THREE
Damascus. One of the oldest cities in the world. A fair white jewel set in the midst of a vast verdant plain. ‘Pearls in a goblet of green’, someone had once said, describing her.
At this moment Saul felt as though he would never see it.
Six days out from Jerusalem. Over one hundred and thirty miles from home. After one hundred and forty hours of solitude forced upon him by the companionship of the members of the Sanhedrin –
a police force of sorts that as a Pharisee he was forbidden to speak or interact with. Tired and foot-sore. Troubled in his heart. Saul had begun to believe the glistening city was nothing more than an empty promise, an almost mythical land which, like Moses, he would be prevented from entering for failing to meet God’s expectations.
Depressed, angry, unable to escape his own dark thoughts, he refused to stop when his companions heard the first rumor of thunder that suggested a storm lay ahead. Night was falling. They had traveled all day with little rest, and he had no intention of passing yet another wet and weary night in the wilderness. Thunderstorms were common in this region and he, for one, was ready for a roof over his head, a dry bed, and some intelligent conversation. Wishing once again that the Sanhedrin had granted them mounts, Saul lifted his weary feet and headed for the crest of the ridge that signaled the end of the mountain range and the beginning of the narrow path that led through the foothills to the gates of the beautiful city itself, leaving the others to follow as they would.
As the skies darkened unnaturally and ominous clouds moved in, eclipsing the setting sun, Saul outpaced his companions and arrived a minute or two before they did. Relieved, he recognized Damascus’ ivory towers, painted rose-gold and tinged with lavender.
It was the last sight he was to see for three days and nights.
Without warning a brilliant light struck him, knocking him from his feet and onto his back. Saul lay on the ground, the dust of the dry sandy soil – untouched by the smallest drop of rain – rising up about him, choking his throat and irritating his eyes so that they filled with tears. As he sought to catch his breath, slamming his eyes shut against the pain, a majestic voice spoke to him both from without and within, filling his being with fear and wonder.
“Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? ” the voice asked in tones at once severe and sad.; its’ sound sonorous as the thunder.
Saul licked his lips, his mouth dry. “Who….” He swallowed and whispered against his fear. “Who are you, sir?”
There followed seven words that changed the young Pharisee’s life forever. From the cradle until that moment, Saul’s life had been aimed straight as an arrow from the quiver toward one single goal: The fulfillment of the law.
Now, unbelievably he met it face to face.
“I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.” The voice paused as a presence of pure light radiated through Saul’s firmly shut eyelids, searing the puny human organisms within. He gasped as he felt the hand of the Lord rest upon his heart, opening wide the barricade he had erected to keep God from speaking to his soul.
“You cannot continue to kick against the goads. But rise; go into the city, and you will be told what to do.”
If he could have Saul would have wept, for his heart was breaking. But his eyes were shut fast as though an impenetrable barrier had formed over them. And in the first moment of true enlightenment he had ever known –
He became blind.
###
On the trail his companions, having ducked beneath rocks and bushes, were surprised when the lightning struck with no sound. And later, upon arrival in Damascus, reported that the thunder which followed seemed to carry with it words they could not understand. Words, they said, that the young Pharisee in their charge had answered as though the God of their fathers spoke to him from out of the storm clouds as He had so long ago to Moses on Mt. Sinai.
Perplexed they left him in the care of good Jews on the street called ‘Strait’, and went to inform those in power that the chosen messenger of the ruling council had been struck sightless. Helpless as a babe Saul lay on a narrow cot in the gathering darkness reciting odd passages of scripture, murmuring snatches of Psalms and crying without tears, for the inner surface of his eyes had clouded and thickened as though scorched, forming a barrier that would not yield to water or the ministrations of the cleverest physician.
Saul for his part wanted only to be left alone.
Alone with his thoughts.
Alone with his God.
For the greater part of the next day he knew a sort of restive sleep. In his waking moments, he would at first be overwhelmed by a deep sense of wonder and excitement, even gratitude, and then without warning, fall into despair and hopelessness. Finally, exhausted and spent, his heart and soul numb, Saul heard strange voices speaking close to his pallet as though he were deaf as well as blind.
“It is a sign from God.”
“But he has been blinded. What can that mean?”
“He has worked tirelessly ridding Jerusalem of the vermin called the Christ’s ones.” The voice paused, obviously disgusted with the misuse of the name of the Messiah. “How could God be displeased with him? Why would he be punished?”
Why indeed?
The next time Saul awoke, he was alone. He thought he could smell the dawn and supposed another day had begun. The house he lay within was on the street called ‘Strait’, which ran from one end of Damascus to the other. It was the main concourse for pedestrians as well as merchants and militia, with its wide central avenue where traffic ran, and two spacious sidewalks where brightly colored awnings and scantily clad slave girls announced a great wealth of products and wares. From within the darkened room where he lay, awaiting his God, Saul could hear the casual passersby laughing and singing and he wondered –
Was he being punished?
According to the law he had loved all of his life it was his just due, and yet Saul thought he had glimpsed another kind of God – one full of mercy and compassion. On the road he had felt a living presence reach out to grip his cold hardened heart, and into that moment of fear and awe had come the sweetest melody he had ever heard. He had known and been a part of love.
But where was that hand now?
Where was this living God?
###
“Brother Saul?” A hesitant voice broke his reverie, drawing him back from his remembrance of the light to the present reality of blackness. Suddenly the burden of Saul’s disability weighed even more heavily upon him, driving his heart into his ribs and riveting his sleight form to the rough straw mat. He turned his head away, seeking the cool comfort of the stone wall against his hot cheek and forehead.
His hearing already more keen, Saul heard a breath drawn, and listened as a light footfall entered the room. A curtain was drawn aside and whoever it was paused beside him. The breath was released in a sigh.
Saul’s spent body tensed, uncertain of their errand. “Well,” he asked through lips cracked and dry, “have you come to pity or to pronounce sentence? Are you God’s man?”
There was a moment of silence and then a man’s voice replied quietly, “Are you?”
Saul shifted on the pallet and turned his blinded eyes towards the sound. “I used to think that was what I wanted …to be God’s man. I was wrong. I am His slave.”
A cool hand touched his fevered skin startling him. “Yes, a slave. Beaten and broken. Left in the darkness…. Penance for what you have done?” There was a curious edge to the man’s voice, as though he was unsure of just who and what he was dealing with. “Or reward, do you think?”
A curious phrase. Saul swallowed hard. “And who are you?
Again there was silence as the hand was withdrawn. When the stranger spoke, it was not to answer.
“If you had asked me yesterday morning, I would have said this is less than you deserve for the agony you have inflicted upon our people. Many have died. Many more are demoralized and lost, bereft of husband, mother…child.” The voice broke, its owner obviously moved to anger. The next words were a sword thrust. “I have no pity for you.”
Saul held his breath, awaiting a blow. This must be a follower of the Nazarene, justly angry and cold with vengeance. It seemed God had judged him and found him lacking. It was no more than he deserved.
Saul waited in silence until the man spoke again.
“No, brother Saul,” he said, his words soft as a prayer, “I do not pity you.
“I envy you.”
Saul blinked as tears formed, stinging his blistered eyes. His voice shook. “Envy me? Why?”
“Has God not asked something of you?”
Saul thought back to the meeting on the road. There had been a command. Arise, go into the city and you will be told what you must do. He had forgotten until now.
“Yes. Yes, He has,” he replied.
The hand reached out again and touched his forehead, but this time it remained. A cool comforting reassurance of the presence of another living being. The stranger’s voice faltered as he spoke, but then continued with greater strength and resolution.
“As we the people of Israel have been chosen of God, so you – Saul of Tarsus – have been chosen by His Son. I have been sent to be God’s instrument. It is His will that you be freed from this darkness. For the Lord said to me, ‘Arise and go to the street called Strait, and inquire at the house of Judas for one called Saul of Tarsus, for behold he is praying and in a vision he has seen a man coming in and putting his hand on him so that he might receive his sight’.”
Saul sighed, the tension leaving his wounded form. “You are Annanias?”
“I am.”
It was true then. Saul had believed it but the wishful thinking of a fevered dream. In the midst of prayer, in his deepest moment of despair, a man had come to him and placed his hand upon his eyes and spoken words that lifted the veil of darkness, signifying the death of the old man and the resurrection of the new.
“Did you not believe I would come?”
Saul paused. “I didn’t dare to hope….” Not only to have his sight back, but to work for the Lord as he had always longed to. To be His voice, to carry the word of His son. Paul sobbed and began to shake. Shame overwhelmed him as he remembered what he had done in the Lord’s name and from his wounded eyes tears began to fall. “I am not worthy. I do not deserve another chance. All those I have wounded….”
Annanias sat on the pallet beside him and placed his other hand on his heaving chest. “All that has gone before is washed away the moment you confess your belief in the life and death of His son, in His death on the cross to take away your sin and grant you life eternal with the Father.
“Do you believe, Saul?”
Saul was without words. He nodded his head, his heart broken.
“Then let it be done.” The older man paused. His hand trembled where it lay upon Saul’s flesh. “Still…before I begin, I feel I must warn you. These also are the words of the Lord most High. ‘Go,’ he said, ‘for this man is a chosen vessel of Mine to bear My name before Gentiles, kings and the children of Israel. For I will show him how many things he must suffer for my sake.’ These hands, which the Lord has sent to you, do not bring comfort, but the promise of pain and hardship. I believe unlike anything you have known before.” When Saul failed to answer Annanias asked quietly, “He has said, ‘Go!’ Will you go?”
Saul shifted on his pallet and with the other man’s help moved onto his knees, grateful to feel the cold stone against his bones and flesh. He bent his head in an expression of servanthood and prayer, and voiced the words he had studied all of his life, but only now begun to understand.
“Here am I, Lord. Send me.”
###
Hours later as Saul sat in a small courtyard off the back of Judas’ house, his skin painted a dusky copper by the fading sun, tears ran freely down his cheeks and into his beard as he beheld with new eyes the glory of the world his Lord had created. Even the weak light made them tear, but that mattered little. What did matter was that he could see – really see.
At Annanias’ touch something like scales had fallen away from his eyes, and immediately his sight had been restored. In that same moment – as his human eyes awoke to the beauty of the day – his mind’s eye opened to God and he was overcome by visions. He saw himself as an old man in chains standing before the rulers of this world, knowing full well they planned his death. He watched as he sought to calm a group of men who shouted and scrambled, terrified, as a mighty wave buffeted the ship they were on, seeking to overturn it and cast them into the sea. He witnessed his own blood running crimson across broad gray stones, forming a small stream that ran from the pillar he was lashed to, to the feet of his Roman guard. He heard himself scream and felt the lash
Felt himself die…..
And yet at one and the same time he experienced the love of God in a way such as he had never known possible. Saul felt the waters of forgiveness wash over his wounded soul, healing him, freeing him from all he had been and done, from every wrong action of the past, from sin and shame, and he knew at once the wonderful, miraculous grace of the Lord. He saw the thousands – the hundreds of thousands of faces of those whom he would meet and teach, and watched as the knowledge of God’s mercy and the incomparable power He would grant them transformed their lives. Saul witnessed the inheritance of the saints as this transformation spread to his world and then beyond.
And he knew.
He knew the course of his life.
Unable to put these things into words, he had arisen quickly and gone to be baptized, making official and public what he had come to know – that the law was but the springboard of love, and the love of God was to be found in His son, Jesus Christ. And that this love was deeper and wider and longer and higher than anything man could conceive.
Now, with his stomach full and his strength returning, Saul sat making plans. He would go back into the city to show those to whom he had been sent to that he was a changed man. Annanias did not think this wise – and the others who had come to visit and to welcome him agreed. But he was determined.
The Lord had a great mission for him and he, for one, did not expect it to end at the close of the first week with him dead on the synagogue’s steps.
“Brother Saul?”
Saul turned and beheld his host. Judas was dressed in a long loose robe and vest. He held in his hand a water jar and cup. “Are you comfortable? Is there anything you need?” he asked.
Saul shook his head. “Thank you, brother. I have all that I need.”
The other man paused a moment. Then Judas asked boldly, “Are you certain you must leave us? Should you not rest? The Lord will surely allow time for you to grow strong. If not demand it.”
Saul shook his head. “It is in weakness that I am strong. It is in despair that I have learned to hope.” He smiled gently. “Only by losing that which I thought was life to me, have I found life.”
He stood and walked to the small balustrade that protected the roofed porch. “There is much I must learn. Many things I need to understand. I have met God’s son, but we are strangers. The law of God forms within the corridors of my mind, but it is the heart – the living heart of it I must learn and claim.” Saul’s eyes rested on the hills far away, the ones that had not long before rolled with thunder and the voice of God.
“As our Lord before me, I need to be alone with God.”
###
Order. Chaos. Light and dark. Hope and despair.
I have known all of these and for my part have found that without knowledge of the one, the other is impossible.
All of my life I had struggled to maintain order. I had used God’s law to protect myself, as a shield against the chaos that was His voice calling me to life. I had blinded my eyes and lost my way. But God in His infinite wisdom and mercy shattered my shield and broke my sword, and as I lay on the battlefield dying, He reached down and drew me up and gave me victory.
Blessed be the name of the Lord.
END -
Image of the older Paul by Rembrandt
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