[00:00:00] Hello listeners, welcome to my podcast. We will continue from yesterday, Acts, a commentary by E. M Blaiklock, B. Cyprus, Acts 13 verses 4-12. The sprawling island in the north-eastern corner of the Mediterranean was an ancient meeting place of nations. There were large settlements of Jews, Acts 11 verses 19 and 20.
[00:00:25] Barnabas himself was a Cypriot, and Cypriots had played a part in the founding of the church in Antioch. It was natural that the island should be chosen as the first scene of organized missionary evangelism. Note the shape of Paul's ministry. He began with the Jews, whom he regarded as prepared and privileged by God. Then he passed through the island systematically, from Salamis in the east to Paphos in the south-west.
[00:00:56] Contact with the Gentiles flowed naturally from the circumstances of his testimony. Readers with some knowledge of ancient history often have occasion to note Luke's careful writing. Acts 13 verse 7 is an example. In 22 BC, Augustus made Cyprus a senatorial province. That is to say, within the system of disguised autocracy which he had invented, he placed the island under the control of the senate,
[00:01:25] instead of retaining it under his own direct authority. It was therefore governed by a proconsul or deputy, seven. The name of a proconsul called Paulus has been discovered in a North Cypriot inscription. The proconsul of Luke's narrative is described as a man of understanding. Acts 13 verse 7, Rudd 5. This is not inconsistent with the presence of a Jewish imposter in his suite.
[00:01:53] The contemporary Roman was extraordinarily prone to superstition, and the Chaldeans and soothsayers, the casters of horoscopes and all manner of associated charlatans, mainly from the east, formed a host who battened on this failing. Tacitus describes them as, A tribe faithless to the powerful, deceitful to those who hope, which will ever be banned among us, and ever tolerated.
[00:02:21] Juvenal pictures the emperor Tiberius himself in retirement in Capri with his wizard crew. Sergius Paulus appears to have held his Jewish fortune teller with a light hand, and to have been convinced by the missionary's exposure of him. Whether this conviction involved conversion is not quite clear. Certainly the same word, believed, is used in both Acts 13 verses 12 and verse 48, and the latter case involves conversion.
[00:02:51] The account is very brief, and to say that one incident is singled out for attention because Peter had a similar experience, Acts 8 verses 9 to 13, is not to make a concession to the perverse criticism which sees the New Testament as a scene of rivalry between the two apostles. The proconsul may have had further conversations with Paul, see F, Acts 24 verse 24,
[00:03:17] and Renan's inability to believe that a person in exalted office could accept the message of the gospel is abundantly refuted by the record of first century Christianity. See Perga, Acts 13 verse 13. The region of Pamphylia seems to have been evangelized only on the return journey, Acts 14 verse 25. Yet it might seem logical to expect such a mission on the party's first arrival.
[00:03:45] Was there a temporary change in plan, and if so, why? In Galatians 4 verse 13, Paul, speaking to the churches of South Galatia, the region of Antioch, Iconium, and Derbe, mentions a serious and ravaging illness which was physically apparent on his first visit to them. The climate of the coastal region of Pamphylia is extraordinarily enervating, and after the strain and fatigues of Cyprus,
[00:04:13] Paul may have fallen a victim to the malaria endemic in the region. Ramsey argues convincingly that this malady, with its penetrating headache and humiliating weakness, was the thorn in the flesh of 2 Corinthians 12 verse 7. The best relief from an attack would be a swift retreat to the highlands north of the Taurus, where Antioch stood at 3,600 feet.
[00:04:38] The route between Perga and the Pisidian Antioch was arduous and bandit-ridden, with perils of robbers and perils of waters, 2 Corinthians 11 verse 26. Either this sudden confrontation of danger, or more worthily, the changed policy of evangelization, working on a rigid, youthful mind, led to a quarrel which Paul remembered painfully for years. John Mark left the party.
[00:05:07] Antioch in Pisidia. Acts 13 verses 14 to 50. This city was the chief town of the Roman province of South Galatia. The region was also known as Phrygia. Arriving as strangers in the late summer or autumn of AD 46, Paul and Barnabas took their seats in the synagogue. The lessons may have been Deuteronomy 1 and Isaiah 1,
[00:05:34] after the reading of which the rulers sent the customary invitation to the visitors to address the gathering. Just as at Philippi, Acts 26 verse 13, the events of the first Sabbath in a new city are described in some detail. Luke clearly regards this visit as marking a great turning point in the apostles' life, and for that reason gives a fairly full report of the address in the synagogue.
[00:06:01] The style shows a similarity to that of Stephen, not without traces of Peter's manner, but this does not exclude marks of an undoubting Paulinism. The history of the Jewish people, Paul maintains, becomes intelligible only in the consummation found in Christ, in whom the promise, given originally to the Jews, found fulfilment. The law cannot save. It is incomplete.
[00:06:29] This, of course, is the theme of the epistle to the Galatians. In spite of God's preparation through all history, and especially through the ministry of the forerunner, the Jews of Jerusalem rejected him, but in so doing fulfilled prophecy, and set atonement and resurrection in the gospel, 30-41. Thanks for listening. See you tomorrow.