Pontus was a region in the far north of Asia Minor, bordered by the Black Sea, called the Euxine Sea by the Greeks.
It belonged to the Greco-Roman world, but lay at one of the empire’s most distant edges, far from centers such as Rome or Ephesus.
The Bible records no episode that took place within Pontus. The place appears three times, always as the homeland or destination of people, never as the setting of a narrated scene.
On the day of Pentecost, Jews from Pontus were among the crowd in Jerusalem who heard the apostles speaking in their own language.
Years later, Paul met the couple Aquila and Priscilla in Corinth. Aquila was a native of Pontus.
The apostle Peter also wrote his first letter to the Christians scattered throughout Pontus and other neighboring provinces of Asia Minor.
Even without an account of a specific divine act there, Pontus shows how the gospel reached Jews and Gentiles scattered at the edges of the known world, through pilgrims, a tentmaking couple, and a circular letter.
