Last month, I confessed to you that I am going through a process of retirement from 44-plus years of ministry.

If there’s one single lesson that I am harvesting during these final days in the pulpit, it is that I am still very much a student, learning new things all the time. Every week it seems, I come to my congregation and say something like, “I learned a new lesson from scripture.”

It’s not that I have been careless or inattentive in my previous study.

Rather, my thoughts are that there are many layers to the truth.

A person can return to the same scripture time after time and discover something fresh. There are certainly surface-level lessons that are sitting right there, obvious and clear, easy pickings. And then there are the “deep things,” which require an effort that might be called excavation.

Such was my recent experience as I was preparing to say something to my congregation about Acts 14, a story that includes episodes in the Apostle Paul’s first missionary journey.

I know those stories pretty well. Paul and companions move from one town to the next, bringing the “good news” regarding God’s love.

I remembered that, in each town, as Paul preached, there were similar reactions: Some embraced with faith, some were disinterested, and others were hostile. More than once, Paul’s life was threatened.

OK, I know that material pretty well.

But the part of the story that took place in Lystra had some detail that I couldn’t readily make sense of, and it is central to the story. I had previously missed it.

After Paul and Barnabas performed a tremendous miracle at the city gate, giving mobility to a lame man who had never walked a day in his life, the city got stirred up! Paul and Barnabas were referred to as Hermes and Zeus, and the people wanted to worship them.

OK, that seems like an overreaction. To show how impressed they were by that “miraculous sign,” the people started to bow down to worship the two missionaries.

And that was followed up with the priest of Zeus processing into town from the temple located just outside Lystra, flanked by oxen who were dressed up and ready to be sacrificed to the gods.

Wow, that seems excessive.

But it wasn’t an excess. The people considered the sacrifice of bulls an appropriate act of worship. The crowds were shouting in their ancient native tongue that they had a visitation from the gods Zeus (king of the gods) and Hermes (mouthpiece of the gods).

It was a bad case of mistaken identity. Paul and Barnabas were mistaken for gods from Mount Olympus.

Why the confusion?

Well, here is where the excavation took place on my part.

As I dug deeper, I learned of a Greek myth written by the Roman poet Ovid in his major work, “Metamorphosis” (Book 8). Ovid wrote that, in a time past, Lystra was visited by Zeus and Hermes. It was their desire to see how they might be received. Well, the gods disguised themselves, and, as they went from home to home, they were rudely rejected. By the end of their visitation, the two were astonished and angry at the cold reception they received. They decided to destroy Lystra with fire and brimstone.

But they venture to knock on one last door.

It happened to be at the home of Baucis and Philemon, who were delighted to take those strangers into their home. They had little to offer, but what they had they freely gave.

As Baucis poured wine into the cups of the guests, she realized that the pitcher kept filling back up supernaturally with a fresh supply of wine. It was then she knew that they were in the middle of a divine visitation. Baucis and Philemon immediately bowed down in worship before Zeus and Hermes.

Well, the story winds up with the hospitable couple being spared from the fiery destruction from Mount Olympus which the rest of Lystra suffered, and they were blessed for their open-handed kindness.

With that myth as their point of reference, the people of Lystra thought that they were once again being visited by the divine and were NOT going to make the same mistake twice. So they quickly bowed and worshiped Paul and Barnabas.

Realizing what was going on, the two missionaries frantically clarified who they were as they had translated for them that local legend that provoked such a liturgical reaction.

Excavating that little piece of Ovid’s “Metamorphosis,” embedded and unseen in Acts 14, helped me understand an important lesson that Paul and Barnabas immediately applied by adjusting their message to the specific context of those listeners at Lystra.

Know your audience.

There may be things that are buried in their past, experiences that we do not know, filters of culture foreign to us, and stories which get lost in the translation. All of those just might fuel a particular reaction or overreaction.

Too often, we make assumptions regarding the people with whom we speak. And, if there are misunderstandings that result in someone wanting to ritually sacrifice a bull in our honor, I suggest that we dig deeper to understand.

Do some excavation.

Listen more closely.

Take it from an old guy who has spent his life ankle-deep in God’s Word, seeking to understand the sacred writings as well as the people who listen to me. Continue to discover the new and the fresh in the scriptures. The Good News is inexhaustible.

So keep digging, and, like the Apostle Paul, be willing to make adjustments as misunderstandings become clarified.

Warren Hoffman is a 43-year veteran of pastoral ministry and considers himself a native of Alpena. He is married to his ministry partner and beloved, Laura Hoffman.