lystra Summary and Overview

a town of Lycaonia, in Asia Minor, in a wild district and among a rude population. Here Paul preached the gospel after he had been driven by persecution from Iconium (Acts 14:2-7). Here also he healed a lame man (8), and thus so impressed the ignorant and superstitious people that they took him for Mercury, because he was the "chief speaker," and his companion Barnabas for Jupiter, probably in consequence of his stately, venerable appearance; and were proceeding to offer sacrifices to them (13), when Paul earnestly addressed them and turned their attention to the true source of all blessings. But soon after, through the influence of the Jews from Antioch in Pisidia and Iconium, they stoned Paul and left him for dead (14:19). On recovering, Paul left for Derbe; but soon returned again, through Lystra, encouraging the disciples there to steadfastness. He in all likelihood visited this city again on his third missionary tour (Acts 18:23). Timothy, who was probably born here (2 Tim. 3:10, 11), was no doubt one of those who were on this occasion witnesses of Paul's persecution and his courage in Lystra.

This place has two points of interest in connection respectively with St. Paul's first and second missionary Journeys: (1) as the place where divine honors were offered to him, and where he was presently stoned, #Ac 14:1| ... (2) as the home of his chosen companion and fellow missionary Timotheus. #Ac 16:1| Lystra was in the eastern part of the great plain of Lycaonia, and its site may be identified with the ruins called Bin-bir-Kilisseh, at the base of a conical mountain of volcanic structure, named the Karadagh.

LYS'TRA , a city of Lycaonia, situated in the eastern part of the great plain, probably at the present Bin-bar-Kilisheh. Paul visited this place twice, the first time in company with Barnabas, Acts 14, when he was saluted as the god Mercury, but afterward stoned, the second time in company with Silas. Acts 16. Timothy was probably born here. 2 Tim 3:11. __________________________________________________________________ M.

(See Acts 14; Acts 16.) A town of Lycaonia, Timothy's birthplace. He doubtless heard of Paul's miraculous healing of the cripple, followed by the people's and priests' offer of sacrifices to Paul as Mercury and to Barnabas as Jupiter before the city (its tutelary god whose statue stood there), which worship the apostles, rending their clothes in horror, rejected, and told them they were men like themselves, and that they preached the duty of "turning from these vanities unto the living God, who made all things," and who heretofore bore with their ignorance, though even then He "did not leave Himself without witness in giving rain, and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness." Then, with a mob's characteristic fickleness, from adoration they passed to persecution, stoning Paul at the instigation of Jews from Antioch and Iconium. But though left as dead outside the city, while the disciples stood round him he rose up and came into the city, and next day went to Derbe; then back to Lystra to "confirm the souls of the disciples" gathered in there, "exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God." Paul's holy courage under suffering, when he might have had adoration instead by compromise of principle, doubtless in part influenced Timothy (2 Timothy 3:10-11) in embracing Christianity, whether he actually witnessed the apostle's afflictions (as Paul's epistle to Timothy implies), or only heard of them. The incidental allusion to Timothy's knowledge of his sufferings is an undesigned coincidence between the epistle and the history, indicating genuineness. A forger of epistles from Acts would never allude to Timothy's knowledge of persecutions, when that knowledge is not recorded in Acts but is only arrived at by indirect inference. Moreover, "Derbe" is omitted in the list of the scenes of Paul's persecutions (2 Timothy 3:11), though usually joined with Lystra, in minute agreement with the history, which mentions no persecution at Derbe. In Acts 16:1 Timothy appears as already a Christian. Paul then circumcised him, to conciliate the Jews there (Acts 16:3). Hamilton (Res. in Asia Min., 2:313) identifies Lystra with the ruins Bin bir Kilisseh, at the base of the conical volcanic-formed hill Karadagh.