2024/09/02

159. Vocation of the Apostle Paul

Paul says: "Put off your old nature which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and put on the new nature, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness" (Ephesians 4:22-24). His experience of having encountered Jesus on the way to Damascus and being baptised with the help of Ananias gave him that realization. To "put on the new nature, created after the likeness of God" means rediscovering within oneself that one is made after the likeness of God and putting on the experience of being a new man in collaboration with the Holy Spirit. Living "in true righteousness and holiness" is also with the Holy Spirit. 

That is why Jesus said, "It is written in the prophets, 'And they shall all be taught by God.' Every one who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me" (John 6:45). As Jesus said, "But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you" (14:26), the "one who has heard and learned from the Father" is the one who learns from "the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name". 

Paul had experienced the Holy Spirit. On the other hand, Paul, who had not known Jesus directly like the other Apostles and did not have "all that I have said to you" in his memory, could not draw anything out of himself. The Apostle Paul was under a very different divine election from those whom Jesus had chosen to be his Apostles to share in his three years of public life, to encounter his Passion, Death, Resurrection and Ascension, and to experience the descent of the Holy Spirit. 

In these circumstances, he commanded Timothy, who had been familiar with the Hebrew Scriptures from his childhood, to "attend to the public reading of scripture, to preaching, to teaching" (1 Timothy 4:13) and taught him: "[The sacred writings] are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness" (2 Timothy 3:15-16). The very wisdom that leads to "salvation through faith in Christ Jesus" is what Paul believed he possessed. 

God chose him and led him in such a way that everything about him was for his good. Among "everything" he wrote about when he said, "Indeed I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord" (Philippians 3:8), were his belief in the resurrection as a Pharisee, his Roman citizenship as a native of Tarsus, and his profession as a tentmaker. Paul put to use all these as blessings from God a lot. Hence, he could say, "[O]ne thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus" (3:13-14). Thus, the end of the fourth century, with the establishment of the New Testament canon and Christianity's becoming the state religion of the Roman Empire, was an extension of Paul's "I press on towards my goal". 

Having already foretold the fall of the Jerusalem temple, Jesus was preparing the "New Jerusalem" for future Christians. It was Paul's vocation to pave that way towards Rome. Hence, Jesus stood by Paul in the barracks of the tribune and commanded him: "Take courage, for as you have testified about me at Jerusalem, so you must bear witness also at Rome" (Acts 23:11). The Lord keeps the door open for Paul (cf. 1 Corinthians 16:8-9; 2 Corinthians 2:12; Colossians 4:3). 

In the letters to the seven churches in the Book of Revelation, the following verse is found: "I know your works. Behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one is able to shut; I know that you have but little power, and yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name" (Revelation 3:8). Accordingly, his reward is as follows: "He who conquers, I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God; never shall he go out of it, and I will write on him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem which comes down from my God out of heaven, and my own new name" (Revelation 3:12). 

Maria K. M.