"...from darkness to light..." -- Acts 26:18
THE RISEN CHRIST in His celestial glory, after having commissioned Saul,
directed him to proceed to the city which was near (Acts 9:3), and to wait there for
further instructions: "Go into Damascus, and there you will be spoken to concerning
all which has been set for you to do" (Acts 22:10).
The men who had traveled from Jerusalem with Saul, in a
north-easterly direction, for about 140 miles, were probably a little distance away from
him when they saw "a light out of heaven" (Acts 9:3; 22:9), and all of them fell
on their faces (Acts 26:14). Since the vision was intended for Saul only, these men beheld
"no one"; they were "dumbfounded" for they heard the "sound"
of the Lord's voice, but they did not recognize it as His voice, nor did they hear the
words which were spoken (Acts 9:7; 22:9). When Saul opened his eyes again, there was darkness
around him, "he observed nothing." Christ's celestial glory, "above
the brightness of the sun," had blinded his eyes to the things on earth (Acts 9:8;
22:11; 26:13). One of his attendants took him by the hand, and thus "they led him
into Damascus" (Acts 9:8), where he did not eat nor drink for three days.
We do not know Saul's thoughts during those days. We may
assume, however, that he realized that he had gone a long way in blindness and
darkness--that he had been in this condition ever since he had entered Gamaliel's
rabbinical college in Jerusalem. Later, as a young Pharisee, the influential members of
the Sanhedrin had led him by the hand; these were the very men who had never recognized
the Lord of glory, or they would not have crucified the One in Whom God's glory had
returned (1 Cor.2:8). Then Saul had progressed in Judaism above many of his contemporaries
and "inordinately persecuted the ecclesia of God and ravaged it" (Gal.1:13,14).
We may further assume that Saul realized that he had been
injuring himself rather than the Lord of glory against Whom his murderous campaign had
been directed. When Christ asked him on the road, "Why are you persecuting
Me?", His meaning was clear. He was saying, "You cannot hurt Me, nor wipe out My
believers; you are only hurting yourself by kicking against the goads" (Acts
26:14). The Concordant Commentary explains: "In the Orient a sharp, pointed rod is
used in place of a whip to urge animals to their task. To kick the sharp goad hurts no one
but themselves. This is a graphic picture of Saul's service up to this time. The Lord was
using him to carry out His purpose, but hitherto Saul did not acknowledge his Master. He
had been goaded into persecuting the saints. Henceforth he was to render willing,
intelligent service. Henceforth he acknowledges Christ as his Lord."
There was no reason for Saul to worry about his future
service under the new commission, since his Lord had promised to give him more detailed
instructions in Damascus. We may assume that his prayerful thoughts centered around the
words which the risen Christ in His celestial glory had spoken to him on the road. During
the first three days of his stay in Damascus he was surrounded by physical darkness which
provided the background for the initial stage of his readjustment, when he came to see new
spiritual realities.
At this juncture, we would like to quote from Unsearchable
Riches magazine, volume 39, page 44, so as to grasp some of the spiritual realities which
were dawning on Saul, either during those three days or at a later period.
"Nationally, Saul belonged to those who were
about to fall from God's favor. Individually, he exceeded them all in opposition
to the Messiah. He endorsed the assassination of Stephen (Acts 8:1). Then he devastated
the ecclesia of God, actually going into the homes and dragging out both men and women, he
gave them over to jail (Acts 8:3). No one in Israel deserved a worse doom than he. What
Ananias and Sapphira did was nothing to his atrocities, and they suffered the supreme
penalty. No penalty could be too severe for him, no death too fearful. If God's attitude
is still the same, He would most miserably destroy him.
"But God has changed His attitude entirely! He does
not send a Philip nor a Peter, but Christ Himself comes to meet the mad man. He
does not strike him dead, as he deserves, but grants him the greatest grace ever given to
a mortal. In an instant He transformed him from His worst enemy to His most faithful and
fervent friend. Here was reconciliation at its fullest and finest. Let us note some of its
salient features. God was about to judge the nation for their rejection of the evangel of
the kingdom, and Saul, as an individual, was the worst of the rebels. According to all
that had been revealed, God was due to destroy him. But He does the reverse! He
treats him as if he were His best friend. He does not reckon his offenses against him
(2 Cor.5:19). And He never does! Paul suffered much for His name's sake, but never for his
persecution of the saints, and never for any mistakes he may have made in his later life,
from the hands of God. For He is conciliated, and all that comes to him henceforth is for
his good.
"Saul's gracious and glorious call on the Damascus
road, like Peter's housetop vision (Acts 10:9-20), was intended to teach him, by the most
powerful means at God's command, the limitless grace of God, to which he should bear
witness before the nations. In this light we can see that even Saul's murderous
career, which preceded his call, was necessary, and can be justified from the divine
standpoint. To display in him the limitless grace that God intended to impart to the
nations, demanded that he deserve the severest judgment, such as the bowls of wrath which
He will pour out on the apostate nation at the time of the end. Had Saul not been the
foremost of sinners, he could not have become a pattern of those who were about to believe
(1 Tim.1:15,16).
PAUL REPLACES THE PRIESTS
"In Saul's gracious call we have not
only God's friendly attitude toward him individually displayed, but His
repudiation of Israel as His religious representatives to the rest of the world, for now he
was to replace the priests in bearing God's name before their kings, nationally,
as well as before the sons of Israel. They were none of them as worthy of judgment as
Saul, so God stretches out the hand of friendship to the whole race. As Paul wrote later,
"that God was in Christ, conciliating the world to Himself, not reckoning
their offenses to them" (2 Cor. 5:19).
"God did not wait for Saul to repent or to pray or to
turn to Him before He called him by His grace. So, also, now, God is conciliated
to the world including all of every race. All that they need to do in order to be
saved is to respond to His grace by believing the special evangel of which Paul
became the dispenser (Eph.3:7; 1 Tim.1:11; 2 Tim.1:11)."
CHRIST'S WITNESS TO ALL MEN
Saul was a blind man of ill fame in a
strange city, and unable to establish contact with the Jewish believers there, for his
recent persecution of believers in Jerusalem and elsewhere was common knowledge, and his
plans to continue his nefarious career in Damascus was no secret either. Hence the Lord
Himself introduces him to those "who are of the way" (Acts 9:2b) in this town.
For this purpose, Saul has another vision in which he sees "a man named Ananias
entering and placing his hands on him so that he should be receiving sight" (Acts
9:12).
At this time, Ananias, too, has a vision in which he
recognizes the Lord speaking to him, "Rise! Go to the street called `Straight,' and
seek in the house of Judas for a Tarsian named Saul, for, lo! he is praying. And he
perceived in a vision a man named Ananias entering and placing his hands on him so that he
should be receiving sight."
The Concordant Commentary explains: "God graciously
gives a double witness to His dealing with Saul. Ananias is quite his opposite, being a
devout disciple. Saul would have found it almost impossible to join the disciples as he
did without some such confirmatory testimony to his conversion, for Ananias himself was
afraid to go, knowing what Saul had done and what he proposed to do."
Ananias, "a pious man according to the law, being
attested by all the Jews dwelling there" (Acts 22:12), was well aware of the sinister
purpose of Saul's journey. Being afraid of him, he answers the Lord in his vision: "I
hear from many about this man, how much evil he does to Thy saints in Jerusalem. And here
he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who are invoking Thy name." But
the Lord allays his apprehensions by telling him what had happened to Saul on the road
outside the city and bids him "Go!" In addition, He advises him of the field and
scope of Saul's future ministries: first and foremost to the nations, later to kings, and
meanwhile to the sons of Israel among the nations. What must have impressed Ananias most,
were the Lord's words, Saul "is a choice instrument of Mine."
Apparently we do not have the full text of the conversation
between the Lord and Ananias, nor does Luke report everything that passed between Ananias
and Saul. The following combines the two accounts, giving us what may be the complete
dialogue (Acts 9:17-19; 22:13-16):
"Now Ananias came away and entered the house, and,
placing his hands on him, said, `Saul! Brother! Receive your sight! The Lord has
commissioned me (Jesus, Who was seen by you on the road by which you came), so that you
should be receiving sight and be filled with holy spirit.' And immediately fall from his
eyes as if scales, and he receives sight.
"And I, in the same same hour, look up to
him. Now he said, `The God of our fathers fixes upon you beforehand to know His will, and
to be acquainted with the Just One, and to hear the voice of His mouth, that you shall be His
witness to all men of what you have seen and hear. And now, why do you defer? Rise,
baptize, and bathe off your sins, invoking His name.'
"Besides, rising, also, he is baptized, and, obtaining
nourishment, is strengthened."
From this it seems that Ananias learned more details about
Saul's conversion from the Lord which are not reported in Acts 9:15,16. For Ananias refers
to "Jesus, Who was seen by you on the road by which you came." When introducing
Saul to the Jewish believers in Damascus, Ananias would be able to corroborate Saul's
story, even in details which he had learned in his own vision. Saul was going to be the
witness of the risen Christ in His celestial glory as he had seen Him. Furthermore (in the
words of Ananias) he was "to know His will...and to hear the voice of His
mouth." In the Greek, the grammatical forms of "to know" as well as
"to hear" and "you...hear" (Acts 22:14,15) indicate a fact
not only of the past (three days ago on the road), but also of the present
(Saul's vision in Judas' house), and of the future (such as referred to in Acts
22:17, 18; 2 Cor.12:4; Gal.1:12; Eph.3:3; 1 Thess.4:15).
We may assume that the Lord's instructions to Ananias were
worded as "placing his hands on him so that he should be receiving sight" (Acts
9:12), just as He described the contents of Saul's vision to Ananias. However, in the
words of the latter (Acts 9:17), Saul is not only to "be receiving sight," but
in addition to "be filled with holy spirit." Since this manifestation of the
spirit depended on the authorized imposition of hands in those days, the Lord may not have
mentioned it to Ananias. However, the sequence in Saul's case (filled with holy spirit prior
to water baptism) deviated from the rule as laid down by Peter, when the gratuity of the
holy spirit had to be preceded by compunction, repentance, and baptism (Acts
2:37,38).
No such works were required from Saul in order to be filled
with holy spirit. The eyes of his heart having been enlightened on the road three days ago
(when he had not even asked for it), his physical eyesight restored now, Saul was sure to
remember the Lord's words, "from darkness to light." As the Lord Himself had
opened his eyes (both spiritually and physically), he was now ready to bear witness
of what he had perceived. This is indicated by the phrase, "filled with holy
spirit," i.e., in order to speak as the Lord had commissioned him.
