“To you first, ought the word of God to be spoken … ”
(Acts 13:46, Murdock)
The stoning of Stephen caused the old, rent garment of the Old Covenant (covered in violence, the law and sin) to be laid in front of the feet of a very specific person, someone about whom God had said, “he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name to the gentiles and their kings and to the descendants of Israel” (Acts 9:15, ISV). Remember: Jesus is the one speaking here.
We have clearly shown that God’s original covenant had been with Israel, and that other nations were strictly speaking excluded, except if through converting they had become part of the nation of Israel. This strong sense of being a covenant people had caused the Jews to develop a certain inbuilt antagonism toward other nations, of which self-importance had perhaps been the primary root. Their own calling had them act as if other nations had been rejected by God. Barclay says that the strongest feeling toward other nations in history sometimes culminated in the Jewish saying “The Gentiles were created by God to be fuel for the fires of hell.” The historian Josephus, in his book Against Apion, says “the Jews had taken a deliberate oath never to show kindness to any Gentile” and that Apion would proclaim that Jews swore by Yahweh “never to show good will to a man of another nation”.
It’s clear that the new movement of the Way (Acts 9:2), as the early Christians had been called, were faced with an enormous problem. Humanity’s salvation had come from the Jews (John 4:22), and was firstly offered to them, but they had rejected it, and in the words of Paul and Barnabas, “It was necessary for the word of God to be spoken to you first; but since you thrust it away, and judge yourselves not worthy of eternal life; behold, we turn to the Gentiles.” (Acts 13:46, EMTV). Now the gospel had to be preached to all the nations (Matt 28:19). The early Christians were thus faced with the problem of the message being for all people whilst at the same time seeming like being nothing more than a Jewish sect (Acts 24:5, 14; 28:22), while the Jews were, in the ancient world, the most hated nation. Someone very specific was needed to cross that contentious chiasm between the Jews and the secular world. Interestingly enough it would turn out to be a man who was probably born in the same year as Jesus of Nazareth. (See A deeper understanding).
The man who had received the mantle had all the right accoutrements of a very religious life. He shares a part of his résumé in Fil 3:5 & 6: “circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as touching the law, a Pharisee; as touching zeal, persecuting the church; as touching the righteousness which is in the law, found blameless.” To defend himself Paul had presented himself as a Hebraic Jew, part of the covenant people of Israel, whose bloodline stretched back to the father of the Jews, Abraham – “Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they the seed of Abraham? So am I.” (2 Cor 11:22).
Like his namesake in the Old Testament, Saul, this Saul was also from the tribe of Benjamin, and a man who had had great authority at a young age, rising head and shoulders above the rest. Both their names shed light on their characters – “to enquire carefully, consult (of deity, oracle), to seek”. Both had also received an anointing that would radically alter their lives, but the New Testament Saul first had to become Paul (literally meaning small), before the mysteries could be made known to him.
- Sela: Draw further parallels between Saul and Paul. What prototypical value lies in it?
- Read: Num 29; Hos 8; Ezek 21
- Memorize: Ezek 21:21
- For a deeper understanding: blueletterbible.org/study/paul/timeline.cfm
