and taking food, he was strengthened. Saul Proclaims Jesus in Synagogues For some days he was with the disciples at Damascus.
A quiet sentence sits between Saul's first sight and his first sermon. He eats, gets his strength back, and stays in Damascus with the very people he came to arrest.
The fast ends
Saul's three days without sight, food or drink ended when his sight came back. One writer follows what happened next, and points out the plan Saul dropped:
Leslie M. GrantWhen Saul received his sight, his fast ended, and eating food gave him strength. Then he remained some days with the disciples in Damascus, not returning to Jerusalem, as he had planned.
Some have asked whether the eating here carries a spiritual sense. One reply keeps it simple, anchoring the meaning in the fast recorded a few verses earlier:
The Christian's FriendActs 9:19, which was also quoted in the question, must surely refer to natural food. Verse 9 says that Saul was three days without sight, and neither ate nor drank.
Among those he came to destroy
Saul had come to Damascus set on wiping out the disciples there. One account sets the entry he had planned beside the one he actually made:
Church HistoryHe is blind for three days, and can neither eat nor drink. So he enters Damascus, blind, broken, humbled, under the solemn judgment of the Lord! How different from what he had intended! He now joins himself to the company he had resolved to wipe out. Yet he enters in by the door, and humbly takes his place with the disciples of the Lord.
Believers belong together
Saul's place among the disciples is more than a fact about him. One writer reads it as the normal fruit of the Spirit's work, and of the new life itself:
The Christian's FriendTwo things stand out after Saul's conversion: first, that he was at once found together with the disciples (v. 19)... It is God's mind that all who believe should be together. Wherever the Spirit of God is acting in power, it is always the case. It is also a necessity of the new nature, once we stand on the ground of redemption. Another apostle says the same: "That which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us."
What the days with the disciples were for
Acts does not say what those days held. One writer suggests private contact with the disciples, matching how Paul acted years later:
C. E. StuartSaul kept company with the disciples in Damascus, and it seems he did so before he preached in the synagogues (Acts 9:19). This fits well with his private meeting with the apostles and elders at Jerusalem fourteen years later... He had been an active and well-known persecutor. So contact with the disciples would have been only consistent conduct: it would convince them of his conversion, and perhaps let him share with them the gospel he was about to preach.
Where these days sit in Saul's story is not certain. Another writer compares Acts with what Paul himself writes, and finds the gap is no loss:
The Christian's FriendComparing these two passages shows clearly that the Spirit of God did not set out to give a dated account in Acts. There is no mention there, for example, of the visit to Arabia that Paul speaks of in Galatians. So we cannot now tell whether the Jews' plot to kill the apostle happened before he went to Arabia or after he came back. Nor is it of the slightest importance that we should settle it, since it is the spiritual teaching of the narrative that demands our attention.
The same grace, for us
The change in Saul is startling. One writer refuses to leave it as something to admire from a distance:
The Christian's FriendBut let us also remember that our own conversion needed the same divine power. Without the grace that visited the heart of Saul of Tarsus, we would have remained in our evil condition of enmity against God. We would have stayed blind to our own state, and blind to the glory of His beloved Son. Not all are called to be such chosen vessels as Saul was, but all of us, equally with him, have been the subjects of divine grace.
Summary
- Fed — The three-day fast ends with ordinary food. Strength comes back before any service starts.
- Joined — He enters by the same low door as anyone else and takes his place with the people he had planned to destroy.
- Together — Life with the disciples is not an extra. It is God's mind for all who believe, and a need of the new nature.
- Unhurried — Days pass before he preaches, and Acts leaves the timing open. The spiritual teaching is what matters, not the calendar.
- Ours — The same power that turned Saul turns anyone. Not all are chosen vessels like him, but all believers are subjects of the same grace.