Acts 14:28

And there they abode long time with the disciples The oldest MSS. omit "there." Render literally, "And they abode no little time with the disciples." St Paul was naturally more attached to Antioch than to Jerusalem, for here was the centre where Gentiles had first formed a Church, and where consequently he found most sympathy with his special labours.

The termination of St Paul's first missionary journey seems no unfitting place for a notice of the character of the Apostle's labours. We must assign a space of three or four years to this first mission, and as the district traversed was but small, a considerable time must have been spent at each place chosen for a centre of labour. The narrative of St Luke indicates this very clearly. He tells us (Acts 13:49) how from Antioch "the word of the Lord was published throughout all the religion." Again he speaks (Acts 13:52; Acts 14:22) of "the disciples" as though converts had been made in no small numbers. Then at Iconium he mentions (Acts 14:1) that "a great multitude both of Jews and Greeks believed," and (Acts 14:3) that "long time" was spent there in striving to overcome the opposition of the "unbelieving Jews," and at last the whole city appears to have been divided into two great factions. Such a result was not produced by two unknown Jewish missionaries, except after the lapse of a long time. So too at Lystra they abode long enough to gain many adherents, and form a congregation of earnest disciples. And the abundant fruit of the labours of the missionaries is clearly seen in the need for the ordination of elders, and in the provisions made for orderly church government. The language of St Paul too (Acts 15:36) when he speaks of revisiting "the brethren in every city where they had before preached the word of the Lord" indicates that he felt that a good foundation had been laid in the different places where they had ministered. It seems from this that the course adopted by the Apostle was to tarry in some centre of population, and continue his preaching till a sufficient number of converts had been gained to carry on the work after he left them, and till some of these were so far instructed as to be able to take oversight of the infant churches.

But it is when we read of the Christian congregations that the narrative of St Luke becomes most full of interest. St Paul had been by a revelation (Acts 22:21) sent to be the Apostle of the Gentiles, and he testifies himself to this statement of St Luke in his Epistle to the Galatians (Galatians 2:7). Yet the history shews him to us quite in harmony with the feelings expressed in his letter to the Romans (Acts 10:1) as one whose heart's desire for Israel is that they may be saved; and in full accord with that language in which in the same epistle (Acts 11:1) he identifies himself with the children of Israel. Throughout all this missionary journey St Paul never neglects to publish the message of salvation first to his own people. No, not even after repeated rejections of his teaching. In Cyprus he and Barnabas are mentioned as going first to the synagogue at Salamis. To the Gentiles they preached with much effect, but the Jews had heard their doctrine first. At Antioch they began their mission work in the synagogue, where they took their places as members of the Jewish congregation, and were invited by the rulers to address the assembly as being brethren and of the same faith. This address, which St Luke has preserved for us in substance, echoes more than once the language of the Epistle to the Romans. If in the epistle (Acts 3:18) St Paul says "We conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the Law," St Luke relates (Acts 13:39) how he said to the Jews of Antioch in precisely similar terms, "By Him all that believe are justified from all things from which ye could not be justified by the Law of Moses." So too just as the Apostle explains to the Romans (Acts 10:19) that the purpose of God had been to rouse His ancient people to jealousy by them that are no people, so to the Antiochene Jews (Acts 13:46) is he represented as saying, "It was necessary that the word of God should have been first spoken to you, but seeing ye judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles." And the action is just in the same spirit as the language which is used in Romans 1:16. There the Gospel is proclaimed to be the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth, but the order in which it is offered is "to the Jew first and afterwards to the Gentiles."

To compare in this way the language of St Paul's chief epistle with the abstracts of his speeches in the Acts is of much importance. For some have been found to maintain that the St Paul of the Epistles is a very different teacher from the Apostle whose history is recorded in the Acts. Those passages in the letters where St Paul speaks so severely of the opposition which he experienced from the Jews have been unduly dwelt on, and the theory of two sections in the early Church (a Pauline and a Petrine party) has been widely accepted, and the Acts described as a work of late date written with a view to bring about harmony between them. We cannot therefore dwell too often on all those points in the narrative of St Luke which find a counterpart in the letters of St Paul. And the farther such a comparison be carried on the more will it be apparent that the agreement between the Apostle and the historian exists because the latter is faithful to what he saw and heard, and so his record cannot but harmonize with the spirit and words of the chief actor in the history.