Bible Study with Jairus Acts 14

Today we will share some understanding from our recent study on Acts 14. Acts chapter 14 talks about the story of Paul healing a man who was lame from birth in Lystra. Paul preached the Gospel in the city of Lystra and then Derbe. He won many converts in Derbe and then returned to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch (verse 21). In verse 22 it says, “Strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God’. （ESV） There are many different translations of this phrase “strengthening the souls of the disciples”. For example, the NIV translates it as “strengthening the disciples” and the New Living Translation translates it as “they strengthened the believers”. But the English Standard Version, New American Standard Bible and King James Bible all pointed out that they strengthen the “souls of the disciples.” The English Standard version and others translate this phrase as strengthening the “souls” of the disciples. But some of our Bible study group members use the Chinese Union Version which translates it as “strengthening the hearts of the believers”. The woman who led the Bible study this week asked a question “why does the Bible say strengthening the ‘soul’ here rather than the ‘spirit’?” This question has its legitimacy as we can learn from the famous verse in Ephesians 3:16: “I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being,” (NIV) The “inner being” here often refers to the spiritual man inside of us or our spirit. This seems to be a pattern in Paul’s speaking. He often mentions the Lord will be present or strengthening our spirits. For example, 2 Timothy 4:22, “The Lord be with your spirit. Grace be with you all.” Galatians 6:18 also says, “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers, and sisters. Amen.” (NIV) I am not sure if this question makes sense to you or not but it does make sense to some of our members in this Bible study. Some of them were saved in a church movement where they stressed the importance of exercising our human spirit strongly. This teaching stresses that once we pursue the growth in our inner spiritual life, other problems in our soul will be solved. Gradually this teaching becomes focused on the development of our spiritual man but neglects the issues in our soul. Whenever someone has troubles in their soul, someone in the church may ignore it by just considering this person has not fully reckoned his or her death in Jesus Christ. But this verse says these Apostles strengthened the souls of the disciples which bothered this woman. So, she asked this question. Why does here stress the word “soul” instead of the word “spirit”? Why does the Bible just say “strengthening their spirits”? What are the significances to mention “souls” here? We recognized a pattern in doing the Bible study the way we do. Often a question raised by a member, in the beginning, is the very question that the Holy Spirit wanted to answer us in that meeting. In other words, the Holy Spirit will often cause someone to ask a question. When we try to understand this question more, the Holy Spirit will release the answer gradually in the meeting and speak a Rhema Word of God to guide us, comfort us and strengthen us. I will explain this more in the following part of this study in the hope that you will understand what I am talking about.