I feel doubly unqualified to speak on this the feast of the conversion of St Paul.
First, because I have had no experience of conversion myself; I have always believed in in a creative and loving force behind and in the world, although He (and He’s not he now) no longer sits on a cloud sporting a white beard. My view of Jesus has developed too but I have never seen him as other than a unique example of humanity through whom we can begin to understand God. And influenced subconsciously, I suspect, by my mother, Christianity has always seemed to me to more about how one should live one’s life, especially in respect of others rather than a matter of one’s own welfare, spiritual or otherwise. What one does is more important than what one feels.
Plainly, not everyone’s Christian formation will be the same or lead to the same conclusion. And I might note that coming to my conclusion, or any other more introspective belief, is not at all the same as putting it into effect.
So, unlike St Paul, I had no dramatic revelation on any road to a Damascus. Perhaps for that reason, I am a little sceptical about such sensational conversions, which is the other reason to question whether I should be preaching this afternoon. I do not doubt such experiences are genuine but as with an overexcited toddler I cannot help fearing that there will be tears before bedtime. Enthusiasm can evaporate as fast as it crystallises although that was not, of course, the case with St Paul.
There are on the other hand, many who have come to Christianity more gradually or calmly, through its music, art or architecture or through the moral stand it does, occasionally, manage to take. And I think most significantly, people come to Christianity through the kindness of which it is capable both institutionally and in its individual members.
St Paul, however, would not have much time for much of this. His was a personal experience. In his letter to the Galatians, wanting to emphasise the authenticity of his gospel, he insists that he encountered Jesus himself and from that encounter developed his belief, wandering in Arabia for three years, where we must assume he worked out his Christian theology without visiting the Christian leadership in Jerusalem from whom he might have acquired only a second hand version of the gospel. He may of course, have had a powerful incentive to avoid the people whom only shortly before he had been persecuting so vigorously.
Nevertheless, I think he must have been familiar with the many stories of healing and conversion effected by Jesus; the Gospels had not then been written, but the stories which they bring together must have been circulating and must in many cases have been told by those who were healed in dramatic encounters with Jesus, or by Matthew and other disciples whom Jesus called with by his commanding presence. Paul believed his credentials were equally authentic “as a minister according to the divine office to me” as we heard him telling the Colossians, but he is also keen to emphasise that his conversion was not just overexcited enthusiasm but carefully worked out theology.
The vivid physical encounter is, however, always there in the background. So, he sees himself in all his bodily afflictions as completing the work of Jesus whom he actually met, as he says, “rejoicing in his suffering” as Jesus suffered. More positively he sees the church as being Christ’s body and each Christian as a member of that body with a
role to play; we are to receive Christ and live in him, rooted and built up in him. Paul’s imagery is close to his and Christ’s physical being.
Despite this corporeal language Paul must know that most of those he converted had 7not had the same very physical encounter with Jesus that he was privileged to receive. Most were members of Jewish communities and conversion to Christianity would have been seen as a progression from Judaism- as we still see it, as we say in the Creed “in accordance with the scriptures”.
I suspect, however, Paul’s emphasis on the corporate nature of the Gospel would have been easier to accommodate into Jewish thinking. It is a huge generalisation, but I am struck by how much the Old Testament is about community and nation; the Prophets are concerned mostly about how the Israelites as a nation are behaving; the great personalities are significant because of the society they lead-or admonish. The Gospels of Mathew Mark and Luke transfer this idea of community to the Kingdom of Heaven or God. However, they and John’s Gospel especially with it promise of eternal life, tell a story mostly of private and uninfluential individuals’ encounters with Jesus- encounters in which they are healed or find salvation. In contrast his teaching and especially his parables are much more concerned with society, which while it may be called the Kingdom of God or Heaven is a state which we can strive to achieve here and now.
Paul spins these threads together; on the one hand he develops his own life changing personal encounter into a new way of seeing oneself and taking on the characteristics of Jesus; and on the other, he puts forward the idea that we may, indeed, should, all become like Jesus- or as St John would put- abide in Jesus. For St Paul we together become Christ’s earthly body, incorporated in the community of the church. Each of us has a role as a member of that body in realising the Gospel and bringing about the Kingdom of Heaven on earth.
Visions are rare nowadays, at least in the part of Christendom in which we live. And I suspect I am not alone in being a little sceptical about dramatic conversions through vivid encounter with Christ.
So, is this aspect of Paul’s theology irrelevant to us? I suggest it’s still inspiring to try to imitate Jesus- and whatever else abiding in Christ may mean it ought to include imitation. And it’s certainly useful to see ourselves, the church, as carrying on Christ’s work, and each of us having a role to play in that task. And I suggest what we do as a church, be it worship or singing or kindness, communal and individual will, as it probably always has been, the best way to convert people to Christianity. Amen