|
About Jesus Steve Sweetman Chapters 21:37 to 22:29 Previous Section - Chapters 21 Next Section - Chapters 22:30... ch. 21:37 - 22:21 ch. 22:22-29 Paul Speaks To The Crowd (ch. 21:37 – 22:21) As
the soldier took Paul into the barracks he asked the commander if he could
speak to him. The commander was evidently surprised by Paul speaking
Greek. All along he had
assumed that Paul was some Egyptian terrorist leader who had caused
problems before. Paul
therefore clarifies who he is. He
says, “I am a Jew, from Tarsus, in We
note here that Paul is saying that he is not this Egyptian that the
captain thought he was. In
fact he was a Jew, not an Egyptian. Beyond
that, he was a Roman Jew, born in The
captain therefore let Paul speak to the mob. Paul
had just spoken to the captain in Greek, surprising the captain, now he
speaks to the Jewish mob in Aramaic, surprising them.
Paul was a well educated man, and if he had not become a Christian
most likely would have been a very influential
man in Judaism and also in society.
For those Christians today who put down education, they
should take a serious look at Paul.
Paul
tells the crowd the he is a Jew fromTarsus, but was raised in Jerusalem
as a young man, and learned in great detail the Law from Gamaliel.
Gamaliel was a member of the Sanhedrin, the ruling Jewish council.
He was a Pharisee, and a very well respected and important Jewish
teacher of the Law. Paul was
taught by this very influential man, and he wants the mob to know this.
He not only was thoroughly instructed in Jewish Law, but he himself
was just as zealous as these Jews, to the extent that he persecuted
members of “the way”, imprisoning not only men, but women as well.
Concerning being a Jew, you could not find a better Jew than Paul. Paul
tells these people that if you don’t believe me, you can ask the high
priest. They most likely still
remembered giving Paul letters of authority to do these things. Paul
continues by reporting to the crowd how he met Jesus on the road to In
response Paul says, “Who are you, Lord”?
See my notes in chapter nine concerning these words.
Paul was basically asking, “who are you?
Are you the Lord God of Israel”? The
voice then replied, “I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom you are
persecuting”. This should
remind you of the words that Jesus said, “when you do this to the least
of these, you do it to me”. This
means that whatever one does to a Christian, whether good or bad, you are
in fact doing that to Jesus Himself. Paul
continues by saying that his companions saw the light but did not
understand the voice. See also
my notes on chapter 9 for further details and the so-called apparent
discrepancies in this account to the account in chapter 9. Paul
recalls how the Lord told him to go into Damascus
where he would come in contact with a man named Ananias.
We
see something about Ananias that we did not see in chapter 9.
Paul says that he “was a devout observer of the Law”.
This is interesting, the one who prayed for him to receive his
sight and the Holy Spirit was a good Jew, as well as a Christian. Yet in
these early days, the teaching on the relationship of the Law to Grace was
not yet developed and thought through.
This would come later with the teaching of Paul. In
verse 14 Paul speaks of the word of prophecy Ananias gave him.
The prophecy stated, “the God of our fathers has chosen you to
know his will and to see the Righteous One, and to hear words from His
mouth. You will be His witness
to all men of what you have seen and heard.
And now what are you waiting for?
Get up be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on His name.
(ch.22:14 - 16) Here
we see Paul’s commission from Jesus, or at least part of it.
We see that the God who spoke to him was the God of his
forefathers, the God of the Jews. Yet
the voice said that it was Jesus who was speaking.
Right away, we see the understanding of God had changed.
Yes, He was still the God of the Jews, as they always knew Him, but
know He was also the God of Jesus, in fact
Jesus Himself. The God of the Jews was now Jesus. The
prophecy says that Paul would see the Righteous One, that is Jesus, and
hear words from His mouth. On
the road to Paul
was to give witness both by word and action to what he has seen and heard
from Jesus. But before he
could do that he had to be water baptized and wash his sins away, and so
he was immediately baptized in water. In
verse 17 we see something that we don’t see anywhere else in Paul’s
writing. While in Jerusalem, soon after his conversion he saw a vision from Jesus.
Jesus told him to “leave Jerusalem
immediately, because they will not accept your testimony about me”.
The reality of Paul becoming a Christian and the prophetic word
concerning the hardships Paul would go through as a result, would now
begin to set in. Paul
replied to what the Lord told him by suggesting that everything should be
okay with his fellow Jews. They
knew well that he went from house to house arresting all the Christians he
could find. Furthermore, he
was with the people who killed Stephen and approved of it.
Paul was basically telling the Lord
that everything should be fine because they knew him, knew his zeal
for the Law, and if he changed in such dramatic fashion, then this was
sufficient for the rest to change. But
this would not be the case. Paul’s
reasoning was faulty. So the
Lord responded by saying, “Go, I will send you far away to the
Gentiles”. Here we see from
the very beginning days of Paul’s new life as a Christian that his
ministry would extend to the Gentile world, far away from the Jews and Jerusalem. Paul The Roman Citizen (ch. 22:22 - 29) Luke
says that the crowd listened
to Paul until he said that Jesus told him to go to the Gentiles.
This infuriated the
crowd. They had little to no
respect for Gentiles, especially since they were under their political
rule. They yelled out, “rid the earth of him (Paul), He is not fit to
live!” As
the custom was when Jewish people were being insulted, the crowd took off
their coats and flung dust in the air with them.
This resulted in Paul being taken into the barracks to be flogged.
Yet when they were about to beat him he asked, “is it legal for
you to flog a Roman citizen who hasn’t been found guilty”. When
the soldier who was ready to flog Paul heard these words from Paul he
immediately went to the commander to see what should be done. The
commander of the soldiers then went to Paul personally and asked if he was
indeed a Roman citizen. Paul
said that he was. The
commander said that he had to buy his citizenship.
Paul replied by saying that he was born a Roman. Luke records that
once the commander found out that Paul was a Roman, “he was alarmed”.
(ch. 22:29) We
need to note here that simply arresting and detaining Paul was against the
Roman Law since he was a Roman citizen.
Flogging him would be a worse crime.
There were always 2 floggers, one on each side of the prisoner.
The strap consisted of many heavy threaded strips.
At the end of each heavy thread was a piece of metal or stone.
When the strap hit the one being flogged it would rip the flesh
resulting in much bleeding. The
intent of such flogging was to break down the will of the person so he
would respond with the truth to the person questioning him.
Thus after Paul was to
be flogged, he would have been questioned by the commander. When
a prisoner was scourged, his feet and hands were tied to a ring on the
floor. His stomach rested on a
heavy pillar that was placed horizontally to the floor.
This would expose the bare back of the person being flogged.
This was one way that the Romans beat a person. You
might ask yourself, “anyone could claim to be a Roman just to get out of
trouble with the Law”. If
someone claimed to be a Roman and was found that he wasn’t, he would be
put to death. So people did
take their claims of citizenship seriously. Paul
was born a Roman. The captain
of the guards bought his Roman citizenship.
This meant that Paul’s citizenship was more respected than the
captain of the guards citizenship. One
thing to note here is that Paul used his civil rights to defend himself.
Some suggest that Christians should not use any of their civil
rights to help them in any negative situation they find themselves in.
Paul was a humble man, but he was not to be a door mat.
He had rights, and he used these rights when he felt that he
should. In this situation Paul
used his citizenship rights to defend himself. In
most cases, those of us who live in the western world still have civil
rights. I see no problem
standing up for our rights, even in a court of law.
This might not always be the case since it seems to me that
Christians bit by bit are losing their civil rights.
|