Highlighting the divine initiative in the church's proactive Gentile mission, Luke describes the church's "release" of Paul and Barnabas (13:3) as sent on their way by the Holy Spirit (compare Lk 4:1, 14). Traveling to Seleucia, a Mediterranean port of Syrian Antioch, sixteen miles west and five miles north of the mouth of the Orontes, the missionary band embarks for Cyprus.

They land at an eastern port and administrative center, Salamis, some 130 miles west of the Syrian coast. Cyprus, 132 miles northeast to southwest, is traversed by two mountain ranges that enclose a fruitful central plain. The island itself is situated on shipping lanes between Syria, Greece and Asia Minor. From Ptolemaic times a large Jewish colony has been present (Josephus Jewish Antiquities 13:284, 287; 1 Macc 15:23; Philo Legatio ad Gaium 282), and a Christian witness appears to have been born there early (Barnabas is a Cypriot—Acts 4:36; compare 11:19-20).

There in the Jewish synagogues Saul and Barnabas "began to solemnly proclaim" (compare 4:2; 13:38; 15:36; imperfect ingressive action—Kistemaker 1990:460) the word of God, that is, the gospel, God's message of grace and salvation (13:7, 44, 46, 48; compare 13:12, 26, 49; 14:3, 25). John—that is, John Mark (12:12, 25; 13:5, 13; 15:37; Col 4:10; 2 Tim 4:11; Philem 24; 1 Pet 5:13) is there as "an assistant."

Frequent references to the word of God throughout the account of this first missionary journey show us that communicating the message of salvation must be the main activity of missions. In a day when specialist short-term work, humanitarian relief and support services are all being called missions, and rightly so, the church needs to make sure it does not shift its primary focus away from the central purpose of missions—the communication of the gospel.