“From Paphos, Paul and his
companions sailed to Perga in Pamphylia where John left them to
return to Jerusalem.” Acts
13:13 (NIV)
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| Perga: Where things went south |
The way this verse
is translated in the NIV, the event seems so trivial that it begs the
question why even mention it: “John left them to return to
Jerusalem.” What's the big deal? Maybe that had been his plan all
along? Maybe he could only accompany Paul and Barnabus for a certain
length of time before he found it necessary to return home? But some
time later when Paul suggests a follow-up trip to southern Galatia
and Barnabus wants to bring John Mark along, Paul has a cow.
“Barnabas wanted to take John
along, the John nicknamed Mark. But Paul wouldn’t have him; he
wasn’t about to take along a quitter who, as soon as the going got
tough, had jumped ship on them in Pamphylia. Tempers flared, and they
ended up going their separate ways...” (Acts
15:37-39 Msg)
Clearly, there is
much more to that story than what Luke tells us. When I read it
again, I become even more perplexed. At the time of John Mark's
departure things really hadn't been going tough – things actually
had been, for the most part, going their way. So why leave at all?
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| Once a thriving center of mission |
Acts
13 is something of a embarkation point in Luke's second chronicle.
For the first time in the history of the Church, a local fellowship
is intentionally seeking to carry the gospel to “the ends of the
earth.” That it had been God's plan all along for disciples of
Christ to do just this thing seems clear to me. But as I have re-read
the first twelve chapters of Acts this year I get the idea that when
Jesus uttered those words we now refer to as “The Great
Commission”, most of those he spoke to that day on the hill outside
Jerusalem had only their fellow Jews in mind. It's easy to forget
that the Church of Jesus which is primarily Gentile today began as a
Jewish movement. Over the passage of time from the outpouring of the
Spirit on the Day of Pentecost (33 AD) to the persecution that broke
out briefly under Herod Agrippa I (circa 44 AD), however, a paradigm
shift was occurring: the idea that “the good news” was for
everyone, whatever their lineage may be. The Jerusalem elders'
response to Peter's story about the conversion of Cornelius and his
household pretty much sums up the light-bulb moment that was
transpiring among some Christians of that time, “So,
then, God has granted even the Gentiles repentance unto life”
(Acts 11:18). I read that and snort,“Duh.”
But for these first Christians, this was indeed news.
In any time, change
is hard and the strongly conservative Church of Jerusalem had perhaps
a harder time than most digesting this remarkable shift in plan. For
a Jew's Jew all the world revolved around Jerusalem. In the Holy City
God would set up his new, holy kingdom with Jesus as Messiah. The
only time the first disciples seem to leave the city is when
persecution broke out and they were afraid for their lives. But at
Antioch, some 300 miles north of Jerusalem, there was something new
in play. The make-up of the church there was much like the city,
cosmopolitan and diverse. And the way Luke tells it, they were the
first fellowship to get a hold of this new insight about the gospel
being for everyone and became intent on doing something about it.
Having discerned God's call and timing (see Acts 13:1-3), the
leadership of the Church in Antioch commission Barnabus and Saul and
in verse 4 they “step off the map”, as it were, and begin what
commonly is referred to as “Paul's First Missionary Journey.”
With them is Barnabus' younger cousin from Jerusalem, John Mark (v.
5), and perhaps some other unnamed guys simply because it was Paul's
habit to take younger men along with him to assist him in the work.
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| Making history: Paul and Barnabus' journey to Galatia |
Their
first stop was the large island of Cyprus out in the Mediterranean
Sea. Why start there? Luke doesn't clue us in to their reasoning but
maybe it was the simple fact that Barnabus was from there (Acts 4:36)
and since it was his home he would already have a network of contacts
for them to access. While the island was mostly Greek there were
enough Jews living on Cyprus that Luke mentions they visited several
synagogues while there. Just how long it took for their party to
traverse the 90 miles between the port city of Salamis and the
provincial capital in Paphos on the other side of the island Luke
doesn't specify. But in every city where they stopped, their pattern
was to attend the local synagogue on Sabbath day with the hope they
would be given an opportunity to share (see
13:14, 46; 14:1; 16:13; 17:1, 10; 18:4, 19; 19:8; 28:17). During the
weeks that followed, nothing happened to write home about – or if
it did, Luke doesn't mention it. So I assume they had plenty of
opportunity to share both formally and informally with many of their
Jewish brethren. What effect the gospel had on those communities is
not clear other than by the time they reach Paphos, the governor is
eager to meet them. And then the first great “missionary” tale
occurs.
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| Okay, not like this...but still |
Acts
13:7-12 is a story that would play well to flannel-graphs. There sits
Sergius Paulus, proconsul of Cyprus sitting on his throne, in my mind
like some wizened old King Theoden in Meduseld. Before him is Saul
(who will go by Paul from herein out), Barnabus and their companions
giving the teaching they had been sharing all over the island. Next
to Sergius Paulus, however, is Elymas, the Grima Wormtongue character
of this tale seeking to dissuade the proconsul from listening to
these travelers. And then it happens. Paul rises up like Gandalf the
White in the Golden Hall and spares no words for the sorcerer seeking
to keep this governor in darkness: “You
bag of wind, you parody of a devil—why, you stay up nights
inventing schemes to cheat people out of God. But now you’ve come
up against God himself, and your game is up. You’re about to go
blind—no sunlight for you for a good long stretch” (v.
10, Msg). (Tolkien-file that I am, if Paul had a staff it would just
add to the drama and the coolness of the moment). Just like that,
Elymas' power is broken, the governor believes and soon after they
sail for southern Turkey to preach there. Upon landing, however, John
Mark jumps ship on the expedition and returns home. Why? I would
think after witnessing that power-encounter in Paphos, he would feel
emboldened for the mission not lose heart with it? What gives?
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| Talk about a hat |
Was
he, as John Stott suggests, simply homesick, “...missing his
mother, her spacious Jerusalem home, and the servants”? (The Message of Acts by John Stott, p. 221) Or did he
not like the group dynamics that were happening within their
traveling band? In Acts 13:1, Luke lists the prophets and teachers in
the Church in Antioch and the name at the top of the list is
Barnabus. The name at the bottom is Saul. Barnabus was not only
physically older than Paul but spiritually older as well. In fact,
Saul owed a lot to Barnabus. When he was new to the Jerusalem
fellowship and no one would touch him because of his reputation, who
was it that vouched for him? Barnabus (see Acts 9:27). After
discerning that what the church of Antioch needed was a first-class
teacher, who went down to Tarsus to persuade him to join him in the
ministry there (see Acts 11:25-26)? Barnabus. When the Holy Spirit
spoke to commission the two for the ministry journey they were
presently on whose name was mentioned first (Acts 13:2)? Barnabus.
Always is the man from Cyprus mentioned first...until after the
events at Paphos. From therein out for the rest of the journey it
will always be “Paul and Barnabus” or, even more telling, “Paul
and his companions” (Acts 13:13). Again Stott raises the question,
“...Did
he resent the fact that the partnership of 'Barnabus and Saul' (2, 7)
had become 'Paul and Barnabus' (13, 46, etc.), since Paul was now
taking the lead and eclipsing his cousin?” (p.
221)
There's
another factor to consider. John Mark comes from the Jerusalem
church, a very conservative group in their own right – maybe one of
the last churches to “get with the program.” What their traveling
ministry team was doing had never been done before. They were, in a
very real sense, making it up as they went. Was John Mark becoming
increasingly uncomfortable with what he perceived were Paul's
reckless preaching to Gentile audiences, sullying, as it were, the
very message they were trying to articulate? “Did he, as
a loyal member of Jerusalem's conservative Jewish church, disagree
with Paul's bold policy of Gentile evangelism? Was it even he who, on
his return to Jerusalem, provoked the Judaizers into opposing Paul
(15:1ff)?” (p. 222)
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| Apparently how Mark wrote his gospel |
Having
landed at Perga the purpose had been to evangelize there but they
don't instead moving quickly on to Pisidian Antioch a hundred miles
north. Why? In Paul's letter to the Galatians he references this time
that Luke glosses over: “You were well aware that the
reason I ended up preaching to you was that I was physically broken,
and so, prevented from continuing my journey, I was forced to stop
with you. That is how I came to preach to you” (Galatians
4:13, Msg). So, if by the time the company had landed at Perga Paul
had come down with a form of malaria as most commentators suggest,
did John Mark think it was time to pull the plug on the mission and
return to Antioch and regroup? Meanwhile, sick though he was, Paul
was adamant on continuing the journey. Were there heated words
shared? Did Barnabus try to settle his younger cousin down? Did Paul
insult John Mark's manhood?
Sir
William Ramsay has this to say about 0this incident:
“Paul
and his companions came to Perga with the view of evangelizing the
next country on their route, a country similar in character to and
closely connected in commerce and racial type with Cyrpus, Syria, and
Cilicia. For some reason the plan was altered, and they passed
rapidly over the Pamphylian lowlands and the Pisidian mountain lands
to Antioch, postponing the evangelization of these districts till a
later stage of their journey. They went to Antioch for some reason
which concerned only that city, and did not contemplate as their
object the evangelization of the province to which it belonged. John,
however, refused to participate in the changed program, presumably
because he disapproved of it. His refusal seems to have been felt as
a personal slight by Paul, which suggests that the change of plan was
in some way caused by Paul...It is plain that
Paul at the moment felt deeply wounded. The journey which he felt to
be absolutely necessary in the interests of future work, was treated
by Mark as an abandonment of the work; and his sensitive nature would
consider Mark's arguments, plausible as they were in some respects,
as equivalent to a declaration of a lack of confidence” (St. Paul: The Traveler and Roman Citizen, pp.
86, 90).
Of
course, all of this is conjecture – arguments from silence and
except Luke's comment in Acts 15:38-39 he is positively mum on what
exactly happened in Perga. In time, it all worked out. Paul went on
doing what God had called him to do as did John Mark, even getting a
shout-out by the apostle himself years later when in his final letter
to Timothy he requests that he send John Mark so that he could be his
“right-hand
man” (2 Tim 4:11, Msg). Usually as I read the account of Paul and
the rest of his contemporaries as Luke tells it, in my mind they
stand head and shoulders above the rest of us poor schmucks who are
in gospel work today. But somehow re-reading this story of the
break-up of this ministry group reminds me that they were real guys
living in real time and just like the rest of us trying to discern
God's leading in their particular setting. Things happen.
Communication breaks down. Feelings are wounded. Disagreements occur.
And, at times, friendships are broken, in some cases irreparably.
That these things shouldn't happen among “Spirit-filled”
Christians is beside the point. That they do reminds me once again
(as if I needed reminding) that “we carry this precious Message
around in the unadorned clay pots of our ordinary lives. That’s to
prevent anyone from confusing God’s incomparable power with us”
(2 Corinthians 4:7, Msg).
Twenty-five
years after the release of Elisabeth Elliot's Through
Gates of Splendor,
which tells the story of the her husband Jim and his friends'
attempt to make contact with the fierce Waodani tribe of Ecuador and
their subsequent martyrdom in 1956, her book was re-released with an
additional chapter that, among other things, included her reflections
on the criticisms that had arisen during the passing years since
their death.
“The [Waodani]
story, at the time of the death of the men, later when I lived with
the Indians themselves, and during all the years since as I have
recounted it and reflected on it in the light of my own subsequent
experience, has pointed to one thing: God
is God.
If He is God, He is worthy of my worship and my service. I will
find rest nowhere but in His will, and that will is infinitely,
immeasurably, unspeakably beyond my largest notions of what He is up
to.”
“This is the context
in which the story must be understood – as one incident in human
history, an incident in certain ways and to certain people important,
but only an incident. God is the God of human history, and He is at work
continuously, mysteriously, accomplishing His eternal
purpose in us, through us, for us, and in spite of us...we
are sinners. And we are buffoons…It is not the level of our
spirituality that we can depend on. It is God and nothing less than
God, for the work is God’s and the call is God’s and everything
is summoned by Him and to His purposes, the whole scene, the whole
mess, the whole package – our bravery and our cowardice, our love
and our selfishness, our strengths and our weaknesses. The God who
could take a murderer like Moses and an adulterer like David and a
traitor like Peter and make of them strong servants of His is a God
who can also redeem savage Indians, using as the instruments of His
peace a conglomeration of sinners who sometimes look like heroes and
sometimes like villains, for ‘we are no better than pots of
earthenware to contain this treasure [the revelation of the glory of
God in the face of Jesus Christ], and this proves that such
transcendent power does not come from us, but is God’s alone.’ (2
Cor 4:7, NEB)” (p. 268, 273)
Whether
John Mark left because he was mad, afraid, disheartened or dismayed,
ultimately, is neither here nor there. The work went on. The Word
went forth. Disciples were made and the Church's influence increased
in spite of the human beings who were responsible for making that
happen.
