Eager to spread the good news throughout Anatolia (modern-day Turkey) but banned by God’s Spirit from entering Asia and Bithynia, Paul, Silas, and their apprentice Timothy reached Troas, on the Aegean Sea. There Christ clarified His reason for closing those other doors. In a vision, a man—note, “man”—from Macedonia appeared to Paul, pleading, “Come over to Macedonia and help us” (Acts 16:9). Paul and his team (now including Luke, the narrator of Acts) immediately set sail for Macedonia, the homeland of the late, great Alexander, to proclaim an infinitely greater King, Jesus (Acts 16:6–10).
It is striking that the first recorded convert in Macedonia (on the continent of Europe) was not a man, but a woman, whose textile import trade had brought her to Philippi. Who was Lydia? The six verses devoted to her in Acts (16:11–15, 40) introduce her.
Lydia’s origins lay in the region that Paul’s team had bypassed. She came from Thyatira, in the province of Asia. Thyatira was well known for producing purple dye and luxury fabrics in that hue, the raiment of the rich and the royal. Her import business must have thrived, since she had a residence maintained by a staff of household servants that was spacious enough to offer accommodation to Paul’s missionary team.
More important than Lydia’s affluence was her identity as “a worshiper of God” (Acts 16:14). This term identified gentiles who were drawn to the living God of Israel and who followed His law’s moral commandments, but who stopped short of full conversion to Judaism with its ceremonial requirements (see Cornelius in Acts 10:1–2; 11:3). The spiritual thirst of Lydia and other women drew them each Sabbath to gather at a “place of prayer” by the river outside the city gate (Acts 16:13). Typically, when Paul and his team entered a city, on the Sabbath they would attend the synagogue where Jews, proselytes, and gentile “God worshipers” gathered to hear God’s Word and to pray. Jews sometimes called their synagogues “places of prayer.” But since Luke consistently uses the word “synagogue” to refer to such buildings (see, for example, Acts 9:20; 13:5; 14:1), and since there were no men in Lydia’s group, Philippi’s “place of prayer” was not a synagogue. The Jewish community in Philippi was so small that it lacked the requirement of ten men needed to constitute a synagogue. There were, however, women whose thirst for God drew them, Sabbath by Sabbath, to this riverside.
There Paul and his team found them and sat down to tell them about the Lord Jesus. As Paul spoke, “The Lord opened [Lydia’s] heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul” (Acts 16:14). Whatever spiritual longing previously led Lydia to become “a worshiper of God,” when she heard the gospel of Christ, she experienced the Lord’s sovereign, saving grace. She not only “paid attention” but embraced the Lord Jesus in saving faith.
Luke uses various expressions to describe what theologians call regeneration or effectual calling. Here we read that the Lord “opened her heart.” Elsewhere in Acts, God “grants repentance” that brings life (Acts 5:31; 11:18); He goes about “turning [people] from [their] wickedness” (Acts 3:26); and He “opens the door of faith” to them (Acts 14:27).
More than anything else—origin, occupation, affluence, influence, or even her previous hunger for God—this gift of grace answers the question, “Who is Lydia?” She was one whose heart was opened by God’s gracious Spirit to receive the good news of Christ the Lord, so from that day on she was a believer in the Lord.
She readily received baptism, and her household followed her lead. The covenant representation exercised by household heads from Abraham’s day (Gen. 17:7–14, 23–27) was reaffirmed by Peter on Pentecost: “The promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off” (Acts 2:39). So in Philippi, when Lydia and later a jailer came to faith, the members of their “houses” received baptism along with them (Acts 16:15, 32–34).
Lydia demonstrated her new faith by insisting on hosting Paul’s team in her home. Jesus had assured His messengers that they would receive hospitality from godly hosts—“sons of peace”—as they carried His good news from city to city (Luke 9:4–5; 10:5–7). Later, John commended Gaius for welcoming gospel heralds into his home (3 John 5–8). Maybe it was the memory of Lydia’s generous hospitality that moved Paul to thank God “because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now” when he fondly recalled the church at Philippi (Phil. 1:3–5).
We are not told how long Paul preached in Philippi before the complex of events that precipitated his team’s sudden departure from the city (Acts 16:16–39). It was long enough for a congregation of believers to have gathered, meeting at Lydia’s place. So when Paul and Silas were released from jail, they entered Lydia’s home, where they saw “the brothers” and encouraged them (Acts 16:40). Lydia was one of many who responded to Christ’s grace by opening their homes for the church’s fellowship and worship (Rom. 16:5; 1 Cor. 16:19; Col. 4:15; Philem. 2; see Acts 2:46).
Who was Lydia? A prosperous entrepreneur, importer of luxury fabrics. The mistress of a spacious home, attended by servants. More importantly, a worshiper of God who hungered to know the Creator. Most importantly, a believer whose heart the Lord opened and transformed by grace, so she gladly offered her home, her staff, and herself to Christ—the firstfruits of gospel harvest in Macedonia and in Europe.
Ligonier Ministries