Believing, Doing, and Suffering

Conversion of Saint Paul
Acts 9:1-22
© 2010 Rev. Matthew L. Whitehead

Tomorrow is the Feast of the Conversion of Saint Paul. Here in our parish we have translated the feast to Sunday, as is our custom, that we might celebrate it in our principal service of worship. The lectionary of the Book of Common Prayer sets out the feasts we are to keep throughout the course of the Christian year. Most of the saints we honor are celebrated on the anniversary of their martyrdom. The ancient Church lectionaries have a feast also for the martyrdom of Saint Paul, it is on June 30th. But the English Reformers did not keep that feast in the Prayer Book; they kept only the Conversion of Saint Paul. Perhaps they did not want to have two feasts assigned for any one saint, and since the New Testament contains three accounts of Paul’s conversion and none of his martyrdom the choice was made easy for them.1 And after all, it was Paul’s conversion, not necessarily his martyrdom, that had the greatest significance for the history of the Church.2

Often times it is assumed that part and parcel of Paul’s conversion was a crisis of conscience between Law and Grace; that he was unable to continue life as a Pharisee, with its strict adherence to the Law; that he came into a new realization that the spiritual life was best lived with reliance upon God’s grace. This, however, was a later development in Paul’s life and teaching. At his conversion there seems to have been no deep consideration of the ‘Law versus Grace’ issue; Rather, Paul’s conversion was an encounter with the Person of Jesus Christ which led to a completely changed life, as evidenced in his belief, evidenced in his activities, and evidenced in his suffering for the cause of Christ.

Let us look first at what Saint Paul believed. Paul’s conversion was a personal encounter with Jesus Christ wherein he believed that Jesus is the Son of God. We know this because that is what he preached immediately after his conversion. For Paul, the devout Pharisaical Jew, acknowledging Jesus to be the Son of God was to acknowledge that all of the Messianic hopes were fulfilled in Jesus, and also an acknowledgment of the Resurrection.3

In Paul’s conversion experience there is a distinction between knowledge and belief. Knowledge does not equate to belief. Before his conversion, Paul knew the Scriptures. As a Pharisee he would have been rigorous and devout in his study of Scripture, but it was not his studies that led him to Christ. His zeal in his religious studies led him to to persecute the Church. He did not persecute the Church because, out of ignorance, he failed to understand the Messianic prophecies; he persecuted the Church because, in his unbelief, he lacked the Holy Spirit to lead him to Jesus Christ, the One to whom those Messianic prophecies pointed. Paul’s knowledge did not lead him to belief, it led him to unbelief. It was that personal encounter with Christ that led him to belief, and gave fulfillment to his knowledge of Scripture.

We would do well to remember this distinction between knowledge and belief. We often think that we can argue people into the Kingdom of God; that if we come up with a good enough proof, people will be unable to refute our logic, and will therefore have no choice but to convert to Christianity. Nothing could be further from the truth. There are many intelligent people who reject Christ, or who reject even a basic belief in a Divine power. These people do not need more knowledge, they do not need arguments; what they need is a personal encounter with Jesus Christ, and it is we in whom they will encounter Christ.

Paul was not satisfied to simply believe, and set off in the corner somewhere quietly; he moved from belief into action. His first action after coming to belief was to be baptized. He submitted himself to the Church, and was initiated in the same way as everybody else. His status as a faithful and devout Jew gave him no standing. Likewise, nobody is a Christian by right of their birth; we all become Christian by conversion.

Paul’s next action was to preach. Having been converted to the Christian faith on the way to Damascus, he went to the synagogues of Damascus to preach his new faith. This must have taken great courage. These were the same synagogues who were expecting Paul, the great persecutor of Christians, to come in and silence the Christians in their midst; and here he now stands, not persecuting them, but defending their teaching! One wonders what emotions Paul felt as he first began to preach, and the mouth that had once so effectively reviled Christ began to so effectively proclaim the gospel of Christ.

Up to this moment Paul had been doing what he himself liked, what he himself thought best, what his own will dictated. From this time forward he would be told what to do, his will was now submitted to Christ. The Christian is one who has ceased to do what he himself wants to do, and who has begun to do as Christ directs. That direction will not always be easy.

Disappointing the Damascus Jews by preaching counter to his reputation initiated a pattern of suffering that would define the rest of Paul’s life and ministry. They plotted to kill him, and he had to escape the city through a hole in the wall under the cover of night.4 Ananias had been told that Paul would be shown what great things he must suffer for the name of Christ, and did it ever come about! Here is Paul’s own testimony about his sufferings: “[I am] in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep; In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness.”5

Nowhere in Scripture are Christians promised that their lives will be easy. Quite to the contrary, we are promised only hardship and persecution in return for our testimony. One might posit a theory: the effectiveness of your witness for Christ is directly proportional to the suffering you endure for his name. History gives us a great list of saints who were martyred for their faith, and a great many more who were otherwise persecuted. Saint Paul is numbered on that list, and we are called to live our faith so boldly that we might also be given opportunity to witness for Christ with our very blood.

Let us pray: That we might be given grace to believe as Saint Paul believed, and follow in his Faith; That we might be given grace to act as he acted, witnessing boldly for Christ, regardless of our own personal concerns; and, finally, That we might be given grace to endure whatever suffering might come our way for faithfully following Christ and his Apostle: “O God, who through the preaching of thy blessed Apostle Saint Paul hast caused the light of the Gospel to shine forth upon the Gentiles : grant, we beseech thee ; that we, who this day call him to remembrance, may feel the effectual succour of his intercession. Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”6

1 Acts 9:1-22; 22:3-16; 26:1-23; See also Gal 1:11-24.
2 Shepherd, Massey H., Jr. The Oxford American Prayer Book Commentary. New York: Oxford University Press, 1950; 229.
3 The Pharisees believed in the resurrection of the dead, the Sadducees did not. Paul used this to his advantage when on trial (Acts 23:6-10), and would be no great stretch to posit that he accepted belief in Jesus’ resurrection immediately upon his conversion, since all the Christians witnessed to it unanimously.
4 Acts 9:23-25.
5 2Cor 11:23b-27.
6 Collect for the “Commemoration of St. Paul the Apostle”, from The People’s Anglican Missal, E81.