While they were at Lystra, Paul and Barnabas came upon a man with crippled feet. He had been that way from birth, so he had never walked. He was sitting
Parallel translations
- WEB At Lystra a certain man sat, impotent in his feet, a cripple from his mother’s womb, who never had walked.
- KJV And there sat a certain man at Lystra, impotent in his feet, being a cripple from his mother’s womb, who never had walked:
- BSB In Lystra there sat a man crippled in his feet, who was lame from birth and had never walked.
- NKJV And in Lystra a certain man without strength in his feet was sitting, a cripple from his mother’s womb, who had never walked.
- NASB In Lystra a man was sitting whose feet were incapacitated. He had been disabled from his mother’s womb, and had never walked.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
At Lystra sat a man crippled from birth who had never walked. His lifelong, hopeless condition sets the stage for a striking display of God's power.
Overview
Luke emphasizes that the man's lameness was congenital and total, beyond any human remedy, much like the lame man healed at the temple gate in Acts 3. Such details underscore that the coming miracle is genuinely the work of God. Physical helplessness pictures the deeper helplessness of sinners who cannot save themselves.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 5
- Acts 3:2A certain man who was lame from his mother’s womb was being carried, whom they laid daily at the door of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask gifts for the needy of those who entered into the temple.
- John 5:3–5In these lay a great multitude of those who were sick, blind, lame, or paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the water;
- Acts 4:9if we are examined today concerning a good deed done to a crippled man, by what means this man has been healed,
- John 9:1–2As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth.
- John 5:7The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, but while I’m coming, another steps down before me.”
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Acts is the risen Christ continuing his work by the Spirit through the church, as the apostles preach that there is salvation in no other name under heaven.
How Acts 14:8 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Greek word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.