Blinded (5-1-2022) Acts 9.1-20

I like to follow the lectionary. This is a table of scripture lessons that follows a three-year cycle of First Testament, Second Testament, and Gospel readings along with a Psalm. After three years, there should be a reading from almost every book in the Bible. With that there should be exposure to all the parts of the Bible so that it can never be said that one has not heard anything from the first testament.

But in the Easter season there is a difference. In each of the three years the First Testament reading is replaced by a reading from the Acts of the Apostles. And this is the one time that Acts really is highlighted. There are no other times that Acts is in the lectionary. It is for that reason I have decided to do a series of sermons that are based on Acts. Beginning with last week’s reading we set out on a journey of the early church, how it was started, the difficulties it faced and how the greatest missionary the church has known did his work.

Today we meet that missionary. He is not yet the missionary that he will become but there is a missionary zeal to him. His zeal is what propels him to do the work that he is doing and that is persecuting those who are a part of what is known as the Way. His zeal is for a missionary purpose of spreading the Jewish religion and looking for the one that they call Messiah. And in his position as a Pharisee, he is looking with great anticipation. This was a time of great anticipation and the man is caught up in this.

In fact, he stood by guarding the cloaks of those who stoned one of the first witnesses, or martyrs, of the message that Jesus was the Messiah and the Son of God. He approved what had happened there and continued to approve of this persecution.

Now there were some Pharisees who were not as zealous as this man. They were willing to let this group of people known as the Way do their own little thing as long as they did not get out of hand and bring down the Romans upon them. After all, there were many groups in Judaism, what was one more? But the man we are talking about is not one of those Pharisees. Here is a group talking about a Messiah who was killed and killed in a most shameful manner. This man was no Messiah and this group needed to be extinguished.

The man’s name is Saul. He is of the tribe of Benjamin and is named after the most well known Benjaminite, Saul the first king of Israel. If there was ever a name that brought back visions of glory that was not David, it was Saul. And this Saul is a man of learning. He knows his Torah, or teaching, his prophets and his writings, the whole of the Hebrew Scriptures. He knows what the Greeks and Romans teach as well. Saul is what we would call a Renaissance man. And it is in this capacity of being one of the Pharisees that holds to the Law in a manner that is hard to come by that Saul is ready to go after the people of the Way.

But first he has to find the people of the Way. Saul and the religious authorities have done what they could to root out those followers in Jerusalem and have done a good job it would seem. So, where to go next? Saul makes the determination to go to Damascus a major city in the Roman provinces and one that has a significant Jewish population and, it would seem, to be housing those following this pretend Messiah.

So, with letters from the high priest (who was probably more than happy to have someone else do the dirty work of rooting out these followers) Saul heads to the city. Now there is something interesting that I had not heard before I began to read about this passage. The Pharisees and others were very intent on prayer and meditation and they looked for visions from God who would tell them what to do and what to say. They especially liked Ezekiel who had a vision at the beginning of his ministry that is both powerful and perplexing to say the least. It is a vision of power where the prophet is surrounded by a great light and sees the glory of the LORD, though he does not see God. It might have been with this in mind that Saul is traveling to Damascus. He might have been meditating on this when what is known as all heaven breaks loose on him.

The text tells us this: “Now as he was going along and approaching Damascus, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.”[1] Saul may have been thrilled and terrified at the same time. Here was what he had been looking for most of his adult like, a real live vision from God with the glory of God shining around him. He was having what I like to call a Homer Simpson moment of great excitement, one where Homer raises his arms and shouts out “Woo Hoo!” N. T. Wright says this about the vision and Saul’s possible reaction to this: “Imagine his excitement as, in the depth of devout meditation, he saw with the eyes of his heart, so real that it seemed as though he was seeing it with his ordinary physical eyes, and then so real that he realized he was seeing it with his physical eyes, the form, the fire, the blazing light, and—the face!”[2]

And here is where Saul’s whole life changes. Because he is not looking into the face of someone he does not expect to see. And the words being spoken are not what he expects to hear in response to his question: “He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” 5 He asked, “Who are you, Lord?” The reply came, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.”[3] Here is another Homer Simpson moment. This the one where the exclamation is one of things not going the way one has expected, usually following the woo hoo. It is D’oh! And one can clearly hear Saul saying this when told that the person whom he is persecuting is the person whom he is seeing alive and in glory.

Saul is told to get up and to go into the city where he is going to be told what do there. The men who are with him are rendered speechless as they heard the voice and most likely saw the light as well. They were terrified. When the light is gone, they rush over to Saul and find that he cannot see. He is blinded by the light that shone around him. So, they lead him into the city where he contemplates and prays about what has happened to him, fasting and taking no water. He is in state of shock and wonders where he will go from here.

While he is contemplating this, the LORD appears to another man in the city. His name is Ananias and we meet him only once, in this passage. His response is quick when called upon, he says “Here I am, Lord.” But when he is told to go find Saul and lay hands on him so that he might see, he balks. Surely the Lord knows what this man has done and is about to do as well. This would be taking his life into his own hands and put him in danger. But God has a mission for Saul and tells Ananias that this man is going to take Jesus’ name to the Gentiles, kings and the people of Israel. Wright says about this mission: “…when you want to reach the pagan world, the person to do it will be a hard-line, fanatical, ultra-nationalist, super-orthodox Pharisaic Jew. And then they say that God doesn’t have a sense of humour.”[4]

Ananias does what he is told and goes and finds Saul. He lays his hands on him calling him Brother Saul letting him know that he is a part of the group now that he was there to persecute. When he tells him that he is there to help him regain his sight and to be filled with the Holy Spirit, scales fall from his eyes and Saul can once again see, with a different way of looking at things, I am sure. He is baptized (whether with water or the Holy Spirit we are not told) and takes food. He meets with the disciples for a few days and then goes to the synagogues, the very place where he was to root out the heretics and begins to proclaim the message that he came to stamp out, that Jesus was the Son of God.

Saul was blinded. Not just by the light that shown around him on the road to Damascus, but before he began down that road. He was so convinced that those of the Way were in the wrong that he was ready and willing to crush them and finish this movement before it really gained traction. Willie James Jennings has this to say about the Pharisee Saul: “No one is more dangerous than one with the power to take life and who already has mind and sight set on those who are a threat to a safe future. Such a person is a closed circle relying on the inner coherence of their logic. Their authority confirms their argument and their argument justifies their actions and their actions reinforce the appropriateness of their authority. Violence, in order to be smooth, elegant, and seemingly natural, needs people who are closed circles. The disciples of the Lord, the women and men of the Way, have no chance against Saul. They have no argument and certainly no authority to thwart his zeal. They are diaspora betrayers of the faith who are a clear and present danger to Israel. This is how Saul sees them. His rationality demands his vision of justice. But what Saul does not yet know is that the road to Damascus has changed. It is space now inhabited by the wayfaring Spirit of the Lord. Saul pursues, but he is being pursued.”[5] See, Saul is blinded by what he sees as the right way of doing things and of his closed circle that completely keeps him from seeing the life and message of Jesus. And then he sees the light, literally and is blinded physically. The circle has been broken. The pursuer was pursued and finally apprehended. There are many like Saul in the church today. Zealous for what they believe is right they will brook no one whom they deem dangerous. They will stamp out all who do not believe as they do and they are a closed circle. But be warned. A closed circle is always vulnerable to being broken open by God.

Ananias was also blind. Instead of seeing Jesus’ call to go and minister to Saul, he can only see who Saul is and what Saul has done. He is blind to the vision that Jesus had for Saul and for his work that he is about to embark upon.

We are also blinded. We do not want to see the person who has done something against us a someone whom God loves. We want to hold on to our righteous indignation like Saul and have a closed circle to anyone who is not in our circle. Like Ananias we don’t want to listen to God when called upon to minister to those with whom we have issues. But in the end God will have God’s way.

We want a conversion story like the one of Saul. We want to tell others how we experienced the light in a dramatic fashion, of how God showed us our errors and how we turned from that path. But if we are honest, our conversion is one that comes quietly and is the result of a lifetime of being with those who are faithful. Granted we are sometimes blind and it does take something like a Damascus Road experience to change us, but most of us have a quiet conversion where our eyes were opened by someone like Ananias ministering to us and helping us see. The good news of all of this is that like Saul, we can do nothing to bring about our conversion. It is only by the grace of God that we are no longer blind to the message and grace of Jesus. And to that all one can do is quote Homer Simpson and say: Woo Hoo! Thanks be to God. Amen.

[1] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1989. Print. [2]Wright, Tom. Acts for Everyone, Part 1: Chapters 1-12. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2008. Print. [3] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1989. Print. [4]Wright, Tom. Acts for Everyone, Part 1: Chapters 1-12. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2008. Print. [5]Jennings, Willie James. Acts. Ed. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher. First edition. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2017. Print. Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible.