Besides being dragged out of Lystra for dead, what other times was Paul near death?
Beyond Lystra, Paul was near death through sickness, beatings, imprisonments, and other hardships. He endured the thirty-nine lashes and was stoned, a punishment so brutal that victims were pummeled and left obscene. These sufferings were part of what he went through to give us the New Testament.
Les explains that besides the time Paul was dragged out of Lystra for dead, there were other times when, as far as the apostle was concerned, he was next to death—whether through sickness, beatings, imprisonments, or whatever. The beatings were severe: few victims could take that many, and usually the highest authority had to stop the whipper before reaching that point because most men would die while being whipped; sometimes they stopped at 25 or 30. People today cannot conceive of what a human looked like after being beaten 39 times. Stoning was even worse. When the Jews stoned someone to death, the corpse was obscene, because rocks so big that it took two hands to smash down left the person pummeled. The Apostle went through that. Les reminds us that in our western culture most have never suffered for their faith, yet this is what the man had to go through for us to have our New Testament as we know it.
And there came thither certain Jews from Antioch and Iconium, who persuaded the people, and, having stoned Paul, drew him out of the city, supposing he had been dead.