QUOTE : Accompanying Paul’s preaching, though this aspect is not often stressed, were deeds of power, as both Acts (e.g., 15: 12) and the letters (Rom 15: 14–21; 2 Cor 12: 12; Gal 3: 1–5) attest. Paul can even summarize his Spirit-empowered ministry as one that took place “by word and deed”(Rom 15: 18). This ministry of powerful deeds would certainly have included healings and possibly also exorcisms. Although Paul believed such “signs and wonders and mighty works”(2 Cor 12: 12) were of no significance apart from a ministry of Christlike service (2 Cor 12: 13–17), they were part of the evidence, both for Paul and apparently for his audiences and then his communities, of his apostleship: the presence of God’s power in him and his message. No less miraculous for Paul was the regular departure from pagan worship and ways of living that accompanied the response to his message. This too was the work of the Spirit, who, after all, is the Holy Spirit. Ironically, however, it was the message of the cross that brought about the outpouring of the Spirit through Paul and on his hearers (Gal 3: 1–5). The defeat of sin and evil powers on the cross was being translated into the defeat of sin and evil powers in people’s real lives.