by Tim Green
before the Gentiles. He will stand before kings and before the children of Israel and proclaim my name to them. I will also show him how many great things he must suffer for my name's sake." So Ananias went on his way and entered into the house where I was. He laid his hands on me just as I had seen in the vision and proclaimed, "Brother Saul, the Lord God, even Jesus, that appeared unto you in the dusty road as you came here. He has sent me, that you might receive your sight back and that you may be filled with the Holy Spirit." Immediately there fell, as it were scales from my eyes and I received my sight back at that very moment. I had finally come out of the dark and into the light. I realised that I had been wrong about upholding the Laws of Moses in my own strength. I had spent many years in deception, thinking it was the truth.
So I arose and got up on my feet. I went with Ananias and was baptised in water and received the out pouring of the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in other tongues. I was given food to eat which caused my physical strength to return. I had not eaten nor had anything to drink for three days. However it was the inner strength and power that I felt in my inner man that amazed me. I was strengthen with all might in my inner man by the Holy Spirits power. It was that same power that had raised Jesus Christ from the dead. That power was now living and active in me.
Something supernatural happened to me when I went through the waters of baptism. The water was a physical sign of my faith and my believing in the Lord Jesus Christ. This simple act of obedience changed my life. The waters were symbolic of a permanent reality. The reality was that the waters immersed me into a fixed position captured in both space and time. My old sinful man was suspended in time forever on the cross of Jesus Christ where He died. That old carnal man with it's evil lusts were buried and laid with Christ in the tomb. The old man with it's lustful affections was crucified with Christ and buried with Him through the waters of baptism. As I came up out of the waters I was resurrected with Christ out of the grave. I was now a new man.
The new man, the new me, the spiritual me was raised together with the Lord Jesus Christ. When Christ, the Messiah was raised from the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit, I was raised up together with Him. I was raised to now serve Him in newness of life. It was no longer I that lived, but the resurrected Christ now lived in me. I was a new creature, a new man altogether. Old things had passed away and all things had become new. I was water baptised into His painful death, into His burial and into His resurrection. The water had suspended me and trapped me in space and time. I was dead with Him. I was buried with Him, and I was raised to new life with Him. God forbid that I should boast or glory in anything except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. I was now crucified unto the world and the world was crucified unto me.
I spent a few days with the disciples, Christ's followers that were at Damascus. Straight away I began to preach Christ Jesus, the Messiah in the synagogues. I boldly proclaimed that He is the Son of God. All those who heard me were amazed and astounded at my transformation and conversion. They said, "Is not this he that destroyed them which called on Christ's name in Jerusalem. Has he not come here with the intent of taking saints back to the chief priests, bound and in chains?"
When Christ was revealed in me on that dusty Damascus road, I did not confer with flesh and blood. I didn't consult or counsel with any frail human being or communicate with anyone. Nor did I even go up to Jerusalem to those who were the apostles. But I went into Arabia, and preached there for three years, before returning again to Damascus. The King of Arabia had put a warrant out for my arrest, so I returned to Damascus. What had been bestowed upon me was from God, and God alone. I did not have to seek man's approval, when I had been given a divine mandate from the Messiah Himself? God gave this calling and ministry to me. Only He could revoke it, as the gifts and callings of God are without repentance.
I increased more and more in strength and spiritual stature. I confounded the Jews that lived and dwelt at Damascus with my teachings. I supernaturally began to receive divine insight and revelation from heaven above. The eyes of my understanding were enlightened to the holy Scriptures. I began to see Christ upon the pages of every ancient manuscript. The hidden mysteries and secrets of heaven were being made known to me. These mysteries and secrets had been hidden throughout the ages, but they were now being revealed unto me. Those Jews still followed the Law of Moses religiously, as I had done. They had not yet been awakened to Christ, the Messiah. I proved to them from their own Scriptures, that this man Jesus was the very Christ and our Messiah.
After a few days went by, the unbelieving Jews took counsel to kill me. They were as stubborn about the traditions of our forefathers as I once was. They were no longer prepared to listen to my teachings. They were entrenched in the old letter of the Law, blinded like I once was, before my heavenly encounter. The Jews watched the gates both day and night, looking for me to kill me. They wanted me dead. I became aware of their schemes and did every thing in my power to avoid them. The same murderous spirit that once drove me to kill the saints was now on them.
Late one night the "Disciples of the Way" took me and let me down by the wall in a huge basket. As I was being lowered down in the basket it occurred to me how a small baby was once rescued in a basket. My life was being saved by a basket exactly how a young baby was once saved. He was lowered down into a river in a basket. He was only a young baby when his mother, Jochebed made a basket out of bulrushes. She made it watertight by daubing it with a bitumen pitch. Then she put the child in it and laid it among the rushes, by the brink of the River Nile. That young baby was Moses, the father of our Law. So here I was, like Moses being saved by a basket.
That night I travelled and made my way to Jerusalem, the capital city of Judea. It was the centre for Judaism as our Temple was located there. It was home to our kings and our priesthood. King David first made Jerusalem his home after defeating the Jebusites there. Melchizedek, King of Salem originated from there and our Messiah was crucified there. It was my desire to join myself with the Lord's disciples and His apostles that were there. But they were all afraid of me and didn't believed that I was now a "Disciple of the Way." They thought it was a conspiracy of mine to discover who they were and where they were living, so I could flush them out and hand them over to the chief priests. However there was a young man who believed me and my story, named Barnabas. His name meant, the son of exhortation. He was a Jew from Cyprus, a Levite. He took me and led me to the Lord's apostles.
I declared unto them how I had seen the Lord Jesus Christ in the Way, as I travelled to Damascus. How Christ had revealed himself to me in a heavenly vision. I told them how I had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of the Lord. I spent time with the saints and the apostles, coming and going in and out at Jerusalem. I spoke boldly in the name of the Lord Jesus, and disputed against the Grecians, the Jews that spoke Greek. But once again they went about to slay and kill me. When the brethren, the brothers knew that the Grecians were wanting to kill me, they took me down to Caesarea for safety. Caesarea was a major Mediterranean port that was rebuilt by Herod the Great. It was named after Caesar Augustus, the Roman Emperor.
The brothers sent me back to Tarsus, my home town for my own safety. I spent five years there working with my hands, doing my trade and skill, which was making tents. It was during this time that I became intimate with the Lord Jesus Christ and with His heavenly Father. The Holy Spirit began to enlighten my understanding to the ancient texts and the Scriptures more and more. The Scriptures came alive to me and I could see Christ upon every page. The word of Christ began to dwell in me richly. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ had hidden Himself in our Law, the Psalms and the Prophets. I was just too blind in my zeal and my traditions to see it. But ever since the eyes of my understanding had been enlightened and the eyes of my spirit had been flooded with light, I could finally see. Christ is all and in all. I could see Him everywhere in our sacred texts.
It was also during this time that the churches had rest thr
oughout all the regions of Judea, Galilee and Samaria. They were built up in the most holy faith and were edified in Christ. They walked in the reverential fear of God Almighty and stood firm in the comfort of the Holy Ghost. The churches multiplied and increased greatly. Holy respect and reverence for God came upon every soul and many wonders and signs were done by the hands of the apostles.
Yet in Tarsus, God was preparing me for greatness and I knew it. Like steel is tempered in a fire and forged to conform to the shape that the hammer smith deems fit. So my character was being forge by the fire of the Holy Spirit burning deep within me. God was working within me both to will and to do of his good pleasure. God the Father had begun a good work in me and I knew that He was going to finish what He had started. I was His workmanship, created for good works in Christ Jesus. A message was been engraved into me, which I received directly from Jesus Christ Himself. This Gospel message was not taught to me by men, but I received it by divine