Pastor Jeremy M. Thomas
Fredericksburg Bible Church
107 East Austin
Fredericksburg, Texas 78624
830-997-8834      jthomas@fbgbible.org
A0935 – August 30, 2009 – Acts 22:1-21 – Paul's Apologetic To The Jews

Now, the picture we were left with was Paul being dragged out through the outer court of the Temple and up the stairs into the Antonia Fortress. You can see the violence of the mob in v 35 so the soldiers had to carry Paul up the stairs. And the Roman soldiers are doing an excellent job protecting this man that had been assaulted. They’re carrying him up and Paul makes a request of the commander in v 37, “May I say something to you?” In other words, Paul respects the authority of this commander, and we think we know his name, Commander Lysias, and with that question in the Greek tongue the commander deduces, v 38, that Paul is not the Egyptian they’d been looking for. The Roman army gathered intelligence data and they kept profiles on wanted criminals and apparently these profiles contained all kinds of information; size, build, color of hair, color of eyes, what languages they spoke and the Roman army commander had in his file the various languages the Egyptian spoke and he did not speak Greek so automatically he concludes “you are not the Egyptian.” And then, v 39, Paul identifies himself, “I am Jew of Tarsus, in Cilicia, a citizen of no insignificant city; and I beg you, allow me to speak to the people.” And the Roman commander would have never permitted this if Paul was a wanted man, but seeing that he was not a wanted man he permits it. At this point if he can calm down the crowd it would be a good thing to preserve order and even if they won’t give Paul much of a hearing it will stop the violence momentarily and the whole thing will subside. So this is another wise decision by the Roman commander. 

Today we come to Paul’s defense. Paul is going to give this defense from the stairs that led up into the Antonia.  He’s well-protected by the Roman soldiers and so he motions with his hand to the people and when there was a lull in the chaos he spoke to them in the Hebrew dialect saying, “Brethren and fathers, hear my defense which I now offer to you.” Now, despite almost being beat to death by them he addresses them very fondly, Brethren and fathers just as Stephen had done in Acts 7:2. And by doing so he says look guys, I’m related to you, you’re my brothers and my fathers. And then he begins his defense. The word for defense is apologia from which we get our English word apologize, but that’s not the sense of the word in Greek. Paul’s not going to apologize for Christianity; Paul is going to defend Christianity. To give an apologia was to give a defense in a court of law. And when the Christian faith is attacked the Christian is put in a position where he must defend the faith and turn it around so the attacker has to defend his beliefs. And that’s what Paul does in Acts 22. They’re attacking Paul, accusing him of being a renegade Jew who’s apostatized from the Mosaic Law and profaned the temple. So Paul defends his beliefs. 

There will be times when you are going to be called upon to give a defense for the hope that is in you. And obviously the better acquainted you are with the text the better able you are to do this. Always it is the man who most thinks God’s thoughts after Him that is the most able to defeat the opposition and put the other side in a position where they don’t have an answer. All the great men in Acts; Paul, Stephen and Apollos were apologists of the Christian faith. Some Christians today think that they do not have to give an answer; that all they have to do is say to their non-Christian neighbor, just believe. The Bible says that every man is to sanctify Christ as Lord in his heart “being ready to give a defense to everyone that asks for a reason for the hope that is in him,” therefore we have a mandate directly from the Lord to give a defense for the Christian faith. And that’s what Paul does in Acts 22.

The reason for this, of course, is that God doesn’t just force people to believe. God is a gentleman and God allows the person to choose to believe or to reject. And therefore Paul persuaded men, meaning if a person had a question about the Christian faith Paul would take the time to answer them. Excepting the case where the unbeliever was only playing games and Paul would give an impenetrable answer. Such is the nature of the word of God and so when the defense operates from the word of God it’s unanswerable.

Paul has given an apologetic in Acts 13 before the Jews, he gave another in Acts 17 before the Gentiles. Now we’re in Acts 22 and we see Paul before the Jews once more. The defense breaks up easily into three sections. Following the introduction in vv 1-2, in vv 3-5 Paul describes his heritage and training and this is background that answers the question, who is this guy? Who is Paul? In vv 6-16 Paul describes his conversion to Christianity which he did not initiate and which was observed by credible eyewitnesses. And in vv 17-21 he describes his commission to the Gentiles, God’s will for his life. And then he gets cut off. So today again we are studying apologetics. 

So he begins: Brethren and fathers, hear my apologia which I now offer to you.” 2And when they had heard that he was addressing them in the Hebrew dialect, they became even more quiet; in other words he addressed them in their native tongue. The native tongue was Aramaic not Hebrew so when it says Hebrew dialect that’s Aramaic. Same alphabet, same language family so they’re similar languages but not the same. Obviously Paul could have spoken to them in Greek like he did the commander but that would have linked him with Hellenistic Jewry and most of his audience was native Jewry so he speaks the native tongue and this gets him, quote “political points,” shall we say, it’s a strategic move. It would be like someone walking in here and speaking native Texan, using all the Texan phrases, ya’ll, fix’in to and that gets your attention and you lower your guard, and that’s what Paul’s doing. Upon hearing it they became even more quiet and he said, 3I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, but brought up in this city, educated under Gamaliel. 

Now Tarsus of Cilicia was in the Diaspora, so he says I’m a Diaspora Jew, but I was brought up in this city, Jerusalem, and educated at the feet of Gamaliel. What’s Paul saying? Well, if ever there was a well-rounded Jew you’re looking at him. I’m from the Hellenistic world of Jewry, the city of Tarsus which was a university town, so I’m familiar with all the Greek ideas, so you can’t pin me as a Greek philosopher, familiar with the ideas yes, but brought up in Jerusalem, so I’m familiar with Jewish theology and further, I was educated at the feet of Gamaliel. So I really know what I’m talking about here, these are my credentials. Now this is a lesson some Christians need to learn. You don’t walk in some place and start flapping your mouth without giving your credentials. I don’t care who you think you are, you have no credibility with people until you’ve shown the credentials. So if you want to get a hearing from people and you want people to listen to what you have to say, you better have some credentials. And so Paul says, I’ve been to Greece, I’ve been to Jerusalem and I’ve been to the academy and the specific academy he studied in was the school of Hillel. And his teacher was Gamaliel. Now Gamaliel was one of the seven greatest theologians in all Jewish history, He held the title rabban, not rabbi.  Rabban - and the difference between a rabbi and a rabban is that a rabbi was a teacher of Israel but a rabban was “the” teacher of Israel. He was the teacher of the whole nation and under him were all the rabbi’s. So Paul sat at the feet of one of the seven greatest minds ever produced by the Jewish people. Paul’s a well-rounded, well trained man. What else? 

End of v 3, being zealous for God just as you all are today. The proof of which is in the pudding of v 4, I persecuted this Way to the death, binding and putting both men and women into prisons as also the high priest and all the Council of the elders can testify. In other words, it’s written in the minutes what I did, go check the annals of the Council, they’re held about 100 yards from where we stand, so go check them yourselves and you’ll see the names of the men and the women, and you’ll see I was the one who arrested them, I was the one who put them in prison, I was the one who testified in a court of law against them, I was the one who had them put to death. And notice how he mentions women in there.  Women are in the ledger book. It didn’t matter to Paul if you were some sweet little thing, nice figure, from a prominent family. Paul didn’t care about that. You believe in Jesus you cute thing? Against the wall! And he’d read you your Miranda rights, cuff you and haul you off to jail. What does this show us about Paul? It shows us Paul was an issues man. And the issue very simply for Paul was that he considered Christianity a threat to Judaism. Gamaliel didn’t see it. Gamaliel was the type, let’s just see what happens. Paul did see it. Paul saw the implications because had been down at the local synagogue debating the implications with a man named Stephen in Acts 6. Stephen was the first man in the Church to start seeing the broader implications of the Messiah and the Temple. Stephen was the first to say, you know what, Jesus and His cross are greater than the Jewish people. His program is larger than the Jewish Temple and therefore Stephen began to make the break outside the Jewish world. And Paul was in debate with him down at that synagogue and I can tell you one thing, it was not a pretty sight. Paul was used to tearing everybody to pieces in debate. Paul would knock down one guy after another guy after another guy. For Paul it was easy. He was a theological genius, an absolute theological genius; he had a first rate mind, he had the best training you could get, he was studying for his doctorate under rabban Gamaliel and now this guy Stephen, who’s he? Some Diaspora Jew, hasn’t been to the best schools, hasn’t sat at the feet of Gamaliel and he knocked Paul down, and just wiped him out in the debate. And Paul didn’t like that very much. Paul was the type that if he couldn’t beat your brains intellectually, he’d beat your brains physically. Paul said I’m going to be valedictorian of the universe and if you try to stop me, if you embarrass me I’ll have you knocked off. That’s the kind of zeal this man had. Male, female, it didn’t matter, the issues are what mattered and Paul was seriously bothered by Stephen. Stephen got under Paul’s skin. How did Stephen get under Paul’s skin? Stephen had destroyed his framework of thinking. All of Paul’s life had been devoted to the Pharisaic framework and in 45 minutes Stephen had undermined and destroyed the Pharisaic framework. And when you do that to a person, it hurts very badly, that’s the kind of thing that really makes people mad. Saul was so mad he led litigation against Stephen and had Stephen stoned. And what did he do after that? V 5? Did he stop shedding blood? No, he went to the Council of the elders. From them I also received letters to the brethren, and started off for Damascus in order to bring even those who were there to Jerusalem as prisoners to be punished. In other words, he walked 140 miles just to arrest other Christians who were teaching Stephen’s framework. Now that’s a six day journey which shows you in Paul’s mind Christianity is a tremendous threat, in Paul’s mind it was war.  

Now you may not like that about Paul; that he would come and have you killed but that is the same Paul who wrote half your NT. So let’s categorize the type of person Paul was. There are three kinds of people. People type A are the types that have natural ability, innate ability; they never have to study, they never have to practice, they’re just good at something and they can be lazy for awhile.  They don’t have to work hard so they don’t work hard and they still beat people. But sooner or later People type B come along and they are the type that do not have natural ability but they work hard, they study hard, they practice hard and they start to hone their skills and sooner or later they pass people type A.  People type A say, what is this, how does that inept person beat me? And the reason is because people B’s work habit and discipline finally pay off. Then you have People type C and people type C are both naturally talented and they work hard. People type C are rare, they aren’t a dime a dozen. What kind of person is Paul? Paul is person type C. Paul had a first rate mind and Gamaliel recognized it and took him under his wing; and trained Paul personally. But Paul had a little something else. Paul worked hard, he had zeal. He didn’t just rely on his great intellect, he studied day and night, day and night and when he came to his conclusions he put them into action. Paul wasn’t just a doctrine man, he was also an application man. Now a person like this can be used for tremendous good or tremendous evil. It all depends on their orientation to the word of God. On one hand Saul is a great persecutor of the Christian faith, he wrote the rulebook. But he writes another rulebook later, the apologetics of the Christian faith, that’s the Book of Romans. So he is used for evil before Acts 9 but good afterwards.

So what’s Paul’s point with all the autobiography in vv 3-5? It’s to say, this is my resume, these are my credentials. And if you guys think you know the system of Judaism and if you think you’re zealous against the Way you should’ve seen me twenty-five years ago, right here on the streets of Jerusalem. I fought for Judaism, I persecuted the Way, I led the charge, I wrote the rule book on how to persecute these people. So don’t think I don’t know what you’re thinking. I know exactly what you’re system says and I defended the ancestral traditions with greater zeal than you. 

Now this is one argument we tend to forget we can use. Not only has he established credibility but we Christians have one argument that no non-Christian has ever had or can have. And that’s the fact that we’ve lived on both sides of the fence. We know, particularly if we became a believer in later life, what it’s like to be a non-Christian and we know what it’s like to be a Christian. So we have this argument that we can say, alright, I know what it’s like to be a non-Christian so don’t come to me and say, you don’t know what it’s like. I do know what it’s like. At least that should get you a hearing. We’re not saying it’s a full-proof argument, but hey Paul says, look, I lived on your side of the fence, I was steeped in Judaism and the Law, I sat under Gamaliel for crying out loud so if you’re smart you’ll listen to what I have to say.  Of course, not many of them were very smart and they didn’t listen but nonetheless, this is how you do it.  

And now, v 6 he begins to describe how he got on the other side. Acts 9 is the greatest conversion in church history. Luke records it on three different occasions; Acts 9, Acts 22 and Acts 26. Then Paul records it himself in Galatians and Philippians. So five times this conversion is recorded and if the word of God records something five times you better believe it’s important. This man’s conversion is a key event in history. So he begins v 6, But it happened that as I was on my way, approaching Damascus about noontime, For context, why is he going there? To arrest Christians. And key to this is the word noontime. What’s noontime got to do with it? Noontime is the hottest part of the day, the sun is straight up in the sky and Paul is walking to Damascus. To get an idea of the strength of the sun in this area, historically the Arabs in this region have always had troubled eyesight and they attribute it to the sun. So it’s bright, it’s hot and then something happens to Paul, a very bright light…flashed from heaven all around me. Now how do you explain that Paul saw a very bright light when he was standing out in the bright sun? Only if it was about a hundred times brighter. It was so bright, in fact, it blinded Paul. And the only thing we can liken this to is a nuclear blast. A blast of white light so intense Paul fell to the ground and then something else: he heard a voice.  Now we have verbal revelation. Paul is getting first hand verbal revelation. And the voice said, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?” Now, that is one of the strangest questions in all the word of God. What would Paul say? What do you mean persecuting you? Who are you? I know I’m persecuting Christians, but who are you? Now, this is an insight the Lord is giving us which is terrific. And that is, that somehow as Paul persecuted Christians he was also persecuting Jesus. And the only way that can be is if there’s a unity between Christ and Christians. And that’s the concept of the body of Christ. Christ is the head and the believers are His body and when you touch the body you touch Christ. That’s Jesus’ argument to Paul. And that’s evidence that the Church started in Acts 2 and not Acts 9, 13 or 28. There are other kinds of dispensationalists out there that try to argue the church started later than Acts 2, but if you try that approach what do you do with Christ’s statement Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me? So, we have evidence the Church had already begun.

V 8, Paul responds, Who are You, Lord? And Lord there is kurios, the NT equivalent of the OT YHWH so he recognizes its God but just like Moses at the burning bush he wants to know his name. So he says, Who are You, Lord? I want to know your name. And He said to me, ‘I am Jesus the Nazarene, whom you are persecuting.’ Now why did he say Jesus, why didn’t He say I’m God,  Paul? Because Paul already knows it's God.  So he says I am Jesus the Nazarene, which meant you grew up in Nazareth. So now, in addition to knowing this is God, Paul knows his name is Jesus and he’s a man. So we have the God-man. And now all the pistons are firing. And according to Gal 1:11-12 this is where Paul believed in Jesus and was justified. So keep that in mind as a lead up to v 16. Paul was justified on the Damascus road.

Now, to show this was not just some psychological breakdown, which is what all the liberal commentators say, that Paul felt guilty from all the blood on his hands, he’s marching to Damascus to kill more Christians, it’s hot, and Paul had a nervous breakdown en route. Well, if Paul had a nervous breakdown why does v 9 say the other people on the road saw the light? The details of the text aren’t handled by the liberal who hates the supernatural. But what the text describes, if you know your OT then you see clearly what this great light is? This is the Shechinah Glory and what’s happening is He’s cloaking the Lord Jesus Christ and so while everyone can see the light Paul is the only one who can see Jesus’ face and hear exactly what He’s saying. The other guys, they see the light to be sure, but they couldn’t understand what He was saying. Apparently they heard the voice but they couldn’t pick up on what was being said. But in verse 10 we find out what was said. And I said, ‘What shall I do, Lord?’ And the Lord said to me, ‘Get up and go on into Damascus, and there you will be told of all that has been appointed for you to do.’ Now, it’s interesting that the Lord does this. Why doesn’t the Lord just tell him on the spot? You’re already in a conversation; why not just tell the guy what you want him to do? Because God is omniscient and God knows about this trial we’re reading about 25 years later. And therefore God says, I want to bring someone else into the story, a man named Ananias. What is it about Ananias that makes him crucial to history? Well, let’s find out. Paul’s friends lead him into the city and then in v 12 comes this Ananias. Now if we were in Acts 9 we would see that Ananias got a vision from the Lord that Saul was coming and he was to go to him down on the main street, the street called Straight. Ananias had some misgivings about doing it but the Lord straightened him out and he went. And in v 12 Paul recounts it, A certain Ananias, a man who was devout by the standard of the Law, and well spoken of by all the Jews who lived there, came to me, now do you see why God wanted Ananias in the picture? Who’s Ananias? What are Ananias’ credentials? He’s a devout Jew…well spoken of by all the Jews. So Paul can now add weight to his argument. Who’s his crowd? Devout Jews. Who’s Ananias? A devout Jew. So this is one of your own guys. Are you going to reject one of your own guys? God set up Paul’s conversion so that it would provide irrefutable evidence to these people. This is how you build a case. Paul is giving a defense, it isn’t just I had an experience; this is a courtroom defense, the marshalling of evidence, witnesses and so forth. Here look at the evidence Paul’s marshaled. A) You can go check the annals of the Council, it’s all recorded what I did, I got letters, I went to Damascus. B) Ananias is on the other end of this, he saw I was blinded from the event on the Damascus road; he’s a devout Jew, well spoken of. And so God brought Ananias in because God knew by His omniscience that 25 years later Paul was going to be on the steps of the Antonia and then the Ananias evidence is going to be crucial to the case.

So Ananias arrives, v 13, and standing near said to me, ‘Brother Saul, receive your sight!’ And at that very instant I looked up at him.” Now it’s sort of cute that it says standing near because Ananias initially was afraid of Paul so to stand near him means he’s no longer afraid. God’s done a work so he stands near and heals Paul, And at that instant I looked up at him, instant return of sight, clearly a divinely wrought miracle. And now Ananias reveals the will of God for his life which God didn’t give him on the Damascus road. V 14. And he said, ‘The God of our fathers has appointed you to know His will and to see the Righteous One and to hear an utterance from His mouth, reason given, v 15, For you will be a witness for Him to all men of what you have seen and heard. Now, there are three infinitives following the main verb in v 14. The main verb is appointed. Who appointed Paul? The God of our fathers, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, what covenant? The Abrahamic Covenant is wrapped up with the fathers. So the God of the Abrahamic Covenant, the God who controls history has appointed you, Paul. See how this is all linked back to the word of God? It’s not just some personal testimony. When Paul gives an apologetic he doesn’t just say I had an experience, he goes back to Scripture which is the only place to build an apologetic. So the God of the Abrahamic Covenant appointed Paul. That Greek word means “to put into the hand of” someone. And in the middle voice, God being the subject and the recipient of the action, it means God put Paul in His hand to do what he wants with Paul. Now pay attention to this verse because in the beginning of Paul’s epistles he’ll refer back to this appointment, over and over. Paul will say before I was even born God pre-ordained in His counsels these three things A) to know his will.  In other words, this is special revelation, Paul’s going to get a fresh word from God and so right away Paul knows he’s going to be writing Scripture. Don’t be sloppy in your talk like a lot of Christians are, saying things like God spoke to me, God told me this, God told me that. The Scriptures carefully reserve that kind of talk for special revelation, verbal revelation and we have to be careful the way we express ourselves because if God really talked to you in a verbal way you ought to be writing Scripture, we ought to have Rev 23 coming out of your pen. Not only do we have to be careful because of the way Scripture uses that kind of language but because unbelievers hear that and they run with it. So and so has a word from God and they’re making policy in our government based on this private revelation. This came out a number of times in the Bush administration. And quite frankly it’s the fault of the Christians because we’re always saying God spoke to me. If you say that what do you think an unbeliever is going to think you mean? So we should try to avoid that kind of talk. God speaks in His word and God spoke to Paul not you, Paul was going to write Scripture.

B), the second thing, God appointed Paul to see the Righteous One and if you know your OT you know precisely where this comes from. Isa 53, the most Messianic passage in all the word of God. Who’s the Righteous One? The Messiah. Why’s He called the Righteous One? Because He didn’t have any sin. He didn’t inherit a sin nature, He was born of a virgin, He didn’t have any personal sin. He’s the Righteous One. Now why do we need a Righteous One? Because we do have sin. We have a sin nature and personal sin and that means we’re in a load of trouble with God, we’re separated from Him. So why do we need a Righteous One? To get back to Him. If we could do it on our own we wouldn’t need a Righteous One. Now you’re not going to help God out on this one. God has done it all and if you’re trying to say hey God, look at this good deed and look at that good deed and I said a prayer and I got dunked in the local baptistery, now will you accept me? The answer will be no. You’re still a sinner, you are not righteous. So we need the Righteous One, Jesus Christ. The One Paul saw.

And C) the third thing, Paul heard a voice from his mouth. That’s not an impression Paul got, its verbal speaking like I’m talking to you here and now. This is all required to be an apostle by the way. This is Paul’s apostolic commissioning. One of the requirements for being an apostle is to have seen the Lord Jesus Christ in His resurrected state. Why? Because of v 15. The witness. What’s the Book of Acts all about? Acts 1:8 “But you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and so forth…” Now what are they to witness too? Its not their personal experience. I’m sure the apostles had some wonderful spiritual experiences. But isn’t it interesting that you never see any of the apostles saying me and Jesus sat around a campfire up by the lake of Galilee and me and Jesus did this and because of my experience you ought to believe in Jesus. Now you may experience what you call Buddha or Confucius or anything. God may have changed your life so you don’t smoke pot anymore. But what Jesus did in your little heart is not the witness the Bible is talking about. The Bible is talking about the witness of history, the witness of the resurrection. Space and time hinge on that event. And Paul heard the voice of the resurrected one. He’s an apostle. He has apostolic authority.

Now, v 16, Ananias says, why do you delay? Get up and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on His name.’ And this is a difficult verse. This again is one of those verses called up by the Church of Christ to say you have to be water baptized to be saved. The answer to this is very simple. The Book of Acts is a transitional book and transitions by nature are not normal. Acts tells us what happened, not how it must happen. So it’s very dangerous to build doctrine from the Book of Acts. You build doctrine from the Epistles. And the Epistles teach no such thing as water baptism is necessary for salvation. In Corinthians Paul says, I don’t know if I baptized any one except the house of Stephanus. Obviously if it was necessary to salvation Paul would have baptized people, but he says there he didn’t. So what we have in the Book of Acts is a transition period and there are all kinds of strange things that happen in the transition that are not the rule and norm of the Church. But still how do we explain verse 16? Because no matter how you read verse 16 baptism and washing away sins are simultaneous here. Okay, what do you do about it? This is what we do about it!

The first thing we say is Gal 1:11-12 which indicates clearly Paul was justified on the Damascus road. So that’s already happened. Whatever is happening here is not justification. What has to be observed here is the participle calling, that’s translated as a present participle.  It's not a present participle, it’s an aorist participle that we’d translate, “having called.” Paul’s already called on His name, he did that on the Damascus road, his sins were washed away on that road, and now three days later Ananias is saying get up and be baptized as a visible symbol of what happened on that road. What’s that going to accomplish? Why does he do that? To show the believers in Damascus that Paul is the real deal. Paul was a very dangerous man, he was destroying the church. And the believers in Damascus knew it. So what better to demonstrate he was no longer dangerous than for him to be baptized in Jesus’ name? That would be a very serious statement by Paul that I now declare publicly my break with Judaism and my identification with Jesus Christ. That’s what the text is saying. And so we grant this is a very strange conversion but it occurs in transition so it’s no problem. The epistles give us the norm and the norm is that at the moment of faith you’re both justified and baptized by the Spirit. For Paul there was a split between being justified and baptized by the Spirit. And I don’t think this should be too strange because every believer in the OT was justified and none of them were ever baptized by the Spirit. Spirit baptism is what puts a person in the body of Christ and since the body of Christ didn’t start till Pentecost in Acts 2 they never had that.

Now, if you still have a problem and want to say water baptism is necessary for salvation and you want to argue from Acts 2 I’m going to present you this problem. This is one of the last times I’ll cover this so you better get this down now if you haven’t so far. What we’re interested in is water baptism and spirit baptism, the sequence these occur in the Book of Acts. In Acts 2 water baptism first then Spirit baptism. In Acts 10 Spirit baptism first and then water baptism and then Acts 9 water and Spirit baptism simultaneous. Now just look at that, if we assign these two as A and B, there are only three possibilities. A before B, A after B or A and B at the same time. All three occur in the Book of Acts. So which one are you gong to choose to build your doctrine? Acts 2, Acts 9 or Acts 10? See, you can’t do that. You can’t develop a doctrine of baptism from the Book of Acts. The Book of Acts is a transitional book, it doesn’t tell us what must happen, it simply tells us what did happen. 

Now in v 17-21 we come to the third part of his defense, his commission to go to the Gentiles and very quickly let’s cover these verses. “It happened when I returned to Jerusalem and was praying in the temple, that I fell into a trance, 18and I saw Him saying to me, ‘Make haste, and get out of Jerusalem quickly, because they will not accept your testimony about Me.’ 19“And I said, ‘Lord, they themselves understand that in one synagogue after another I used to imprison and beat those who believed in You. 20‘And when the blood of Your witness Stephen was being shed, I also was standing by approving, and watching out for the coats of those who were slaying him.’ 21“And He said to me, ‘Go! For I will send you far away to the Gentiles.’ ”

Now in v 17 you have Paul back in Jerusalem. Paul was converted out on the Damascus road, he went on into Damascus and then Paul went out into the wilderness of Syria for about three years, that was so God could get alone with Paul and teach him some doctrine and then he came back to Damascus for a few months and finally down to Jerusalem. Damascus was the trial ground, Paul was going to try out his new teaching and then truck down to Jerusalem and start getting conversions. And when he got there, v 17 he was praying in the temple and went into a trance. And he’s relating what happened and what happened is Jesus and Paul went at it in the temple. You might even say that Paul, in verses 19-20 is giving the Lord some lip. And the significance of this episode, this confrontation between Jesus and Paul is where it took place. Notice in verse 17 where it occurs, the temple. Where is Paul giving this defense? In the courts of the temple. And this is the place where God told me to get out of Jerusalem. He had to tell Paul this twice, He tells him in v 18 and Paul argues back and finally He tells him again in v 21. Go. And where is Paul now? He’s back in Jerusalem.

So verse 18 Paul’s in the temple. Christ shows up and says get out of Jerusalem and he doesn’t just say get out but get out quickly. This all occurred back in Acts 9 and he’s recounting that event. The Lord told me back in that time to get out of Jerusalem. Why?  Because the end of verse 18, there’s a cause phrase, very important, because they will not accept your testimony about Me. And then Paul acts like he knows more than Jesus Christ in vv 19-20. Jesus, are you really sure you know all things because I have this big long testimony to share with these people. I did all this persecution and they’re going to see how my life is changed and they’re going to listen to me because of my tremendous testimony. And everyone’s going to pay attention and they’re going to put up tents and we’re going to have a big revival in Jerusalem and everyone’s going to come hear my testimony and they’re going to be won to You. Now this is the kind of business the Lord is not interested in. The Lord says just who do you think you are Paul? I’m omniscient and I say they’re not going to listen to your testimony. And that about does it for big testimonies. The Lord isn’t interested.

And why isn’t the Lord interested? Because what’s the big emphasis in vv 19-20. What is Paul going to emphasize when he stands in the big tent. It’s all about Paul and this big transformation in Paul. The Lord says that’s not My testimony. That’s your testimony. So the Lord concludes, v 21, ‘Go, For I will send you far away to the Gentiles.’ I want you out there, My plan for you Paul is out there, I’ve got other people in Jerusalem, so you get out of town, you do what I tell you to do. And it’s a case where man thinks he’s got a better plan than God and man tries to do things his way rather than God’s way. And it’s a constant struggle. We all struggle with it, even the great apostle Paul struggled with it. But God has a plan He’s working out and it’s going to work His way, He’s sovereign. Now that’s the story of Acts which is why we call it the Acts of the Holy Spirit, and it’s a grand story.  We’ll pick it up again next week, develop it some more, but if you’re having trouble getting a handle on Acts it’s about the Acts of God in history, how He controls, how He works despite our sin, our failures and our weaknesses.