Acts 14:26

Act_14:26-28

And thence sailed to Antioch … And when they were come, and had gathered the Church together, they rehearsed all that God had done.

Apostles and Crusaders at Antioch: a historical contrast

If when we contrast the voyage of Paul and Barnabas across the bay of Attalia with the voyage of those who sailed over the same waters eleven centuries later, our minds are powerfully drawn towards the pure days of early Christianity, when the power of faith made human weakness irresistibly strong, the same thoughts are not less forcibly presented when we contrast the reception of the Crusaders at Antioch with the reception of the apostles in the same city. We are told that Raymond, Prince of Antioch, waited with much expectation for the arrival of the French king; and that when he heard of his landing at Seleucia he gathered together all the nobles and chief men of the people and went out to meet him, and brought him into Antioch with much pomp and magnificence, showing him all reverence and homage, in the midst of a great assemblage of the clergy and people. All that Luke tells us of the reception of the apostles after their victorious campaign is what he says in the text. Thus the kingdom of God came at the first without observation--with the humble acknowledgment that all power is given from above, and with a thankful recognition of our Fathers love to all mankind. (J. S. Howson, D. D.)

Missionary enterprises

I. There is great need in the world for missionaries.

1. There was great need for them in the days of the early Church.

2. There is much more need in the present day.

II. It is the duty of the Church to take up the subject of foreign missions, because--

1. The Church of all earthly things is the most, and indeed only, capable.

2. The Church itself, having received the glad tidings, ought from gratitude to make them known to others.

III. This duty, if rightly performed, will surely meet with success. Not necessarily at first, but eventually.

IV. It is the Saviours command that the gospel should be preached in all lands. (T. Newsome.)

Missionary reports

1. It is well that missionaries should occasionally return. Their return will strengthen them, and again arouse the Churches to a new interest in the missionary cause.

2. The true missionary will report, not what he has done, but what God has done with him.

3. The true missionary will report holy God has opened the door of faith to those to whom he was sent. (S. S. Times.)

The report of the mission

This was the first missionary report ever presented. Of late years these rehearsals have been common. And it is well that it should be so, provided that the accounts are truthfully given and the results anxiously weighed. Let us observe--

I. The object of the apostles mission.

1. You all know how ill any work must be done which has not a definite aim. What would a carpenters, a builders, a lawyers, or a physicians work be without some end set before it? Too often in religious matters this is left out of sight. A clergyman, as it is said, performs duty--that is, he has gone through the public service, etc. But was that his end, or only the means to his end? A serious question. Far too often we do make these duties ends: if we can perform our duty (as it is sometimes said) creditably, we are ready to say, I have done my duty; I have gained my end. But who does not see that no amount of labour thus accomplished necessarily implies the slightest sense of the real work of the ministry? Where is the end in all this? No builder would satisfy his employer by merely being seen so many hours each day at his work, if nothing came of it, or nothing but crooked walls, leaking roofs, etc. It is even so in things spiritual. He is not a good workman who has nothing to show for it but his toil. True, in these matters, unlike the other, men cannot by any skill or any devotion secure his object: God gives, and withholds; and he who thinks that his own labour or even his own prayer can guarantee success has not yet learned his first lesson in the school of Jesus Christ. St. Pauls object is forcibly expressed in his own words, That ye should turn from these vanities unto the living God. Turning, conversion, was and still is the end of the ministry.

2. If this is indeed the meaning of our office, and its responsibility, can any exhortation be more needful than that which bids the congregation remember its object and so aid its work? If its end is to turn you to God, yours surely will be the chief loss and the chief misery if it fails.

II. Its methods. We are struck by its unity, and we are struck also by its variety.

1. St. Paul appears to speak quite differently to the Jews at Antioch and to the idolaters at Lystra. With the one he argues from the Scriptures; with the other only from the book of nature. And how can it be otherwise if a man is in earnest? Does the physician proceed, without inquiry, to apply one mode of treatment everywhere, and expect the recovery of health, which is his object, to reward such unreasoning efforts? Even so it is with the physician of the soul. His first business is to ascertain where men stand, what men know and believe. Till he knows something upon these points, he can only employ the bow at a venture. To speak to a man of salvation when he has never been conscious of danger, to offer a man forgiveness who has never trembled at sin, is to cover up the mischief instead of extirpating it, to comfort a man in his sins instead of rescuing him from them. Till the people of Lystra knew that there was one God, it was idle to say to them, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. On the other hand, those who already possessed the evidence also of a Divine revelation, those whose fault it was to count themselves safe because they had honoured God with a ceremonial worship, must be instructed out of that revelation itself as to the sinfulness of sin, as to the need and the promise and the coming of a Saviour, in the language of a prophet in whom they believed.

2. More than half the failures of our ministry arise from inappropriate teaching and from inappropriate hearing. There is a man here, as there once was when Jesus Himself was the Preacher, possessed by the spirit of an unclean devil. He comes hither, drawn perhaps by custom, perhaps by a wish to gloss over his lost state, perhaps by an instinctive longing to lull the disquietude of his soul. This man meets Jesus here. But too often it is only a hearing of the sound--something about guilt, about atonement, about the mercy of God--and the man goes away as he came; what he has understood he has misapplied; the unclean spirit is still there, soothed, calmed, lulled, like the surfeited snake till its next fit of hunger. That man ought to have been told of God in conscience before he was told of God in redemption. Till he has trembled at judgment to come, till he has cried out against himself as a sinner, he can scarcely profit, he may even be fatally injured, by the offer of a pardon which he wants not, or of a Saviour whom he will only crucify afresh.

3. What cannot be done by the preacher must be done for himself by the individual hearer. Let a man ask himself, Is that word for me? Does that suit my case? God give me the spirit of wisdom in hearing, lest that which should be for my health be to me the occasion of falling.

III. It had also a careful regard to the carrying on of that which was well begun.

1. In the form of regular supervision. They ordained elders in every congregation. He who is turned to God still needs training. It is a comfort to us to believe that our assemblies for worship and instruction had their origin in the institutions of the primitive Church. It is not the one reception of the one great truth which will secure us from the risk of falling away. The minister has to learn; and if he do not learn, his ministry will soon become a vain repetition, a barren and a wearisome form, both to himself and to those who hear him. Even so is it with the congregation. They too have need to learn in the school of God; and the services of this place ate designed to help them in learning.

2. In the form of well-instructed expectation (verse 22). Neither our Saviour nor His apostles ever misled men as to the nature of the Christian life below--that it must be a conflict, and therefore a life of tribulation. (Dean Vaughan.)

Apostolic rehearsal

I. What did the apostles rehearse in the ears of the Church? All that God had done with them. Not all that they had done of themselves, by dint of their own efforts, by the power of their own persuasion. Not how many good sermons they had preached, what overflowing congregations were attracted to hear them, or what unbounded applause had been bestowed upon their ministry. Nor did they make their sufferings the theme of conversation: yet they were destitute, afflicted, tormented (Heb_11:37). They related all that God had done with them. Not what the Almighty had performed by His own immediate agency, independent of all human instrumentality; but what He had done by their hands, as the servants of His will.

1. God had by them communicated instruction in Divine things to the people whom they addressed.

2. They not only taught many: they were also made the happy instruments of leading a great multitude to believe in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

3. God made them the instruments of confirming the souls of the disciples.

4. God had opened a door of faith to the Gentiles.

II. To whom the apostles rehearsed the things which God had done by their instrumentality. They gathered the Church together, etc. Let us inquire, what were the discriminating marks by which the primitive Churches were distinguished?

1. By their disunion with the world. The primitive Christians had their conversation in the world (2Co_1:12), and mixed promiscuously with human society, working with their own hands (1Co_4:12). They were not slothful in business; but fervent in spirit, serving the Lord (Rom_12:11). Notwithstanding, they held no unnecessary intercourse with ungodly men, never selecting them as companions; for the friendship of the world is enmity with God (Jam_4:4). Although they were in the world, they were not of it.

2. The members of the primitive Churches were distinguished by the sanctity of their characters, and the consistency of their conduct. Each of them could adopt the language of St. Paul (Gal_2:20). The principles by which they were actuated were faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, and love to His holy name.

III. What were the motives that induced the apostles to rehearse what God had done with them?

1. We may conceive that it was done to express the warm and grateful effusions of their hearts.

2. The apostles rehearsed what God had done by their means, to gladden the hearts of others.

3. They rehearsed what God had done by them, as a public acknowledgment of the obligations under which they were laid to Him. (R. Treffry.)

And how He had opened the door of faith unto the Gentiles.--

God opening doors:--He who has the keys of David can open all doors. No preacher must assume these keys to himself, but must pray that God, who only can use them effectually, will do so. And if anything is to be effected for the salvation of souls, God must open four doors--the door of the preachers mouth, the doors of the hearers ear and heart, the door of heaven. (K. Gerok.)

The door of faith

I. This metaphor sets forth that the simple act of trust in God, as revealed in Christ, is the way by which we pass into the house of God. Christ says, I am the Door, and faith is the means of access. This faith is the outer door, the vestibule which leads to the real opening by which we enter into all the mystery and the sweetness of the Divine home. It is a very little, low door. There are a great many much more pretentious ways to God held out to men. There are the doors of contemplation, of asceticism, of ceremonial, of a self-righteous, proud, purity of life; but a man cannot get more than a step inwards if he tries them. But there is a narrow portal yonder, and if a man will go down upon his knees, and if he will leave his sins outside, it will be like one of those narrow passages with a little tiny aperture in it, where a hunted race used to take up their abode, and which widened out into a broad apartment where a man could stand in safety and warmth and home. We go through this narrow door of trust, but we come out into the large room of our Fathers house.

II. The other side of the metaphor suggests the means by which God can enter into us. The door into our hearts is faith. There is no possibility, in heaven or in earth, for God to come with His blessings into any mans heart except through the door of that mans faith. You take a flask, seal it hermetically, tie a bit of canvas over the mouth of it, pitch that with tar, and plunge it into the Atlantic; and the inside of it will be as dry as if it was in the midst of African deserts. And as long as a mans heart is hermetically sealed, which it is by the absence of faith, it is all one to him, as if there were no mercy. The ocean of mercy and love is all outside of him. Notice, in passing, how small a thing a door is--just a piece of timber worth a few shillings. Yes! but if a king comes in, there is a dignity about it. Faith in itself is nothing; it is precious because it is a means by which we lay hold upon precious things.

III. This door is to be kept open by ourselves. We read of Lydias heart being opened by the Lord; and we read of Christ knocking at the door, waiting for our opening of it to Him. These are two halves of a great truth. Lydias heart would never have been opened had she not willed. You are responsible for exercising and for continuing to exercise this act of faith. This is one of those doors that shut to in a moment if not clasped back. Day by day we must get rid of the worlds rubbish that tries to choke up the doorway, by prayer, by effort to expel the evil. The Lord stands before each of us and summons us, Lift up your heads, O ye gates; even lift them up, ye everlasting doors: and the King of glory shall come in. Let us answer, Come in, Thou blessed of the Lord; wherefore standest Thou without! (A. Maclaren, D. D.)

The open gate of salvation

The trouble with many people is that they want to have a hundred curious questions about God and heaven answered before they come to Christ and trust in Christ. They do not act so in other matters. If a man is out in the woods at night and has lost his way, he does not sit down on a log and wait for the sun to rise, or for someone to kindle a bonfire that shall illuminate the whole forest. No, no. If the glimmer of a candle reaches his eye, no matter how faint and far away, he rejoices--he begins at once to move in that direction. The light shows that he can be saved if he will follow it. And it is so with even the feeblest shining of the light of life which reaches a man. Let him be faithful to what it reveals, and he is sure of salvation. Says Dr. Parkhurst: Light is a sure guide, because, unlike sound, it goes in straight lines. If you were to strike the tired, diminished end of a sunbeam a million, million miles from the sun, you are on the certain track of the sun the instant you begin treading upwards the glittering highway that that sunbeam spreads out for you. And wherever and howsoever far out upon the circumference of Christs character you take your position and begin threading inward any one of its radiating lines, you move by a line as straight as a sunbeam towards the heart and centre of the entire matter. One radius is as good as another for finding the centre. Each of the twelve gates thresholded a main avenue of the heavenly Jerusalem. The gate of heaven is not away up yonder; it is wherever we look to Christ as the Opener of heaven to the penitent and believing soul. He said, I am the door; by Me if any man enter in he shall be saved. The gospel, whenever we study it as earnest seekers after truth, presents to us one of the pearly gates of paradise.

Gods open doors

There are few men who would pass through a gold mine, having full permission to carry away with them choicest specimens of its choicest treasures, who would not make good use of such an opportunity. All along the highway of life God is setting before each traveller opportunities to be and to do which are far more valuable than the richest treasures of gold or gems which earth offers. These opportunities are so many open doors which lead to the treasure houses of God, prepared for all who seek, and offered to all who ask. (H. W. Beecher.)

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The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

14:26-28 As soon as Paul and Barnabas returned home to Antioch from their first missionary journey, they called the church together and gave a full report of their evangelism and discipleship. They humbly acknowledged divine guidance in opening the door of faith to the Gentiles (see 11:18; 1 Cor 16:9; 2 Cor 2:12). Similar reports (Acts 15:4, 12; 21:19) always stressed the activity of God as working through the ministries of his servants (see Rom 15:17-18; 1 Cor 3:5-9; 15:10-11).

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Act 14:26. Ἀπέπλευσαν) they sailed back.—παραδεδομένοι, from whence they had been recommended [dedicated]) ch. Act 13:2: נתינים, Nethinim = ‘devoted:’ applied to the servants of the temple who waited on the Levites.—τῇ χάριτι) the grace (ch. Act 15:40) which was about to flow through them upon many.—ἐπλήρωσαν, they fulfilled) A most delightful word.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Act 14:26 . κἀκεῖθεν , cf. Act 7:3 , and Luk 11:53 , in six other places in Acts in a local sense as here, only once elsewhere in N.T., in Mar 9:30 , in same sense; see also Act 13:21 . ᾖσαν παραδεδομ .: “they had been committed,” R.V., in Act 15:40 “commended”; in both passages A.V. “recommended,” a rendering which has changed its meaning; only in these two passages in this sense, but cf. 1Pe 2:23 (Joh 19:30 ). ὃ ἐπλήρωσαν , cf. Act 12:25 , Act 13:25 , still, as hitherto, St. Paul found the χάρις of God “sufficient”.

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Antioch of Syria.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

sailed to Antioch, from whence they had been recommended--(See on Act 13:3).

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 26. And thence sailed to Antioch] This was Antioch in Syria; and to reach which, by sea, they were obliged to coast a part of the Mediterranean Sea, steering between Cyprus and Cilicia; though they might have gone the whole journey by land.

Whence they had been recommended-for the work which they fulfilled.] The reader will recollect that it was from this Antioch they had been sent to preach the Gospel to the heathen in Asia Minor: see Ac 13:1-2; and that they fulfilled that work: see in the same chapter, Ac 13:48; and the circumstantial account of their travels and preaching given in this chapter.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

26. When they had been commended. Luke might have said that they were ordained there to be the apostles of the Gentiles; but by a circuit of words he doth more plainly express that they were neither sent away of men, neither did they attempt any thing trusting to their own strength, but that their whole journey, together with the success, was committed to God, the author thereof. Therefore, their preaching was no man’s work, but a work of the grace of God. And the word grace is referred as well unto the power and efficacy of the Spirit, as also unto all the rest of the signs of favor; because all those gifts be free which God bestoweth upon his servants. And the sentence may be thus resolved, that they prayed God that he would show forth his grace to further the labors of his servants.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

26. from whence they had been recommended to the grace of God] Better, “had been commended.” The verb is not the same as in Act_14:23, but the sense is. The old English verb “recommended” had the meaning which now belongs only to “commend.”

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And when they were come,.... To Antioch:

and had gathered the church together: which was in that place, and who came together at their request; for as they were sent out by them, they judged it proper to call them together; and give them an account of the issue of their work they were recommended by them to the grace of God to fulfil: and being come together at their usual place of meeting,

they rehearsed all that God had done with them; and by them, as instruments; what grace and strength he had given them to preach the Gospel; what numbers of souls were everywhere converted by it; what miracles were wrought by them for the confirmation of it; and what persecutions and sufferings they had endured for the sake of it; and what deliverances were vouchsafed unto them:

and how he had opened the door of faith unto the Gentiles; the phrase, "the door of faith", seems to be Jewish; it is to be met with in Jewish writings: it is said (f),

"there are two women found in the world, that express the praise of God, so as all the men of the world have not; and who are they? Deborah and Hannah: Hannah, according to Sa1 2:2 "there is none holy as the Lord, for there is none beside thee" and all proclaim that she , "opens the door of faith to the world", as Act 14:8 "he raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth the beggar from the dunghill, lo, the door of faith; to set them among princes", lo, the faith that is above.''

The sense here seems to be, that God had given an opportunity to the apostles to preach the doctrine of faith unto the Gentiles, and the Gentiles had had an opportunity of hearing and embracing it; God had opened the mouths of his ministers to preach to them, and he had opened their hearts to attend unto it, and receive it; for it may be understood of his giving of them the grace of faith, by which they received Christ, and his Gospel, into their hearts: so a like phrase is used by the Targumist on Jer 33:6 who paraphrases the words thus;

"behold, I will bring unto them healing and redemption, and I will heal them, and I will reveal, or "open to them", , "the door of repentance";''

that is, I will give them repentance: so here, when God is said to open the door of faith to the Gentiles, the sense is, that he had given the grace of faith to them, which came by hearing the word of the Gospel, which he sent them; and gave them encouragement to believe in Christ; so the phrase a door of hope is used in Hos 2:15.

(f) Zohar in Lev. fol. 8. 3. & in Deut. fol. 109. 4. Vid. ib. in Gen. fol. 60. 2. & 68. 2. Vid. Raziel, fol. 39. 2.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

25 And when they had preached the word in Perga, they went down into Attalia:

26 And thence sailed to Antioch, from whence they had been recommended to the grace of God for the work which they fulfilled.

Ver. 26. Recommended to the grace of God] This shows that they set not upon the work in their own strength, but wholly depended upon the free grace of God, qua nolentem praevenit ut velit, volentem subsequitur, ne frustra velit, saith holy Augustine, who was a great advancer of grace, and abaser of nature; as being wholly of St Paul’s spirit, for which the Papists sharply censure him. (Stapleton, Sixt. Senens.)

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And thence sailed to Antioch - See the note at Act 11:19.

From whence they had been recommended ... - Where they had been appointed to this missionary tour by the church, Act 13:1-4.

To the grace of God - His favor and protection had been implored for them in their perilous undertaking.

For the work which they fulfilled - This shows conclusively:

(1) That they had accomplished fully the work which was originally contemplated. It was strictly a missionary tour among the Gentiles. It was an important and hazardous enterprise, and was the first in which the church formally engaged. Hence, so much importance is attached to it, and so faithful a record of it is preserved.

(2) It shows that the act by which they were set apart to this Act 13:1-3 was not an ordination to the ministerial office. It was an appointment to a missionary tour.

(3) It shows that the act was not an appointment to the apostleship. Paul was an apostle before by the express appointment of the Saviour; and Barnabas was never an apostle in the original and proper sense of the term. It was a designation to a temporary work, which was now fulfilled.

We may remark, also, in regard to this missionary tour:

(1) That the work of missions is one which early engaged the attention of Christians.

(2) It entered into their plans, and was one in which the church was deeply interested.

(3) The work of missions is attended with danger. People are now no less hostile to the gospel than they were in Lystra and Iconium.

(4) Missionaries should be sustained by the prayers of the church. And,

(5) In the conduct of Paul and Barnabas we have an example for missionaries in founding churches, and in regard to their own trials and persecutions. If they were persecuted, missionaries may be now; and if the grace of Christ was sufficient to sustain them, it is not the less sufficient to sustain those of our own times amidst all the dangers attending the preaching of the cross in pagan lands.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Antioch; that Antioch which was in Syria, as appears Act 13:1-3, to which this relates; and is a sufficient proof that they had not sought God in vain, and that there is no better preparation or provision towards any business, than faithful prayer unto God concerning it; doing our duty, and leaving the event unto his disposing.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

26. Sailed to Antioch—Trace upon the map their line of voyage cutting through the Mediterranean, between Cilicia and Cyprus, to Seleucia, the seaport town of Antioch.

Whence they had been recommended— Antioch had been the departing point, (Act_13:1-4,) and Antioch is now their returning point.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

They sailed for sailed, A.V.; committed for recommended, A.V.; had fulfilled for fulfilled, A.V.

Prayer as a recommendation to the grace of God.

The Syrian Antioch is here referred to as the place "from whence the two great missionaries had been recommended to the grace of God," and from Act_13:3 we learn in what this recommendation to the grace of God consisted: "And when they had fasted and prayed, and laid their hands on them, they sent them away." We fix attention, then, on the point that we know what were the prayers of these Antiochene disciples. They were intercessory prayers, and they lovingly commended the Christian laborers to the grace of God. When prayer, for any reasons, cannot be precise and definite request for particular things, it can still be offered, and take this every-way satisfactory form, a commendation of those for whom we pray to the grace of God. We may show how

(1) such a kind of prayer may satisfy our love and our longing for the good of others; and

(2) how it may secure for them even better blessings than any precise requests, based only on our thought of their well-being. What can we do so well for our friends as bring down over them the hallowing shadow of the Father-God?

I SUCH PRAYER MAY SATISFY OUR LOVE AND LONGING FOR THE GOOD OF OTHERS. For, after all, just the one thing we want for them is to have God for their portion. No requests for temporal blessings can adequately express our hearts" desires. Ask what we may, we feel that we have not asked enough or asked the best things. So we get no rest in prayer for others until we learn simply to commend them to the grace of God. The same may be shown by pointing out that our knowledge of cur friends" needs is never adequate, and we may make serious error by asking unsuitably. There can be no mistake if we ask for them God"s grace.

II SUCH PRAYER SECURES THE REST BLESSINGS FOR OUR FRIENDS. For in having God they have all. To be within the grace and keeping and supply of God is to have the best blessings, in fittest adaptations. Illustration should be taken from the first missionary journey of Barnabas and Paul. They were prospered and preserved because they were within the grace of God. R.T.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Recommended to the grace - Or favour, of God, for the work which they had fulfilled - This shows the nature and design of that laying on of hands, which was mentioned chap. xiii, 3.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

See notes on verse 24

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

26. ὅθεν ἦσαν παραδεδομένοι τῇ χάριτι τοῦ θεοῦ, from whence they had been commended to the grace of God. It is necessary to recur to the more usual meaning of παραδίδοσθαι before we reach the whole sense of these words. It is most commonly used of giving up to enemies, and of exposing to danger; and that there were dangers and foes in abundance before them those who sent out Barnabas and Paul knew, but while sending them into danger, they had faith in the grace of God for them.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

26.] ὅθεν, as being the centre whence their apostolic commission had spread.

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.