Now there were in Antioch, in the assembly which was [there], prophets and teachers Barnabas, and Simeon who was called Niger, and Lucius the Cyrenian, and Manaen, foster-brother of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul.
Antioch was a Gentile city far from Jerusalem, and there the church's outward mission starts again — with no office and no council, only five names. Who were these men, why are they listed in that order, and what did prophets and teachers do?
The mission that follows does not set out from where the story began:
Notice, before we set out with the apostles on their journey, how changed everything is. They start, note, not from the old centre, Jerusalem, but from Antioch, a city of the Gentiles. This matters. Jerusalem and the twelve apostles have lost their place in outward authority and power. The Holy Spirit calls Barnabas and Saul to the work, fits them for it, and sends them out, without the twelve having any authority over it.
Yet this shift caused no split:
Antioch, instead of Jerusalem, now became a centre for spreading the gospel. It was independent of apostolic authority, yet it did not break the unity of the Spirit by forming a separate church.
Five gifted men, yet Luke writes of one "church at Antioch":
No one can deny that there were many gifted men here, five of high standing in full service of Christ, and this plainly in "the church at Antioch." "Churches" in the same place, each with its own minister, are ignored here as everywhere. This does not mean the believers may not have met regularly to break bread in many houses here and there, as we know they did in Jerusalem. Even so, in that city as in every other, they made up "the assembly" there.
The five were not a closed circle. Later arrivals joined the same work:
From Acts 13:1, I see that at Antioch there were only five whom the Holy Spirit recognised as teachers: Barnabas, Simeon, Lucius, Manaen, and Saul. No doubt at every meeting it was only these five, one or more of them, whom the believers expected to speak. This was a settled ministry. But it was not an exclusive one. When Judas and Silas came (Acts 15:32), they were glad to take their place among the others, and then there were more recognised teachers.
Barnabas heads the list and Saul closes it. The order is not a ranking of importance:
Notice too that these five prophets and teachers are not listed by worldly rank or by church office. If they were, Barnabas would not have been first, and Saul would certainly not have been last. They seem instead to be arranged in the order of their spiritual birth… But the gracious power of the Lord, in keeping with His word in Matthew 20:16, was soon to make first in the testimony of His truth the man who here stands last.
Luke names two gifts, not one:
Here the writer draws a distinction, we think, between a prophet and a teacher, since he mentions both… A prophet is someone who has the mind of God and can pass it on, whether he foretells the future or not. So Abraham is the first person in the Old Testament called a prophet, though he never, as far as we read, predicted any event (Gen. 20:7).
Put simply, the two gifts reach a person at different points:
A teacher unfolds the mind of God to the assembly… The prophet is one whose ministry brings the conscience into the immediate presence of God. "Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet," said the woman of Sychar, when her conscience was reached. In general, the teacher is for the understanding, the pastor for the heart, the prophet for the conscience.
The five came from very different backgrounds:
This large church, made up mostly of Gentiles, had no fewer than five prophets and teachers among its members. Their names are given, and they teach us much. One had a surname that probably shows he was a black man (Niger means Black). One was notable enough to have been a foster-brother of Herod. Barnabas was a Greek-speaking Jew. Saul had been a Pharisee of the Pharisees. Lucius may have been a Gentile. So it was clear very early that race and breeding are not what count most in the church, but the gift given from on high.
Manaen and Herod grew up together as foster-brothers:
How different the paths of the two foster-brothers! Herod had ruled his own region for years, but had lately been sent into exile… The other, through grace, became an heir of God and a joint-heir with Christ, called to reign with Him — and before His judgment seat Herod Antipas must one day stand to receive his sentence as the murderer of John the Baptist.
- New centre. The work starts again from Antioch, a Gentile city, not Jerusalem — a fresh centre, not a rival church.
- New gifts. Five prophets and teachers serve there. The prophet reaches the conscience. The teacher unfolds the mind of God to the understanding.
- New reach. A black man, a Greek-speaking Jew, a former Pharisee and Herod's foster-brother stand side by side. The gift from above counts for more than race or breeding.
- New order. The list is not a ladder of rank. The Lord would soon make the man named last first in the testimony of His truth.
- New pattern. One assembly in one city. Its ministry was settled but not closed, and later workers joined the five.
And as they were ministering to the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, Separate me now Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.
In Antioch a small group of teachers and prophets are praying and fasting when the Holy Spirit breaks in with a command. The moment raises questions that still shape Christian service: what were they doing when He spoke, who called Barnabas and Saul, and does the Spirit still direct His workers this way?
What filled the room was not preaching to people. It was time spent with the Lord Himself. (The quotes here use an older translation, which reads "as they ministered to the Lord.") One writer rules out two common misreadings and explains what the fasting added:
Do not confuse this ministering to the Lord with serving Him in preaching or teaching. It was no doubt mainly prayer and intercession. The idea that the Lord's Supper was involved is crude and unfounded... The fasting that went with their spiritual action toward the Lord confirms this. Fasting humbles the outward nature, so that the inner man may be before Him with an undivided heart.
That posture is not a relic of the past. It raises a question about how we start work for God today:
We may well ask whether our service for God today is often taken up too easily. Would it not help spiritual power and effectiveness if we were more often found in this attitude before we began anything for God?... Our question is about waiting on God together, with fasting, before we start work in which all the saints have a common interest. The early Church understood this.
The wording of the command is the point. Something that speaks, claims servants for itself, and issues orders is not a force:
Many have thought of the Holy Spirit as only an influence, and not as a Person, equal with the Father and the Son in the unity of the Godhead. But Scripture shows plainly that He speaks and acts only as a Divine Person can speak and act. The present occasion bears this out. An influence cannot say, "Separate ME Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them." This is the language of a Divine Person. It is the speech of sovereignty, and only a Divine Person is qualified to use it, out of a will that is all-powerful and wholly wise.
Notice the tense. The Spirit does not say "I am calling them" but "I have called them." The separation falls on two men who had already served for years:
Whatever the channel, the word was not spoken to the church but to the fellow workers, to separate those two for the special work in front of them. It is the Spirit Who says, "I have called them." This was not the first time either Barnabas or Saul had been called with authority to the service of Christ. Even the younger of the two had worked openly and well for years, both in the gospel and in the church. Men in a hurry to find the rite of ordination in this passage end up with ordination carried out by brothers of lower rank than the two men themselves.
The commission did not come from Jerusalem, from the twelve apostles, or from the meeting in Antioch. Their work traced back to one source:
The Holy Spirit commands them to separate to Him Barnabas and Saul for the work to which He had called them... The definite and obvious source of their mission was the Holy Spirit. It was the Holy Spirit who called them to the work. He sent them out — an all-important principle in the Lord's ways on earth. We come out from Jerusalem, from Judaism, and from the authority of the apostles the Lord chose while He was on earth.
One writer draws the line between what belonged to that hour alone and what stays with the Church:
The occasion was momentous. It was the first regular going out from the assembly of messengers who would carry the gospel to Gentiles as well as Jews. Some features here belong to the apostles alone. Yet in the main it is a simple picture of the spirit of prayer, self-denial, dependence and fellowship that should mark the Church of God at all times. There may be no "prophets" now who can put the infallible "thus says the Lord" in front of their own words. But we have the "thus says the Lord" in His all-sufficient and infallible word, and we have the same sovereign Spirit, who can certainly make His will known.
- Waiting — They were not planning a campaign. They were busy with the Lord in prayer and fasting. Guidance came to men already turned toward Him.
- Speaking — A mere influence cannot say "Separate Me." The One who broke the silence claims servants for Himself. That is the language of God.
- Calling — The call came first, the separation second. God's summons to a work is His own act, not a rank conferred by other men.
- Sending — The mission came from the Spirit, not from Jerusalem, not from the twelve apostles, not from the meeting at Antioch. A new starting point on earth had opened.
- Continuing — Some features belonged to that one hour. The prayer, self-denial, dependence and fellowship are for the Church always, and the same sovereign Spirit still makes His will known.
Then, having fasted and prayed, and having laid [their] hands on them, they let [them] go.
The Spirit had just named Barnabas and Saul for the work He had called them to. This verse records what the gathering at Antioch did next: fasting, prayer, and hands laid on the two men. What did that act give them, if anything?
The chapter mentions fasting twice. One writer reads that repetition as a sign about the people waiting on God, not about the food.
Twice fasting is mentioned, and it must be specially significant. I do not speak of the mere going without food. I mean that spirit of earnest longing, of self-denial, of absorption, which lies behind the actual neglect of food. Fasting is not an end, and hardly a means to an end. It is a sign of the purpose of a soul that has lost its natural inclinations in one mastering desire. It is to such souls, emptied of self, that the Spirit makes known His will.
One writer answers those who say such passages only describe an inner attitude:
The assembly identified themselves fully with their mission by fasting, prayer, and laying on of hands. I think when Scripture says a fast, it means a fast. Often one hears it said, "That means a moral state." Do you think it was only a moral state at Antioch? The moral state existed, and it showed itself by an actual, physical fast, which was not commanded, so far as we read.
The account explains the gesture later, when the two men return to where they started.
This was not to confer authority... The end of Acts 14 explains what this action was, and why hands were laid on them. It says there that they sailed to Antioch, the starting-point, from where "they had been commended to the grace of God for the work which they fulfilled." That was the object and meaning of the hands laid on Barnabas and Saul. It was not the presumptuous thought that men who were spiritually below the apostles could give them what they themselves did not have to the same degree. It was simply a brotherly commendation to the grace of God.
One writer draws out what a hand laid on a man commits you to.
Note this, no hypocrisy. If I pray, and put my hands upon a man, I am identified with him. If I put my hand on my brother in prayer, I ought next to put my hand into my pocket, to help him, because "the laborer deserves his wages." They identified themselves with these two men, and no doubt supported them.
One writer asks who was laying hands on whom, and what that would mean if the act were ordination.
Here prophets are together, and the Holy Spirit says, "Separate me Barnabas and Saul to the work to which I have called them." There was no popular choice of office-bearers, at any rate. And these prophets (not the presbytery, of which there is not a word) laid their hands on them. It was not to ordain them, but to commend them to the grace of God for the work which they then fulfilled. ... If this is ordination, it is ordination of apostles by laymen.
The last words of the verse matter. Where the ESV reads "sent them off," one writer argues that the assembly only let them go:
They were all waiting on the Lord in complete seriousness of spirit when the word came. Afterwards, when they laid their hands on them, prayer and fasting went with the action. But those who acted with this true and earnest interest took no authority in it. They "let them go" — not "sent them away." The text says next, in plain words, that the "sending forth" was of the Spirit.
From here the base shifts, and so does the authority behind the mission.
They were sent forth by Him — an all-important principle as to the Lord's ways on earth. We come out from Jerusalem, from Judaism, from the jurisdiction of the apostles named by the Lord while He was on earth. ... A glorious Christ in heaven acknowledges the disciples as members of His body, as Himself on high. The mission comes from the Holy Spirit on earth, and it knows only His energy as the source of action and authority. This is the work which now opens.
- Emptied — fasting is the sign of a soul absorbed in one desire, and the Spirit makes His will known to such souls.
- Commended — the hands on Barnabas and Saul meant one thing, and the end of Acts 14 says it: the assembly commended them to the grace of God for the work.
- Identified — real commendation continues in support: a hand on a man in prayer, then a hand in the pocket.
- Released — the assembly only let them go; the word for sending them out belongs to the Holy Spirit in the next verse.
- Sent — the mission came from the Spirit, not from Jerusalem or any office, and the work now opens away from the old centre.