What did St. Paul mean when he said, “persevere in the faith … of the Gospel which has been preached to every creature under heaven.” He obviously knew that those who actually heard the Gospel at the time he was writing the letter to the Colossians (c. 60??) was limited to a small number of people in Greece and Asia Minor, the Levant and Egypt and a smaller number still in the rest of the Mediterranean world. In fact, he used to boast that he preferred to preach in places that had never heard the Gospel. I think this reflects the utter confidence that Paul had in the Gospel. He was so sure of the power of the message that he could presume on its universal impact.
