Authors: Tim Lahaye 7 Jerry B. Jenkins
Luke's Story (9 page)
“Oh, we were both young men, and—”
“No, now please. Your memory is as good as mine, and I have been haunted by every proud word and action. I am more than willing to kneel right here in the sand until you—”
“There’s no need for that, Saul—Paul. Of course I accept your apology and forgive you. Let’s put it behind us. But you must also know that I harbored envy and jealousy too, toward you.”
“I was wholly unaware, Luke. Of course, I really considered no one else back then. How could I?”
“Forgive me.”
“Of course!”
Luke was plainly overwhelmed. What had happened to this man? The Saul he knew may not have asked permission for anythi”
“I wasn’t afraid! At least not at first. I was angry, insulted, offended for the name of God. But I confess that the more we tried to make life miserable for them, the more they multiplied. I could not understand it. Why could they not see that their hero was dead and gone and was not returning? Many new believers claimed they were convinced by miracles. I had not seen any of these personally and of course did not believe they were real.”
“That would have been my view, Paul. It still is. To a scientist, a man of history and of medicine, it would take God himself speaking to me to make me believe.”
“Or a miracle?”
“Or a miracle.”
“What do you think changed my mind?”
“You saw a miracle with your own eyes, something that could not be explained, something you know without doubt was not a magician’s trick?”
“Come, come, Luke. You knew me better than that.”
“I suppose I did. I’m listening.”
That he was listening was an understatement. Luke was aghast, and had it been anyone but Paul telling this story, he might have dismissed it out of hand. That the most dynamic personality he had ever encountered could become so radically different made him listen all right—with his entire being.
SEVENTEEN
When it came time for the evening meal, Luke and Paul made their way down into the galley and, despite the crowd, were able to sit where they could be heard by only each other. Luke noticed that in the corner of the noisy, steamy room, the man whose finger he had bandaged sat with crewmates and gingerly favored his wounded hand.
Luke excused himself and headed over, sidling between benches, to ask the man how he was doing.
“I can feel every beat of my heart,” the mate said.
“Is it turning red?” Luke said.
“I haven’t dared check.”
“May I?”
“Sure.”
As Luke knelt to carefully unwrap the bandage, the others at the table peered over his shoulder. He turned to look at them, hoping to shame them into giving the man a modicum of privacy, but the man said, “It’s all right. They saw it happen.”
Sure enough, the wound was bright red at the edges, yellowing farther out. “I have other ointments and tonics that may help,” Luke said. “Come find me after the meal.”
When he returned to his table, he told Paul he feared something had invaded the deep wound.
“I’d like to meet the young man,” Paul said.
“tinue, please.”
Paul thrust a chunk of bread into a thick stew of seafood, tucked a bite into one cheek, and said, “Well, all during that time I led a great persecution against the believers in Jerusalem. The ones we could catch were either in hiding—like their leaders, apostles who had known Jesus personally—or were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. Some of the bravest and most devout of them carried Stephen to his grave
,
and we heard of much lamenting over him.
,
and we heard of much lamenting over him.
“I tell you, Luke,” Paul said, gulping from a cup, “my goal was to make havoc of this sect, and I accomplished this by entering every suspect house and dragging off men and women, committing them to prison. Maddeningly, I soon learned that those who were scattered went everywhere spreading their doctrine.”
“So on the one hand you were succeeding, and on the other you were failing.”
“It seemed that the more I did, the more I encouraged them! All I could think of was threatening and murdering the disciples of Jesus. I begged an audience with the high priest and felt good about myself when he not only agreed to see me but also complimented me on my efforts. I told him I had heard that some of the heretics had fled to Damascus and asked if he would provide letters for me from him to the synagogues of that city, so that if I found any who were of The Way—which is what they had come to be known, whether men or women—I might bind them and haul them back to Jerusalem.”
Besides his own personal intrigue, the historian in Luke also loved this story and wished he were writing it down. “And he gave you this authority?”
“He did. He praised me again, provided the documents, told me he was proud of me, and wished me Godspeed. I confess, Luke, I was as proud of myself as I could be. Not only had this been my idea, but I had also clearly already impressed the high priest, and I just knew that if I succeeded on this mission, my future as a Jewish leader in Jerusalem would be guaranteed.”
“So you were doing this as much for yourself as for God?”
“Oh, certainly! I didn’t see it then, of course, but it’s quite clear to me now. Then I truly believed God would be pleased with me as well. And there is no better feeling.”
“For one who believes in these sorts of things, I suppose.” What had been so ingrained in Luke that he found it so difficult to think unconventionally? Dare he believe in something beyond himself, as so many of his patients now did? As Paul clearly always had? As Saul, his old acquaintance had seemed miserable. But Luke’s believing patients exhibited an inner peace he could not understand. And now Paul seemed so different.
Paul rubbed a sleeve across his mouth and grinned. “So said by one to whom God Himself would have to speak, or before whom some miracle would have to be performed in order for him to believe.”
“I’m afraid so,” Luke said. “I’ve seen too many misguided people put their trust in the immaterial and wind up none the better for it.” He was div>
“Luke, I had no choice. Jesus was speaking to me from heaven, and I knew He could have killed me on the spot.”
“And what did he tell you to do?”
“He said, ‘Arise and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.’”
“What did your traveling companions make of all this?”
“They stood speechless, telling me later that they had heard a voice but saw no one. When I arose I opened my eyes and could see nothing. My men led me by the hand and brought me into Damascus to the house of a man named Judas on a street called Straight. For three days I could see nothing, and I had lost my appetite. I neither ate nor drank all that time. I simply prayed the entire time. And during my prayer, the Lord gave me a vision. In my mind’s eye I saw a man named Ananias coming to lay his hand on me that I might receive my sight.
“Now soon, Luke, as God is my witness, a man arrived and introduced himself as Ananias. He said, ‘The Lord spoke to me in a vision, and told me to arise and go to the street called Straight and inquire at the house of Judas for one called Saul of Tarsus, for behold, he is praying and in a vision has seen a man named Ananias coming in and putting his hand on him, so that he might receive his sight.’
“Ananias told me that he told the Lord he had heard from many about me and how much harm I had done to the saints in Jerusalem. He had even heard I had authority from the chief priests to bind all who call on Jesus’ name. But still the Lord told him to go and said to him, ‘for he is a chosen vessel of Mine to bear My name before Gentiles, kings, and the children of Israel. For I will show him how many things he must suffer for My name’s sake.’”
Luke found himself actually envying Paul’s passion, though this was all too much to fathom. “Gentiles, kings, and your own people? Did that make any sense to you?”
“Luke, really, what makes sense to a man in my condition? I can tell you I had no doubt God was working in me somehow. That was all I knew. Ananias laid his hands on me and said, ‘Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you came, has sent me that you may receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.’”
“What did that mean?”
“Well, I didn’t know either until immediately there fell from my eyes something like scales, and I received my sight at once. I arose and was baptized. When I had eaten, I felt strengthened. Then I spent several days with the disciples of Jesus at Damascus.”
“And all of a sudden you had gone from being their enemy to being one of them?”
“Immediately. And God gave me utterance. I preached in the synagogues that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. All who heard were amazed, and said, ‘Is this not he who destroyed those who called on this name in Jerusalem, and has come here for that purpose, so that he might bring them bound to the chief priests?’
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“Proving it how?”
“Proving it how?”
“From the Scriptures, which I knew almost by heart. And by performing miracles.”
“You? You performed miracles?”
Paul nodded.
“Show me.”
“Show you? The miracles that Jesus and His disciples performed are not for entertainment, Luke. They are done to show the power of God unto sal
vation. When men see them, they believe and come to repentance.”
vation. When men see them, they believe and come to repentance.”
“Repentance?”
“Of sin. I have come to believe that Jesus is who He claimed to be, the holy and righteous Son of God who came to seek and to save those who are lost. He bore their sins in His own body on the cross, sacrificing His blood and His life for the remission of sin.”
Sin. The concept sounded so earthy, so crass, and yet it resonated with Luke. Sinful was how he felt about his pride, jealousy, conceit, lust, boastfulness. Sin was what his master Theophilus and he rued when they talked about trying to take control of their own passions and how wanting Stoicism was in this regard. They had never called it sin, of course, preferring other terms. Was it possible he could be forgiven, repent, and not be controlled by his own desires?
EIGHTEEN
I’m intrigued by how your own people responded to this change in you, Paul. You had been making a name for yourself. Your defection must have been noisy.”
“Oh, it was! In fact, after many days I became aware that the Jews were plotting to kill me. I naturally wanted to return to Jerusalem, though I feared I faced the same fate there. My hope was to persuade the disciples of Jesus that my conversion was real and to see if I could come alongside and help them in any way. But I dared not travel back out of Damascus the way I had come, for word was that the Jews were watching the gates day and night, and they would not be merely arresting or imprisoning me. The disciples of Damascus took me by night and let me down through the wall in a large basket, far from any gate, and I was able to steal away.”
“So you got to Jerusalem?”
“In truth for several years I lived in seclusion, studying, praying, and preparing myself for ministry. Partly I felt I needed to wean myself from my old ways and prepare myself for the new. But I confess that it was too dangerous for me to return to Jerusalem, once the leaders of the synagogue there had heard what had become of me. And I knew the disciples of Jesus would be wary of me also.
“It was seven years after the resurrection of Jesus that I finally stole into Jerusalem. But my hopes were almost immediately dashed. I put out the word quietly that I wished to talk with the leaders of Jesus’ disciples. I had heard they were camped in an upper room at a private home, but messages came back to me that they had no reason to believe I was being sincere. So many of their number had suffered at my hands that they naturally feared this was a trick to infiltrate them.
“My only ight="6" width="1em">
“But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.
“But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.
“Not that I have already attained it, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. Luke, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things that are behind and reaching forward to those things that are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
“I pleaded with those disciples to be like-minded with me, because I believe that our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself.
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