Daily Thought

So, Paul starts his defence before the people. How does he do it?Does he justify himself? Does he protest his innocence? Does he harangue them for making unfounded accusations? No! He tells his testimony. It must have been an amazing event to witness. Luke records that there was a ‘great silence’, 21. 40, and then comments that, when they heard him speak to them in Hebrew, the local language, they ‘kept the more silence’, 22. 2. What a contrast to the tumult only moments before!

Notice the respect and courtesy with which he addresses the people, v. 1. He stresses the orthodoxy of his upbringing, mentioning the well-respected Rabbi Gamaliel as his mentor. He speaks of his zeal toward God, v. 3, and acknowledges that they too shared it, though ‘not according to knowledge’ as he will say in Romans chapter 10 verse 2. He calls the high priest and the elders to witness to his pre-conversion manner of life, v. 5, that he had been a persecutor of believers in Christ. Here was not a man who was easily convinced or gullible, but a man who had been stopped in his tracks by a direct revelation from heaven of the risen Christ. Truly, the conversion of Saul of Tarsus is one of the great evidences for the truth of the resurrection. Note that there is not one voice raised in dissent; they knew the truth of what he was saying.

He then recounts the details of what took place on the Damascus road and Ananias’ subsequent visit to him. Note that Paul makes it absolutely clear which ‘Jesus’ spoke to him, v. 8 - it is ‘Jesus of Nazareth’.

He finally returns in thought to Jerusalem and to the temple itself where he receives, first of all, a divine warning that the Jews would seek his life, cp. 9. 29. In response Paul reaffirms his previous manner of life, which the Jews all knew. How, then, could they fail to accept the testimony of one who had known such a radical change? Yet, as a nation, they had rejected the Lord Jesus and the subsequent testimony of Stephen. Now they would reject Paul’s testimony, too. Paul then relates how that in the temple he received the divine commission to go to the Gentiles. How would the Jews respond?