Lessons from the Journey (Acts 14:21-28)

Lessons from the Journey

May 17, 2026

Acts 14:21-28

By Pastor Mike Conner

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In recent weeks, we have been learning from the ancient Christian congregation in Antioch of Syria. Luke tells their story in chapters 11 through 15 of Acts. Barnabas and Paul were leaders in that fledgling community. They had arrived in Antioch—Barnabas from Jerusalem and Paul from Tarsus—as the Holy Spirit was knitting people from vastly different cultural, ethnic, and religious backgrounds into spiritual community. Like master gardeners, Paul and Barnabas lovingly nurtured this new experiment in belonging that had sprung up out of the Antiochian ground.

And then one day as the church was worshipping, the Spirit spoke: “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.”  What they were being called to do was not yet known. That they were being called was perfectly clear. So, the church sent them out, with prayer and fasting and the laying on of hands.

We are picking up the story today at the end of chapter 14. Paul and Barnabas are beginning to retrace their steps after a great adventure in sharing the gospel abroad with other people in far-off places. They are far from home, though not nearly as far as Paul will one day be. There will be other journeys like this, and Paul will carry the name of Jesus farther. But a first journey is always irreplaceable, a kind of initiation.

These eight verses are packed with insights, and I didn’t really want to leave anything out. So instead of trying to preach a 10-point sermon, I’m going to take this passage verse by verse. I trust that you will hear in this retelling something of spiritual benefit to you. May the Holy Spirit make it so.

After they had preached the gospel in that town and made many disciples, they returned to Lystra, to Iconium, and to Antioch… (v. 21) 

Consult the map included in your bulletin. After they had been blessed by their congregation, Barnabas and Saul, along with a man named John Mark from Jerusalem, took a short walk to the port city of Seleucia, and from there sailed for the island of Cyprus. They landed in Salamis and traveled west across the island to Paphos. From Paphos they embarked on another ship and sailed northwest to the coastal city of Perga, then walked north to another Antioch in the region of Pisidia. East to Iconium, south to Lystra, east to Derbe. This is all relayed in detail in chapters 13 and 14 of Acts. You can see that Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe are all in the region of Galatia. The new churches in these places will eventually be the recipients of Paul’s letter to the Galatians.

From verse 21 we learn the essence of the work that the Spirit had called them to: preaching the gospel and making disciples. These are two different yet linked activities. Preaching the gospel summons people to trust in Christ; making disciples is the process of forming people to live as lovers of God and neighbor. Hearing and doing, faith and works, always held together. 

Notice that the town of Tarsus lies southeast of Derbe, across the mountains of Cilicia. We know from other parts of the New Testament that Paul was deeply connected to Tarsus; he might’ve even grown up there, though we’re not sure. And then, moving clockwise around the Mediterranean Sea from Tarsus is Antioch of Syria, “home base” for Paul and Barnabas. In Derbe, they are not that far from home. They could’ve just kept going in a circle. Yet that’s not the route they take. On the cusp of a more familiar world, they turn around and begin retracing their steps, returning to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch of Pisidia. 

They did it out of love. They had brought so many new, wonderful people into a faith in Christ and spiritual fellowship with each other, and now they wanted to return to visit each of these new communities and reinforce the message of God’s love. This drive wasn’t born of an anxiety that everything would fall apart without them. No, it came from wisdom and compassion. Paul and Barnabas knew firsthand the value of nurturing churches. They had done it in their own Antioch to great effect. Having planted these seeds, it was time to water and weed the gardens. They took the longer and more difficult way home. But it’s the way that honored the heart of the work.

…strengthening the disciples by encouraging them to continue in the faith and by telling them, “It is necessary to go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God (v. 22).

On the return journey, Paul and Barnabas encouraged the new disciples to continue in the faith, and they taught them about the inevitability and value of hardship. The Greek word that’s translated here as “encouraging” is a form of the verb parakaleo. It means to embolden, comfort, advocate, plead. It’s one of the ways that Jesus, in John’s Gospel, describes the identity and work of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is the Paraclete, the Advocate, the one who gives us comfort and courage. Paul and Barnabas are channeling the work of the Spirit as they challenge these new congregations to stay the course, to walk in grace and mercy and justice.

They then offer a reframing of hardship. It is necessary, they say, for us to go through many difficult things to enter the Kingdom of God. Our challenges and sufferings can humble and teach us, if we let them. And the way of Christ is difficult: it’s a way of forgiveness and patience, of sharing and vulnerability. The way of Christ requires the congregation to continually change as new people start participating. The way of Christ is all about using the power one has to lift from the bottom, to give power away to others. The way of Christ demands justice for the poor and oppressed from those in positions of economic or political influence. Paul and Barnabas don’t want these brand-new Christians to fall away at the first moment of inner or outer resistance. Press through the pain, they say, and you’ll gain the prize.

And they can say this with authority. Their companion John Mark deserted them after they first arrived in Perga. They were forced to leave Antioch due to hostility. Paul was almost stoned by an angry mob in Iconium, and then successfully stoned in Lystra and left for dead. By turning around and revisiting each of these towns Paul and Barnabas were practicing what they preached: Do not be afraid; in Christ, God has overcome the world.

When they had appointed elders for them in every church and prayed with fasting, they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed (v. 23).

During each visit on the return journey, Paul and Barnabas appoint elders, presbuteroi, within the local congregations. While power is meant to be shared and given away in Christian community, there is always a need for the gifts of leadership, for individuals who, with wisdom and maturity, can see the big picture, move deftly through conflicts, and keep the group grounded in the essential goals of their mission. Paul and Barnabas make leaders of the locals. They recognize and call forth gifts already present in the people. 

Jesus Christ ascended into heaven so that he could pour out his Holy Spirit on others and be present in all times and places. His leaving paradoxically paved the way for the expansion of his presence. His leaving also empowered the original disciples, because they now had to step into their calling to speak and act as Christ’s Body on earth. Jesus gave them the authority to do this, to baptize, teach, and make disciples; they passed that authority along to people like Paul and Barnabas; and now they are entrusting it to new Christians in and beyond Galatia.

The handing off of authority, the proliferation of spiritual elders, has never stopped. We have many strong leaders here at First UMC, and I am grateful for the ways that leadership gifts have been recognized, offered, and honed in our community. Many of you lead in how you live your life; many of you lead various ministries or from behind the scenes; and many of you lead by being visible out in front, helping to tell the story of who we are and what God is up to among us. People of wisdom, integrity, vision, and steady strength are all around us; we must lean on one another as I prepare to leave and you prepare for a summer in between pastors. Paul and Barnabas show us the value of trusting the inherent giftedness of the local people.

They passed through Pisidia and came to Pamphylia (v. 24).

During every journey there are times when we are simply in transition and nothing else is really going on. We’re just getting from one place to another with no other agenda. It’s a fallow time, a rest note. Paul and Barnabas had to get from Antioch in Pisidia back down to the Sea. That was all. I imagine they discussed everything they’d experienced up to that point, and that they shared great stretches of silence. They ate their meals and prayed their prayers.

Not every moment has to be squeezed for productivity, for results. Sometimes its enough to just put one foot in front of the other. And we know that the risen Christ loves to meet us on the road as we walk along, to reveal himself to us in the simple things, as he did with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus.

After they had spoken the word in Perga, they went down to Attalia (v. 25).

Paul and Barnabas had passed through Perga on their way, but Luke doesn’t report that any ministry happened there. All he tells us is that Perga was where John Mark decided he couldn’t go any further and boarded a ship heading for Jerusalem. Perga had been a place of initial fragility, doubt, and division.

But, as the saying goes, you never step into the same river twice, and God’s mercies are new every morning. Paul and Barnabas weren’t ready to share the gospel in Perga during those first difficult days, but on the return journey something has shifted, and they are ready and able to ‘speak the word’ there. Then they go down to Attalia, which wasn’t even been on the inbound itinerary.

Paul and Barnabas were open to new possibilities on the return journey. They conducted themselves with great openness. They were able to be surprised, redirected, to have their assumptions overturned. Familiar or even written-off places can offer surprisingly fresh possibilities for those who are awake to the Spirit’s call.

Is there something in your life that you’ve overlooked, or where you might be called to try again?

From there they sailed back to Antioch where they had been commended to the grace of God for the work they had now completed (v. 26).

At last, the pair travels east across the sea and returns to the congregation at Antioch. Their work, which at first was undefined and had to be discovered in the going, is now known. It’s been lived. What a lovely word this is: the work is completed, fulfilled. The grace of God carried them through it, showed them what they needed to know and to do in each new setting. 

Not every work that God calls us to lasts forever. Most journeys have a defined scope. It’s okay for our life with God to have cycles of calling and completion. And to be clear, fulfilment does not mean finality. Paul himself was utterly changed by his missionary activity. He will now always be an apostle to the Gentiles, planting and nurturing churches. This becomes his vocation. But it’s a vocation lived in seasons and stages.

It’s okay for one thing to come to an end so that another thing can begin, because the spaces in between call us to do something we so often rush right past: they offer us the opportunity to celebrate.

After they arrived and gathered the church together, the reported everything God had down with them and that he had opened the door of faith to the Gentiles (v. 27).

The community sent Paul and Barnabas out to bless the world, and now Barnabas and Paul return with stories from the world to bless the community. They call the people together, and they tell their story. And it’s a marvelous story—of Jews and Gentiles learning to love and belong to one another; of powerful preaching, miraculous healings, and difficult persecutions; of prayer, encouragement, and raising up leaders. The circle is being drawn wider. The family of faith is growing.

Paul and Barnabas report everything that God had down with them and how he—how God—had opened the door of faith to the Gentiles. How did the Gentiles come to believe in Jesus Christ? Make no mistake, God opened the door. Yet God did it through the ministry of Barnabas and Saul. Ministry is always both/and. We do it. God does it. We do it in God, God does it in us. The two are true at the same time.

We should never attempt to erase or minimize ourselves in our stories of God’s goodness. Otherwise they wouldn’t be true testimonies, true celebrations. All testimony takes its cue from Mary Magdalene’s Easter proclamation: “I have seen the Lord!” I! God is always working through the stuff of creation; God saved the world by joining us here in our world or atoms and bodies. Stories have characters, and it’s good for us to be characters, so long as we know through whom and in whom and for whom we do what we do. 

And they spent a considerable time with the disciples (v. 28). 

Once they were back in Antioch, Paul and Barnabas settled again into the familiar rhythms of their faith community. They re-engaged and filled back up. Paul and Barnabas won’t stay put forever, but they need to be refreshed and restored, to process and pray through their own experiences.

One thing I bet they realized is that the Antiochian church had done okay without them, that this community of deep prayer, sincere worship, generous sharing, and strong leadership had held together, and even been brought closer together, through their absence. Paul and Barnabas weren’t the only ones who had stories; the Antiochian Christians had their own victories to share, for the Holy Spirit had continued to work in and through them in their local context while Paul and Barnabas traveled.

So when the winds of the Spirit started blowing again, and it was time for Paul to board another ship and sail into the unknown, I imagine he felt the peace and freedom to do so. He knew that his siblings in Antioch would continue to flourish. He knew that, through God and with one another, they already had everything they needed.

Thanks be to God. Amen.