St.Paul of Tarsus
St. Paul of Tarsus was a contemporary of Jesus of Nazareth who went from the extreme of persecuting the followers of Jesus, to spreading the gospel himself Paul, a Greek-speaking Pharisee born in the Cilician City of Tarsus, was a Roman citizen well-educated in Greek culture. He was also the leading persecutor of the group known as Christians.
As a member of the Pharisees, Paul believed in strict adherence to the Mosaic Law in a time when keeping the law was synonymous with morality and religion. And Paul sought to keep the Law to the best of his being because it was right and he desired to do it. It would seem that God's will was his will, as well. Paul believed he was doing God's will by following the law, and he wanted to obey God's will, with every fiber of his being.
Paul believed that the followers of Jesus committed blasphemy by claiming that Jesus was the Messiah that had come to save his people. He believed that, as a Pharisee, it was his duty to root out and persecute all Christians, to keep them from spreading their "lies." Paul states in Galatians 1:13 that "beyond measure I persecuted the Church of God, and made havoc of it." Paul was present at the stoning of the first martyr, St. Stephen. As stated in the book of Acts 7:58 and 8:1, "meanwhile the witnesses laid their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul [Paul before his conversion]� And Saul was there, giving approval to his death." Paul may have already started to wonder about his way of life, while watching Stephen face death so fearlessly, actually asking God to forgive his persecutors, as Jesus had done on the cross. We can only guess what might have been going on in his mind after the death of St. Stephen, but is possible that Paul could have already been torn in two by debates of whether his pharasaism was actually the best way of life.
Paul, however continued to persecute the Christians until around 36 AD, when he was headed to Damascus to find a group of Christians hiding out there. Paul stated in Acts 26:12-18 what happened to him on the road to Damascus, that changed his whole life. "On one of these journeys I was going to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests. About noon, O king, as I was on the road, I saw a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, blazing around me and my companions. We all fell to the ground, and I heard a voice saying in Aramaic, 'Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.' Then I asked, ' Who are you, Lord?' ' I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,' the Lord replied. 'Now get up and stand on your feet. I have appeared to appoint you as a servant and as a witness of what you have seen of me and what I will show you. I will rescue you from your people and from the Gentiles. I am sending you to them to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.'" There are different versions of what immediately happened after seeing the vision, but it's not the details that are important, but only the fact that Paul rose to his feet ready to obey Jesus the Messiah.
Paul was blinded by his vision for three days as he waited, praying constantly, until his sight was restored. During the period of his blindness Paul must have pondered and about the meaning of it all; the restoration of his sight was the physical counterpart of the spiritual awakening he now felt. Where he had been blind, now he saw. Ananias, a Christian in Damascus was called, while praying, to go to Paul and restore his sight and to baptize him.
After his conversion, Paul, believing he was called into the mission field, began to spread the true meaning of Jesus's life and death. As a result of his preaching of the gospel, Paul was imprisoned many times, beaten and whipped about eight times, shipwrecked three times, and even stoned once. Paul went on three missionary journeys, the first one in 48 and 49 AD to Antioch, Cypress, Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe. Paul went on another journey between 52 to 54 AD to Antioch, Cilicia, Lyaconia, Galatia, Troas, Philippi, Thessalonica, Berea, Athens, and to Corinth. In the years 54-58 AD, he traveled to Antioch, Ephesus, Macedonia, Corinth, Phillippi, Miletus, and Jerusalem.
Paul's message, as we know it, is by his letters to the different churches that he helped found. These epistles, as we know them, were written to the community as a whole, and were designed for public reading The letter were spiritual letters from Paul to his failing flocks to praise them as well as convict them of sinful routines they might be falling into. The primary importance of each of the letters, is the religious teaching. Each one was to help each church keep growing and producing spiritual fruit, and often to convict some in the churches of their sin, so that they might repent. Some of the epistles, specifically 1 and 2 Timothy, and Titus are known as pastoral epistles, because they give instructions to Timothy and Titus on how to care for the communities under their charge, as a pastor would care for his congregation.
Paul took his ministry to Arabia, Asia Minor, North Syria, Cypress, Thessaly, Macedonia, Greece, and eventually, as a prisoner to Rome. Paul was in Rome in 68 AD when he was executed during the summer, on the orders of Nero.
There were many ways in which Paul helped the growth of the Christian Church. Paul overcame the separation that arose when he began to spread the gospel to the Gentiles and began to split this new religion of Christianity from its roots in Judaism. Paul started churches throughout Asia and the Middle East during his missionary journeys, which caused a division to arise between the Jewish Christians and the Gentile Christians. On each of his missionary journeys, Paul traveled to new areas, as well as staying in areas where he had previously established churches. Some of these churches we learn of from the Bible. Each of the epistles in the New Testament, of those written by Paul, are written to churches that he helped found, and as such a founder, he feels responsibility for them. He founded churches in each of the areas he visited on his missionary journeys and many more in various parts of the eastern Mediterranean and Asia.
Paul went from being the leading persecutor of Christians to one of the most influential people in the history of the church, from one extreme to the other. Paul was the person that broke Christianity from its ties in Judaism, and pushed its spread throughout the world outside of Jerusalem.
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