Acts 13

Provinces of Asia Minor.

(There are twelve divisions of Asia Minor commonly recognized. Three were on its southern coast, Cilicia, Pamphylia, Lycia; three on its western, Caria, Lydia, Mysia; three on its northern, Bithynia, Paphlagonia, Pontus; and three in the interior, Cappadocia, Galatia, Phrygia. Caria, Lydia, and Mysia constituted the Roman province of Asia, and it is in this limited sense that the word Asia is used in the New Testament—e. g., Acts 2:9; 16:6, 7. The seven churches in Asia (Rev. 1:4) accordingly were in this region, viz.: Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea, though the last named was in Phrygia, and therefore farther inland than the rest. W. H. G.—After the Roman provincial system was established in Asia Minor, the boundaries of the provinces were variable. The two districts, Pisidia and Lycaonia, mentioned Acts 13 and 14, were politically attached to one or other of the contiguous provinces. Yet each had its chief town, which had been its capital: Antioch in Pisidia, and Iconium in Lycaonia. B.)

14. But when they departed from Perga, they came to Antioch in Pisidia, and went into the 15 synagogue on the sabbath day, and sat down. And after the reading of the law and the prophets the rulers of the synagogue sent unto them, saying, Ye men and brethren, if ye 16 have any word of exhortation for the people, say on. Then Paul stood up, and beckoning 17 with his hand said, Men of Israel, and ye that fear God, give audience. The God of this people of Israel chose our fathers, and exalted the people when they dwelt as strangers in 18 the land of Egypt, and with an high arm brought he them out of it. And about the time of 19 forty years suffered he their manners in the wilderness. And when he had destroyed seven 20 nations in the land of Chanaan, he divided their land to them by lot. And after that he gave unto them judges about the space of four hundred and fifty years, until Samuel the 21 prophet. And afterward they desired a king: and God gave unto them Saul the son of 22 Cis, a man of the tribe of Benjamin, by the space of forty years. And when he had removed him, he raised up unto them David to be their king; to whom also he gave testimony, and said, I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after mine owe heart, which shall fulfil all my will. Of this man’s seed hath God according to his promise raised unto Israel a Saviour, Jesus:

When John had first preached before his coming the baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel. And as John fulfilled his course, he said, Whom think ye that I am? I am not he. But, behold, there cometh one after me, whose shoes of his feet I am not worthy to loose. Men and brethren, children of the stock of Abraham, and whosoever among you feareth God, to you is the word of this salvation sent. For they that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew him not, nor yet the voices of the prophets which are read every sabbath day, they have fulfilled them in condemning him. And though they found no cause of death in him, yet desired they Pilate that he should be slain. And when they had fulfilled all that was written of him, they took him down from the tree, and laid him in a sepulchre. But God raised him from the dead: and he was seen many days of them which came up with him from Galilee to Jerusalem, who are his witnesses unto the people. And we declare unto you glad tidings, how that the promise which was made unto the fathers, God hath fulfilled the same unto us their children, in that he hath raised up Jesus again; as it is also written in the second psalm, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee. And as concerning that he raised him up from the dead, now no more to return to corruption, he said on this wise, I will give you the sure mercies of David. Wherefore he saith also in another psalm, Thou shalt not suffer thine Holy One to see corruption. For David, after he had served his own generation by the will of God, fell on sleep, and was laid unto his fathers, and saw corruption: but he, whom God raised again, saw no corruption.

Be it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins: and by him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses. Beware therefore, lest that come upon you, which is spoken of in the prophets; behold, ye despisers, and wonder, and perish: for I work a work in your days, a work which ye shall in no wise believe, though a man declare it unto you. And when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought that these words might be preached to them the next sabbath. Now when the congregation was broken up, many of the Jews and religious proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas: who, speaking to them, persuaded them to continue in the grace of God.

And the next sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God. But when the Jews saw the multitudes, they were filled with envy, and spake against those things which were spoken by Paul, contradicting and blaspheming. Then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold, and said, It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you: but seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth. And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord: and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed. And the word of the Lord was published throughout all the region. But the Jews stirred up the devout and honourable women, and the chief men of the city, and raised persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them out of their coasts. But they shook off the dust of their feet against them, and came unto Iconium. And the disciples were filled with joy, and with the Holy Ghost.

THE promise goes beyond “pardon,” and proclaims “justification” as the portion of every man who believes. When “justified” as well as “pardoned,” we are taken up to the level of the unfallen and sinless; nay, we are treated according to the character and deservings of Him through whom the justification comes. We are made to stand where he stands, and to receive the righteous favor which he receives. Yes; we are justified from all things. Our whole person is accepted; and everything, great or small, that was against us is taken out of the way. All this simply in believing! Not working, nor feeling, nor striving, nor wrestling, but simple believing. It is our believing that introduces us into the condition of justified men; it is this believing that God acknowledges; it is this believing that the conscience responds to; for that which we believe is the one justifying thing, the one thing which is well-pleasing to God, and which pacifies the conscience. We have to do with a propitiation completed on the Cross. In crediting God’s testimony to that propitiation, we have pardon; and in accepting the promise annexed to the testimony, we know that we have it; because God is true. Bonar.

14. The Pisidian Antioch lay a hundred miles north of Perga, on the central table-land. Like the Syrian Antioch, it was founded by Seleucus Nicator, one of the four successors to Alexander’s divided kingdom, and named after his father, Antiochus. It was a considerable city, and had been made by Augustus a Roman colony. Its previous history, and the added distinction conferred upon it by the emperor, together with its connections with the east and west, rendered it a point of great importance in the extension and establishment of the Christian Church. Here, as in every considerable place in the Roman Empire, Jews formed part of the population, with Greeks, Romans, and natives. And, though few (as indicated by their single synagogue), they possessed great influence, and had made many proselytes, especially among Gentile women. This marked influence of the Jews appears in all the events of Paul’s missionary career. On the first Sabbath in Antioch the Christian missionaries, as usual, first sought the synagogue. B.

15,16. There are certain traditional peculiarities which have doubtless united together by a common resemblance the Jewish synagogues of all ages and countries. The arrangement for the women’s places in a separate gallery, or behind a partition of lattice-work; the desk in the center, where the reader, like Ezra, may “open the book in the sight of all the people”; the carefully closed Ark (on the side of the building nearest to Jerusalem) for the preservation of the rolls or manuscripts of the law; the seats all round the building, whence “the eyes of all them that are in the synagogue” may be “fastened” on him who speaks; the “chief seats,” which were appropriated to the “ruler” or “rulers” of the synagogue, according as its organization might be more or less complete—these are some of the features of a synagogue, which agree at once with the notices of Scripture, the descriptions in the Talmud, and the practice of modern Judaism. On their entrance into the building, the four-cornered Tallith was first placed like a veil over the head, or like a scarf over the shoulders. The prayers were then recited by an officer called the “Angel” or “Apostle” of the assembly. The sacred roll of manuscript was handed from the Ark to the Reader by the Chazan, or “minister,” and then certain portions were read according to a fixed cycle, first from the Law and then from the Prophets. The Reader stood while thus employed, and all the congregation sat around. The manuscript was rolled up and returned to the Chazan. Then followed a pause, during which strangers or learned men who had “any word of consolation” or exhortation rose and addressed the meeting. And thus, after a pathetic enumeration of the sufferings of the chosen people or an allegorical exposition of some dark passage of Holy Writ, the worship was closed with a benediction and a solemn “Amen.”

To such a worship in such a building a congregation came together at Antioch in Pisidia on the Sabbath which immediately succeeded the arrival of Paul and Barnabas. Proselytes came and seated themselves with the Jews; and among the Jewesses behind the lattice were “honorable women” of the colony. The two strangers entered the synagogue, and, wearing the Tallith, which was the badge of an Israelite, “sat down” with the rest. The prayers were recited, the extracts from “the Law and the Prophets” were read, the “Book” returned to the “Minister,” and then we are told that “the rulers of the synagogue” sent to the new-comers, on whom many eyes had already been fixed, and invited them to address the assembly, if they had words of comfort or instruction to speak to their fellow Israelites. The very attitude of Paul, as he answered the invitation, is described to us. He “rose” from his seat, and, with the animated and emphatic gesture which he used on other occasions, “beckoned with his hand.” H.

17-39. In its method, this first recorded discourse of Paul resembled that of Peter at Pentecost, and the defense of Stephen. Each of the three speaks as a Jew to Jews; takes the Jewish history and Scriptures as the basis of the doctrines advanced; specially refers to God’s choice and conduct and care of Israel, and to the prophetic revelation of a Messiah to come and to suffer; and each declares that the Messiah has come, in the person of Jesus of Nazareth; that he has suffered death and has risen again through the power of God. Paul here outlines the history until David’s reign; then abruptly turns from it because he has reached his theme, God’s crowning mercy and promise to David, the actual advent of Messiah. He cites the Baptist’s testimony (as one well known and accredited by all Jews as a prophet) to Christ’s true and sole Messiahship. Then he preaches Jesus and the resurrection, and adds a clear announcement of the central doctrine of Christianity, justification by faith. More sharply than either Peter or Stephen, he contrasts the latter with justification by law.

26-37. “The Word of Salvation” includes the Crucifixion and Resurrection of the Messiah, Jesus.—To you the saving word is sent, he says emphatically, for your sacred prophecies, being exactly fulfilled in his death and resurrection, demonstrate that Jesus is indeed the long-desired Messiah and Redeemer. Yet, he adds with reference to both the crucifiers and the friendly buriers of Christ, unwittingly they fulfilled all that was written of him; and this although the words of the prophets were heard by them every Sabbath. He does not excuse the rulers’ guilt, neither does he sharply denounce it. His aim seems to be to press upon his hearers their deeper responsibility in now receiving this knowledge which Christ’s crucifiers did not so clearly possess.

With the statement of the two facts (of crucifixion and the resurrection as disclosed in their Scriptures), he proceeds with a broader sweep of thought and in warmer tones of personal feeling to press this word of salvation, or these glad tidings, upon them. Not only was this the tenor of prophetic disclosure, but the sacrificial death and the resurrection, the eternal life and reign of Jesus comprised the very substance and complete fulfillment of God’s original and oft-repeated promise to the fathers. This grand point Peter and Stephen had made. From first to last Paul insists upon it. By sacrifice and ceremonial, by prophecy and promise, in history and psalm, through symbol and fact, through dark saying and plain, the entire Old Testament revelation comprises, as its one only theme, Messiah, the Son of God and Son of man, the self-moved offerer, the divinely appointed and accepted offering for the sin of man. His voluntary death, His self-resurrection, His quickening power and eternal sovereignty—these are included in the promise of mercy first to Adam, afterward to Abraham and his descendants, emphatically to David; these comprise the substance of all ancient revelation. They are the facts upon which we rest, and which make the Old Testament one promise of glad tidings, still of vital force and value to all who receive the Christ of God. So Paul teaches here, and so we must believe.

In verses 33 to 37, referring to prophetic promises in the psalms seemingly made to David and concerning him, he shows their higher reference to the resurrection of David’s Lord and Son. As matching his own purpose here, in citing from the second psalm (v. 33), we may take Paul’s assertion that Christ was “declared to be the Son of God with power by the resurrection of the dead.” He shows from further passages that after resurrection Christ shall never die again (as David died and saw corruption), but will live and reign eternally. And in the light of this Messiah’s unchangeableness of being, he illustrates the certainty of the mercies promised through him. In all these citations and statements, Paul is only adding to and enforcing the Scriptural proofs of Christ’s resurrection and abiding life, because this was the main fact to be substantiated; first, as having been foretold, and next, as having been fulfilled. Upon this, as Paul elsewhere plainly asserts, hangs the entire truth of Christianity, and the sole hope of guilty man.

38, 39. Remission of Sins and Complete Justification from the Condemning Hold of Law, the Sure Result of Faith in this Crucified, Risen, and Reigning Redeemer.—In these and the previous verses we find the germ thoughts of the Epistles to the Romans and the Galatians. The manner in which Paul introduces this root doctrine of justification by faith is in keeping with its vital character. He uses a form of bold and earnest proclamation. He assumes the fact of their sinfulness. He says nothing directly of the way of forgiveness and justification. This he has distinctly hinted at in announcing Christ’s death and resurrection as glad tidings, and as the fulfillment of God’s great promise of mercy. But he emphasizes the fact that there is re- remission of sin, and deliverance from the law’s condemnation, in Christ, through His achieved redemption.

Forgiveness and remission of sins “through this one” (not this man) had been already preached by Peter and others. But they had said nothing about being justified, about a sinner’s being accounted righteous, or treated by God as though he were righteous. Righteousness was the great text and theme of the Pharisees. But until this convert from their ranks uttered these words (v. 39), the true relation of a sinner to the law of perfect righteousness had not been expressly stated by any Christian teacher.

Scholars are agreed in charging a translation (v. 39) which seems to teach that the law does justify from some things, and Christ makes up the deficiency. Contrary to this, Paul says: “From all [sins], from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses, by Him every one who believes is justified.” The law justifies from none! Christ justifies the believer from all! Therefore all effort to keep the law as a means of divine acceptance is both useless and evil. Faith, which Christ calls a work, “the work of God” (or that God commands), a simple utter reliance upon His mercy in Christ, this is our part and our only part in the supreme matter of being accounted righteous and so treated by Him.

And this grand vital principle of justification by the heart’s faith, now first clearly proclaimed, really gave to the sacrificial system of Moses all its meaning and utility. The sin-offering, prescribed and presented under the law to expiate even the smaller offenses, implied as the condition of its efficacy an underlying sorrow for the offense, and a reliance upon the mercy that accepted a substitute sufferer in the offender’s place. So, strictly speaking and most truly, the law of itself could do nothing for forgiveness or justification. The lawgiver’s act alone accepted a substitute for the offender. Thus the Old Testament and the New are in accord upon this vital matter. The Jew, standing upon the ceremonial law of Moses, finds there the New Testament principle of forgiveness through a substituted sacrifice. Only in the ancient offering the victim was a typical one, and a true spiritual deliverance lay in the offerer’s faith that God would provide a real and sufficient sacrifice.

Thus far in this first discourse (of which we have at least a complete outline) Paul proves the facts of the gospel from their familiar Scriptures. Earnestly he proclaims Christ’s sacrificial death, resurrection, and eternal life, as God’s fulfilled promise of grace, and therefore as glad tidings. And he urges their acceptance of this word of salvation, their personal trust in Christ, in order that they may be delivered from the law’s condemning power. Jesus Christ, he says, is the Messiah of ancient promise.

In exact fulfillment of your inspired prophecies, He lived and died, He rose and lives for ever! Then, believe in Him! Or, if you will not believe, then beware! His closing word of warning, which, like Peter, he foreknows will be needful, is taken from Hab. 1 : 5. The original prediction had been fulfilled by the Chaldees upon their fathers. He uses it again, thus strongly enforced by one fulfillment, to impress the tremendous peril impending over them. In little more than twenty years its second fulfillment came upon the whole Jewish people, for they renewed their rejection of God’s mercy in the person and saving work of His own incarnate, risen, and reigning Son.

42, 43. The Earnest Request and the Private Conference that followed Paul’s First Discourse.—According to the better reading, all who had heard (as they were leaving the synagogue) besought him to repeat his teaching on the next Sabbath. This request showed an intense interest on the part of the body of Jews and Gentile proselytes in the new doctrine of Paul. In many of both classes, so strong was their instantaneous faith, that they followed Paul and Barnabas to their tarrying-place, in order to receive further instruction. At once recognizing the grace of God that had wrought the faith, the missionaries simply but fervently exhorted these infant converts to continue trusting in and looking for the same Divine grace. This phrase, “grace of God,” is here first presented in the large sense of reconciliation and redemption by Christ’s saving work. In connection with a reliance upon this grace, the converts were also counseled to distrust and avoid self-righteous attempts at legal obedience. And the whole exhortation was in accordance with the great truths of Paul’s discourse.

44, 45. The Immense Gathering of Pagan Gentiles, and the Consequent Envy and Malice of the Jews.—The intervening week had been one of general discussion of the strange doctrines, by all classes in the city. So, when the next Sabbath came, the apostles were greeted with an immense multitude of pagans anxious simply to hear the wonderful words which had been reported. They hungered for truth—“to hear the word of God”; for no mention is made of a single miracle, by which they might have been attracted. And this moving of almost a whole city was the effect of a single sermon, and of its widespread report by Gentile proselytes. Was not this ample assurance that God’s time had come, and His purpose in the conversion of the Gentiles was now to be fulfilled?

But the Gentile multitudes, whose presence rejoiced the hearts of the missionaries and their true disciples, only stirred the Jews to envy. B.—Their spiritual pride and exclusive bigotry was immediately roused. They could not endure the notion of others being freely admitted to the same religious privileges with themselves. This was always the sin of the Jewish people. Instead of realizing their position in the world as the prophetic nation for the good of the whole earth, they indulged the self-exalting opinion, that God’s highest blessings were only for themselves. H.—And yet their own prophets had declared that the Messiah, “the glory of his people Israel,” was also “a light to lighten the Gentiles.” Now, inflamed by jealous envy and arrogance, with passionate violence of speech, they railed at and so blasphemed “the word of God spoken by Paul.”

46, 47. The First Plain Announcement of God’s New “Election” of the Gentiles.—The apostles meet the calumnies and blasphemies of the fanatical Jews with bold and sharp reply. “This Messiah whom you reject,” say they, “bade us first utter the word of salvation to you. But since you will not receive it, since by your own act in deliberately rejecting it, you count yourselves unworthy of eternal life, He bids us turn to those who are now heeding his call.” The words of self-pronounced verdict have only the simple but terrible severity of truth. They do but anticipate the self-conviction of all once enlightened but finally lost souls in the day of final judgment. They have judged themselves unworthy of everlasting life!

Paul and Barnabas turned from the Jews to the Gentiles in Antioch. And in many other places, this turning was subsequently repeated, and similar scenes were enacted. And now, for more than eighteen hundred years, God’s covenant people have turned from their own Messiah, and “through their fall salvation is come unto the Gentiles.” Yet we know that God hath not utterly “cast away his people” (Rom. 11). They shall be restored to the faith and joy of God, and be incorporated into the grand spiritual kingdom of Messiah on the earth. And, as in the earlier ages they were chosen as the medium of conveying God’s light and promises to the world, so in the later ages their conversion shall furnish a sure testimony to the consummation of all prophecy and promise, in the latter-day glory of Messiah as King over all peoples.

48, 49. This Antioch, also, became the center of a widespread and mighty Christian movement under the joint labors of the two apostles and their new disciples. “Throughout all that region the word of the Lord was published.” By so extended and successful a work among the Gentiles, first in the city, and afterward in the country around Antioch, did the Holy Ghost honor the very outset of their mission.

As many as were ordained to eternal life believed. The word here employed signifies more than mere disposition or preference. It includes the idea of determination. And the passive form of the word shows that this determination is exercised upon the subject by another. That other can only be, clearly is, God, who “worketh in” the believer “to will and to do.” The fact here asserted is the divine disposing of these Gentile believers to eternal life. In this, as in other fuller and more explicit teachings, the intimation is conveyed that all things pertaining to salvation, like all proviprovidences bearing upon the earthly life, are ordered and arranged according to the purpose and by the power of God. Believing, then, is the effect of no accident or whim of man, of no purpose originating with man, unmoved from without. “No man can come to me,” said Christ, “except the Father draw him.” Rightly apprehended and gratefully received, this is a most inspiring and comforting truth.

But the connected truth, indicated in the injunction

“Work out your own salvation,” though not referred to here by Luke, always finds place in the exposition of God’s working in us. For it intimates that the divine ordering neither annuls nor directly counteracts man’s own agency in the matter of salvation, any more than in providences affecting the outward life. Every believer knows that he was won, not arbitrarily forced, to submission to the wiser, better will of God. Except the power of divine grace had first persuasively drawn his heart, he never would have submitted; so that gratitude was blended with gladness in his blessed experience of being “made willing.” Both truths—God’s determining or working in us, and our yielding yet working out our own salvation—are clearly revealed; the one to impress the supremacy of divine grace, the other to enforce the sense of human responsibility. And the opposite results, of faith and unbelief, may be thus summed up: God’s determination, with which man’s will is in unison, admits to the everlasting kingdom; while man’s own sole inclination and decision excludes from the kingdom. And the personal consideration may be added, that though we can not harmonize the two revealed facts, of God’s ordination to life and man’s uncontrolled choice of life or death, yet any and every one may practically reconcile them by believing!

50-52. Persecution, instigated by the Jews of Antioch, led the Two Missionaries to Iconium.—This first great success aroused great opposition. So it was ever afterward. “A wide door and many adversaries,” is Paul’s terse statement of a uniform fact in his entire experience.

The chief cause of offense, in this and subsequent persecutions, was not the preaching of the Cross and the Resurrection. It was the extension, directly and without any condition, to the Gentiles of the divine privileges and promises exclusively claimed by the Jews. This enraged both Jews and

Antioch in Pisidia.

proselytes, when they saw the Christian movement spreading widely and the Christian doctrine taking root among the people. It was easy to stir up the female proselytes, and natural to incite them to employ their great influence with the leading men to oppose this new and hated religion. And this fact, often repeated in Paul’s history, finds singular corroboration in the statement of a writer (Strabo) familiar with the region of western Asia. He expressly states that in religious opinions the influence of the women was controlling with the men.

From the systematic persecution thus brought against the apostles, they retired to Iconium, on the western border of Lyconia, and on the confines of Pisidia, Galatia, and Phrygia. Not through fear, but in accordance with the express instructions of Christ, they withdrew, in companionship with their invisible Lord. But the persecution that compelled them to flee did not harm the Church they had planted. The same Lord who went with the rejoicing apostles to Iconium, remained with the new disciples at Antioch; so that they, too, were filled with joy in the Holy Ghost.

Persecution can not injure the cause or set back the course of truth. The periods of sorest trial have often been those of greatest progress to the Church. Opposition stimulates true Christian principle; it nerves courage and strengthens faith by evoking the prayer that brings the power of the Holy Ghost. B.