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| The Damascus Road Experience |
Saul of Tarsus, later known as the Apostle Paul, is credited as author of 13 of 27 books of the New Testament. This man was no ordinary man nor from an ordinary city. Tarsus was part of the Roman Empire, and Saul was a Roman Citizen. This would play an important part in the life of Paul, the Apostle, as he would eventually appeal to Caesar, under the laws of Rome.
Saul and Paul are paradoxical; although the same man with a changed name and a changed heart, on either side of the Damascus Road Experience and Saul’s Conversion, this man always had singular focus--he always stayed a rebel with a cause. His paradox lay in his nature, before and after his conversion; his singular focus was in his passion. This man was alway on a mission.
Saul was powerful! Saul wholeheartedly approved of Stephen’s death (Acts 8:1). Saul was so powerful, on the day of Stephen’s stoning, the witnesses placed their outer robes at his feet (Acts 7:58). And on the day of Stephen’s stoning and death, a great and relentless persecution broke out against the church in Jerusalem; and the believers were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles (Acts 8:1).
Prior to the Damascus Road Experience, Saul breathed threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord. Relentless in his search for believers,he went to the high priest, and asked for letters of authority from him to the synagogues at Damascus. So if Saul found any men or women there belonging to the Way [believers, followers of Jesus the Messiah], men and women alike, he could arrest them and bring them bound, with chains, to Jerusalem (Acts 9:1-2).
Isn’t it ironic that this rebellious young man against God and our Lord Jesus Christ--this rebel with a cause, to relentlessly search for believers, arrest them, and put them in chains, would himself become a believer, be arrested, and be bound in chains. Why? Because, as Paul the Apostle, he would still be a rebel with a cause--this time on the other side of The Cross. He no longer breathed threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord; instead threats and murder were being issued against him by the religious sect in Jerusalem that had commissioned him with arrest warrants. Now the warrant was for him, his arrest, and for him to be put to death.
What a contrast between the mission of Saul and the mission of Paul. The same person, yet a different man. When saved, when we believe on Jesus Christ, we each have our own Damascus Road Experience, through The Cross. Once Saul, now Paul. Let’s be REBELS WITH A CAUSE!
Although you are correct in the difference between the acts of Paul before en after the Damascus experience, I am not at all convinced that there is a change of name. The Aramaic / Hebrew name is Saul and the Greek name is Paul. When Luke narrate the history in the regions where the speak Hebrew - he will use "Saul". Elsewhere it is "Paul".
ReplyDeleteActs 22:7 Paul himself, speaking Hebrew, refers to himself as "Saul".