Seek Me, Find Me

“Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” Acts 9:4

I’ve read the fascinating account of the conversion of Saul several times, how this man went from being a sort of Gestapo for the new Christians to one of the greatest evangelists for Jesus. He was unwavering in his mission, and founded several churches in Asia Minor and Europe, until he was beheaded like John the Baptist. 

New atheists dismiss Paul’s conversion experience with the blinding light as a textbook case of Temporal Lobe Seizure just as they explain away the numerous sightings of Jesus after His death as mass hallucination. I like science to explain phenomena as well as any man, but it is up to each one of us to come to a rational understanding of reality. 

There’s no such thing as mass hallucination for instance. There’s mass hysteria where people can be highly susceptible to suggestions but you cannot have even two people have exactly the same hallucination. 

As for Saint Paul, can one seizure change a man completely? Saint Paul’s writings show that Paul changed not because of a seizure but because he got to know Jesus Christ very well indeed. From the time Paul saw the light in the sky and heard Jesus ask: “Why are you persecuting me?”, Paul never looked back. He began at once to proclaim Jesus in the synagogue as the Son of God. We too can get to know Jesus, not only through the gospel stories, and the Acts of the Apostles, and the letters of Saint Paul. 

God promised if we seek Him, we will find Him. (Rev. 3:20, Jeremiah 29:13) “When you seek me, you will find me, provided you seek for me with all your heart.”