Acts chapter 13

vs 1

A pretty interesting bunch of people if you ask me. They had come from lots of foreign parts, for one. Manean you would assume was fairly influential if he grew up with Herod (it's a stratafied society, remember). Simeon may or may not have been from Antioch, and if he wasn't, then we see a startling thing - that none of the leaders of the church are from the area.

vs 2

How did it say this, exactly? It isn't explained. We are meant to just know what it means. Well, apart from what that one bit means, we do know what the rest of this verse means - that Barnabas and Saul are set apart for a specific work.

vs 3

Can't argue with the Holy Spirit. Mission agencies and modern missiologists make a lot of the fact that while Barnabas and Saul were part of the calling, so were the rest of the leadership of the church.

I personally think that's important, but other people disagree.

vs 4

Again, in steps the Holy Spirit and they somehow end up in Cyprus. What is happening here? Who knows.

vs 5

John I assume means John Mark. It's weird people having different names. Apparently they didn't know that they were being called to be missionaries to the gentiles, because they spent all their time with Jews.

vs 6

You mean the jewish guy was a sorcerer and a false prophet? Surely the jews never did anything like that! :P

vs 7

Sergius sounds like a fairly alright man. We have to remember, though, that Christianity was a totally new thing, and also that people giving public speeches about things like religion was pretty much the equivalent of TV back in those days.

vs 8

Of course that's what it means...

Regardless, he was trying to stop the proconsul from hearing about Christianity. What faith did he want him to have? Probably faith in his sorcery, so that he kept his job.

vs 9

Oooh, you know when it says "filled with the Holy Spirit" there's going to be some smackdown. This is also the first verse where Saul is also called Paul. Note that, unlike the way some preachers put it, it was not a name change that came about because of his conversion. It's just a different name that he also used.

vs 10

Wow, Paul ripped him a new one! I guess Paul was angry not only because the guy was perverting judaism by being a sorcerer, but also trying to pervert Christianity by speaking against it. Sometimes you've just got to tell people they are spiritual excrement.