Lives of Scripture

Andronicus appears in a single verse, among Paul's long list of personal greetings closing his letter to the Romans: 'Greet Andronicus and Junia, my kinsmen and my fellow prisoners, who are outstanding among the apostles, who also were in Christ before me' (Romans 16:7). Three details stand out. First, Andronicus shared a period of actual imprisonment alongside Paul at some unspecified point in his ministry, a level of costly partnership in the gospel Paul does not attribute to many people he names elsewhere. Second, Paul says he was 'in Christ before me' -- meaning Andronicus's conversion predated Paul's own well-known encounter on the road to Damascus, making him one of the earliest believers named anywhere in the New Testament. Third, Paul calls the pair 'outstanding among the apostles,' language many early church commentators read as including Andronicus within some understanding of apostleship, whether in the broader New Testament sense of a commissioned messenger of the gospel (as with Barnabas or the unnamed 'apostles of the churches' in 2 Corinthians 8:23) rather than the narrower sense limited to the original Twelve. Nothing further is recorded of Andronicus's background, travels, or later ministry, but Paul's brief, pointed commendation -- kinsman, fellow prisoner, early believer, and outstanding servant of the gospel -- marks him as a Christian of unusually high standing and sacrifice in the earliest years of the church's history.