like we have first name, middle name, last name, they've got their Latin names for the different names. So, you know, Paul, as we call him, might have been Saulus, Paulus, Benjaminius, or some such thing like that. So essentially you switch to the other name and chapter 13, I think it's verse 9, yeah, 13.9 is the one that looks at Paul as being called Saul and then Paul, it is only later, as Paul is recounting how he became a believer, that he speaks his name as Saul. Other than that, the name Saul drops off. So as he's telling others, here's how I became a believer and the Lord confronted me, and he said, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? As he recounts that account, as he tells that history, That's the only time the word name Saul pops up again.

Okay. The other thing we notice is initially Barnabas was mentioned first. Barnabas and Saul. Barnabas and Saul. And then we start seeing a reversal. Plus the name change. So it starts off Barnabas and Saul, then Paul and Barnabas. It becomes a sequence. It's not universal. We can't count on it as a, you know, this is always true, but frequently those reversals indicate a change in prominence. Let's just ask this question. Why would Barnabas have been mentioned first earlier?

Yes. Ah. Yeah, Barnabas was the front end guy. He was willing to put his foot forward and step out, take his neck out as we might say, on Paul's behalf. And to say, I'm telling you, you may be shocked, but this guy's okay. And so yeah, he had a place of prominence in introducing him as this guy really has come to the Lord. You're not hearing false rumors. You're not being lied to.

He really is a believer. So Barnabas stuck his neck out for Paul. And so Barnabas, he would be listed first and most prominent just from that standpoint. He was from the Jerusalem Church, the founding church, far earlier. It was around chapter 4, I think he first gets mentioned. So you got a first introduction, a Jerusalem Church foundation, there with the apostles. There's a lot to be said for his position of prominence there.

Why else? Can you think of other reasons? That was good, by the way. Other reasons? Barnabas had been a believer longer. So initially, he'd been a believer longer, and so that was one of the other impacts. One of the additional things was Barnabas was a Levite, so he had that background, and it kind of gave him some initial head start, if you will, in terms of how people would have viewed him. And we'll actually see something about the character of Barnabas a little later, a couple chapters down the road here.

Okay, you got something else? Ah, good question. Very good question. Let's think about that. Art's asking the question, was there spiritual growth I assume that's what you're talking about. Spiritual growth any different than our spiritual growth today. What do you think? We got any insights on that? Ah, okay. And here's, I think, one of the things to look at. The inputs to spiritual growth. For us, one of the reasons we get here together to study God's Word is because here we are as believers, we have the fantastic privilege of studying God's Word.

They had the Old Testament, the New Testament, even as of the very chapters we're looking at here this morning, still hadn't been started. So here are these guys, they don't have the New Testament to work with. As an interim way of providing direction for the church, they had the gift of prophecy. A temporary gift that had a very good purpose up until the time of the completion of the New Testament. So it had a very good purpose.

Now, you look back at this question here, our growing, one of the things that we look at is like 2 Corinthians 3.18, we behold the Lord through his word and thereby are transformed from glory to glory. Our spiritual growth is carried about by the word of God. What they had in the way of the Word of God was only the Old Testament, supplemented by prophets. So, an aspect of their spiritual growth was from a different source.

Good point, Art. That's a good one to think through. Let's think also of something else. What were the things that, and we talked about this in the previous couple of weeks, what were the things that they didn't understand yet? Things that, from anything we can tell, were not revealed yet. The church is the body of Christ. Paul writes about that, particularly in Ephesians and Colossians. That Christ is the head and the church is the body. Those two teachings together are only found in Ephesians and Colossians.

Those were not written for many years after what we're looking at right here. So there are things that they didn't understand yet. They weren't able to grow on them because they didn't have them yet. So it's interesting, for us, the word is all laid out for us. We simply have to learn it. For them, the growth is kind of a different thing in this standpoint, that things are being revealed through time, and they're becoming aware of those things through time. It just hadn't been revealed. It's not because nobody had looked at it, it's because it wasn't there to look at.

So there are different inputs to the lives of the believers in those days. One of the things that's real interesting is as you look at spiritual gifts. Have you ever heard of spiritual gifts tests? You ever heard of that? You go to the Christian bookstore and they give you the test. I've seen it online. Pardon?

Yeah, there's classes on how to get your spiritual gift and they pray for you that you find it and all that. What's interesting is as you look in the New Testament, It does not appear that they had any difficulty at all recognizing their spiritual gifts. There's nothing, Paul doesn't give a chapter on here, you go through this and you take that and you take this test and you train this way. They seem to just drop into these spiritual gifts.

It was an era in which the Lord led the people much more directly, explicitly, personally and in a customized way because they didn't have the completed New Testament to work with. And so they grew spiritually, but the inputs and manner in which that took place is different. Thanks for bringing that up, Art, because that's an interesting thing to look at, is because of the differences in the book of Acts as a transitional book, what is going on there is not typical of what's going on in our lives because they simply did not have some of the revelation that we have, and instead the Lord gave them other revelation that is no longer valid. That's one of the reasons, somebody will say, well how can you say there's no tongues or no prophecy? One of the key things is simply to look at what's the purpose? What's the purpose? And the purpose of those temporary gifts was to provide revelation and validation for things that are now eclipsed. by the New Testament and what we have revealed.

That's why towards the end of the Bible you'll see Jude. Jude verse 3. I urge that you contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. Once done. Perpetually valid. Hapax. And that contending is an Olympic term. I urge that you put forth a supreme athletic effort on behalf of the faith. Definite article. that was once, that's hapax, once given perpetually valid, once delivered to the saint. So that's his urging. Why? The faith was at a point where it had been delivered. It's here, folks. Contend for that. That faith. Alright, let's take a look down here.

We've also got this guy named John, or Mark, or some call him John Mark. and he began the journey with Paul and Barnabas and noticed that basically as they leave Cyprus he heads back he goes back to Jerusalem and that's going to be an interesting thing because what's going to happen later on we're going to find out that in Acts 15 there's a disagreement between Barnabas and Paul over this guy Barnabas who as we find out in Colossians we'll see that a little later on as we're studying Colossians Barnabas was John Mark's cousin. So there's a family connection there. And so Barnabas, the next trip out, said, hey, let's take John Mark. And Paul says, uh-uh, he flaked out on us earlier.

And so anyway, we'll see what comes of that, because there's a longer story and more complete story that we'll take a look at later. OK? All right. The last paragraph there on page one, we have these synagogues. Basically, here's the way they operated.

The Pharisees were the ones who were missionary about Judaism. Remember, two-thirds of the Jews, during the New Testament time, two-thirds of the Jews lived outside of Israel. So most Jews were living in other places, and this was one of the other places where they were, in this area of Turkey. So now, here you've got these Jews that are all over. The Pharisees had it in their mind, you know, our job is to take Judaism and go out into the Gentile lands and bring those people into Judaism.

So you came into a relationship with God, as they saw it, by coming into Judaism. Paul's going to come into these synagogues and tell Jew and Gentile alike, no, it's by faith in Christ. which of course the people at the synagogues frequently got ticked off at. Okay, so now you get the synagogue. The synagogue, according to the Pharisaical tradition, had to have ten men to form a synagogue. Up until then you couldn't have a synagogue.

Ten men. Women didn't count. Kids didn't count. Ten men. That's why, for example, when they went to Philippi, there wasn't any synagogue. They found a small group of Jews by the river. Not enough men. Tells us there's a small group of Jews in Philippi, right?

Okay. So they'd have these synagogues. The synagogues would be a place where the Jews would gather on Sabbath. And again, Sabbath is sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. They'd gather together on the Sabbath. They would have their meetings and there would be both structure as well as some latitude. Do you have something to share with us? Would you like to read something to us? Things of that sort.

That was where Paul would have the latitude to bring up the gospel, and he could bring up Old Testament prophecies about Christ, you know, the Old Testament, sure, anybody could read that, that's great, no problem doing that here. It's just when he tied it together and said, this Jesus, this Jesus, that's the one that he's talking about, that's when he lit the fuse. That's when he lit the fuse, and that's what happened here at the second Sabbath, there at city of Antioch. Okay, now, something else to take a look at. Second page.

There's some elements of Greek mythology here to take a look at, some cultural insights. One, in Greek mythology, an interesting thing, there are a number of accounts, and archaeologically in the area here where Paul and Barnabas were considered Zeus and Hermes, we find that particular combination of Greek gods was popular.

So what would typically happen is that the God who spoke out was actually the lesser God in rank. The higher ranking God would be quiet, while the lower ranking God would be the one speaking. Isn't that interesting? And so that's why, well, Paul's the one speaking, and if these people come and heal this guy who's been lame from birth, I mean, we've all known this guy around here for years, and now he's healed. Obviously, if Paul's speaking, he's Hermes. Logically, the other one's Zeus. He's not saying anything.

So they just jumped to that conclusion because here's a miracle performed right in front of them. What did they do? They interpreted the miracle instead of as a validation of apostleship, they interpreted the miracle in terms of their own kind of religious thought pattern and habit, the way they'd been accustomed to.

So Paul and Barnabas are both of what ethnic group? Jews! Both of them. Barnabas is a Levite, Paul is a Benjamite, and so both of them are Jews. What we see, and you'll find this in the Old Testament, you'll see they tore, it'll say tore his clothes, tore in some cases her clothes, or tore their clothes. Those phrases, those three phrases, you will find several dozen times in the Old Testament, starting in the book of Genesis. So it's a long-standing Jewish custom. Now, are these people that are doing this Jewish?

No, they're Greek, and they're recognizing them as Greek gods. So, interesting, Paul and Barnabas' way of showing their distress was a Jewish expression that the people didn't understand, probably. It was sort of puzzling to them, therefore Paul had to explain.

See that? Have you ever had an experience like that where there's been cultural misunderstanding? Have you ever run across that? Let me give you a for instance. Years ago Nancy and I were in a church in Ukiah and it was sort of an informal gathering and one of the young ladies there was an exchange student from Brazil. She was a neat Christian gal, young gal, but she was an exchange student. And she was talking with one of the fellows there in the church. And as they were talking, the fellow went like this.

Now, in our culture, this means like, OK, right? Great. Well, this guy was from Brazil, where this doesn't mean it's OK. Her name was Doris, Doris Nemov. And she just turned every shade of red that you could imagine. Why? The symbol didn't communicate.

That's essentially what's happening with Paul and Barnabas here. They're starting to tear their clothes and the people are, why are Zeus and Hermes tearing their clothes? They don't understand. So Paul has to explain and so that's what we see him doing next in this passage. He begins explaining to see what's going on so that the people start to understand. Essentially, Paul had to talk the people out of their own understanding to the place where he was getting them to understand, no, this is not at all what we're looking for. Not at all what's happening.

And can that happen with us as believers? Can we go into a place and try to share the gospel and have it be quite misunderstood? Yeah. Yeah, can happen. Ever been sharing with somebody and it's just like, you know, it's like you just can't get across to them. It can be a real wrestle.

But I think as we look at this, one of the things we can learn from And we'll see it again, I think especially in chapter 17, is how does Paul take somebody from the culture and the thinking that they're at to a place of understanding? And it's interesting to watch that process and see how does the Lord do that through a person? And it's valuable to know that too. I mean, missionaries run into that sort of thing all the time, but we can run into that as well, being quite misunderstood. And then it becomes our place as believers to learn, okay, how do I learn to communicate with somebody who is not of my understanding, and to bring them along.

Craig Case, for example, just thinking a year or so ago, we were going through some things in actually the church history class. Boy, that was almost two years ago. And he was saying that he, just a few years ago, was an atheist. And it was looking at some of the evidences of Christ outside of the New Testament that kind of opened his eyes.

And so we have that place, just like Paul did, just like Craig came across. We kind of need to ask our question, what do I need to tell this person to bring their thinking along so that they'll understand? It's a valuable question to ask. And that's what Paul was addressing here. Alright, now, here's the other thing we mentioned up here with this map.

This place where they went, Lycaonia. Impacted by the Greek culture outside the Roman Empire. So here's a real mix. Impacted by the Greek culture because of Alexander the Great three and a half centuries before. Outside the Roman Empire, so that's a place where they could escape to. and it mentions in there a Lycaonian dialect. Now it turns out that the dialect was only spoken among the lower and the middle classes and that eventually after some centuries kind of got faded out. But that's why that was spoken here and it was only spoken there only in certain classes which also tells you that Paul and Barnabas didn't go to the upper class folks in that area. They were dealing with folks that were lower and middle class economically. socially.

So, but real interesting and it also fits historically and as to the location. That's also real important. Okay. Now here's Paul and Barnabas. They go back through these churches. They appoint elders in each of the churches and then they share with what's happened at the Church of the Antioch. Gathering everybody together. Alright, let's take a look at the questions quickly. Question number one.

It often seems like Paul and his companions encountered more trouble from the Jews than from the Gentiles. Is this a cultural problem or is it a spiritual problem? Should they have done anything differently? Was the reason that the Jews reacted Paul and Barnabas problem? Or was the problem with the Jews who reacted? Should Paul and Barnabas have done something differently?

Think about that. On the last page, we have three questions. Barnabas was the one who introduced Paul to the leaders of the church in Jerusalem and seemed to have a more prominent role earlier. This is a question we actually asked and answered in some degree here. Then Paul clearly surpasses him in profile and expression.

This doesn't seem to bother Barnabas or cause him to be disturbed or jealous. Why would it not bother him? It didn't seem to bother him at all. He didn't go back to the church at Antioch and say, we had a great time, but Paul, he went and took the platform with everybody and I'm ticked. There's not even the slightest mention that Barnabas was resentful about this. It didn't bother him the least.

How come? Why not? Number three. Though Paul had later written over a dozen letters to churches and individuals that became a part of the New Testament, why does this all seem to happen later in the timeline of Acts and beyond? Why doesn't Luke mention, and that's something we'll run into, Luke does not mention any of the letters that we find in the New Testament. Why not? Think about that.

And then in number four there, Acts 14.23, we read about Paul and Barnabas.

After they'd gone through these churches, they looped back, kind of a reverse route, and it sounds like they didn't go back to the Jews because that would have got them in hot water. They went back to the churches, places where people had come to believe, and they appointed elders. Why did they appoint elders? Do we have any idea what criteria they used, if any. Were those criteria identical to the ones we have in... I have Timothy 3, 1-7, to be 1st Timothy, if you want to make a note of that, and or Titus 1, 5-9. Why doesn't it say that they appointed deacons at the same time while they were at it? How many elders did they appoint in each church?

So, lots of questions there. Things for you to think about. There's a lot to dig into. Okay, so those are your questions. Now, aside from those questions, have you got any questions? Or have you got any other comments or thoughts? Yeah, James? You mentioned that land up there that's no longer there. The Cappadocia? Yeah, the ones that the Romans came in several decades later and took over. What is that now? It's eastern Turkey. Eastern Turkey, yeah.

Something real interesting is that that area was outside the Roman Empire, but by that time They'd actually What is shown as purple there because that's actually the time of Christ But they'd actually by the time that these words were written had invaded the southern part of Britain So that's real interesting. They'd invaded the southern part of Britain, but had not captured Cappadocia yet Some weeks back you may remember we went through some slides of Cappadocia.

That's the place where they had underground houses. They had underground cities. They had one city that would accommodate tens of thousands of people. 18 stories deep underground. Amazing arrangement. That's one of the reasons why it's a problem. How do I capture these people? I can't even catch them. I can't even get to them. I go in there to conquer and they're gone.

So it was a tough thing to go in because you have to go chasing the Cappadocians. I mean, they had places that looked like, you know, hey, here's a house and you go in there and it wasn't a house. And you'd go into a place that looked like it was an access to the house and it would be a trap. So the Cappadocians were real pain. That was the one reason they didn't go in there. So yeah, it was a tough one. So that's why they actually invaded Britain about three decades earlier than Cappadocia. Yeah, James? Well, the bottom line is there were areas where the Romans went in and they did have a tougher time doing it.

And the one thing that they could do is try to go in and move fast. They had set up Roman roads in the area that they did have up to the edge of it. And so part of it was getting all the roads and everything in place. There were two Roman colonies right in that area that we talked about here with Sidi and Antioch.

And it was just a matter of get everything set up, then wait for the right time, and then strike. They had to be able to come in fully set up, ready to strike, and move fast. Because if they give the Cappadocians a chance, the Cappadocians had all these crazy, tricky ways of just disappearing and putting in traps and things like that. And they just wanted to come in and surprise them, be fully set up to attack full force. So that's why, just wait for the right time. Obviously, you can't let people run off like that. You have to block things off. Are you going to go to the underground city? That's fine. You've got to go past our guards.

You have to end up putting guards in place and putting protections in place to keep the people from establishing a separate entity apart from Rome. They had to go in and do it at the right time and then be ready to hold power. So, you're saying that the city in Antioch was very important to having order there in the Cappadocia? Yes, the city in Antioch was on the Roman side and then they immediately, as soon as they were running away, they went over into the Cappadocian side to the area that Rome had not captured yet.

And so the Lyconian area, that's an area, not a city? It is a particular city, but it's also, you know, it's kind of like the area, like here. We say Denver, we mean two things by it. There's an official Denver, and then there's all the area around it that's often times referred to as the Denver area. So it's used, like we use it frequently, both terms. I'm just curious, is there any other city in that, oh, I've got an idea that's messing up my understanding.

Oh yeah, yeah. Let's see, they've got a trio. Yeah, let me look here. Yeah, Liconia, Lystra, and Derby, those were areas where they could get out of this. Yeah, I'd have to take a look at a map to show exactly where they are. As a matter of fact, let me do that. I'll get a map so we can take a look at what is exactly where. But that's why they went over in that area and were able to operate within a few different places that within a few decades the Romans had then taken over.

Yeah, and a lot of times, it's sort of shorthand, isn't it? In other words, people frequently will just say, well, that's Denver. I was reading recently, there's a fellow saying, well, I'm from Columbus, Ohio. Truth is, he was in some suburb of a different name, but it's like whoever heard of this suburb. It's interesting how that changes over time, too. It's a matter of applying a specific name to a larger area, and that frequently happens.

It was interesting, I was looking at, this is kind of an aside, I was looking at something online, and it was one of the smaller suburbs in this area, and it listed the nearest city of a million population, and they gave Phoenix. And to us that sounds a little funny, but it's just because the official population of the cities in Denver, none of them was over a million, of the explicit legal, you know, political boundaries.

Okay, other questions, comments? Yeah, Eddie. Yes. Yeah, yeah, that's a good point. Let's think about that. A lot of people tend to think that the United States must be all about the same. A couple decades ago when I was doing marketing and we were trying to work with a firm over in Germany, that's precisely the problem we had. They looked at the United States as one big giant uniform market rather than recognizing it as having different areas. That's right. And it may be false. Yes. Right.

If you say, I'm a Christian, what do people assume? It's interesting, I've seen some notable exceptions. A number of Jews, for example, have a real fear about Christians because they'll relate it to something historically where somebody who had the name Christian was horrible. And this would be, for example, during the Middle Ages they would gather Jews into a cathedral and they'd give them the gospel in Latin and tell them, you know, you believe or you're going to be slaughtered.

Well, this obviously was horrible. A lot of the Jews didn't even understand what was being presented to them. So they just kind of didn't respond. They had no idea they were being asked anything because it was in a language they couldn't understand. And then they'd be slaughtered. Well, obviously that doesn't leave a very good taste in anybody's mouth. So it would be an instance where the perception ends up being badly stained, and for good reason.

Our neighbor across the hall, who some of you may have met because she's been here a few times a few years ago, but her name is Margot. She escaped from Nazi Germany the last time a Jew could legally do so. It's like the next boat out, they wouldn't allow them. So she was the last boat out that could legally do so. When she came to the United States, she said the Christians were wonderful. So her particular experience is very different from what is a stereotype in the minds of a lot of Jews. So yeah, you would have differences like that. You're going to have differences that will vary from region to region. Some small differences in one region to another may be enough to account for the differences.

Do you ever talk to somebody on the phone with a southern drawl so intense that you can't understand them? A friend of mine lived in Texas and talked to somebody over the phone from another part of Texas and he couldn't understand him. The drawl was so intense, he finally just handed the phone to somebody else. It is possible to have some intense differences in language and cultural background in the country and make it real difficult.

One of the things that I learned when I was involved in marketing across the United States was do not send a man from New England into the South to market. That was just absolutely a marketing no-no. And that would be one example. There are probably a number of them.

But understanding those cultural differences is real important. There are other areas differences of language can be really big. One of them they showed us in the business realm is in one of the Chinese dialects, Coca-Cola means bite the wax tadpole. So slight variations in language can be huge.

I talked to one missionary over in Hong Kong and he said he was at a gathering and the person was trying to say we want to help the Chinese people. Slight inflection difference in the way he said it. And it came across as, we want to butcher the Chinese people.

And of course one of the other missionaries recognized the error and stood up and corrected it before everybody left. But you can imagine, those differences matter. And here's what Paul and Barnabas encountered. Their first reaction, tear the clothes, was out of their own culture. It didn't communicate easily to these people.

So Paul had to speak and to talk to them to bring them along so that they understood. And by the way, Paul's from Tarsus, which is still in the Roman Empire, but just south of there, and so would have some better understanding if you took a moment to think about it.

Okay, we've run out of time, so let's pray. Lord, thank you. As we look at this passage, we see some situations in which Paul and Barnabas had a difficult time, and yet we also know that you indeed have an intent to bring your gospel, Lord, to people, not only Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria, but to the ends of the earth. And we thank you that by your Holy Spirit's guidance, that we have an ability that would not be our own, and a desire that would not be our own, and an understanding that would not be our own, because of the way you've blessed us. We thank you for those blessings, in Jesus' name. Amen.