Greetings

Greetings everyone! Welcome to Friday’s edition of EDiBS, and God’s abiding peace to each of you in our Lord Jesus Christ. Thanks for being with me today for some time in God’s Word, where right now we’re in the early verses of Acts 9.  Let’s pray as we prepare to read and study the Scriptures together. 

Prayer 

Heavenly Father, thank you for this time to be in your Word today. Please open our hearts to what you desire to teach us, and help us to become evermore rooted and grounded in the Scriptures as your people. We ask this in Christ’s holy name, amen. 

Getting Started 

As we get started today, we come upon an interesting topic to discuss. Our focus: completing a picture.

Acts 9:5-9

5”Who are you, Lord?" Saul asked. 6"I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting," he replied. "Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do." 7The men traveling with Saul stood there speechless; they heard the sound but did not see anyone. 8Saul got up from the ground, but when he opened his eyes he could see nothing. So they led him by the hand into Damascus. 9For three days he was blind, and did not eat or drink anything.

Many of you well remember, and perhaps still miss, the always-engaging and ever-wise Paul Harvey. My first memories of his very distinct and instantly recognizable voice come from summertimes at my grandparents’ house. He always came on the radio right after dinner, and we’d sit around the table listening to him share…The Rest of the Story. As you know, Mr. Harvey’s practice was to present little-known or forgotten facts on a variety of subjects with some key element of the story — usually the name of some well-known person — held back until the end. The broadcasts always concluded with a variation on that now famous tag line: "And now you know...the rest of the story."

As we come to God’s Word today and consider the situation before us — that of a man on the road to Damascus who has fallen to the ground in a heap due to a dazzling light from heaven — there’s something we need to know: there’s more to the story!  In fact, the account of Saul’s encounter with Jesus here in Acts 9 is actually the CliffsNotes version of the event, the briefest telling of it that we have.

After Saul is converted and becomes Paul, he gives more details about this experience on two separate, but ultimately related occasions: first when he’s arrested in Jerusalem and speaks to a hostile crowd outside the military barracks in Acts 22, and later on when speaking before King Agrippa during his ongoing legal troubles resulting from his preaching of Christ in Acts 26. In these two recountings by Paul, he shares more details about what happened than what’s contained in the narrative before us today. Before we dive into this incident too deeply, then, the first and best thing that we can do is to simply read these additional accounts. Once we’ve done that, we can put everything together and talk about it as a whole.  

As I share, first from Acts 22 and then from Acts 26, be listening carefully. You won’t find any discrepancies in the readings, but you will begin to fill in some blanks so that a fuller picture begins to emerge.

Acts 22:3-11

3 “I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, but brought up in this city. I studied under Gamaliel and was thoroughly trained in the law of our ancestors. I was just as zealous for God as any of you are today. 4 I persecuted the followers of this Way to their death, arresting both men and women and throwing them into prison, 5 as the high priest and all the Council can themselves testify. I even obtained letters from them to their associates in Damascus, and went there to bring these people as prisoners to Jerusalem to be punished. 6 “About noon as I came near Damascus, suddenly a bright light from heaven flashed around me. 7 I fell to the ground and heard a voice say to me, ‘Saul! Saul! Why do you persecute me?’ 8 “‘Who are you, Lord?’ I asked. “‘I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom you are persecuting,’ he replied. 9 My companions saw the light, but they did not understand the voice of him who was speaking to me. 10 “‘What shall I do, Lord?’ I asked. “‘Get up,’ the Lord said, ‘and go into Damascus. There you will be told all that you have been assigned to do.’ 11 My companions led me by the hand into Damascus, because the brilliance of the light had blinded me.

Acts 26:12-18

12 “On one of these journeys I was going to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests. 13 About noon, King Agrippa, as I was on the road, I saw a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, blazing around me and my companions. 14 We all fell to the ground, and I heard a voice saying to me in Aramaic, ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.’15 “Then I asked, ‘Who are you, Lord?’ “‘I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,’ the Lord replied. 16 ‘Now get up and stand on your feet. I have appeared to you to appoint you as a servant and as a witness of what you have seen and will see of me. 17 I will rescue you from your own people and from the Gentiles. I am sending you to them 18 to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’

So far, God’s Word.

Wrapping Up

As we wrap things up for the day, what popped out at you from Paul’s sharing? What did you learn that you didn’t know before? How does this fuller description of that day on the road to Damascus inform your understanding of how Paul was impacted and changed by the event?  When we come back next time, those are the things we’ll be talking about, and I’m looking forward to it. For now, however, our Bible has spoken. And because it has, 

“Now you know...the rest of the story!”

Have a terrific weekend everyone — I’m grateful to have been with you this past week, and I pray that we’ll all be together again soon to open God’s Word another time.  God’s peace, and the joy of our Lord Jesus fill your hearts. Take care!