Why do you persecute me?

This is the same question Jesus could have asked many of us. My own attitude toward Him and His followers was mocking, angry and scornful, but by no means indifferent. The Bible also gives us evidence of how Jesus can radically win a person’s trust and change a life completely in the blink of an eye.

“I am Saul of Tarsus, and I was sincerely wrong”

Saul of Tarsus is a person whose life took a radical, sudden turn on the road to Damascus around AD 34. Acts 13:9 is the first time it becomes clear that this is Paul himself:

Then Saul, who was also called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, looked straight at Elymas and said, (Acts 13:9, NIV)

n Philippians 3:4–6, Paul describes his Jewish background and says that as for the law, he was a Pharisee, as for zeal, a persecutor of the church, and as for righteousness based on the law, faultless. That is probably the most precise and reliable description available of his identity before the events on the road to Damascus.

So Saul was a deeply devout Jew who had made it his mission to stop the followers of Jesus.

The Bible describes the moment when the first martyr of our faith, Stephen, was stoned to death practically at Saul’s feet. This is how Stephen’s final moments are described:

Acts 7:58 “dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul.”

A couple of verses later, in chapter 8, verses 1 and 3, we are told:

"1. And Saul approved of their killing him. On that day a great persecution broke out against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria.” and “3. But Saul began to destroy the church. Going from house to house, he dragged off both men and women and put them in prison.” (NIV)

Acts 9:2 also says that Saul asked the high priest for and received letters of authorization that allowed him to take all the Christians travelling on the road to Damascus to Jerusalem in chains.

So Saul acted deliberately and knew what he was doing. He seemed to have an outright obsession with capturing and imprisoning everyone he saw following Jesus, that “new troublemaker.” As a devout Jew, Saul was also completely certain that he was doing God’s work. So a person can be sincere, deeply convinced, active and willing to pay the price for their convictions – and still be completely wrong.

A complete turnaround in the blink of an eye

On the road to Damascus, while “destroying the church,” as the Bible says, Saul was stopped in an extremely radical way. He was a fierce man, ready in his zeal to kill and murder people who believed differently from him. Jesus knew what would make Saul stop...

3 As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. 4 He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” (Acts 9:3–4, NIV)

Saul did not need any special explanation of who he had come up against: “Who are you, Lord?”  He immediately recognized and acknowledged someone greater than himself.

This Jesus whom Saul encountered is the same then and now. He wants to encounter each one of us too, but most of the time He probably does not use such a radical style.

Jesus also did not ask, “Why do you persecute my followers?” but went straight to the point: “Why do you persecute me?”

In the blink of an eye, Saul was confronted with something that surely shattered his entire worldview up to that point: Jesus, whose followers he was willing to kill one by one, really was alive and did exist! He realized that by persecuting the followers of this Lord, he had in fact been persecuting the Lord Himself. That must have been an enormous moment for a person who, just moments earlier, had been utterly convinced to the very core of his own agenda and mission.

The man who had to be led by the hand

This Saul, who was full of hatred and his mission, could not even make his way on his own after encountering Jesus. He had gone blind, and his traveling companions had to lead him by the hand to Damascus.

There is something striking about this to me.

Sometimes God has to bring us into a situation where we can no longer see the way forward ourselves. For three days Saul was blind. He did not eat or drink. The Bible does not tell us everything that was going through his mind during those days, but the event shook him to his core.

One thing, however, the Bible does tell us: Saul prayed. The man who only moments before had been full of activity, plans and his own certainty was now silent before God.

“At once he began to preach”

t the same time, God had spoken to Ananias, who found Saul and prayed, placing his hands on Saul.

“Immediately, something like scales fell from Saul’s eyes, and he could see again. He got up and was baptized,” (Acts 9:18, NIV)

The same chapter continues by saying that Saul ate and regained his strength. He spent several days with the disciples in Damascus, and

“At once he began to preach in the synagogues that Jesus is the Son of God.” (Acts 9:20, NIV)

The same courage, determination and strong personality are still there! It is wonderful that God has created each of us, on the one hand, “in His own image,” yet in such a way that we are allowed to be completely unique individuals. He does not force us into another mold.

What matters is that although the intensity of Saul’s actions was the same, their direction had changed completely. Jesus took what was already in Saul and gave it a new direction.

What if I am wrong?

Perhaps this is the very thing about Saul that speaks to me most.He had to admit that he was wrong about something he had been absolutely certain of.That is not easy for us either.

It is much easier to ask God to confirm what we already think than to give Him permission to show us that we have been mistaken. It took me over 22 years to learn that. When I finally realized that it is better to be thankful that I get to be part of God’s plan than to ask Him to bless my own plans, many new, meaningful paths opened up in my life in very concrete ways.

That is why Saul’s story still makes me ask myself:“Are there things in my life that I am so certain about that I no longer even ask God?”

And above all: “If Jesus shows me that I have been wrong, am I ready to change direction?”

Maybe we do not need to be stopped in the same way Saul was on the road to Damascus. But we need the same kind of attitude – an attitude that is ready to stop, listen and, if necessary, say:

“Lord, I thought I knew. You show me the way.”