The Journeys

The Acts of the Apostles narrates Paul’s mission as a sequence of journeys outward from Antioch — first through Cyprus and southern Asia Minor, then across the Aegean into Macedonia and Greece, then from a long base at Ephesus, and finally as a prisoner by ship to Rome. This file traces that itinerary, the churches it founded, the recurring pattern of synagogue-then-Gentiles, the Jerusalem council that secured the Gentile mission, and the riots, arrests, shipwreck, and arrival at the capital with which Acts closes.

Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (Apostle)

From Damascus to the First Journey

After his call Paul spent time in Arabia and Damascus (Gal. 1:17), escaped Damascus by being let down the wall in a basket (2 Cor. 11:32–33; Acts 9:23–25), and only later went up to Jerusalem and then home to Tarsus and Cilicia (Gal. 1:18–21; Acts 9:26–30). Barnabas brought him to Antioch in Syria, the great mixed city where the disciples were first called “Christians” (Acts 11:25–26), and it is from Antioch — not Jerusalem — that the Gentile mission is launched. The church at Antioch, prompted by the Spirit, set apart Barnabas and Saul for the work (Acts 13:1–3).

The First Journey (Acts 13–14)

Barnabas and Saul, with John Mark, sailed first to Cyprus, preaching from Salamis to Paphos, where the proconsul Sergius Paulus believed and where, at Acts 13:9, “Saul, who also is called Paul” takes the lead and the narrative thereafter calls him Paul. Crossing to the mainland of Asia Minor, they preached in the synagogues of Pisidian Antioch (the great sermon of Acts 13:16–41), Iconium, Lystra — where Paul was stoned and left for dead (Acts 14:19) — and Derbe, before retracing their steps to strengthen the new churches and returning to Syrian Antioch (Acts 14:21–28). The journey set the pattern of the whole mission: enter the synagogue, preach Christ from the Scriptures, and when rejected by most of the Jews, turn to the Gentiles, “for so hath the Lord commanded us” (Acts 13:46–47).

The Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15)

The success of the Gentile mission forced a crisis: must Gentile converts be circumcised and keep the Law of Moses? Paul and Barnabas went up to Jerusalem, where the apostles and elders met to decide (Acts 15:1–29). After Peter spoke for freedom from the yoke of the Law (Acts 15:7–11) and James, the Lord’s brother and head of the Jerusalem church, gave the judgment, the council ruled that Gentiles need not be circumcised but should abstain from certain things (Acts 15:19–29). This was the charter of Paul’s law-free Gentile gospel. Paul gives his own account of a Jerusalem meeting in Galatians 2:1–10, where the pillars — James, Cephas, and John — recognized “the gospel of the uncircumcision” committed to him and “gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship” (Gal. 2:9). Whether the Galatians 2 meeting is the same event as Acts 15 is one of the central chronological problems (see Acts and Pauline Chronology).

The Second Journey (Acts 15:36–18:22)

After parting from Barnabas over John Mark (Acts 15:36–40), Paul took Silas and revisited the churches, picking up Timothy at Lystra (Acts 16:1–3). Forbidden by the Spirit to preach in Asia and led by the Macedonian vision (Acts 16:6–10), Paul crossed into Europe. At Philippi he converted Lydia, cast a spirit from a slave girl, was beaten and imprisoned, and converted the jailer in the night earthquake (Acts 16:11–40). He preached at Thessalonica and Beroea (Acts 17:1–14), addressed the philosophers on the Areopagus at Athens (Acts 17:16–34), and then settled for eighteen months at Corinth, working as a tentmaker with Aquila and Priscilla and founding one of his most important churches (Acts 18:1–11). It was at Corinth, by the common reckoning, that he wrote 1 Thessalonians — the earliest surviving letter. His appearance before the proconsul Gallio at Corinth (Acts 18:12–17) provides the single firmest date in Pauline chronology.

The Third Journey (Acts 18:23–21:16)

After a brief return, Paul set out again and made Ephesus his base for some two to three years (Acts 19:1–10; cf. 20:31), the longest settled period of his mission. From Ephesus, the capital of Asia, the gospel spread through the province; there he worked wonders, confronted the magicians, and provoked the silversmiths’ riot over Artemis (Acts 19:11–41). It was probably from Ephesus that he wrote 1 Corinthians, Galatians, and Philippians (the imprisonment letters, on one reconstruction), and into this period fall the Corinthian crises reflected in 1–2 Corinthians. Paul then revisited Macedonia and Greece (Acts 20:1–6), where Romans was written from Corinth, gathered the collection for the saints at Jerusalem that was a central concern of his later mission (Rom. 15:25–28; 1 Cor. 16:1–4; 2 Cor. 8–9), and, after the farewell to the Ephesian elders at Miletus (Acts 20:17–38), set his face toward Jerusalem despite repeated warnings (Acts 21:10–14).

Arrest, the Voyage to Rome, and the Close of Acts

At Jerusalem Paul was seized in the Temple by a hostile crowd, rescued by the Roman tribune, and held (Acts 21:27–36). He defended himself before the crowd, the Sanhedrin, the governors Felix and Festus, and King Agrippa, and — as a Roman citizen — appealed to Caesar (Acts 25:11). The final voyage carried him as a prisoner across the Mediterranean, through the great storm and the shipwreck at Malta (Acts 27), to Rome, where Acts leaves him under house arrest, “preaching the kingdom of God, and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ, with all confidence, no man forbidding him” (Acts 28:30–31). Acts ends without narrating Paul’s death; the tradition of his martyrdom at Rome comes from other sources (see The Roman Martyrdom).

The Letters and the Journeys

The journeys are inseparable from the letters, for it was to the churches founded and visited along this itinerary that Paul wrote: to the Thessalonians, the Corinthians, the Galatians, the Philippians, and (looking ahead to a journey not yet made) to the Romans. The letters arise out of the pastoral crises of these communities and are the living residue of the mission Acts narrates (see The Undisputed Letters). They also supply a check on Acts: the “perils” catalogue of 2 Corinthians 11:23–27 — beatings, shipwrecks, dangers by land and sea — fills out and confirms the hardships of a missionary life that Acts records only in part.

References

The Holy Bible, King James Version. The Acts of the Apostles 9–28; the Epistles to the Galatians, First and Second Corinthians, Romans, First Thessalonians.
Bruce, F. F. Paul: Apostle of the Heart Set Free. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1977.
Murphy-O’Connor, Jerome. Paul: A Critical Life. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.
Riesner, Rainer. Paul’s Early Period: Chronology, Mission Strategy, Theology. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998.