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Scripture Reading: Acts 9:1-19
In this message we shall begin to consider the conversion of Saul.
Acts 9:1 says, “But Saul, still breathing threatening and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest.” Saul approved of Stephen’s killing (8:1), and those who stoned Stephen laid down their garments at the feet of Saul (7:58). Saul, a persecutor, was a young man with a very strong sense of purpose.
Saul was born in Tarsus, a highly cultured city, and received his Greek education at the university there. In 22:3 he says that he studied “at the feet of Gamaliel, having been trained according to the strictness of the law.” This indicates that he received his religious education from Gamaliel, a great rabbi. No doubt, Saul was a scholar in both the Greek and Hebrew languages, and he was trained in both Greek culture and in Hebrew religion. Furthermore, he was a Roman citizen. With him we see the three main elements of Western culture: Hebrew religion, Greek culture, and Roman politics. He was taught according to the Hebrew religion, he was trained in Greek culture, and he was a citizen of the Roman Empire. His parents or grandparents may have become Roman citizens, and Saul himself was born a Roman (22:25-28). Therefore, Saul had a threefold qualification — in Greek culture, Hebrew religion, and Roman politics.
The Lord is sovereign and all-knowing. Stephen seemed to be better educated than Peter and John, who were unlearned Galilean fishermen. But Stephen was not as qualified in the three elements of Western culture as Saul was. In Philippians 3:5 he describes himself as “a Hebrew of Hebrews,” for he was born a Hebrew and was well educated in the Hebrew religion. No one else was as qualified as he to bear the commission to bring God’s New Testament economy to the Gentile world.
Before the Lord gained Saul, he was gained by Satan. Satan must have known that Saul was an important person. Satan not only gained Saul; he also instigated him to take a leading part in persecuting the followers of Jesus. When the persecutors were stoning Stephen, Saul took care of their garments. After the death of Stephen, “Saul was devastating the church, entering house after house; and dragging off both men and women, he delivered them to prison” (8:3). It is significant that Luke purposely uses the word “devastating” to indicate that Saul wanted to destroy, to demolish, the entire church and all the followers of Jesus.
Saul was not satisfied with persecuting the believers in Jerusalem. He went to the high priest and “asked for letters from him to Damascus, for the synagogues, so that if he found any who were of the way, both men and women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem” (9:2). According to 9:14, Saul had authority to bind all those who called on the name of the Lord Jesus. Saul wanted to go to Damascus because a number of the scattered saints were there. He intended to go there to arrest all those who called on the Lord’s name.
Acts 9:2 says that Saul’s intention was to find those “who were of the way” and “bring them bound to Jerusalem.” Here the way denotes the Lord’s full salvation in God’s New Testament economy. It is the way God dispenses Himself into the believers through Christ’s redemption and the Spirit’s anointing; it is the way the believers partake of God and enjoy God; it is the way the believers worship God in their spirit by enjoying Him, and follow the persecuted Jesus by being one with Him; and it is the way they are brought into the church and built up into the Body of Christ to bear the testimony of Jesus.
The way in 9:2 includes the way of truth, the straight way, and the way of righteousness spoken of in 2 Peter 2:2, 15, and 21. The way of truth is the path of the Christian life according to the truth, which is the reality of the contents of the New Testament (1 Tim. 2:4; 3:15; 4:3; 2 Tim. 2:15, 18; Titus 1:1). It is designated by other titles according to its various virtues, like the straight way, the way of righteousness, the way of peace (Luke 1:79; Rom. 3:17), the way of salvation (Acts 16:17), the way of God (Matt. 22:16; Acts 18:26), the way of the Lord (John 1:23; Acts 18:25), and the way (19:9, 23; 22:4; 24:22). It was slandered as the way of heresy (Acts 24:14).
Saul was probably very happy as he was on his way to Damascus. He may have been excited and perhaps even was in an ecstasy. Saul may have said to himself, “I have obtained authority from the high priests to bind all those who call on the name of Jesus. I am going to Damascus to arrest all those who call on this name, bring them to Jerusalem, and put them in jail.”
The Lord Jesus was watching over Saul as he was journeying toward Damascus. Instead of appearing to Saul immediately, the Lord waited until “he drew near to Damascus” (9:3). Then “suddenly a light from heaven shone around him; and he fell on the ground and heard a voice saying to him, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?” (9:3b-4). Saul must have been shocked by the light from heaven and by the voice that called him by name. Saul thought that he was persecuting merely the followers of Jesus. Now a voice came from the heavens and told him that he was persecuting this One who is in the heavens. To Saul’s great surprise, he experienced a heavenly light, a heavenly voice, and a heavenly One. Spontaneously Saul said, “Who are You, Lord? And He said, I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting” (v. 5). Saul called Him Lord, even without knowing Him.
Saul may have said to himself, “I have never persecuted Jesus. Rather, I persecuted Stephen and other followers of Jesus. I thought that Jesus was in the tomb, but now He comes to me from the heavens.”
According to 9:4, the Lord Jesus asked Saul, “Why are you persecuting Me?” This is a corporate Me comprising Jesus the Lord and all His believers. Saul did not have this revelation, thinking that he was persecuting Stephen and other Jesus-followers in the way he considered heresy (24:14). He did not know that when he persecuted these he persecuted Jesus, for they were one with Him by being united to Him through their faith in Him. He considered that he was persecuting people on earth, never thinking that he touched anyone in heaven. To his great surprise, a voice from heaven told him that He was the One whom he was persecuting, and His name was Jesus. To him this was an unique revelation in the entire universe! By this he began to see that the Lord Jesus and His believers are one great person — the wonderful “Me.” This must have impressed him and affected him for his future ministry concerning Christ and the church as the great mystery of God (Eph. 5:32), and laid a solid foundation for his unique ministry.
Luke does not give us the details related to Saul’s conversion. Nevertheless, we can see that the Lord Jesus preached an adequate gospel to Saul. Saul indeed heard the gospel. Some may wonder how we can say this. They may point out that the voice from heaven did not say anything about the crucifixion, the redeeming blood, or the resurrection. However, we need to realize that the name Jesus is an adequate gospel. Saul was a sinner, an opponent, but he must have known the significance of this name, since he knew both Hebrew and Greek. He must have realized that Jesus means Jehovah, the Savior. Is this not the gospel? Do we not hear the gospel when we hear of Jesus? Who is Jehovah, the Savior? Paul surely knew the meaning of the name of Jesus.
In 9:6 the Lord Jesus said to Saul, “Rise up and enter into the city, and it shall be told you what you must do.” The Lord would not directly tell Saul right after his conversion what He wanted him to do, for the reason that he needed a member of His Body to initiate him into the identification with His Body, since he had been saved and brought to the Lord directly by Him, not indirectly through any channel. Without a member sent by the Lord from His Body to contact him, it would be difficult for any member of His Body to receive him (see 9:26).
Verse 8 says, “And Saul rose from the ground, and though his eyes were opened, he saw nothing; and leading him by the hand, they brought him into Damascus.” Here we have the Lord’s dealing with Saul. Before this, Saul considered himself marvelously knowledgeable, regarding himself as one who knew all things concerning man and God. Now the Lord made him blind so that he could see nothing until the Lord opened his eyes, especially his inner eyes, and commissioned him to open the eyes of others (26:18).
In 9:10-19 we see that Saul’s conversion was confirmed through Ananias. Verses 10 and 11 say, “Now there was a certain disciple in Damascus named Ananias, and the Lord said to him in a vision, Ananias! And he said, Behold, I am here, Lord. And the Lord said to him, Rise up and go to the lane called Straight, and seek in the house of Judas a man from Tarsus named Saul; for behold, he is praying.” The Lord sent Ananias, one member of His Body, to go to Saul so that Saul might be initiated into the identification with the Body of Christ. This also must have impressed Saul with the importance of the Body of Christ and helped him realize that a saved believer needs the members of the Body of Christ.
In 9:12 the Lord told Ananias that Saul had “seen in a vision a man named Ananias coming in and laying his hands on him, so that he may receive his sight.” For the blinded Saul to receive sight was for him to be saved in full. It meant a great deal to him, especially for his inner eyes to be opened to see the things of God concerning His mysteries and His economy.
In verses 13 and 14 Ananias said, “Lord, I have heard from many concerning this man, how many evil things he has done to Your saints in Jerusalem; and here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who call upon Your name.” This indicates that calling upon the Lord’s name in the early days was a sign of the Lord’s followers (1 Cor. 1:2). This kind of calling must have been audible so that others could hear. Thus it became a sign.
In 9:15 and 16 the Lord said to Ananias, “Go, for this man is a chosen vessel to Me, to bear My name before both the Gentiles and kings and the sons of Israel; for I will show him how much he must suffer on behalf of My name.” Because Saul was a chosen vessel to the Lord, he was set apart from his mother’s womb and called by the Lord (Gal. 1:15). The Lord is sovereign and able, according to His choosing in eternity, to make the most fierce among His persecutors a vessel, a leading apostle, to carry out His commission in preaching the gospel and taking the way he had opposed and persecuted. Eventually, the opposing Saul became, in his victorious ministry of the gospel, Christ’s vanquished captive in the triumphant procession celebrating Christ’s victory over all His enemies (2 Cor. 2:14).
Acts 9:17 says, “And Ananias went away and entered into the house; and laying his hands on him, he said, Saul, brother, the Lord has sent me, Jesus, who appeared to you on the road by which you came, so that you may receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” Saul’s case was a particular one because as the most significant persecutor, he was saved directly by the Lord from heaven while he was on his way to persecute the believers. Hence, he needed, as did the Samaritan believers (8:14-17) and the twelve disciples in Ephesus (19:1-7), a member of the Body of Christ to initiate him into the identification with the Body of Christ by the laying on of hands.
The filling with the Holy Spirit in 9:17 is the outward filling. According to the principle of salvation in God’s New Testament economy, Saul must have received the Holy Spirit of life essentially at the time of his conversion, prior to Ananias’ coming and laying his hands on him. Before Ananias came, he was praying to the Lord (v. 11). This indicates that Saul had believed in the Lord and was calling on Him (Rom. 10:13-14) like those believers whom he had ravaged and was going to arrest. But since he was not saved through any member of the Body of Christ, the Holy Spirit did not fall upon him economically until Ananias came, as the representative of the Body, to identify him with the Body of Christ.
Verses 18 and 19 continue, “And immediately there fell from his eyes something like scales, and he received his sight and rose up and was baptized; and taking food, he was strengthened. Now he was with the disciples in Damascus for some days.” The case of Saul, like that of the Ethiopian eunuch, instructs us to pay attention to water baptism, which signifies the believers’ identification with Christ’s death and resurrection (Rom. 6:3-5; Col. 2:12), as well as to Spirit baptism, which signifies the reality of the believers’ union with Christ in life essentially and in power economically. Water baptism is a believer’s affirmation of the reality of Spirit baptism. Both are necessary.
