And hath seen in a vision a man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hand on him, that he might receive his sight.
While blind and praying in Damascus, Saul was shown beforehand a man named Ananias coming in and laying his hands on him to restore his sight, which prepared and assured him for the help God would send. This came during three days of total blindness, fasting, repentance and earnest prayer in the house of Judas, when he was in darkness of mind, distress and uncertainty about what was required of him. Christ did not heal him directly or tell him his duty directly, but worked through appointed human agents, with Ananias acting in Christ's name and authority to bring sight and the Holy Spirit through the ordained channel of the church. The bodily blindness humbled him to see himself a sinner condemned by the far-reaching claims of God's law, and with enlightened vision to learn that Jesus is the foundation and fulfillment of the sacrificial system and the vindicator of the law he had thought abolished. The vision belongs to his complete transformation from a persecutor of Christ's followers into a devoted preacher of Jesus to strengthen believers and carry the gospel to the Gentiles, showing that beneath even hatred, prejudice and crime a soul may be rescued by Christ's grace.
Blindness, Prayer, and Vision
While blind and praying in Damascus, Saul was shown beforehand a man named Ananias coming in and laying hands on him so that he might receive his sight, and this revelation prepared and assured him for the help God would send through Ananias. The coming healing touch was disclosed to him before it happened, directing the work of his restoration through a human messenger.
This occurred during three days of fasting and prayer in the house of Judas, when Saul was totally blind and in utter darkness of mind about what was required of him. His faith was severely tested, and in uncertainty and distress he cried earnestly to God. God answered by giving the vision of a disciple named Ananias coming to restore his sight by laying hands on him, and at the same time told Ananias in vision to arise and go to the street called Straight and inquire at the house of Judas for Saul of Tarsus because he was praying and had seen that vision.
The blindness had followed the glory of the heavenly light revealed on the road to Damascus, after Jesus revealed Himself to him there. Saul remained blind and without food during three days of reflection, repentance, and earnest prayer for pardon, humbled to the dust. His sight was not restored immediately by Christ.
As shown beforehand, Ananias came and laid hands on him, and Saul immediately regained his sight in answer to the vision. He then arose and was baptized. Paul later remembered his former persecution of Christ's followers with gratitude that his eyes had been opened to the gospel he once despised and that he had been privileged to preach the truth he once opposed.
Christ Works Through Church
Christ did not restore Saul's sight directly nor tell him his duty directly, but worked for his salvation through agents He had appointed, entrusting responsible work to people authorized to act in His stead. While Saul waited blind and praying, God showed him beforehand a man named Ananias coming in and laying hands on him so that he would regain his sight. This revealing of the coming human helper in advance meant Paul would receive both sight and instruction through the very disciples he had persecuted, joining him to the organized church and its ordained channel of blessing rather than giving him an experience independent of the church.
Ananias represented Christ and Christ's appointed ministers, acting in Christ's name and authority. Through Ananias Saul received his sight and the Holy Ghost. Christ's blessings come through the agencies He has ordained, connecting people with the church through which those blessings are given. The vision while Saul was without sight directed him to the church, pointing him toward the disciples he had persecuted, whom he was required to join and learn from.
Christ revealed Himself to Saul and convicted him, yet Saul still needed help from Christ's disciples to learn God's will. Even though Paul was brought directly into the presence of Christ to be fitted as a chosen vessel for a most important work, Christ did not Himself teach him the lessons of truth he must learn. He arrested his course and convicted him, and when Paul asked what he should do, Christ placed him in connection with His church to be told what he must do. God had ordained disciples to teach His truth, so the restoration of sight was not immediate and the disciples had a part in guiding the penitent Saul.
The vision pointed Saul toward the very disciples he had persecuted, whom he was required to join and learn from. Saul had a part in confessing to those whose destruction he had intended, acknowledging his wrong to them. While praying and awaiting instruction he was connected with Ananias as representative of the church rather than given an experience independent of the church.
Persecutor Turned Apostle
Acts 9:12 belongs to the conversion in which the risen Saviour suddenly arrested Saul in his persecution of Christ's followers on the way to Damascus, revealed Himself to him, convicted him of sin, and completely transformed him from persecutor into devoted worker. He had been a sincere but prejudiced persecutor who breathed threats against the church, yet the encounter made him an obedient servant who accepted Jesus as the Messiah. He turned from persecuting believers to professing faith and preaching the gospel he said he had received through revelation of Jesus Christ, preaching Him as earnestly as he once condemned Him.
The change made Saul a chosen preacher of Jesus to strengthen the disciples and carry the gospel to the Gentiles. The revelation on the road made the Saviour's mission and Paul's work in converting the Gentiles plain to him and commissioned him for it. The circumstances of that conversion helped prepare him to turn from those who rejected the message and to turn from opposition to preaching Christ to the Gentiles.
The conversion followed Stephen's martyrdom, and Stephen's faith, steadfastness, courage, God-marked face and words remained in Saul's memory. That faith and God-given glory made a deep and lasting impression on Saul, testified to the truth Stephen proclaimed, and contributed to Saul's change from persecutor to believer. Permitting wicked men to triumph in putting the true and faithful Stephen to death did not appear to strengthen God's cause, yet God used that apparent defeat to convert Paul and through his word bring thousands to gospel light.
The wonderful conversion demonstrates in startling manner the Holy Spirit's miraculous power to convict mind and heart of sin. It was brought about by overwhelming evidence rather than impulse or fanaticism, when a heavenly vision revealed Jesus to him and turned him from persecutor to sincere believer. The revelation of divine glory brought him terror at first, then consolation, and he was called to be an apostle by God's will.
The story was later related before kings and governors as testimony concerning Jesus. Paul's later visits to Jerusalem brought back memories of his former life and his part in persecuting Christ's followers, when the former persecutor had received his sight through Ananias. Word of his great change had reached the disciples in Jerusalem only as a rumor, but because he had immediately retired into Arabia with nothing definite heard afterward they did not credit it, remembered his persecutions, suspected him of acting a part to deceive and destroy them, and would not receive him as one of their number.
The conversion serves as the example of the thorough conversion ministers need before they are fitted for God's work. It also shows that before conversion Paul's heart was susceptible to divine impressions. The assurance conveyed to him in the first part of his ministry shaped all his after life and encouraged him, as one turned from a persecutor who once ridiculed and despised all who believe on Christ to a believer working on His side. Because of that personal experience and personal knowledge of the Lord he could speak intelligently, had living abiding faith, cultivated a sense of Christ's presence in all his works, received strength in prayer, looked to his Captain for orders as a faithful soldier, and never regarded the work as impossible no matter what obstacles stood before him.
Spiritual Sight and Law
Saul was made physically blind by the glory of the One he had blasphemed so that he might receive spiritual sight. During the days and nights of that blindness he had time for reflection, and he no longer saw himself as righteous but as sinful, with his thoughts, words, and actions condemned by the law. The far-reaching claims of God's law took hold of his life, reaching to the thoughts and emotions of his sin-corrupted heart, and the thought of his zeal in persecuting God's people filled him with bitter remorse and abhorrence of himself and his work. Hopeless and helpless, he cast himself on Jesus as the only one who could pardon him and clothe him with righteousness, giving up his supposed righteousness as a proud Pharisee who thought himself justified by good works and becoming a humble suppliant for mercy whose tongue praised Christ.
With enlightened vision he learned that Jesus, whom in his blindness he had counted an impostor, is indeed the Author and foundation of all the religion of God's chosen people from Adam's day, and the Finisher of the faith, the vindicator of truth and fulfiller of all prophecies. Touched by the finger of God, he learned that Christ is the originator and foundation of the entire Jewish system of sacrifices, that in Christ's death type met antitype, and that Christ came into the world for the express purpose of vindicating His Father's law and did not make it of none effect. In the light of the law he saw himself a sinner where he had thought he kept it zealously and found he had transgressed it, died to sin and became obedient to its claims, repented of his sins and had faith in Jesus as Saviour, was baptized, and preached Jesus as earnestly as he once condemned Him.
He had verily believed that faith in Jesus repudiated the law of God and the service of sacrificial offerings, that Jesus had Himself disregarded the law and taught His disciples that it was now of no effect, and that it was his duty to strive with his utmost power to exterminate the doctrine that Jesus was the Prince of life. His conversion convicted him that Jesus upheld God's law and fulfilled the Old Testament prophecies about Israel's Redeemer, with the sacrificial types meeting their fulfillment in Jesus at the cross. His eyes were opened to see and his heart to feel the power of the gospel truths he had once despised and opposed, and to know them. Like Isaiah, he was brought to see his own unworthiness, receive assurance of full and free forgiveness, and arise a changed man.
Strict religion, joining the church, and baptism do not make a man a Christian without the new birth. Paul was very strict in carrying out his religion but was not a Christian until Christ revealed Himself to him and talked with him, showing him that he was persecuting his Master in the person of His saints. Then he was converted, became one of the sect he had despised and hated, and for love of Christ received the same cruel treatment he had once cooperated with others in giving. The verse proves that those who serve in conscientious error, as Paul did when breathing threats and slaughter against Christians and binding men and women, can have Jesus reveal Himself to them, even as many now worshipping an idol sabbath do so as conscientiously as Paul persecuted. Strict conscientiousness does not leave one guiltless once the Spirit impresses his cruelty upon him, and he must become a learner of the disciples.
Paul's exchange of Phariseeism for the gospel cost him popularity, positions of honor, and ambitious preferment, yet he counted it no sacrifice. He had thought that in persecuting the saints, hailing them before judges and seeking to wipe them from the earth, he was doing God service, but Christ arrested him and showed him his zeal was not according to knowledge and that in persecuting the saints he was persecuting Christ Himself. When he found he was in the wrong path he turned from it, linked himself with the very people he had before thought worthy only of persecution, bound himself to Christ, and served Him through trials and humiliations unto martyrdom. The chapter is a lesson to all about conversion and persecution, for before conversion Saul hunted up souls to be persecuted as an instrument of Satan, showing that unless the converting power of God comes men will be used the same way. Those who are not converted will oppose and persecute with all their power, as satanic agencies in Christ's day crucified Jesus the only begotten Son of God and as Lucifer exalted himself, a history to be repeated in present and future experience, and great education and experience do not help unless they perfect the knowledge of the glory of God to exalt the Lord Jehovah and His only begotten Son.
Paul was thoroughly converted, and men must be thoroughly converted because their carnal minds are at enmity with God, war with all their powers against the law of God and break that holy law, and are not subject to it. They cannot be subject to that law unless, like Paul, they are thoroughly converted.
Lessons for Believers Today
The account to which the verse belongs is that of Saul of Tarsus, a determined enemy of the gospel who became Paul, a devoted minister of Christ, and it shows that beneath hatred and contempt, even crime and degradation, a soul may still be rescued by Christ's grace. Saul was filled with bitter prejudice, yet his case was not beyond what God can work mightily to overcome. Strong iron walls of prejudice can be broken down when God's servant is humble and teachable and molded by His Spirit.
Such a servant hides in God and does not get in the way, but labors with melting love and pity and tenderness while clinging to Jesus Christ. He is ready to be counseled by more experienced brethren and goes forth not in his own name but in the might and power of Israel's God. He is not easily discouraged by difficulties or fierce opposition but endures hardness, presses on in faith and courage and hope, and takes courage from the life of Christ.
While blind and praying in Damascus, Saul was shown beforehand a man named Ananias coming in and laying his hands on him to restore his sight, which prepared and assured him for the help God would send. This came during three days of total blindness, fasting, repentance and earnest prayer in the house of Judas, when he was in darkness of mind, distress and uncertainty about what was required of him. Christ did not heal him directly or tell him his duty directly, but worked through appointed human agents, with Ananias acting in Christ's name and authority to bring sight and the Holy Spirit through the ordained channel of the church. The bodily blindness humbled him to see himself a sinner condemned by the far-reaching claims of God's law, and with enlightened vision to learn that Jesus is the foundation and fulfillment of the sacrificial system and the vindicator of the law he had thought abolished. The vision belongs to his complete transformation from a persecutor of Christ's followers into a devoted preacher of Jesus to strengthen believers and carry the gospel to the Gentiles, showing that beneath even hatred, prejudice and crime a soul may be rescued by Christ's grace.
Blindness, Prayer, and Vision
While blind and praying in Damascus, Saul was shown beforehand a man named Ananias coming in and laying hands on him so that he might receive his sight, and this revelation prepared and assured him for the help God would send through Ananias. The coming healing touch was disclosed to him before it happened, directing the work of his restoration through a human messenger.
This occurred during three days of fasting and prayer in the house of Judas, when Saul was totally blind and in utter darkness of mind about what was required of him. His faith was severely tested, and in uncertainty and distress he cried earnestly to God. God answered by giving the vision of a disciple named Ananias coming to restore his sight by laying hands on him, and at the same time told Ananias in vision to arise and go to the street called Straight and inquire at the house of Judas for Saul of Tarsus because he was praying and had seen that vision.
The blindness had followed the glory of the heavenly light revealed on the road to Damascus, after Jesus revealed Himself to him there. Saul remained blind and without food during three days of reflection, repentance, and earnest prayer for pardon, humbled to the dust. His sight was not restored immediately by Christ.
As shown beforehand, Ananias came and laid hands on him, and Saul immediately regained his sight in answer to the vision. He then arose and was baptized. Paul later remembered his former persecution of Christ's followers with gratitude that his eyes had been opened to the gospel he once despised and that he had been privileged to preach the truth he once opposed.
Christ Works Through Church
Christ did not restore Saul's sight directly nor tell him his duty directly, but worked for his salvation through agents He had appointed, entrusting responsible work to people authorized to act in His stead. While Saul waited blind and praying, God showed him beforehand a man named Ananias coming in and laying hands on him so that he would regain his sight. This revealing of the coming human helper in advance meant Paul would receive both sight and instruction through the very disciples he had persecuted, joining him to the organized church and its ordained channel of blessing rather than giving him an experience independent of the church.
Ananias represented Christ and Christ's appointed ministers, acting in Christ's name and authority. Through Ananias Saul received his sight and the Holy Ghost. Christ's blessings come through the agencies He has ordained, connecting people with the church through which those blessings are given. The vision while Saul was without sight directed him to the church, pointing him toward the disciples he had persecuted, whom he was required to join and learn from.
Christ revealed Himself to Saul and convicted him, yet Saul still needed help from Christ's disciples to learn God's will. Even though Paul was brought directly into the presence of Christ to be fitted as a chosen vessel for a most important work, Christ did not Himself teach him the lessons of truth he must learn. He arrested his course and convicted him, and when Paul asked what he should do, Christ placed him in connection with His church to be told what he must do. God had ordained disciples to teach His truth, so the restoration of sight was not immediate and the disciples had a part in guiding the penitent Saul.
The vision pointed Saul toward the very disciples he had persecuted, whom he was required to join and learn from. Saul had a part in confessing to those whose destruction he had intended, acknowledging his wrong to them. While praying and awaiting instruction he was connected with Ananias as representative of the church rather than given an experience independent of the church.
Persecutor Turned Apostle
Acts 9:12 belongs to the conversion in which the risen Saviour suddenly arrested Saul in his persecution of Christ's followers on the way to Damascus, revealed Himself to him, convicted him of sin, and completely transformed him from persecutor into devoted worker. He had been a sincere but prejudiced persecutor who breathed threats against the church, yet the encounter made him an obedient servant who accepted Jesus as the Messiah. He turned from persecuting believers to professing faith and preaching the gospel he said he had received through revelation of Jesus Christ, preaching Him as earnestly as he once condemned Him.
The change made Saul a chosen preacher of Jesus to strengthen the disciples and carry the gospel to the Gentiles. The revelation on the road made the Saviour's mission and Paul's work in converting the Gentiles plain to him and commissioned him for it. The circumstances of that conversion helped prepare him to turn from those who rejected the message and to turn from opposition to preaching Christ to the Gentiles.
The conversion followed Stephen's martyrdom, and Stephen's faith, steadfastness, courage, God-marked face and words remained in Saul's memory. That faith and God-given glory made a deep and lasting impression on Saul, testified to the truth Stephen proclaimed, and contributed to Saul's change from persecutor to believer. Permitting wicked men to triumph in putting the true and faithful Stephen to death did not appear to strengthen God's cause, yet God used that apparent defeat to convert Paul and through his word bring thousands to gospel light.
The wonderful conversion demonstrates in startling manner the Holy Spirit's miraculous power to convict mind and heart of sin. It was brought about by overwhelming evidence rather than impulse or fanaticism, when a heavenly vision revealed Jesus to him and turned him from persecutor to sincere believer. The revelation of divine glory brought him terror at first, then consolation, and he was called to be an apostle by God's will.
The story was later related before kings and governors as testimony concerning Jesus. Paul's later visits to Jerusalem brought back memories of his former life and his part in persecuting Christ's followers, when the former persecutor had received his sight through Ananias. Word of his great change had reached the disciples in Jerusalem only as a rumor, but because he had immediately retired into Arabia with nothing definite heard afterward they did not credit it, remembered his persecutions, suspected him of acting a part to deceive and destroy them, and would not receive him as one of their number.
The conversion serves as the example of the thorough conversion ministers need before they are fitted for God's work. It also shows that before conversion Paul's heart was susceptible to divine impressions. The assurance conveyed to him in the first part of his ministry shaped all his after life and encouraged him, as one turned from a persecutor who once ridiculed and despised all who believe on Christ to a believer working on His side. Because of that personal experience and personal knowledge of the Lord he could speak intelligently, had living abiding faith, cultivated a sense of Christ's presence in all his works, received strength in prayer, looked to his Captain for orders as a faithful soldier, and never regarded the work as impossible no matter what obstacles stood before him.
Spiritual Sight and Law
Saul was made physically blind by the glory of the One he had blasphemed so that he might receive spiritual sight. During the days and nights of that blindness he had time for reflection, and he no longer saw himself as righteous but as sinful, with his thoughts, words, and actions condemned by the law. The far-reaching claims of God's law took hold of his life, reaching to the thoughts and emotions of his sin-corrupted heart, and the thought of his zeal in persecuting God's people filled him with bitter remorse and abhorrence of himself and his work. Hopeless and helpless, he cast himself on Jesus as the only one who could pardon him and clothe him with righteousness, giving up his supposed righteousness as a proud Pharisee who thought himself justified by good works and becoming a humble suppliant for mercy whose tongue praised Christ.
With enlightened vision he learned that Jesus, whom in his blindness he had counted an impostor, is indeed the Author and foundation of all the religion of God's chosen people from Adam's day, and the Finisher of the faith, the vindicator of truth and fulfiller of all prophecies. Touched by the finger of God, he learned that Christ is the originator and foundation of the entire Jewish system of sacrifices, that in Christ's death type met antitype, and that Christ came into the world for the express purpose of vindicating His Father's law and did not make it of none effect. In the light of the law he saw himself a sinner where he had thought he kept it zealously and found he had transgressed it, died to sin and became obedient to its claims, repented of his sins and had faith in Jesus as Saviour, was baptized, and preached Jesus as earnestly as he once condemned Him.
He had verily believed that faith in Jesus repudiated the law of God and the service of sacrificial offerings, that Jesus had Himself disregarded the law and taught His disciples that it was now of no effect, and that it was his duty to strive with his utmost power to exterminate the doctrine that Jesus was the Prince of life. His conversion convicted him that Jesus upheld God's law and fulfilled the Old Testament prophecies about Israel's Redeemer, with the sacrificial types meeting their fulfillment in Jesus at the cross. His eyes were opened to see and his heart to feel the power of the gospel truths he had once despised and opposed, and to know them. Like Isaiah, he was brought to see his own unworthiness, receive assurance of full and free forgiveness, and arise a changed man.
Strict religion, joining the church, and baptism do not make a man a Christian without the new birth. Paul was very strict in carrying out his religion but was not a Christian until Christ revealed Himself to him and talked with him, showing him that he was persecuting his Master in the person of His saints. Then he was converted, became one of the sect he had despised and hated, and for love of Christ received the same cruel treatment he had once cooperated with others in giving. The verse proves that those who serve in conscientious error, as Paul did when breathing threats and slaughter against Christians and binding men and women, can have Jesus reveal Himself to them, even as many now worshipping an idol sabbath do so as conscientiously as Paul persecuted. Strict conscientiousness does not leave one guiltless once the Spirit impresses his cruelty upon him, and he must become a learner of the disciples.
Paul's exchange of Phariseeism for the gospel cost him popularity, positions of honor, and ambitious preferment, yet he counted it no sacrifice. He had thought that in persecuting the saints, hailing them before judges and seeking to wipe them from the earth, he was doing God service, but Christ arrested him and showed him his zeal was not according to knowledge and that in persecuting the saints he was persecuting Christ Himself. When he found he was in the wrong path he turned from it, linked himself with the very people he had before thought worthy only of persecution, bound himself to Christ, and served Him through trials and humiliations unto martyrdom. The chapter is a lesson to all about conversion and persecution, for before conversion Saul hunted up souls to be persecuted as an instrument of Satan, showing that unless the converting power of God comes men will be used the same way. Those who are not converted will oppose and persecute with all their power, as satanic agencies in Christ's day crucified Jesus the only begotten Son of God and as Lucifer exalted himself, a history to be repeated in present and future experience, and great education and experience do not help unless they perfect the knowledge of the glory of God to exalt the Lord Jehovah and His only begotten Son.
Paul was thoroughly converted, and men must be thoroughly converted because their carnal minds are at enmity with God, war with all their powers against the law of God and break that holy law, and are not subject to it. They cannot be subject to that law unless, like Paul, they are thoroughly converted.
Lessons for Believers Today
The account to which the verse belongs is that of Saul of Tarsus, a determined enemy of the gospel who became Paul, a devoted minister of Christ, and it shows that beneath hatred and contempt, even crime and degradation, a soul may still be rescued by Christ's grace. Saul was filled with bitter prejudice, yet his case was not beyond what God can work mightily to overcome. Strong iron walls of prejudice can be broken down when God's servant is humble and teachable and molded by His Spirit.
Such a servant hides in God and does not get in the way, but labors with melting love and pity and tenderness while clinging to Jesus Christ. He is ready to be counseled by more experienced brethren and goes forth not in his own name but in the might and power of Israel's God. He is not easily discouraged by difficulties or fierce opposition but endures hardness, presses on in faith and courage and hope, and takes courage from the life of Christ.