Preaching Acts 22129

Preaching Acts 22:1-29

LOVE
a.) To speak to them at all
it is amazing that he conquered those feelings and
had such compassion for people that he could call a group of men who had just tried to kill him “brothers” and then calmly and respectfully urge them to hear the message of Jesus. This is a kind of love that really is remarkable.
b.) to speak their heart language

Points of Identity

1. I am Jew by birth.


2. I was schooled by Gamiliel


3. I persecuted the church

Phil 3:  I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more:  circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness, under the law blameless.  But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ.

Romans 9  I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers and sisters, my kinsmen according to the flesh.



First,
he spoke of his Jewish birth and upbringing, and of
his training *in the law of our fathers* under Gamaliel (cf.
5:34), the most eminent teacher of that time and the leader of the
school of Hillel, whose disciple he had been. So his Jewishness
was incontrovertible. He was `a Hebrew of the Hebrews' (Phil. 3:5,
AV.).
Secondly,
he drew attention to his zeal for God, which was
as great as theirs, since he had persecuted  the followers of the
Way, both men and women, even to prison and to death. The
Sanhedrin could testify to this, since it was they who had issued
him with the extradition order which he took with him to Damascus.

     Thirdly,
Paul narrated the circumstances of his conversion,
which was entirely due to a divine intervention, and not at all to
any initiative of his own. A light from heaven had blinded him,
and the person who spoke to him had identified himself as Jesus of
Nazareth,
Fourthly,
Paul referred to the ministry of Ananias, whom
he deliberately characterized as *a devout observer of the law and
highly respected by all the Jews living there* in Damascus (12).
It was he who restored Paul's sight, who told him that *the God of
our fathers* had chosen him to know his will, see the Righteous
One, `hear his very voice' (14, NEB) and be his witness, and who
baptized him. Then fifthly, Paul came to his vision, which took
place in the very temple he was supposed later to have defiled,
and in which *the Lord* (Jesus is not mentioned by name) told him
to leave Jerusalem immediately, in spite of his reluctance and
objections. `Go', the Lord had said. `*I will send you far away to
the Gentiles.*' That is, *exapostelo se*, almost `I will make you
an apostle', indeed the apostle to the Gentiles (21:26:17; cf.
Gal. 1:16; 2:7-8).

Stopped
Paul

It was tantamount to saying that Jews and Gentiles were equal, for they both needed to come to God through Christ, and that on identical terms.  –Stott

     Looking back over Paul's defence, we may perhaps say that he
made two major points. The first was that he himself was a loyal
Jew, not only by birth and education but still. True, he was now a
witness where before he had been a persecutor. But the God of his
fathers was his God still. He had not broken away from his
ancestral faith, still less apostatized; he stood in direct
continuity with it. Jesus of Nazareth was `the Righteous One' in
whom prophecy had been fulfilled. And Paul's second point was that
those features of his faith which had changed, especially his
acknowledgment of Jesus and his Gentile mission, were not his own
eccentric ideas. They had been directly revealed to him from
heaven, the one truth in Damascus and the other in Jerusalem.
Indeed, nothing but such a heavenly intervention could have so
completely transformed him.