PERSECUTOR TURNED PREACHER

“Then, after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to get acquainted with Cephas and stayed with him fifteen days. I saw none of the other apostles – only James, the Lord’s brother. I assure you before God that what I am writing is no lie. Then I went to Syria and Cilicia. I was personally unknown to the churches of Judea that are in Christ. They only heard the report: ‘The man who formerly persecuted the church is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.’ And they praised God because of me.” Galatians 1:18-24.

Paul’s story takes some beating! How could this happen? “The man who formerly persecuted the church is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.” It doesn’t happen every day. It’s like Hitler turning Jewish! And yet it did happen.

If ever there was a reason to believe that Paul had the right to defend the sufficiency of Jesus’ death for salvation, it was his own story. He had discovered for himself that all his efforts to satisfy the requirements of the law to gain access to God’s favour, were useless and futile. He spelled it out clearly in his letter to the Roman church. The harder he tried to change himself on the inside, the more he was sucked into his sinful ways. Trying to obey the law could not break the power of sin within him.

Paul knew what it was like to struggle with guilt, but he also knew the reality of God’s peace. Out of his own personal experience he could write:

“Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Romans 5:1

“…and the peace of God which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds through Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:7.

This peace was unknown to him until he came face to face with Jesus and received by faith and without lifting a finger, the righteousness he had tried so hard to earn. How could he ever go back to the old way and how could he sit by and say nothing when others were trying to persuade Gentiles to buy into a life of futile self-effort? He would fight the false teaching with every breath and with every ounce of energy in his body.

Paul was a man with a brilliant mind. He could think and argue like an astute lawyer. He was trained as a rabbi and a Pharisee under the best religious teachers of his day. Just as he once contended for Judaism, now he contended for the faith which he clearly understood from the Scriptures he knew so well. From the moment he met Jesus, everything he had learned as a rabbi fell into place. He did not invent a new faith. He preached with conviction what was already proclaimed in the Old Testament and fulfilled in Jesus, the Messiah.

He did not need Peter or the other disciples to teach him the truth. His three years in Arabia alone with the Holy Spirit, entrenched in him God’s Word which he had memorised from childhood and now understood. The truth became so deeply embedded in his spirit that he became God’s replacement for Judas, the betrayer. He paid a brief visit to Jerusalem to introduce himself to Peter and to reassure him that he, Paul, was no longer a persecutor but a preacher of the one he tried to destroy. He met none of the other apostles, only Jesus’ half-brother, James.

Then he returned to Damascus and went back home to Cilicia. Paul did not record here that he became a danger to the church in Jerusalem because of his fiery preaching, so they shipped him back home to Tarsus (Acts 9:28-30). The church had rest for a while after he left until the next wave of persecution hit them when God opened the door of faith to the Gentiles.

The outcome of Paul’s encounter with Jesus and his years of training in Arabia was a convinced and loyal apostle of Jesus and colleague of the men whom Jesus commissioned to take His message to the ends of the earth. After Peter’s initial visibility in the first few chapters of Acts, Paul took centre stage, and the rest of the book is his story. He became the champion of the Jesus way, not only in the work he did across the empire but, even more, in the legacy he left the church down the ages through his letters.

What an encouragement to know that, if God could change a vicious persecutor, He can change anyone!

Acknowledgement

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.