The First Missionary Journey of Paul Essay

On the road to Damascus the Lord intervenes in Saul’s life (Acts 9: 3-6) and he is genuinely converted during that encounter with the Lord Jesus. Under the ministry of Ananias (a disciple) he was also healed and filled with the Holy Spirit. Saul now known as Paul from that moment on immediately began preaching Christ in the synagogues of Damascus. Paul’s preaching was very convincing and disturbing to the Damascus Jews to the point where they desired to kill him. Therefore, the other Christian disciples assisted him in his escape by night (Acts 9:22-25) that he may escape to Arabia. Paul’s missionary Journeys were defining actions of him, he usually set foot with other companions and he endured hardships on these voyages. He was imprisoned, lashed and stoned several times and almost murdered once (2 Cor. 11:24-27).

What were the key social and cultural factors that enabled the Gospel to spread so quickly through the Roman Empire? Using primary and secondary sources, discuss with particular reference to Paul’s writings and the Book of Acts.

Paul’s first recorded missionary journey resulted in the widespread conversion of Gentiles to Christianity. Paul’s first journey is recorded in the New Testament from Acts 13:4 to Acts 15, and tells the story of Paul, Barnabas, John and Mark’s activities of preaching the Gospel in the areas they visited, being Cyprus, Antioch in Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra, Derbe, and returning home to Antioch. This was a journey that saw the Apostles travel a staggering 2250 km around the area of Asia minor, Syria and Cyprus. Once they returned back to Antioch, they heard word of people preaching that you had to be Jewish to follow Jesus: “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved”(Acts 15). Paul did not agree with this,

Therefore, Paul, employing the Lords wisdom, ensured the church to be viable and Godly in a city mentioned of similar importance as Rome, Corinth, Antioch, and Alexandria. In his ministry, Paul makes multiple journeys to Ephesus to ensure that the Word was growing in such a keystone city to much of eastern Asia. On his first missionary journey, he diverted to Macedonia at the Lord’s prompting, prohibiting him from travelling to the region. However, Paul leaves behind Aquilla and Pricilla (Acts 18:18-21), on his second journey, as more of an advance party to begin establishing the church. This was a necessary move, as a full effort by Paul to minister in Ephesus would have not gone successfully. The Ephesian economy aligned itself with pagan religion, as well as Judaism, and relied heavily upon trades, such as idol making, which related to the worship of pagan gods. For example, the temple of Artemis sustained an industry of silversmiths and idol makers. During Paul’s second third journey, due to his effective ministry in Ephesus, caused such a disruption in pagan commerce, merchants incited a mob to eliminate him from the city. The church remained despite his hasty departure. Paul centered his basis of ministry in this keystone city during his third missionary journey. As a result, this allowed him to

The message of my work is to try and highlight the importance of showing how a person’s faith can have a positive and life-changing impact on their lives. I have done this by looking into the lives of two early Christian missionaries and portray how they would 've felt about their journeys, who they met and what they were teaching others. In doing so, I try to portray, to the best of my ability and knowledge, the apostle 's thoughts and just how strong their conviction and faith in God was.

Without Paul, all of Jesus’s followers would have remained Jewish. Jesus’s disciples thought that the afterlife was going to happen very soon, so they awaited and kept on being Jewish. Paul knew Jesus’s main disciples. After Jesus’s death, Paul went out and talked with these disciples and formed a plan to spread Jesus’s teachings. Paul convinced them to start converting others, Paul was the one who organized the early converters and told them what to do. When Jesus’s disciples started to try and convert Jewish people, they remained unsuccessful and low on resources. Paul gave them the resources they needed, as he was doing very well at converting. These resources helped the other heads of the religion to start converting. They listened to Paul, and because of Paul they started to be successful at gaining more followers. Paul decided to convert Gentiles, the non-Jewish people. Paul expanded the religion from being a small branch off of Judaism,

Paul became an advocate for the inclusion of the Gentiles among the ‘true’ followers of Christianity. Until this moment in history, Jewish Christians believed that non-Jews had to convert to Judaism and follow the law like them, which included many dietary restrictions and circumcision. Gentiles who worship in the synagogue but did not convert were only

Paul arrived in Berea after escaping from Thessalonica. Luke tells us that the Bereans had a more opened mind than the Thessalonians. They gladly listened to the message from Paul. They studied the Scriptures every day to weigh the truth of they heard. As a result, many of them believed, including many important Greek women and men. However, Paul’s successful mission in Berea would not last long. The jealous Jews in Thessalonica heard that Paul was in Berea

Paul the apostle is known for his letters in the Bible to the church in Philippi. Paul devotes his faith in Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, to promote Christianity to the people of the Philippians. He is seen throughout the New Testament furthering God’s Word and projecting it in such a way to get fellow Jewish people to convert to Christianity. In the midst of this activity, Paul was travelling in between cities when a mob broke out against him. Israelites were furious with him spreading the Word of Jesus Christ throughout their land. The Israelites began to beat him repeatedly until the word reached the commander of the Roman soldiers. The roman soldiers immediately came to Paul and put him under arrest for a total of seven days before freeing him. Paul was charged with speaking out against the law of the land, promoting Jesus Christ among the Jewish people and disturbing the peace among the city.

Our source of knowledge of the apostolic work of Paul comes first from the Book of Acts. The epistles written by Paul serve to further our knowledge of his mission. These letters were written to churches that he had founded or churches that were known to him. Luke’s account of Paul introduces us to the basic facts about this important biblical figure. A more complete understanding of Paul’s journeys can be gleaned from his letters. These epistles were written almost at the time they occurred and they comprise some of the earliest works contained in the New Testament.

Paul writes in Acts 22:6 that he experienced a vision, ‘I fell to the ground and heard a voice say, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me... I am Jesus of Nazareth.”’ Paul was blinded but continued on to Damascus where he became certain that his vision of Jesus symbolised his calling to spread the Gospel. When he arrived his sight was restored by a disciple named Ananias and Paul was baptised as he became a Christian, a follower of Jesus. This conversion to Christianity enabled Paul to believe that he had been given a mission to go preach the word of God. Paul embarked on journeys to towns where he would seek employment and gradually get to know people. Paul wanted to influence these people by speaking of his experiences he had with God and what they had taught him about Christianity and the teachings of Jesus. In these towns, Paul also established local churches and invited elders to run them whilst he was out of town spreading the word of God, ‘Paul and Barnabas appointed elders for them in each church and, with prayer and fasting, committed them to the Lord, in whom they had put their trust’ (Acts 14:23).

The Apostle Paul (formerly Saul) is responsible for the spread of Christianity throughout the areas of Asia Minor and Greece. Through his 3 mission trips to the region Paul created a base of support for the Christian faith and implemented a support strategy for future growth. The time period for his journeys was 45 AD – 58 AD. The story of Paul is interesting from the perspective that the man best known as the author of most of the New Testament started out as a devout Jew and despised the Christian faith. After his conversion he made it his life’s work to spread the Christian message throughout the world. To this end, Paul made several mission trips to the area of Asia Minor and Greece.

Apostle Paul was not always a preacher of Christianity, Paul’s parents were Jewish as well as Roman citizens. Paul was to be a Rabbi though his future plans changed, on Paul’s journey of scorning Jesus, he had a vision in which Jesus asked why Paul scorns him, then commissions Paul to preach his message to the Gentiles who received mercy through Jewish unbelief. Around A.D. 56-58; Apostle Paul wrote the Romans, verses 8:26-30 states, “26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.

Although many Gentiles accepted the Gospel of Jesus Christ, there were Jews that continued to display their anger towards the Gospel. There were some Jews that came and stirred up the crowd at Lystra against Paul and Barnabas. This crowd also stoned and left Paul for dead, but Paul did not allow that to stop him from preaching the Gospel to the city of Lystra. Lystra and Derbe proved to be fruitful areas to preach the Gospel, but not without their difficulties. One convert at Lystra on this

“The grandeur of the ancient city is evident in the remains uncovered by archaeologists, including the ruins of the Artemision, the civic agora, the temple of Domitian, gymnasiums, public baths, a theater with seating for 24,000, a library, and the commercial agora, as well as several streets and private residences” (Holman, np). This was a big city, full of culture, and full of ungodly people and activities. Among the many religious groups in the city, there were many Jews there who were brought the gospel right after Pentecost (Orr, np). Because of the pluralism of religions in the city, new Christians didn’t know exactly what to believe or how to worship. On top of this, the city was constantly bombarded with false teachers trying to tell people that salvation came from works, not faith (MacArthur, np).