Acts 26:12-18

Whereupon as I went to Damascus.

The conversion of Saul of Tarsus

I. His character before his conversion.

1. He was a moral man (Philippians 3:6). Yet he needed conversion. The necessity of conversion arises from the depravity of human nature, and not from a greater or less degree of immorality.

2. He was a Pharisee. He was zealous for his religion, made long prayers, and did many deeds of charity. And have you any better religion?

3. He was a hater of Christ, notwithstanding his morals and his zeal. So still men will attach such undue merit to their own actions, that salvation through Christ alone becomes offensive.

4. He was a persecutor of the people of God. As from love to Christ springs love to His people, so from hatred to Christ springs the spirit of persecution to His people. The spirit of Saul is inherent in the human mind (Galatians 4:29). Can you despise and revile the devout spirit of the true believer?

II. The evidences of the truth of his conversion.

1. Penitence. He fasted three days. What a change from the haughty Pharisee! If God the Spirit has changed our hearts, we shall have a deep sense of sin. We shall “look on Him whom we have pierced and mourn.”

2. Prayer. The prayer which evidences conversion is humble, sincere, fervent, and offered only in the name of Christ.

3. Humility. From this time the man who had previously said “I thank God that I am not as other men,” felt himself to be the chief of stoners, and less than the least of all saints.

4. Faith. Ananias was sent to baptize him--to initiate him into the Christian faith.

5. Love. We have seen his enmity to Christ and His people. Now they form the objects of his warmest affections. With regard to Christ, he could sincerely say, “I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord,” etc. With regard to the people of God, “I endure all things for the elects’ sake.”

6. Obedience. “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?”

III. The ways of God manifested in his conversion.

1. Sovereignty. Was there ever a more unlikely subject? God accounts for his conversion on this principle. “He is a chosen vessel unto Me” (Acts 9:15).

2. Power. What but the power of an almighty arm could have wrought so wonderful a change?

3. Mercy (1 Timothy 1:12). And who shall despair of mercy when Saul of Tarsus obtained it?

4. Wisdom. How were the designs of the devil and the malice of men here defeated? Not by destroying the enemy, but by converting him.

Application:

1. Let the true convert strive to gain more adoring thoughts of God’s ways towards him, and aim to become more holy and live more to the glory of God.

2. Let the unconverted guard against mistaken notions of conversion, and seek the influences of the Spirit, to create within them a clean heart, and renew a right spirit within them.

3. Let the careless and the obstinate be sure that their damnation will be just, if they live and die in the neglect of a God so gracious, and a salvation so great.

4. Let the sceptic consider the unreasonableness of his objections to the gospel. (Essex Congregational Remembrancer.)

The conversion of Saul: its genuineness

It cannot be explained by the supposition that the account was in any way forged. What motive had St. Paul for inventing it? Was it, as has been supposed, some private pique or annoyance with the Jews, that led him to change his religious profession, and to account for the change in this kind of way? But there is no trace of any feelings of this kind in his early life. It would have been a sin against natural feeling, since the Jewish people had singled Paul out for a place of special confidence and honour; and, as a matter of fact, when the Jews were persecuting him afterwards to death he expressed in more ways than one his deep love for his countrymen. He deplores their blindness; he excuses their conduct as far as he can. Even if, in one place, he paints it in dark colours he would gladly, he says in another, were it possible, he accursed in their place. Was it the spirit of a sensitive independence which will sometimes lead men to assert their own importance at the cost of their party or their principles? That, again, is inconsistent with his advocacy of the duty of subjection to existing authority, in terms and to a degree which has exposed him to fierce criticisms from the modern advocates of social and political change. Was it, then, a refined self-interest? Did the young Jew see in the rising sect a prospect of bettering himself? But Christianity was being persecuted--persecuted, as it seemed, to the very verge of extermination. It had been crushed out by the established hierarchy in Jerusalem itself. It was doomed to destruction, every intelligent Jew would have thought, as well by the might of the forces ranged against it as by its intrinsic absurdity. It had nothing to offer, whether in the way of social eminence or of literary attraction. It was as yet, in the main, the religion of the very poor, of the very illiterate. On the other hand, the young Pharisee had, if any man had, brilliant prospects before him if he remained loyal to the synagogue. The reputation of his great master, his own learning and acuteness, his great practical ability, would have commanded success. If his object was really a selfish one, no man ever really made a greater, or more stupid mistake, to all appearance, for no Jew could have anticipated for a convert to Christianity, within a few years of the Crucifixion, such a reputation as that which now surrounds the name of St. Paul. (Canon Liddon.)

Christ’s remonstrances

My object is to trace the stages of the process set forth here, and to ask you if you, like Paul, have been “obedient to the heavenly vision.”

I. The first of these all but simultaneous and yet separable stages was the revelation of Jesus Christ. The revelation in heart and mind was the main thing of which the revelation to eye and ear were but means. The means, in his case, are different from those in ours; the end is the same. “Saul! Saul! why persecutest thou Me?” They used to think that they could wake sleep walkers by addressing them by name. Jesus Christ, by speaking his name to the apostle, wakes him out of his diseased slumber. What does such an address teach you and me? That Jesus Christ, the living, reigning Lord of the universe, has perfect knowledge of each of us. And more than that, He directly addresses Himself to each man and woman in this congregation. We are far too apt to hide ourselves in the crowd, and let all the messages of God’s love, the warnings of His providences, as well as the teachings and invitations and pleadings of His gospel, fly over our heads as if they were meant vaguely for anybody. And I would fain plead with each of my friends before me to believe that the gospel of Jesus Christ is meant for thee, and that Christ speaks to thee.

II. Secondly, notice, as another stage in this process, the discovery of the true character of the past. “Why persecutest thou Me?” Saul was brought to look at all his past life as standing in immediate connection with Jesus Christ. Of course he knew before the vision that he had no love to Him whom he thought to be a Galilean impostor. But he did not know that Jesus Christ counted every blow struck at one of His servants as being struck at Him. Above all, he did not know that the Christ whom he was persecuting was reigning in the heavens. If I could only get you, for one quiet ten minutes, to lay all your past, as far as memory brought it to your minds, right against that bright and loving face, I should have done much. One infallible way of judging of the rottenness or goodness of our actions is that we should bring them where they will all be brought one day, into the brightness of Christ’s countenance. If you want to find out the flaws in some thin, badly-woven piece of cloth, you hold it up against the light, do you not? and then you see all the specks and holes; and the irregular threads. Hold up your lives in like fashion. Again, this revelation of the past life disclosed its utter unreasonableness. That one question, “Why persecutest thou Me?” pulverised the whole thing. If you take into account what you are, and where you stand, you can find no reason, except utterly unreasonable ones, for the lives that I fear some of us are living--lives of Godlessness and Christlessness. There is nothing in all the world a tithe so stupid as sin. Wake up, my brother, to apply calm reason to your lives while yet there is time, and face the question, Why dost thou stand as thou dost to Jesus Christ? You can carry on the questions very gaily for a step or two, but then you come to a dead pause. “What do I do so-and-so for?” “Because I like it.” “Why do I like it?” “Because it meets my needs, or my desires, or my tastes, or my intellect.” “Why do you make the meeting of your needs, or your desires, or your tastes, or your intellect, your sole object?” Is there any answer to that? Further, this disclosure of the true character of his life revealed to Saul, as in a lightning flash, the ingratitude of it. “Why persecutest thou Me?” That was as much as to say, “What have I done to merit thy hate? What have I not done to merit, rather, thy love?” But the same appeal comes to each of us. What has Jesus Christ done for thee, my friend, for me, for every soul of man?

III. Lastly, we have here a warning of self-inflicted wounds. The metaphor is a very plain one. The ox goad was a formidable weapon, some seven or eight feet in length, shod with an iron point, and capable of being used as a spear, and of inflicting deadly wounds at a pinch. Held in the firm hand of the ploughman, it presented a sharp point to the rebellious animal in the yoke. If the ox had readily yielded to the gentle prick given, not in anger, but for guidance, it had been well. But if it lashes out with its hoofs against the point, what does it get but bleeding flanks? Paul had been striking out instead of obeying, and he had won by it only bloody hocks. There are two possible applications of that saying, which may have been a proverb in common use. One is the utter futility of lives that are spent in opposing Divine will. There is a great current running, and if you try to go against it you will only be swept away by it. Think of a man lifting himself up and saying to God, “I will not!” when God says, “Do thou this!” or “Be thou this!” What will be the end of that? It is hard to indulge in sensual sin. You cannot altogether dodge what people call the “natural consequences.” It is hard to set yourselves against Christianity. But there is another side to the proverb of my text, and that is the self-inflicted harm that comes from resisting the pricks of God’s rebukes and remonstrances, whether these be in conscience or by any other means; including, I make bold to say, even such poor words as mine tonight. For if the first little prick of conscience, a warning and a guide, be neglected, the next will go a great deal deeper. And so all wrong-doing, and neglect of right-doing of every sort, carries with it a subsequent pain. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)

Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?--

Christ and Paul

I. The question. It was personal. When I preach to you, I am obliged to address you all in the mass. But not so our Master. If He had spoken in general terms, it would have glanced off from the heart of the apostle; but when it came personally--“Why persecutest thou Me?”--there was no getting off it. I pray the Lord to make the question personal to some of you. There be many of us here present who have bad personal preaching to our souls. Do you not remember, dear brother in Christ, when you were first pricked in the heart, how personal the preacher was? I remember it well. It seemed to me that I was the only person in the whole place, as if a black wall were round about me, and I were shut in with the preacher, something like the prisoners at the Penitentiary, who each sit in their box and can see no one but the chaplain. I thought all he said was meant for me; I felt persuaded that someone knew my character, and had written to him and told him all, and that he had personally picked me out. Why, I thought he fixed his eyes on me; and I have reason to believe he did, but still he said he knew nothing about my ease. Oh, that men would hear the Word preached, and that God would so bless them in their hearing, that they might feel it to have a personal application to their own hearts.

2. It contained some information as to the persecuted one. If you had asked Saul who it was he persecuted, he would have said, “Some poor fishermen, that had been setting up an impostor.” But see in what a different light Jesus Christ puts it. He does not say, “Why didst thou persecute Stephen?” but “Me?” Inasmuch as you have done this unto one of the least of My brethren, you have done it unto Me.

3. It demanded an answer. “What have I done to hurt thee? Why art thou so provoked against Me?”

II. The expostulation. “It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.” For--

1. You do not really accomplish your purpose. When the ox kicks against the goad, it is to spite the husbandman for having goaded him onward; but instead of hurting the husbandman it hurts itself. If thou thinkest, O man, that thou canst stop the progress of Christ’s Church, go thou and first bid the universe stand still! Go, stand by the winds, and bid them cease their wailing, or bid the roaring sea roll back when its tide is marching on the beach; and when thou hast stopped the universe, then come forth and stop the omnipotent progress of the Church of Christ. “He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh,” etc. But put it as a personal matter, have you ever succeeded in stopping the work of grace in the heart of anyone? Aye, young man, you may laugh at your own shop mate, but he will beat you in the long run. If Christians are but faithful, they must win the day. It is no use your kicking against them; you cannot hurt them.

2. You get no good by it. Kick as he might, the ox was never benefited by it. Suppose you say you don’t like religion, what have you ever got by hating it? You have got those red eyes sometimes on the Monday morning, after the drunkenness of the Sunday night. You have got that shattered constitution, which, even if you had now turned it to the paths of virtue, must hang about you till you leave it in your grave. But you are moral. Well, have you ever got anything even then by opposing Christ? Has it made your family any the happier? Has it made you any the happier yourself? Will it quiet your conscience when you come to die that you did your best to destroy the souls of other people?

3. But kick as the ox might, it had to go forward at last. If anyone had told Saul when he was going to Damascus, that he would one day become a preacher of Christianity, he would, no doubt, have laughed at it as nonsense; but the Lord had the key of his will, and He wound it up as He pleased. “Then why persecutest thou Me”? Perhaps you are despising the very Saviour you will one day love; trying to knock down the very thing that you wilt one day try to build up. Mayhap you are persecuting the men you will call your brothers and sisters. It is always well for a man not to go so far that he cannot go back respectably.

III. The good news. Paul, who persecuted Christ, was forgiven. He says he was the very chief of sinners, but he obtained mercy. Nay, more, he obtained honour. He was made an honoured minister of Christ, and so may you. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.--

Kicking against the pricks

I. The conduct with which Saul was upbraided. He was involved in one continuous struggle against the will, the power and the cause of Christ. The expression does not mean striving against the convictions of his own judgment, for Saul acted upon principle, and was most conscientious when he was most bigoted. Hence he says, “‘ I verily thought with myself, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth.” This expression indicates one main ground of the apostle’s prejudice. Like Nathanael, he was persuaded that no good thing could come out of Nazareth, and that it was his duty to seek the extirpation of the rising sect. In Acts 22:8, express notice seems to be taken of this. Hence we discover, not only the amazing grace vouchsafed in the work of his conversion, but the consummate wisdom displayed in its mode. Saul’s grand error had been the entertaining low thoughts of Christ; it was essential, therefore, that the new apostle should be possessed with a deep sense of the power of Christ, as risen and received into glory. The conduct thus exposed is not peculiar to Paul. We kick against the goads--

1. When we seek to stifle the convictions of conscience and strive against the constraints of Divine grace. Saul was not guilty in this respect; but are none of us?

2. When we rebel against the dispensations of God’s providence.

3. When we oppose the truth of God, or hinder the work of God.

II. The warning which he received may be considered to characterise his course as--

1. Sinful. Saul might have learned this from the counsel of his master Gamaliel.

2. Foolish; for his resistance was fruitless.

(1) His object was to extirpate the Church of Christ. Little, however, did the oppressor understand that each true disciple was a missionary. “They that were scattered abroad, went everywhere preaching the Word.”

(2) The apostle, at the instant when the text presents him, was made to realise this to the full. Like some rash fencer, who has provoked a stronger and more skilful than he to mortal combat, and is but instantly disarmed, and lies helpless in the dust, with his adversary’s weapon pointed at his heart, the self-righteous and infuriated bigot now lay trembling and astonished, completely at the mercy of the despised Nazarene. The power which frustrated this proud Pharisee was exerted in pity; the defeat itself was love; but still, viewed as a defeat, and merely so, nothing could be more entire and abject. (C. F. Childe, M. A.)

The ox and the goad

Jesus even out of heaven speaks in parables, according to His wont. To Paul He briefly utters the parable of the rebellious ox. Note the tenderness of the appeal: it is not, “Thou art harming Me by thy persecutions,” bat, “Thou art wounding thyself.” He saith not, “It is hard for Me,” but “hard for thee.” Observe--

I. The ox. A fallen man deserves no higher type.

1. You are acting like a brute beast, in ignorance and passion. You are unspiritual, thoughtless, unreasonable.

2. Yet God values you more than a man does an ox.

3. Therefore He feeds you, and does not slay you.

4. You are useless without guidance, and yet you are unwilling to submit to your Master’s hand.

5. If you were but obedient you might be useful, and might find content in your service.

6. You have no escape from the choice of either to obey or to die, and it is useless to be stubborn.

II. The ox goad. You have driven the Lord to treat you as the husbandman treats a stubborn ox.

1. The Lord has tried you with gentle means--a word, a pull of the rein, etc. by parental love, by tender admonitions of friends and teachers, and by the gentle promptings of His Spirit.

2. Now He uses the more severe means--

(1) Of solemn threatening by His law.

(2) Of terrors of conscience, and dread of judgment.

(3) Of loss of relatives, children, friends.

(4) Of sickness, and varied afflictions.

(5) Of approaching death, with a dark future beyond it.

3. You are feeling some of these pricks, and cannot deny that they are sharp. Take heed lest worse things come upon you.

III. The kicks against the goad. These are given in various ways by those who are resolved to continue in sin. There are--

1. Early childish rebellions against restraint.

2. Sneers at the gospel, at ministers, at holy things.

3. Wilful sins against conscience and light.

4. Revilings and persecutions against God’s people.

5. Questionings, infidelities, and blasphemies.

IV. The hardness of all this to the ox. It hurts itself against the goad, and suffers far more than the driver designs.

1. In the present. You are unhappy; you are full of unrest and alarm; you are increasing your chastisement, and fretting your heart.

2. In the best possible future. You will feel bitter regrets, have desperate habits to overcome, and much evil to undo. All this if you do at last repent and obey.

3. In the more probable future. You are preparing for yourself increased hardness of heart, despair and destruction. Oh, that you would know that no possible good can come of kicking against God, who grieves over your infatuations!

Conclusion:

1. Yield to the discipline of your God.

2. He pities you now, and begs you to consider your ways.

3. It is Jesus who speaks; be not so brutish as to refuse Him that speaks from heaven.

4. You may yet, like Saul of Tarsus, become grandly useful, and plough many a field for the Lord Jesus. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

Striving against conviction

This sentence was one of the oldest of Greek proverbs, and being addressed to Saul in the Hebrew language, is an instance of the voice of Religion rightly using the tones of everyday life. That Christ should use a figure here was consistent with His habit, who used His parables to speak to men in figures. And doubtless the statement applied to many of Paul’s recent experiences, which were finding their climax in that crisis. Doubtless the reflection of one who knew the Scriptures as Paul did, and who had the warning Gamaliel gave him, and the recollections he must have had of the martyrs he was making, and preeminently his recollection of Stephen, must have brought many misgivings like so many goad thrusts, which found their full force in the vision and voices of that hour. Anyhow, the text tells that, whether for a longer or a shorter time, Paul had been resisting conviction. This is--

I. Common. We see it--

1. In continuance in outward sin which is felt to be evil.

2. In cherishing secret evils known to be wrong.

3. In postponing allegiance to claims of religion felt to be just.

II. Painful. It is “hard” because a man is--

1. In collision with the best social influences--in church, in godly family, etc.

2. In conflict with his own higher nature. Reason, conscience, have been goad-thrusts.

3. In opposition to God.

III. Wrong.

1. It is “fighting against God.” So Gamaliel warned.

2. It is persecuting Jesus. The noblest, tenderest, best Being. (U. R. Thomas.)

The sinner his own enemy

The first glance at the words shows us a proverb. Even from heaven, God, if He speaks at all, must adapt His speech to man’s usages. The risen and ascended Saviour spake not on earth only in parables. That before us is taken from the very commonest life of man. With a goad in his hand, headed by a long sharp spike of iron, the farmer drives before him the reluctant animal which would loiter or deviate from its way. In the obstinacy of an untamed will, the bullock unaccustomed to the yoke will even kick against his driver; and then the iron, otherwise harmless, enters into the recalcitrant foot. So in human life, in the affairs of the soul, there is a Hand which directs, and there is also a wilt which it seeks to guide. So long as the human will moves along the straight furrow of duty, so long the goad of punishment is unfelt. But if man will refuse the Divine influence, and stop or hedge aside, the guiding impulse must become a painful goad of discipline, and resistance must be coerced and, if necessary, punished into acquiescence.

1. “The way of transgressors is hard.” So speaks Solomon. He had found it so. And so speaks Christ. The young man thinks it a sign of independence to forget God that made him, and to walk in the way of his own heart. He learns to forsake the rule of his father, and to despise the law of his mother. He forms new associates; his habits become more and more such as a Christian parent would mourn over. Does he find his new life a freedom? Are his new ways ways of pleasantness? He calls them so in his hours of mirth. But somehow he feels to be more in bondage than ever. The old rules of his parents, if they were restraints, at least had no sting in them. But now, these pleasures of sin, not only are they short lived, they are anxious in the indulgence, and torturers in the retrospect. His conscience is ever warning and lashing him. And when sickness comes, when grey hairs are upon him, when death is imminent; how then? Young men--young women--be persuaded of this; that there is a God over you; if you will have it so, a God of love; if you will not have it so, then at least a God of power! It is hard for thee now, as well as dangerous eventually, to kick against the pricks.

2. There are those who are kicking against the goad of a fatherly discipline, who do not understand and love the method by which God is training them for Himself. They are denied many things which they desire: they are subjected to many things which they dislike. When they seemed to have even attained, the prize was wrenched from them. When they did attain, the coveted fruit has turned to ashes in the mouth. By these means the world was made a world of nothingness to them. Perhaps they were too eager for it. They were of that nature which would have been satisfied to “sit by the fleshpots and eat bread to the full.” And therefore the discipline needful for them was desert life. Sinai, with God speaking from it, was necessary to their soul’s safety. And yet scarcely were they in it, when they began to find fault. Their “soul loathed this light bread,” the bread of eternity and of the Spirit. The smitten rock yielded only a spiritual supply; and they were athirst for something more luscious, more earthly. Thus again and again they were rebellious against the hand that guided, and forced it to become a hand that drove. Why? “Even because He had a favour unto them.” To kick against that Hand, even if it was forced by their waywardness to hold a goad, was rebellion as much against happiness as against strength. I address some tonight who are in definite trouble. My friend, “it is the Lord. I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil.” “Shall the thing formed say to Him that formed it, Why hast Thou made me thus?” “Humble yourselves” rather under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time. It is hard for thee, painful now, eventually ruinous, to kick against the goad.

3. There is yet a further use of the proverb, that in which it was originally spoken. St. Paul was moral and conscientious; but be was kicking against the goad because he was refusing the revelation of Christ. He saw not his own sinfulness. He knew not his own want of a Saviour. He was not willing that others should trust in One whom he knew not. Can there be any here whose sin is that of Saul? Certainly there are those who are willing to take everything of the gospel save the very gospel itself; moral, conscientious, earnest men, yet who suffer themselves to repudiate altogether the revelation of the forgiveness of sin through the Atonement, and of renewal by the Holy Spirit. Depend upon it, you are kicking against a goad. You do want a Saviour for forgiveness, cleansing, strength, comfort and grace in daily life. Why, then, will you keep out of your heart that bright light? Why will you compel Him to drive, who would lead and guide? Conclusion: Scripture gives us examples of every kind of direction. Mark the order.

1. There is the sharp iron for the refractory. “It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.”

2. There is the bit and bridle for the unreasoning.

3. There is the voice of the Shepherd, known and loved by the docile flock.

4. There is the guidance, not even of voice, but of the eye only, which suits the ready, anticipating will of the entirely tractable and sympathising child.

To kick against the goad is the extreme of disobedience; to watch the guiding eye, to wait not for the word or the sign, much less for the spur of authority, is the perfection of obedience. In all senses, may that last be ours! (Dean Vaughan.)

Opposition to the truth fatal

The swordfish is a very curious creature, with a long and bony beak projecting in front of his head. It is also very fierce, attacking other fishes, and trying to pierce them with its sword. The fish has been known to dart at a ship in full sail with such violence as to pierce the solid timbers. But what has happened? The silly fish has been killed outright by the force of its own blow. The ship sails on just as before, and the angry fish falls a victim to its own rage. But how shall we describe the folly of those who, like Saul, oppose the cause of Christ? They cannot succeed: like the swordfish they only work their own destruction.

Opposition to the truth, self-destructive

Dr. John Hall compares the attacks of infidelity upon Christianity to a serpent gnawing at a file. As he kept on gnawing he was greatly encouraged by the sight of a growing pile of chips; till, feeling pain, and seeing blood, he found that he had been wearing his own teeth away against the file, but the file was unharmed.