Paul's First Missionary Journey

1. Paul and Barnabas, with John Mark as their assistant, set forth upon the first missionary journey from Antioch, the metropolis of Syria (Acts 13:1), already described on page 107.

2. They descended the mountains to Seleucia (Acts 13:4), the seaport of Antioch, 16 miles from the city, named from its founder, Seleucus Nicator, B.C. 280. It is now a small village known as el Kalusi, having among its ruins an ancient gateway, still standing, through which Paul and Barnabas may have passed.

3. Setting sail, they crossed over the arm of the Mediterranean to the island of Cyprus (Acts 13:4-13), the early home of Barnabas, 60 miles west of Syria, and 40 miles south of Asia Minor; of irregular shape, 140 miles long and 50 wide; then thickly inhabited, and governed by a Roman proconsul, now under the rule of Great Britain.

4. Their first stopping place was at Salamis (Acts 13:5), on its eastern shore, on the river Pediæsus, where they found a Jewish synagogue. The city is now desolate, and its unoccupied site is known as Old Famagousta.

5. They crossed the island from east to west, preaching on their way, and came to Paphos (Acts 13:6), the capital, and residence of the proconsul. This city contained a famous shrine of Venus, to whose worship, with all its immoralities, its people were devoted. There was an old and a new city, of which the former was[119] the one visited by Paul and Barnabas. It is now called Baffa.

6. Sailing in a northwesterly direction a distance of 170 miles, they reached Asia Minor, in the province of Pamphylia. Passing by Attalia for the present, they ascended the river Cestrus, and landed at Perga (Acts 13:13), 7½ miles from the sea. This was a Greek city, devoted to the worship of Diana: now in ruins, and called Eski Kalessi. Here their young assistant, Mark, left the two missionaries to prosecute the hardest part of the journey without his help.

7. Their next field of labor was Antioch in Pisidia, a city east of Ephesus, and northwest of Tarsus, now known as Yalobatch. Here Paul preached in the synagogue a discourse reported more at length than any other in his ministry, and here a church was founded. (Acts 13:14-52.)

8. Driven out of Antioch by the persecution of the Jews, they went on 60 miles eastward to Iconium, a large city, still in existence as Konieh, and in the Middle Ages the capital of a powerful Mohammedan kingdom. This region, in the apostle's time, was independent of the Roman empire. (Acts 14:1-5.)

9. Again compelled to endure persecution, they traveled to Lystra, a heathen city in the district of Lycaonia, where a miracle wrought by Paul led the superstitious people to offer worship to the two apostles as the gods Jupiter and Mercury (in Greek, Zeus and Hermes). There is reason to suppose that Lystra was at the place now known as Bin bir Kilisseh, "the thousand and one churches," a mass of ruins in the Kara Dagh, or Black Mountain.

10. Paul having been stoned at Lystra, the apostles went on to Derbe, 20 miles distant, but in the same province, where they were suffered to labor in peace. It is supposed to be represented by the modern village of Divle. This marked the furthest place reached by the evangelists. They were now quite near the pass in Mount Taurus, known as the Cilician Gates, and could easily have reached Tarsus, and thence taken a short voyage home.

11. But they preferred to return by the same route, perilous as the journey was from the enmities excited by their preaching; and revisited Lystra, Iconium and Antioch, confirming the churches which they had planted, and establishing new ones in other neighboring places in Pisidia and Pamphylia, as in Attalia, a seaport on the river Katarrhaktes, 16 miles from Perga, now known as Adalia, where they took ship once more, and thence sailed over the Cilician section of the Mediterranean, north of Cyprus, to Antioch in Syria, where they were gladly received by the church which had sent them forth.

Paul's First Missionary Journey

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