Arabia, Jerusalem, and Points Beyond

Galatians 1:11-2:21

How do you counteract an attack by Fake News?

Paul did it through authority.

He went to the top! Here and in 2 Corinthians, he stresses his apostleship, his being called by God. Central to that claim was the transformation on the road to Damascus. What does Paul include in that testimony?

1 - He claimed he met the risen Christ, that he saw Jesus after His resurrection just as the apostles did. Thus Paul qualified as a witness to the resurrection in direct contact with Christ!

This matched any qualifications other had.

2 - God had commissioned him to be a missionary to the Gentiles. This is at least part of what he meant when he talks about the Gospel he preached. The call to discipleship included an appointment as a missionary to foreigners!

3 - He had not been instructed by the earlier apostles or disciples. Presumably as a well trained rabbi involved in putting down the Christian heresy, he would have heard many or most of the teachings of Jesus and about Jesus. He would not, therefore be playing the game of “I follow Peter,” “I follow Apollos,” “I follow whoever.” (Compare the opening of 1 Corinthians where exactly that is going on.)

4 - His authority and teachings came directly from Christ. Therefore he speaks with authority and his words are a faithful guide to God’s will. Remember at that time they had no New Testament. Galatians is one of the earliest NT books to be written.

> What’s your commitment and mission? Consider that Christ did not invite Paul to follow Him, he demanded he follow. Could he have refused? Sure. But the experience was so overwhelming it changed his entire life. Was your calling that powerful? What is the central driving force in your life?

Paul stated clearly that his Jewish background matched anyone else. He plays this theme in several other places, especially in 2 Corinthians 11.  But he sees his Damascus experience as fulfilling why God created him in his mother’s womb. Conversion made him complete.

And conversion makes everyone complete! How would your life change if you fully committed to finding why God created you and what He has or would commission to do?

Why Arabia?

First, most of what was known as Arabia was what we now call Jordan. Elsewhere ( ) Paul said he had problems with   the king of the Nabateans. I believe these were the people who lived in the wonderful wall buildings of Petra.

Once again, there are several possibilities of why Paul went to Arabia.

1 - My favorite is that he took time to digest his experience and re-think all its implications for his theology.

2 - Some feel he plunged immediately into missionary work. Even though the people of Arabia were mostly Semitic, since they were not Jews, they were Gentiles to whom Paul was called to preach.

3 - A recent suggestion by one Bible scholar is that Paul was going to Mt Sinai as Moses and Elijah did - getting in contact with the roots of his faith.

4 - You can fairly easily combine all these ideas by saying Paul felt the need for a retreat to assess what had happened, what differences it would make, and where to go from here. What better place to go for that than Mt Sinai? On the way back to Damascus, he could well have begun his preaching and teaching in the lands east of the Jordan.

Anyway, in Galatians, his main point is that it was three years before he set foot in Jerusalem again. When he did go there, he apparently only visited with Peter, James, and a few other leaders. He didn’t see enough people that Christians would recognize him.