The following teaching is the twelfth of a series on the book of Acts by the Reverend John W. Howe of Truel Episcopal Church in Fairfax, Virginia. The title of this teaching is The Conversion of Saul, and the scripture reference is Acts chapter 9, verses 1 through 19. Lord, we would bless your holiness. With all that is within us, we would sing your praises. We acknowledge you to be a great and mighty king.

We would worship you this day. Thank you for all your benefits to us. Thank you for your loving kindness, for your mercy, for your faithfulness, for your compassion.

Open our minds to understand your word more fully and our wills to obey it. For your name's sake. We come to chapter 9 of the book of Acts.

I need to set this in context again for us. We've been dealing with the story of Stephen, first of all, and then Philip, last time. And what Luke really has been doing in telling about Philip especially is showing us one of the consequences of the persecution that broke out in Jerusalem.

Remember the sequence of events that Stephen made this tremendous defense and on the very day that he was killed persecution broke out. Tremendous persecution broke out. And what Luke has done is just traced the consequences in one man's ministry, the ministry of Philip.

As we left Jerusalem, the Christians were scattered, and Philip went down into Samaria. And that really represented a major breakthrough. That was the first major breakthrough.

A wall that separated Jews and Samaritans was demolished in the Gospel of Christ. We now see that the Gospel is not going to be only for Jews, only for Jerusalem Jews or Judean Jews, but it's going to reach across the barrier between Jew and Samaritan. Now that's not the major breakthrough.

The major breakthrough is going to come when the Gentiles are included in large numbers. And what we're going to return to in just a moment is the shaping of a life. The man who is going to spearhead the ministry to the Gentiles is being prepared for that ministry right now.

And what an unlikely figure he would be, humanly speaking. just about the last person that you'd imagine would take the gospel to the Gentiles, is now being readied for that by the Lord. I need us to understand, though, that while we trace that particular story of Philip going into Samaria and then also touching the life of the Ethiopian eunuch, so that his ministry also really extended down into Africa via the Ethiopian, While we trace just that one story, it's one of hundreds, perhaps thousands, that could have been traced.

It may be one of the most significant. But the scattering really emptied out Jerusalem. And there were hundreds, there were thousands of Christians in Jerusalem, people who had been won, overwhelmingly they were Jewish, who had been won to Christ, and now they're scattered all over, back, for the most part, to their own homeland, to their own cities, wherever they had come from, throughout the Roman Empire, various parts of the dispersion, in other words.

So, we just saw that little vignette, and now we're going to return to Jerusalem. We're going to return to the sort of the source of the persecution, and come back to the figure of Saul, who in many ways was behind that. We're not sure that he was single-handedly the instigator, but obviously he had played a tremendously central role in unleashing the persecution.

He was consenting to Stephen's death, and he becomes very active in carrying out the persecution right after it. So chapter 9, and the first couple of verses we read, But Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. Now I need you to be aware of another thing, that there are in fact three accounts of the story of Saul's conversion.

The first one is right here, as it happens in Acts chapter 9. Saul, who later becomes Paul, recounts that story himself on two occasions that are recorded in the book of Acts. One in chapter 22, verse 4 to 16, when he's before the tribune in Jerusalem.

And then again in Acts chapter 26, when he's before King Agrippa in Caesarea. So what you really would need to do, and I'd invite you to do this at your leisure, is read all three accounts and put the pieces together. They overlap.

They don't all have all the details. And in fact, in chapter 26, for instance, it seems as if Paul sort of compacts into one single speech what Jesus in fact said across a period of time. But if you read all three of those accounts, you begin to see how it fleshes out, how it fits together.

I'm going to just assume that as we go through it this morning and leave you to read it for yourself at your leisure. Saul is still breathing threats and murder. That's a very heavy phrase.

It's as if his very breath, the air that's flowing in and out of his lungs, whatever is coming out of his mouth, is a threat of persecution. And not just persecution, but murder. That's a very, very strong word.

He says that about himself later. He acknowledges. He wasn't just standing there consenting to the death of Stephen.

whatever that slightly ambiguous phrase might mean. But he is active in the taking of Christians to their death, in literally dragging them to death. And he confesses that when he tells the story about himself a little bit later.

And here you see him. I hope you can begin to get inside the rage that is just, it's possessing this man at this point. He is literally a man possessed.

He's a man insane. at this point. He's chasing, if you can see this, Christians have been driven out of the city of Jerusalem, and here he is on a vendetta, chasing them wherever they've gone, going from city to city, and dragging them back to Jerusalem.

That's his mission. It mentions here that he goes to Damascus, but again, when he tells the story about himself, he says to many foreign cities. He was chasing Christians back to wherever they were, dragging them back to stand trial, in some cases to be beaten, in some cases to be literally put to death.

He even goes into other countries. It's not just throughout the land of Judea. He's crossing national boundaries.

Damascus is in Syria. That's a very good distance. You can see it on a map.

It's way up in Syria, up to the northeast. east, and it's several days' journey to get up there. There's an incredible rage dominating this man, incredible vindictiveness.

He's going on the authority of the high priest. You remember that the high priest is Annas. High priest is the president of the Sanhedrin.

And if that is a little bit confusing to you, how in the world does the high priest's authority extend even across national boundaries. The reason is this. You see, under the Roman Empire, everybody was compelled to worship the Roman deities on point of death.

And in particular, out of the pantheon of Roman deities, to worship the emperor who was considered a god. To bow down and pay obeisance to the Roman Empire and say, Caesar is Lord. Caesar is God.

You were required on point of death to say that. Except that the Jews wouldn't say that. They simply would not say that.

And the Romans tried everything they could think of to get the Jews to bow down, and they were totally unsuccessful. Whatever else you might say about the Jews, at least they were loyal to God in that point. They would not say that Caesar is God or that any of the other deities of Rome is God.

They wouldn't say it. Now, in every other aspect, they were model citizens. and so finally the Romans made an exception to the rule they said everybody else has to bow down to Caesar but we just won't fuss with the Jews anymore we'll leave them alone so long as they pay their taxes which is why they raised that very interesting question is it lawful to pay taxes or not so long as they'll be good citizens in every other respect we'll let them be an exception to the rule now therefore you see as long as this new religion this Messiah worship this elevation of Jesus so long as it is considered a sect or a denomination or a variation within Judaism then the Romans say we'll leave it to the Jews to sort that out so long as the Christians are Jews then we'll leave it to the Jews to sort that out and the high priest is the temporal head of the Jews and so his authority extends to wherever there's a synagogue throughout the whole Roman Empire wherever in the dispersion there is a gathering of Jews the high priest has authority over them and so that's the background of what's going on Saul now a Pharisee has common cause with the Sadducees who control the Sanhedrin.

And he moves on the authority of the high priest himself with letters of authority going on this incredible vendetta to go and drag Jewish converts to Jesus back to Jerusalem to stand trial and to try to stamp out this new teaching. It's interesting. We keep referring to them as Christians, but that's not how they're referred to at this point in the New Testament itself.

They're called the way, or more fully, people of the way. That's rather a nice phrase. It suggests a whole lot of things.

People who knew the way. People who knew that Jesus is the way. People who knew what He said about Himself.

I am the way, the truth, and the life. people who are following his way. That's how they were identified.

They weren't ever called Christians until the Gentiles in Antioch began to use that word as a kind of an epithet. It was a word of ridicule. It's exactly the same thing that happened in the 60s when they began to refer to the Jesus people.

It was a put-down. And then the Jesus people owned that title for themselves. They said, we'll gladly call ourselves Jesus people.

well you might ask why is Saul so absolutely out of control at this point why is he I mean he really is insane why is that so in chapter 8 verse 3 it says that he was ravaging the church ravaging the church I commented I think last week that that's a phrase that might be used a word a verb that might be used of a wild animal, just on a rampage of destruction. When he tells his own story in chapter 26 in verse 11, he says, in raging fury, I persecuted them even to foreign cities. Why is that?

Why was he so out of control? Well, his whole world view is under attack. His whole world is threatened.

Do you remember when he wrote to the Philippians at a much later date? He called himself a Hebrew of the Hebrews. A Pharisee of the Pharisees.

I don't know if you've ever really gotten inside the mind of a Pharisee. It would be rather hard. All of us have somewhat Pharisaic attitudes in some areas.

But a real thoroughgoing Pharisee of the Pharisees. By age five, a Pharisee had memorized the book of Leviticus. Alright, does that grab you a little bit?

Between five and twelve, between five and twelve, he is absolutely saturated in the law, the Pentateuch, the five books of Moses. If he's breathing fury here, he's breathing the Pentateuch by age 12, by the time of Bar Mitzvah, if you will. After that, he branches out and begins to know the Psalms and the Proverbs and the poetic books and the prophets and the historical books.

He knows the scripture. But he knows it through interpretation. It's not just the scripture in its own right, but it's the scripture with interpretation upon interpretation upon interpretation, rule upon rule.

It's through a grid, and the key to unlocking that grid, if you want to know what is a Pharisee really about, the Pharisee's whole life is based upon one question. How do I avoid breaking the law? And it's interesting that it's put in the negative.

It's not how do I keep the law. Maybe if they asked it that way, they would have come out at a different place. But literally, it's how do I avoid breaking the law.

And so with all this tremendous wealth of Bible as a foundation, and especially the book of Leviticus, with all of its specific laws, it becomes how far can I go without breaking that? How do I set limits for myself that it's okay to do thus far but no farther. And so by the time of Jesus, just to give you a for instance, with regard to honoring the Sabbath, there were 1,521 specific things that you must not do on the Sabbath.

Spelled out! 1,521 things that you must not do, and the Pharisee knew every one of them. Chapter and verse.

Including rescuing a drowning man. You must not do that on the Sabbath. Wait until the next day.

I think from our point of view, it becomes a literally incredible construct that they're working within. And right down to the present time, some of you know this. If you go to Israel today, on the Sabbath, all the hotel elevators switch to automatic.

Do you know why? lest you press the button, which makes an electrical connection, which involves a spark, which is literally fire, and making fire on the Sabbath is doing work, and that's forbidden. Okay?

So in order that you would not break the Sabbath, the elevator goes on automatic, and it stops at every floor, which means that it's never there when you need it, and you walk down 20 flights. That's how you avoid doing work on the Sabbath. Isaiah, you might, I guess we have the time.

Just turn to Isaiah 28 for a second. If you get done before I do, feel free to leave. But Isaiah really ridicules this mindset in a very interesting passage.

Isaiah 28. And you'll recognize this. Paul picks up on this in 1 Corinthians and quotes part of it in relationship to speaking in tongues.

Isaiah 28 and verse 10. This is the Pharisaic mindset at its very best. For it is precept upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little.

That's the Pharisaic mindset. And God says about all this, Nay, but by men of strange lips with an alien tongue, the Lord will speak to this people to whom he said, This is rest, give rest to the weary, this is repose. Yet they would not hear.

Therefore the word of the Lord will be to them precept upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little, that they may go and fall backward and be broken and snared and taken. That's where it's going to lead you. Line upon line, rule upon rule, So interpretation upon interpretation is going to get you in a snare.

You're going to fall backward and break yourself. And you might have some fun working out how that passage relates to what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 14. I'll leave that to you.

This is the Pharisaic mindset. He's built his whole life constructing a worldview piece by piece, how you avoid breaking the law. and now along comes a gospel that says that's irrelevant that doesn't add up to anything the law has already been fulfilled and when you put your faith in Jesus of Nazareth who is the Christ the law is fulfilled in you and you can forget those 1521 laws about the Sabbath because he's already fulfilled them you see what's at stake the law the priesthood the temple the sacrifices, the whole way of life.

Judaism itself, as far as the Pharisee is concerned, is under attack, and the attack must be stopped. It must be stopped. What comes to my mind is a very clear picture from the movie Bridge on the River Kwai.

Do you remember the story? Here's Alec Guinness, and he spent months building this incredible bridge. Now, it should never have been built in the first place.

The enemy is using that bridge to destroy Alec Guinness' own people. But he's got so much invested in it that when he knows it's about to be destroyed, he'll do anything to prevent it, including murder. That's Saul.

He's built this incredible bridge that should never have been built in the first place. The enemy is using it to ensnare people, but he's got so much invested in it that when he sees it's about to be destroyed, he'll do anything, including murder. It becomes clear in just a moment that Saul is already harboring a growing suspicion that he's on the wrong track, and that's haunting him.

I suggested a couple weeks ago that he never forgets the witness of Stephen. He never forgets the way that Stephen died, the way that Stephen reflected the Lord Jesus himself, the way that Stephen said, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And that haunted him.

And all the other hundreds of people that he's persecuting who are marching off embracing death in the testimony of Jesus are haunting him. But here he is, like Alec Guinness, ready to do anything to stop it. He's marching off to Damascus with a little band of temple guards to drag the Christians back.

We move on. As he adjourned, he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. And he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?

And he said, Who are you, Lord? And he said, I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But rise and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.

The men who were traveling with him stood speechless, hearing the voice, but seeing no one. Saul arose from the ground, and when his eyes were opened, he could see nothing. And they led him by the hand and brought him to Damascus.

And for three days he was without sight, and neither ate nor drank. Again, put the three accounts together, you find out this is at noonday. He's so anxious to get there that he's on the march at noon when most Jews would be taking a rest from the heat of the day.

He wants to get there to carry out this persecution. And suddenly, as bright as noonday is, there's a greater brightness. Noon is swallowed up in glory.

Saul knows very well what that glory is. He's never seen it before. but he knows what it is.

He's seeing the Shekinah of God. And he sees something that the others don't see. In the midst of the glory is a man.

Read all three accounts. Check me out on this. In the midst of the glory is a man.

Approximately his own age. And the man speaks to him. now he's got a problem already because how in the world a man can be standing in the center of the Shekinah glory of God he can't work that out and the man says to him gently, do you hear the gentleness of this Saul, Saul why are you persecuting me?

now don't read too much into his answer when he says who are you Lord he's not yet converted that's simply a term of respect Who are you, sir? Who are you? He doesn't know who this is.

Maybe he's got a real nagging feeling. Who are you? Again, when he tells his own story, he adds another sentence.

The one standing in the middle of that glory not only said, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? But he also said, you know, it's hard for you to keep kicking against the goads. A goad was a long, sharpened pole.

usually tipped with iron, that they use to prod recalcitrant animals, cattle or oxen. Do you get the picture? The one standing there is saying, I've been prodding you, Saul.

But instead of yielding to my prodding, you're kicking against it. Did you ever kick against an iron-tipped spear? You're kicking against it.

What happens? You hurt yourself. It's hard for you, isn't it, Saul?

I've been prodding you, and you know that I've been prodding you. why do you keep kicking against the goads? Why don't you yield to what I'm doing in your life?

Why do you keep persecuting me? He says, who are you? Who are you, sir?

And he says, I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. Phew. Jesus is alive.

It's all true. It's all true what I have been desperately trying to destroy, to tear apart, to crush. It's all true.

I'm wrong. He's right. And so is Stephen.

And all the others. I hope it registers very clearly in your mind it had to absolutely overwhelm Saul at this point. He's never met Jesus, has he?

And yet Jesus says, you're persecuting me. Do you see how Jesus identifies Himself totally with those who belong to Him? You lay a hand on a member of my body, you're laying a hand on me.

You thought you were just persecuting followers of the way. You're persecuting me. And Saul is absolutely overwhelmed.

The people with him apparently see a light, but they don't see the man standing in it. They hear something, but they don't hear the words clearly. It may be like the rumble of thunder or some such thing.

They don't hear the words. They hear Saul answering thunder. What in the world has happened to Saul?

What is going on? Our leader has become out of his head. He's babbling to a light, to the thunder.

And he stands up and he's blind. He's blind inside. He's blind outside.

And instead of him leading them off like an army to take the synagogues by storm, they lead him by the hand into the city of Damascus. It's going to be very quiet now. They were expecting us, but we don't want anybody to know we're here now.

They make their way to the house of one Judas in a street called Straight. Now there was a disciple at Damascus named Ananias, and the Lord said to him in a vision, Ananias. And he said, Here I am, Lord.

And the Lord said to him, Rise and go to the street called Straight, and inquire in the house of Judas for a man of Tarsus named Saul. For behold, he is praying. And he has seen a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands upon him, so that he might regain his sight.

But Ananias answered, Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to thy saints at Jerusalem. And here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who my name. The Lord said to him, Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the sons of Israel, for I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.

Ananias departed and entered the house, and laying his hands on him, he said, Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came has sent me that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit. And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes and he regained his sight. And then he rose and was baptized and took food and was strengthened.

Again, don't read too much into that greeting. When he says brother Saul, that would be a typical way that a Jew would greet another Jew. It's fairly remarkable that he'd be willing to extend the name brother to Saul just as a Jew, just as a human being.

But don't read into that, that he assumes at this point that Saul is a Christian. That process is not yet complete. It's about to be complete.

There are two visions here. God gives a vision to Ananias, just a little insignificant Christian. He's not a member of the clergy.

He's not one of the apostles. We don't know anything more about him but these ten verses. gives a vision to Ananias.

And he says, go. Saul is expecting you because I've just given him a vision. And he's seen you coming in through the door.

Ananias is absolutely horrified. Can you imagine getting a vision and saying, you know, Brezhnev is down the street and he's expecting you to come in and minister the baptism to him or some such thing. Pray for him.

Lay hands on him. Lord, we are expecting Him. We know why He's here.

He's come to destroy us. Ananias obeys. Praise God that Ananias obeyed.

That He was given a peace in holy history because He obeyed the vision. I've shared with you that nearly 20 years ago God spoke to me one night and said go and pray with that man and I'd never laid eyes on him before and within a week he gave his life to Christ and within another week God called him to the mission field and he's been sharing the gospel with Peruvian Indians ever since are you open to God speaking to you in that way? It's so matter of fact.

There was a vision. Had a vision. Go.

Pray with the guy. Lay hands on him. And Ananias did it.

In 1934, in Charlotte, North Carolina, a farmer called together a group of his friends to pray for a series of revival meetings that were being held in their town. And as they prayed that afternoon, God began to give them a burden and their prayer became very specific. They prayed that somehow God would raise up from their city a man who would carry the gospel to the ends of the earth.

They had no way of knowing that out of that series of meetings the farmer's own teenage son would be converted. And you all know his name. Billy Graham.

How many of you can tell me who was preaching that night? No. No. A man named Mordecai Hamm. Good for Edna.

You know, Mordecai Ham probably had no way of knowing what the effect of that sermon would be. You and I have absolutely no way of knowing what the effect will be of our influence on somebody else's life. Ananias didn't do the whole job.

Stephen planted a seed. Many, many other martyrs had their blood, water, that seed. But Ananias was given the privilege of reaping the harvest because he was willing to do what God told him to be.

And he happened to be in the right place at the right time. And God may not raise you or me up to be a Saul cum Paul, but He may be pleased to use your life in a way that you don't even know and won't know until glory to touch somebody else's life. Maybe who will touch somebody else's life?

who will touch somebody else's life. But may we be obedient to the heavenly vision. Ananias goes in, lays hands on Saul, prays for his healing.

That's all. Prays for his healing. That's what God told him to do.

And he was healed. He was healed inside and out. His physical eyes were opened, his spiritual eyes were opened, and the process was complete like that.

He went through baptism, which is the sign of repentance. And God filled him with the Holy Spirit. And we'll read what happened after that next week.

Thank you.