Morning News, June 27: The Apostle Paul, pre-Acts 7, and the bitter truth

In the history of the church, there have been legends about Jesus' actions as a child, other than the the time in the temple. One is that he brought a dead bird back to life. It is the human condition to imagine and make up stories. Since, based on everything we have been told, 30 years transpired before Christ started his ministry, that leaves a lot of time for humans to think up narratives. In the absence of information, people create it, true or not. 

Protestants don't really "go for" these legends. But I have heard many theories about where the Apostle Paul shows up before the martyrdom of Stephen. One of them is that he is the rich young ruler who walks away. Another was on the chat boards for THE CHOSEN.   A character is skulking, in rags, in the background during the resurrection of Lazarus. The fans posit that it's Paul. 

Considering that  by the time Luke, John, and Matthew wrote (Mark, too, perhaps), Paul was very well known, it doesn't make much sense that he would be left out of the gospel narratives. No, he might have been skulking in the background somewhere, but the idea he was quietly following Jesus around is a bit... much. 

Now, that brings me to where we do first see him in Scripture, the stoning of Stephen. "He consented to Stephen's death." He was all in. And he went even further.  Don't read over Acts 8:

Now Saul was consenting to his death.

At that time a great persecution arose against the church which was at Jerusalem; and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. ² And devout men carried Stephen to his burial, and made great lamentation over him.

³ As for Saul, he made havoc of the church, entering every house, and dragging off men and women, committing them to prison.

Later,  Luke repeats this theme: 

Then Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest ² and asked letters from him to the synagogues of Damascus, so that if he found any who were of the Way, whether men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. (9:1-2)

Let's not glaze over at this. What kind of a terrorist was he? "Men and women?" Mothers? Pregnant women? Older women? And prison's were not like ours. "Threats and murder?" "Bound to Jerusalem?"

Saul was one bad dude, to be cliched. And he owns it later; I think we are the ones that want to overlook it. He was perfectly fine, for whatever reason (his zeal?) to kill men and women who followed Jesus.

But notice something else: Men and women. Luke makes the point twice. 

If the women were suffering with the men, were they denied honor with them? 

Is the same true today? Are women being persecuted the same as men for the faith? Of course they are.

I don't want to be one of those women who makes equality of roles into an idol, but one does have to wonder why the distinction of honor and respect intellectually, spiritually, and competency-wise toward women in the "conservative church."