The First Journey

Set apart by the Holy Spirit and sent out by the church of Antioch (Acts 13:1–3), Barnabas and Saul crossed to Cyprus and then to the mainland of Asia Minor, preaching through Pamphylia, Pisidia, and Lycaonia (Acts 13–14). This file follows the whole arc of the first missionary journey: the laying-on of hands, the route, John Mark’s turning back, the scene at Lystra where the crowds called Barnabas Zeus and Paul Hermes, the stoning of Paul, and the return to report all that God had done.

Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (Apostle)

Set Apart by the Spirit

The journey begins not with a human decision but with a commissioning by the Holy Spirit through the worshiping church. Antioch had among it “prophets and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen … and Saul” (Acts 13:1, RSV) — and Barnabas heads the list. “While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’ Then after fasting and praying they laid their hands on them and sent them off” (Acts 13:2–3, RSV). This is the first formal sending of missionaries by a church, and it sets the pattern: the work is the Spirit’s, the church confirms it by fasting, prayer, and the laying-on of hands, and the two are sent — “sent out by the Holy Spirit” (Acts 13:4). Barnabas is named first, the senior figure, leading the party that begins, fittingly, in his own homeland.

Cyprus

“Being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia; and from there they sailed to Cyprus” (Acts 13:4, RSV). The Cypriot leg — the landing at Salamis, the preaching in the synagogues with John Mark as their assistant, the crossing of the island to Paphos, and the dramatic encounter with the proconsul Sergius Paulus and the false prophet Elymas struck blind — is treated in its own file (Cyprus and the Mission). Two things must be noted here for the shape of the whole journey. First, it is on Cyprus, at Paphos, that Luke’s naming shifts: up to this point “Barnabas and Saul,” from here “Paul” (Saul’s Roman name) takes the lead, and the pair become “Paul and his company” and “Paul and Barnabas” (Acts 13:9, 13, 43, 46). Second, it is from Paphos that the company sets sail for the mainland — and at that crossing John Mark left them.

John Mark Turns Back

“Now Paul and his company set sail from Paphos, and came to Perga in Pamphylia. And John left them and returned to Jerusalem” (Acts 13:13, RSV). Luke records the desertion of John Mark with a single bare clause, offering no reason. The young man — Barnabas’s cousin (Colossians 4:10), who had come as their assistant (Acts 13:5) — turned back at the threshold of the hard inland mission and went home. The bare report will become explosive later: it is precisely this desertion that Paul will hold against John Mark when, planning the second journey, he refuses to take him again, and Barnabas insists on doing so (Acts 15:37–38; see The Sharp Disagreement). On the first journey, however, the company goes on without him, up from the coast into the highlands of Asia Minor.

Antioch of Pisidia and the Inland Cities

At Pisidian Antioch, Paul delivers in the synagogue the first of his recorded sermons (Acts 13:16–41), proclaiming Jesus as the fulfillment of Israel’s hope; many Jews and devout Gentiles follow them, but jealousy among the synagogue leaders provokes opposition, and Paul and Barnabas declare, “we turn to the Gentiles” (Acts 13:46, RSV), to the joy of the Gentile hearers — until the two are driven from the district and “shook off the dust from their feet against them” (Acts 13:51, RSV). At Iconium they preach so effectively that “a great company believed, both of Jews and of Greeks” (Acts 14:1, RSV), but again the city divides and a plot to stone them drives them on to the Lycaonian cities of Lystra and Derbe (Acts 14:5–7). Throughout, Barnabas and Paul work as partners, “speaking boldly for the Lord, who bore witness to the word of his grace, granting signs and wonders to be done by their hands” (Acts 14:3, RSV).

“The Gods Have Come Down to Us”

At Lystra occurs the journey’s most vivid scene, and the one in which Barnabas is most directly the focus. A man crippled from birth sat listening to Paul; Paul, seeing he had faith to be healed, said in a loud voice, “Stand upright on your feet,” and the man sprang up and walked (Acts 14:8–10, RSV). The pagan crowds, witnessing the miracle, drew the conclusion natural to their religion: “The gods have come down to us in the likeness of men!” (Acts 14:11, RSV). And they assigned the roles: “Barnabas they called Zeus, and Paul, because he was the chief speaker, they called Hermes” (Acts 14:12, RSV). The identification is telling. Zeus was the chief of the gods; Hermes his messenger and spokesman. That the crowd took Barnabas for Zeus and Paul for Hermes shows that Barnabas, the silent and dignified senior figure, was taken for the greater god, while the voluble Paul was cast as his herald — a glimpse of how the two appeared to onlookers, with Barnabas the imposing presence and Paul the speaker (Acts 14:12; Chrysostom, Homilies on Acts 30; Bruce, Acts, 1988).

The priest of Zeus, whose temple stood before the city, brought oxen and garlands to the gates, intending with the crowds to offer sacrifice to them (Acts 14:13). When Barnabas and Paul heard of it, “they tore their garments and rushed out among the multitude, crying, ‘Men, why are you doing this? We also are men, of like nature with you, and bring you good news, that you should turn from these vain things to a living God’” (Acts 14:14–15, RSV). It is in this very protest that Luke calls them, jointly, “the apostles Barnabas and Paul” (Acts 14:14, RSV) — one of the explicit scriptural witnesses to Barnabas’s apostolic title. Barely did they restrain the crowds from sacrificing (Acts 14:18).

The Stoning and the Return

The fickleness of the crowd turned quickly. Jews from Antioch and Iconium arrived, won the crowds over, and “having stoned Paul they dragged him out of the city, supposing that he was dead” (Acts 14:19, RSV); but he rose and re-entered the city, and the next day went on with Barnabas to Derbe (Acts 14:20). Having preached there and made many disciples, the two retraced their steps — back through Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch — “strengthening the souls of the disciples, exhorting them to continue in the faith” and appointing elders in every church (Acts 14:21–23, RSV). The verb of exhortation is, once more, the verb of Barnabas’s name. Finally they sailed back to Antioch in Syria, “and when they arrived, they gathered the church together and declared all that God had done with them, and how he had opened a door of faith to the Gentiles” (Acts 14:27, RSV). The first deliberate mission of the Church to the Gentile world was accomplished, and Barnabas had led it from its first commissioning to its report — the journey on which “Barnabas and Saul” became “Paul and Barnabas,” and on which both were named apostles before the watching crowds of Lystra.

See Also

References

  • The Acts of the Apostles 13:1–14:28. (RSV consulted; “the gods have come down” at 14:11; Zeus and Hermes at 14:12; “the apostles Barnabas and Paul” at 14:14.)
  • Colossians 4:10. (John Mark the cousin of Barnabas.)
  • Bruce, F. F. The Book of the Acts. Rev. ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1988. (On Acts 13–14, the Lystra episode, and the Zeus/Hermes identification.)
  • Keener, Craig S. Acts: An Exegetical Commentary. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012–2015. (On the first journey and Lystra.)
  • John Chrysostom. Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles, Homilies 27–30. Trans. NPNF I/11.