From Paul’s First Missionary Journey to His Death
From Paul’s First Missionary Journey to His Death
Paul gives us no sequence of events or chronological indicators for the second stage of his missionary career—from the first missionary journey to the end of his life—comparable to what he provides for us in Galatians 1-2 for the first stage of his career. We are almost wholly dependent on Acts for this information. Unfortunately, while Luke provides us with a relatively straightforward account of this stage of Paul’s life—and one that in no way contradicts Paul’s own scattered autobiographical remarks—he is, with certain important exceptions, notoriously vague about chronology. Luke is fond of using phrases such as "a long time,” "after some days,” and "about this time,” which provide little help is estimating elapsed time.
For instance, Luke introduces the first missionary journey in Acts 13:1-3 with no indication about its relationship in time to the other events he has been narrating. Nevertheless, we should probably view the narrative as a continuation of the Antiochian story that was begun in 11:19-30. If so, we can presume that the period of "a whole year” of ministry in Antioch mentioned in 11:26 is the time between Paul’s joining of Barnabas and their setting out on the first missionary journey. This journey took Barnabas, Paul, and—for part of the way—John Mark to Barnabas’s home, the island of Cyprus, and several cities in southern Galatia, namely, Pisidian Antioch, Iconium,
Lystra, and Derbe (Acts 13:4-14:26). Estimates of the time necessary for this trip of about 1,400 miles 42 vary from one year to five years. 43 The best guess is about eighteen months, 44 but we simply have no way of knowing for sure.
Following the first journey, Paul and Barnabas spent "a long time” in Antioch (Acts 14:28; cf. Gal. 2:11-14), before going to Jerusalem for the apostolic council (Acts 15:29). They then returned to Antioch for a period of time (15:30-33), where a dispute over John Mark’s qualifications for continued missionary service led the two to go their separate ways (15:36-41). Paul’s second missionary journey took him to southern Galatia, quickly through Asia Minor, and on to Macedonia—in particular the cities of Philippi (see 1 Thess. 2:2), Thessalonica (see 1 Thess. 2:2; Phil. 4:15-16), and Berea (Acts 17:10-15)—and then Achaia, including Athens (see 1 Thess. 3:1) and Corinth (see 2 Cor. 11:7-9). Luke provides no specific time references until Paul comes to Corinth: he mentions that Paul stayed there for a period of eighteen months (Acts 18:11). This reference may indicate only the length of time spent in Corinth before the Gallio incident (18:12-17), 45 but probably indicates the total time spent in Corinth. 46 Once again, the total amount of time required for the second journey—about 2,800 miles—is hard to estimate, but the indications are that Paul did not spend much time in any place before Corinth, so two years may be about right.
After returning to Jerusalem (implied in Acts 18:22, with its reference to "the church”), Paul went to Antioch, where he spent "some time” (18:23). This stay, however, was probably not a long one, for Paul would have been anxious to return to Ephesus, where he had left Priscilla and Aquila (18:19). Nevertheless, he traveled "from place to place throughout the region of Galatia and Phrygia” (18:23; the reference is probably to the Phrygian part of Galatia) before arriving in Ephesus (19:1; see 1 Cor. 16:8). How long Paul spent here is not clear. In Acts 20:31, Paul tells the elders of the Ephesian church that he had spent "three years” with them. But this could be a rounding off (counting inclusively) of the period of two years and three months specified in 19:8, 10. Luke, however, may not intend these two verses to summarize the entire stay in Ephesus. It is safest to conclude that Paul spent anywhere from two years and three months to three years in Ephesus. From Ephesus Paul moved north into Macedonia, where he met Titus returning from Corinth (Acts 20:1; cf. 2 Cor. 2:12-13). Some scholars speculate that it may have been at this time that Paul ministered in Illyricum (modern Albania and Yugoslavia; see Rom. 15:19), although neither Acts nor Paul’s letters describe such a trip. Paul probably wintered in Corinth (his three-month stay in Greece [Acts 20:2-3; cf.
2 Cor. 9:4]), before retracing his steps to Caesarea and Jerusalem (Acts 20:3-21:16). This journey, of approximately 2,700 miles, must have taken at least three and a half years, and probably four or five.
Very shortly after his arrival in Jerusalem, Paul was imprisoned by the Roman authorities under suspicion that he had fomented a riot in the temple (Acts 21:27-36). Paul was shortly thereafter transferred to Caesarea, where he spent two years (Acts 24:27). Paul was then sent on to Rome, on a voyage that began in the autumn (the "Fast” in 27:9 is almost certainly the Day of Atonement) and ended in the spring, after three months shipwrecked on the island of Malta (28:11). Luke’s account closes with Paul under house arrest for two years in Rome (28:30-31).
Many think that Paul’s life ended at this point, but two considerations point decisively to a longer interval before his death. First, apparently reliable early church accounts associate Paul’s death with Nero’s persecution of Christians in A.D. 64-65. But it is unlikely that Paul’s two-year stay in Rome brings us to this late a date (see below). Second, the evidence of the Pastoral Epistles points to a period of further ministry in the eastern Mediterranean after the Roman imprisonment of Acts 28:30-31 (see chap. 15 below). Almost certainly, then, Paul was released from this first Roman imprisonment
for a period of further ministry. Whether this ministry took Paul to Spain, as he had originally planned (see Rom. 15:24), is uncertain. 47