Acts 13:4-12 What’s in a Name?
Good morning! Turn with me once again to the book of Acts in chapter thirteen. Today we are going to examine verse 4-12, and that’s on page 921 in the pew Bibles.
As you may remember from last week a group of prophets and teachers in the church at Antioch had gathered, worshiping the Lord and fasting, and the Holy Spirit said, “set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.” In obedience to the Spirit, they fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them and sent them off. This is the beginning of the First Missionary Journey of Saul.
Let’s look at the text.
4 So, being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia, and from there they sailed to Cyprus. 5 When they arrived at Salamis, they proclaimed the word of God in the synagogues of the Jews. And they had John to assist them. 6 When they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos, they came upon a certain magician, a Jewish false prophet named Bar-Jesus. 7 He was with the proconsul, Sergius Paulus, a man of intelligence, who summoned Barnabas and Saul and sought to hear the word of God. 8 But Elymas the magician (for that is the meaning of his name) opposed them, seeking to turn the proconsul away from the faith. 9 But Saul, who was also called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, looked intently at him 10 and said, “You son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, full of all deceit and villainy, will you not stop making crooked the straight paths of the Lord? 11 And now, behold, the hand of the Lord is upon you, and you will be blind and unable to see the sun for a time.” Immediately mist and darkness fell upon him, and he went about seeking people to lead him by the hand. 12 Then the proconsul believed, when he saw what had occurred, for he was astonished at the teaching of the Lord.
Let’s pray.
One of the upsides of studying Scripture the way we do here on Sundays, book by book, chapter by chapter, and verse by verse is that we can’t skip over difficult passages that are either uncomfortable or hard to preach on. One of the downsides of studying Scripture, book by book, chapter by chapter, and verse by verse is that we can’t skip over passages that are either uncomfortable or hard to preach on…
Nevertheless, this account is the Word of God, living and active, sharper than any sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
It’s the thoughts and intentions of the Spirit’s heart that are on display in these verses.
4 So, being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia, (that is the port nearest to Antioch) and from there they sailed to Cyprus. 5 When they arrived at Salamis, (the capitol city of the island of Cypress) they proclaimed the word of God in the synagogues of the Jews. And they had John to assist them.
Barnabas and Saul and John Mark, in obedience to the Spirit, left Antioch and headed to Cypress. We don’t really know why they chose to go to Cypress, the Scripture doesn’t say. Barnabas was from Cypress so that may have motivated them to head there first to proclaim the gospel. Either way, they headed out, and when they arrived at the port of Salamis they preached the gospel in the synagogues there.
This was the pattern that Saul would follow in every city he went to. He would start with the synagogue, he would start with the Jews, and share the gospel with them and when they rejected the gospel, he would then preach to the Gentiles. This happened over and over.
6 When they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos, they came upon a certain magician, a Jewish false prophet named Bar-Jesus. 7 He was with the proconsul, Sergius Paulus, a man of intelligence, who summoned Barnabas and Saul and sought to hear the word of God.
Sergius Paulus was the Roman governor of the Island of Cypress, a man of intelligence, he had heard of Barnabas and Saul preaching all over the island and sent for them so that he could hear what they had to say.
Even this little detail, that Sergius Paulus wanted to hear from these men, is evidence of the thoughts and intentions of the heart of the Holy Spirit. He was moving in the heart of the governor so that he sought to hear the Word of God.
But where there is light there is often darkness.
A Jewish false prophet named Bar-Jesus stood between them.
8 But Elymas the magician (for that is the meaning of his name) opposed them, seeking to turn the proconsul away from the faith.
So which is it, Bar-Jesus or Elymas? It’s actually probably neither. These are most likely both nicknames or pseudonyms that this fellow gave himself. And there is meaning in both of them.
The prefix, “bar,” means, “son of,” Simon Bar-Jonah was Peter’s full name, Simon son of Jonah. Barnabas means, “son of encouragement,” Bar-nabas. This title was often assumed to show who a person followed, in this case, this fellow claimed to be a son of Jesus, or a follower of Jesus, both of which were false.
Elymas comes from the Arabic and it means, “wise,” and magician, or, magos, can also be translated as “wise man.” Some Magi, some wise men from the east famously brought Jesus gold, frankincense and myhrr.
Son of Jesus the wise, wise man, sounds like a carnival act to us in our highly evolved and developed sensibilities, but regardless, he had the ear of the governor and was trying to turn him away from the Lord Jesus rather than direct him towards Him.
This is no foreign in our own time, and is honestly, one of the great challenges that the church faces today. There are lots of people who are well rehearsed and polished that have the ears of millions of people but are not leading them to Jesus or helping them follow Him according to His Word.
In the book, The Pilgrim’s Progress, Paul Bunyan called these types of people, “Worldly Wise-Man,” who attempted to turn Christian back on his way toward the holy city.
There is a simple way for us to spot counterfeits today, we have a counterfeit fifty dollar bill that somebody tried to pass off at the restaurant. It is obviously a fake, but I only know that because I have seen a real fifty dollar bill. We can spot counterfeits easily when we familiarize ourselves with the original.
Saul knew the original so he called out the counterfeit.
8 But Elymas the magician (for that is the meaning of his name) opposed them, seeking to turn the proconsul away from the faith. 9 But Saul, who was also called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, looked intently at him 10 and said, “You son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, full of all deceit and villainy, will you not stop making crooked the straight paths of the Lord? 11 And now, behold, the hand of the Lord is upon you, and you will be blind and unable to see the sun for a time.” Immediately mist and darkness fell upon him, and he went about seeking people to lead him by the hand.
The man who called himself, “Bar-Jesus,” the son of Yaweh’s deliverance, Paul called the son of the devil.
The man who called himself, “the wise, wise-man,” was the enemy of righteousness full of deceit and villainy.
Real prophets teach the true way of salvation through faith in Jesus, but false prophets pervert the ways of God and make the straight paths crooked with their lies and lead people away from true faith.
John Calvin wrote, “For seeing as the sorcerer was attempting to darken the sun, and to take from others the benefit of the light, he was, by good right, cast into horrible darkness.”
He who blinded others was blinded himself.
There is a wonderful irony and demonstration of God’s grace in this blindness.
Remember Saul himself had been blinded for a time when Jesus appeared to him on the road to Damascus and someone had to lead him by the hand until his sight was restored. Look at verse 11 again.
11 And now, behold, the hand of the Lord is upon you, and you will be blind and unable to see the sun for a time.” Immediately mist and darkness fell upon him, and he went about seeking people to lead him by the hand.
Just as Saul was, Elymas was gifted the opportunity for self-examination and reflection as an act of divine grace. The design of this punishment, this temporary blindness, was to lead this man to reformation not condemnation.
12 Then the proconsul believed, when he saw what had occurred, for he was astonished at the teaching of the Lord.
This is a demonstration of what Saul would later write in 2 Corinthians 2:15-16,
15 For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, 16 to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life.
There is something to be learned from Saul’s name change as well.
The name, “Saul,” a Hebrew name, means desired and beloved. Saul was named after the King, more handsome than any in Israel, and a whole head and shoulders taller than any other man in the nation.
Now we can finally call Him Paul, a Roman name which means, small and weak. Paul would later refer to himself as weak, and the least of all the saints, and, least of all the apostles, but in that weakness the Lord worked mightily and showed Himself strong.
I can’t help but think that the Holy Spirit may have brought this interaction to Paul’s mind as he wrote these verses from 2 Corinthians 4,
Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart. 2 But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God’s word, but by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God. 3 And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. 4 In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. 5 For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. 6 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Amen.
