Verse 21
21. Taught many At Derbe, as at neither of the last three places, Paul seems to encounter no persecution, but to have won many converts. The simple omission of any mention of persecutions strikingly coincides with Paul’s own account in 2 Timothy 3:11, where Paul reminds Timothy of his persecutions at Antioch, at Iconium, at Lystra, and there stops. Paley draws a striking argument from this plainly undesigned coincidence between the Acts and the Epistle to prove the authenticity and the truth of both.
Here terminates the journey of the apostle, and from this point he retraces his steps, by Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch, mainly by the route which he came, to the Mediterranean, thence by sea to the great Syrian Antioch whence he started. A few hours’ journey eastward from Derbe would have brought him to the Syrian Gates, whence he could have taken a shorter route to metropolitan Antioch, visiting by the way his native Tarsus. But objects nearer to his heart even than his home and kindred lay in the route he took.
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