No Small Parts - Elymas
January 24, 2021 Sunday Evening Study

The Bible is full of stories of miracles of healing, restoration, and deliverance - especially in the New Testament. These stories lend to the good news of the Gospel - they provide hope and bolster our faith and the faith of the people who saw them happen. We speak of the wonders and great things that Jesus did, and sometimes...sometimes - we forget something about the nature of God. Jesus led a ministry of love - but even as we discussed this morning, there were times where Jesus’ ministry involved speaking the truth - and in doing so stirring up trouble and making waves all over the place.

What we forget is God is not a pushover. God expresses love and grace to us, but there is no compromise in His righteousness. The very reason that the Sanhedrin wanted Jesus dead was because there was really nothing they could charge Him with - the truth was the truth and it threatened everything about the systems they had built for themselves. As the disciples followed Jesus and watched him teach and minister, they experienced first hand the balance that Jesus walked between speaking the truth of the Gospel in righteousness and opposing the darkness of the world. We so easily forget that even when Jesus was traveling and ministering to the world, evil was still present and just as active as it is today - and often it found its way into the paths of Jesus and the apostles.

In the Bible we come across several characters who practice “powers” that are not of God - we talked about Simon the sorcerer a few weeks back. At A2J this past week we talked about when Paul and Silas cast the demon out of a “fortune teller” and go to prison over it - there seems to be no shortage of people who believe they can tap into a power to use for their own devices. And with Simon from before, he even sought to buy the power that he saw in the apostles as the spirit was filling the Samaritans around him who were being saved. Each time we meet a person like this, whether it is Jesus or an apostle, there is always a direct confrontation - no punches are pulled, and the power of God not only overcomes, but does so before there is even a fight.

Please open your Bibles to Acts Chapter 13. I want to give a brief outline of the context here - so that you can begin to see how each of these characters we have been studying will fit into this overall narrative. You will recall that Saul had been stricken blind on his way to Damascus, and once in Damascus, he was presented the gospel by Ananias and was saved and baptized. The story then goes back to Peter who heals a paralytic, raises Dorcas from the dead, and then is involved in the conversion of Cornelius - the first Gentile convert who is uncircumcised.

While Peter is ministering in this way, we learn that the church is spreading as a result of the martyrdom of Stephen - people are looking for a safe place to worship now that real persecution is at hand in many parts of Palestine and outlying areas. In Jerusalem, they learn that the church is taking root strongly in Antioch in the north - not just with Jews, but with the Greeks too, so they send Barnabas there - a man known for being a righteous man and gifted teacher. When he gets to Antioch he sees how God is moving there, and sends to Tarsus for Paul. Paul joins him and spends a full year ministering with Barnabas to the church in Antioch - serving Jews and Gentiles alike. As the church flourishes, the Holy Spirit impresses upon the leaders that Saul and Barnabas are being called to a different work. The other leaders fast and pray, lay hands on Saul and Barnabas, and sent them off to sail to the island of Cyprus, where they set about preaching the Gospel in the synagogues. Read Acts 13:6-12.

So as Saul and Barnabas come to the city of paphos, they encounter a pretty unsavory guy. Luke says this man is a sorcerer - originally called a magus  - which also carries the connotation that not only was he a false prophet, but by tradition and position would automatically be an opponent of anyone preaching any religious message. This man is named Bar-Jesus, which in Aramaic means “son of Joshua or Yeshua” - the name Elymas is more of a title name associated with his classification as a magus - it comes from the Arabic term alim which is a term for a ‘wise one.’

This man is well-known, and is likely quite gifted at what he does, because he has the ear of the proconsul - the appointed governor of the island of Cyprus under the Roman emperor Claudius. This man who has oversight of the entire island nation is listening and taking advice from a false prophet and sorcerer, yet the Bible says that he was an intelligent man, and he had a desire to hear the word of God.

This is disastrous for Elymas, because it threatens the control and influence he has with this ruler, so Elymas responds exactly how you would expect. If we recall several stories from the Old Testament - whenever the false high priests of leaders of paganistic rituals were threatened by men and women of God, they immediately go on the offensive. This is Elymas’ response, who is said to attack on 2 fronts - to oppose Saul and Barnabas, and to attempt to turn the proconsul from the faith. This two pronged approach tells us a couple of things about the situation.

One, there is a seed of faith already present in the pro-consul if Elymas must cause him to turn. Acts does not tell us if Saul and Barnabas had even had the opportunity to say anything to the proconsul - only that there is already faith in existence with the man. Had God revealed himself to the man in some way - allowed him to see beyond the lies of his close advisor? This approach from Elymas also tells us that Elymas himself recognized the truth when he heard it - indicating that for both the sorcerer and the pro-consul, there were supernatural powers at play.

We know from the passage that the evil within Elymas is silenced and overcome, and the pro-consul hears the Gospel and believes. We see a miraculous display of God’s power over evil, and another influential man is saved.

There is something else that happens in this story that is easy to miss, because it isn’t at the forefront of the narrative. This encounter between the men of God and ELymas does not just affect the salvation of Sergius Paulus the proconsul - but a profound change takes place in the dynamic of these two servants of God - particularly Saul of Tarsus.

While Saul had been a learned Jewish lawyer, he had only been ministering according to Christian faith for a year - almost like an apprentice of Barnabas. This encounter is recorded as having taken place in the year 45 A.D. and the term ‘Christian’ has only gained popular acceptance in the region of Antioch, largely due to the work Saul and Barnabas had been doing there. Now, when faced with the real presence of evil opposition to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, a dramatic shift occurs. Here, for the first time, Saul is called by his Greek name Paul, and he is called Paul for the rest of his days, referring to himself as an apostle for Jesus Christ.

This represents the first time we see the power of God yielded by someone other than Jesus or a member of the original twelve. Paul acts in Jesus’ name, and overcomes evil. In this the dynamic between Paul and Barnabas changes - though we don’t see it officially until the next section of the passage. In verse 4 - just before this encounter, Acts speaks of Barnabas and Saul in this way - “The two of them, sent on their way by the Holy Spirit, went down to Seleucia and sailed from there to Cyprus.” Then, when they leave Paphos, verse 13 refers to them in this way: “From Paphos, Paul and his companions sailed to Perga in Pamphylia, where John left them to return to Jerusalem.”

This sorcerer Elymas, so seemingly insignificant in the exchange because he is so quickly silenced, becomes the catalyst for change in the life and station of one of the most influential teachers in the history of Christianity. Many scholars point to this singular event as the point in which - not just in name - Saul becomes Paul the Apostle who pens the vast majority of the rest of scripture from that point. And the irony of what happens specifically should not be lost on us - the miracle performed is to afflict this sorcerer with the very same affliction visited upon Paul at the point of his conversion - as if to affirm that Paul is indeed now fulfilling the Holy SPirit’s call on his life.

Elymas essentially launched the career of the most influential person in Christian history after the person of Jesus. This account has been valued by Catholic tradition as well - the Renaissance artist Raphael has a famous painting called La ceguera de Elymas - meaning Elymas struck blind which inspired woven tapestries which still hang today in the Vatican depicting this encounter.

Evil is rampant in the world today, just as it was then. In his mission from the Holy Spirit, Paul opposed evil when he met it, and we are to do so as well. However, we have to also be listening to the direction of the Spirit - often in Paul’s ministry he encountered corruption and cruelty and injustice - some of which he opposed and some of which he did not - his mission was the Gospel. For Paul evil presented itself by preventing the spread of the Gospel, as Elymas was attempting to do - and this is a solid guide for us when choosing what battles to fight as we also oppose evil. The key is to remember the mission above all else - to proclaim the Gospel to as many as often as we can. Let’s pray.