Unshakeable Faith In The Darkest Hours

When Following Jesus Costs You Everything

What do you do when obedience leads straight into danger? Dave Connolly walks us through Acts 14, where Paul and Barnabas face riots, death threats, and actual stoning — and keep going anyway. Their message to new believers afterwards is not what most of us would choose to hear, but it might be exactly what we need.

The Mission That Would Not Stop

Paul and Barnabas had been set apart by the Holy Spirit to travel through the Roman Empire preaching the good news. Their message was simple — Jesus is the fulfilment of God's promises, and through him we are forgiven and freed from everything we could not free ourselves from.

The response was mixed. In Iconium, a great number of both Jews and Gentiles believed. But opposition grew too. Unbelieving Jews stirred up trouble, poisoned minds against them, and eventually conspired with city leaders to have them stoned.

Paul and Barnabas escaped and went to the next city. And what did they do there? Exactly the same thing. They preached the gospel. The mission did not change because the circumstances got harder.

From Worship to Stoning in a Single Chapter

What happens next in Lystra is one of the most dramatic swings in the entire book of Acts. Paul heals a man who has been lame since birth. The crowd is so astonished they decide Paul and Barnabas must be Greek gods — Zeus and Hermes — and try to offer sacrifices to them.

Paul and Barnabas are horrified. They tear their clothes and run into the crowd to stop them. Their message is clear — we are just people, like you. Turn from these worthless things to the living God who made everything.

And then, in the very next verse, opposing Jews from the previous cities arrive. They persuade the same crowd that was just trying to worship Paul to stone him instead. They drag him out of the city, leaving him for dead.

The crowd went from sacrifice to stoning in a matter of hours. Dave pauses here to make an observation that cuts through the drama. This is what the enemy does — poisons minds to turn people against the truth and against those who speak it.

He Got Up and Went Back

What Paul does next is extraordinary. When the disciples gather around him, he gets up. And he goes back into the city.

Not a different city. The same one. The one where they just tried to kill him.

The next day he and Barnabas move on to Derby and preach the gospel there too. Even stoning does not stop them. They do not strategise about whether it is wise. They do not calculate the risk. They simply know what God has called them to do, and they do it.

The Most Uncomfortable Encouragement

Here is where the passage gets really challenging. After preaching in Derby, Paul and Barnabas go back. They retrace their steps through Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch — the very cities where they were stoned, plotted against, and driven out.

Why? To encourage the new believers.

And what is their encouragement? "We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God."

Dave is honest about his initial reaction. On the surface, that does not sound very encouraging. Most of us would prefer a message about how following Jesus makes life easier. But Paul, bruised and beaten, standing in front of new Christians, is telling them something essential.

Nothing went wrong.

The hardship was not a mistake. The stoning was not evidence that God had abandoned them. The opposition was not proof they were on the wrong path. This is simply what faithfulness looks like sometimes.

We Mistake Hardship for Failure

This is the core challenge Dave draws out. Many Christians have a tendency to think that if they encounter resistance, something must be wrong. If life gets hard, perhaps we misheard God. If following Jesus creates conflict, maybe we should pull back.

But Paul's experience says the opposite. Hardship and faithfulness are not mutually exclusive. Sometimes the right path is the hard path. And the response to difficulty is not to retreat but to lean harder into God.

Dave puts it directly — can I just suggest that maybe it's time to lean harder into God and trust him even more?

Do Not Make Gods of Your Leaders

Dave also pulls out a warning from the passage that is easy to miss. When the crowd tried to worship Paul and Barnabas, the apostles did not accept it. They did not enjoy the flattery. They tore their clothes and begged people to stop.

The warning for us is clear. We should not turn pastors, worship leaders, or any Christian figure into celebrities or idols. Their job is to point to God, not to receive the glory. By all means honour and respect those in ministry — but keep the focus where it belongs.

The Quote That Changes Everything

Dave closes with a quote from Jim Elliot, a missionary who was killed for his faith at the age of 28. "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."

It is a sentence worth sitting with. Everything we cling to in this life is temporary. The only thing that lasts is what we invest in God's kingdom. Paul understood that. The early church lived it. The question is whether we are willing to hold our comfort, our reputation, and our safety with open hands.

Practical Steps This Week

• Examine your response to difficulty. When you hit resistance in your faith — at work, in relationships, in your own heart — do you assume something has gone wrong? What if the difficulty is part of the path, not a sign you're on the wrong one?

• Ask yourself what you are protecting. Is there an area of your life where you are playing it safe rather than being obedient? A conversation you are avoiding? A step you know God is asking you to take?

• Keep the focus on God. If you are in any form of leadership or influence, check your motives. Are you pointing people to Jesus or building something for yourself?

• Read Acts 14 this week. Sit with the full chapter. Notice how quickly circumstances change and how unchanging Paul's response remains. What does that steadiness look like in your own life?

A Final Thought

Paul was stoned and left for dead. He got up and went back. Not because he was brave, but because he knew what God had called him to do and nothing — not threats, not pain, not the possibility of death — was going to change that.

What would it look like for you to have that same certainty about what God has called you to?