Charles Ellicott Commentary Acts 15:41

"And he went through Syria and Cilicia, confirming the churches." — Acts 15:41 (ASV)

He went through Syria and Cilicia, confirming the churches.—Cilicia, it will be remembered, had not been visited on St. Paul’s first journey with Barnabas, and the churches must accordingly have been founded at some earlier period, probably during St. Paul’s residence at Tarsus before he came to Antioch (Acts 9:30; Acts 11:25).

Confirming is, it hardly needs to be said, used in the general sense of “strengthening,” but as the bestowal of spiritual gifts by the laying-on of hands was a chief part of this work, it, at least, approximates to the idea of “confirming” in the later and more technical sense of the term.