Lydia

Lydia designates both a region of western Asia Minor and, more prominently in the New Testament, a woman who was the first recorded European convert to Christianity. Lydia the region (corresponding to ancient Lydian kingdom centered on Sardis) is mentioned in Ezekiel 30:5 and was the homeland of a people known for their wealth, commercial sophistication, and the invention of coinage. Its last independent king, Croesus, became proverbial for wealth before the kingdom fell to Cyrus the Great in 547 B.C.

Lydia the woman was a seller of purple from Thyatira, a city in the Lydian region known for its dyeing industry, who was residing in Philippi when Paul arrived there on his second missionary journey (Acts 16:14–15, 40). She was a worshipper of God—a God-fearer attending the Jewish prayer meeting by the river outside the city. When Paul spoke, the Lord opened her heart to receive his message; she and her household were baptized, and she immediately offered her home as a base for the mission. Lydia thus became the nucleus of the Philippian church, one of the most affectionate and generous of Paul's congregations.