Acts 16:6-15
So, passing by Mysia, they went down to Troas. And a vision appeared to Paul in the night: a man of Macedonia was standing there, urging him and saying, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” (vv. 8-9) What’s strange to me in these two verses is that Paul is even at Troas. If you look at a map, the Galatian cities of Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe are in east-central modern-day Turkey, directly north of Cyprus, very far inland from the western coast of modern-day Turkey. In fact, Galatian Antioch is closer to Syrian Antioch than it is to Troas. So, having visited those four Galatian cities where he had preached before, Paul continues northwest through Phrygia and Mysia. Paul had been prohibited by the Spirit to speak further in Asia (modern-day Turkey), so he was intending to go to Bithynia, on the northern coast of modern-day Turkey (the southern coast of the Black Sea), a couple hundred miles east of Istanbul. But he was prohibited by the Spirit to go there also. So his only course was westward, to the west coast of modern-day Turkey, where Troas was located. And at Troas, as fortune (and the Holy Spirit) would have it, he gets the call in a dream to cross the Aegean Sea to go to Philippi, a city in what was then Macedonia and is now in the northeastern strip of land in modern-day Greece.
Why is this strange to me? It took two prohibitions from the Holy Spirit and one dream to get Paul to where the Lord wanted him. That is, Paul had made his plans, but the Lord took over and gave Paul His plans! I look at Paul’s change-of-plans and compare his journey to how Carol and I have found our way to St. Andrew’s. I failed at Texas A&M University – I was denied tenure in 1990. I failed at the University of Delaware – I was not hired into an open position in 1996 even though I was a visiting professor there. And the Episcopal Church failed to follow Scripture faithfully in 2003, leading to St. Andrew’s being formed and forcing us to look for fellowship outside the Episcopal Church. Three major failures and here we are!! Each of those failures was heartbreaking at the time, but the Lord had His plan for us. Blows me away when I really think about it…!! GLORY!
Slava Bohu!