Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”
Acts 9:6
The Lord said, “Go over to Straight Street, to the house of Judas. When you get there, ask for a man from Tarsus named Saul. He is praying to me right now. I have shown him a vision of a man named Ananias coming in and laying hands on him so he can see again.”]
Acts 9:11-12
But the Lord said, “Go, for Saul is my chosen instrument to take my message to the Gentiles and to kings, as well as to the people of Israel. And I will show him how much he must suffer for my name’s sake.”
Acts 9:15-16
“Then he told me, ‘The God of our ancestors has chosen you to know his will and to see the Righteous One and hear him speak. For you are to be his witness, telling everyone what you have seen and heard. What are you waiting for? Get up and be baptized. Have your sins washed away by calling on the name of the Lord.’
“After I returned to Jerusalem, I was praying in the Temple and fell into a trance. I saw a vision of Jesus saying to me, ‘Hurry! Leave Jerusalem, for the people here won’t accept your testimony about me.’
“‘But Lord,’ I argued, ‘they certainly know that in every synagogue I imprisoned and beat those who believed in you. And I was in complete agreement when your witness Stephen was killed. I stood by and kept the coats they took off when they stoned him.’
“But the Lord said to me, ‘Go, for I will send you far away to the Gentiles!’”
Acts 22:14-21
Now get to your feet! For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my servant and witness. Tell people that you have seen me, and tell them what I will show you in the future. And I will rescue you from both your own people and the Gentiles. Yes, I am sending you to the Gentiles to open their eyes, so they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God. Then they will receive forgiveness for their sins and be given a place among God’s people, who are set apart by faith in me.’
Acts 26:16-18
Apart from the preliminary instructions Paul was told, the above portions I have clipped for you are the only instructions that Paul was told as to what he had to do. All the other things Paul was told either by Jesus or by Ananias had to do with the fact that he had to go into the city of Damascus and how it would work out that Ananias would come to him. What is fascinating to me in doing this exercise is that I have seen for the first time in all of my reading of the Bible (and believe me it has been multiple times since 1973) that in the account Luke gave us across three chapters, Paul did not receive any further instruction as to what he must do. (viz Acts 9:6).
We have to assume Ananias passed on the Jesus comments to him in Acts 9:15-16, but those two statements were not set in the form of instructions as to what Ananias should tell Paul. In fact we might even conclude that Ananias may not have passed those comments on as they were comments about Paul and not instructions as to what he (Ananias) was to tell Paul. We would think that Ananias told Paul – he was “My chosen instrument to take my message to the Gentiles and to kings, as well as to the people of Israel”. But even that may have been omitted. There is no record in Acts 9 of Paul being told that. And whether Ananias told Paul how much he was going to suffer is debatable because Jesus said He would show Paul how much he would suffer. It is highly likely Ananias would miss that part out as it might have been awkward to tell Paul that. Luke just doesn’t tell us those things in Acts 9. All he concentrates on are the details of the circumstances that led up to what Paul was told.
The account of what Paul was told in Acts 22 is curious too in that Ananias really tells Paul nothing of the details of what he is to do in real terms. Oh yes he tells him again preliminary things – “Then he told me, ‘The God of our ancestors has chosen you to know his will and to see the Righteous One and hear him speak. For you are to be his witness, telling everyone what you have seen and heard. What are you waiting for? Get up and be baptized. Have your sins washed away by calling on the name of the Lord.’” (Acts 22:14-16)
But no more than that. The rest of the details Jesus must have told Paul himself. The account in Acts 26 is all concerning what Jesus told Paul, not Ananias. In fact what Ananias told him was:
There are no more details other than that. The rest of the details come from Jesus. At the point where Paul was instructed to get back on his feet on the road into Damascus after the appearance of the bright shining Jesus he was told:
- Now get to your feet! For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my servant and witness.
- Tell people that you have seen me, and tell them what I will show you in the future.
- And I will rescue you from both your own people and the Gentiles. Yes, I am sending you to the Gentiles
- to open their eyes, so they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God.
- Then they will receive forgiveness for their sins and be given a place among God’s people, who are set apart by faith in me.’
In the Temple where he fell into a trance he heard:
- ‘Hurry! Leave Jerusalem, for the people here won’t accept your testimony about me.’
- ‘Go, for I will send you far away to the Gentiles!’
- The remaining instructions to Paul are summarized under “and tell them what I will show you in the future.”
That last fact hit me like a ton of bricks. I have not analysed this portion in the way I am doing it now ever before. But now that I have looked at what Luke recorded for us in detail I notice there are no details there! Paul had simply been told again that he would be His witness and that he was appointed to go to the Gentiles, that God would look after him and He would tell him the rest when he needed to know. That indeed is a briefing! I think Tania and I were told more of what was ahead of us when we started out than Paul himself was told. In essence we are all told to Go, that God will be with us and that we need to tune our ear to Him in order to receive further instructions. End of story. This tape will now self-destruct in thirty seconds. Talk about being given a Mission Impossible on the basis of a BRIEFING.
But isn’t it like that for all of us. The essential thing is for us to know that it is God who is sending us, commissioning us and appointing us. The rest of the instructions will follow on a need to know basis when we need to know. Tania often has said if she knew at the beginning what was in store for us ahead she might not have gone. But God gives us enough information to act on at the time. The rest of what we need to know will come when we need to know it. As a wise person once told me concerning guidance:
“God doesn’t give you the details of what is around the corner until you have gone around the corner. Drive to limit of your headlights.”
Reg Ackland
Wise counsel indeed.
I am easily satisfied with the very best.
Winston Churchill
Out of a place of contentment will come your direction.
Wayne Freeman
The ultimate goal of reading the Bible is that we see the glory of God—the worth and beauty of God—revealed in its pages.
John Piper
7,457 Promises of God. And they are all YES in Christ Jesus!
Anon