In Acts 9, we are told about the conversion of Saul. He had spent a few years doing everything he could to destroy the church. He went into Christians’ homes and dragged them out. He put them in shackles and brought them to prison. He was in total agreement when Stephen was stoned to death. He agreed when other Christians were given death sentences. He received letters of authority from the High Priest and the Sanhedrin to go to Damascus to arrest Christians.
As Saul was nearing the city of Damascus, Jesus appeared to him. He was instructed to go into Damascus to find what he needed to do to obey Jesus. Our Lord told him to find a man named Judas who lived on Straight street and stay there. The irony of the man’s name cannot be missed. Judas was the name of the apostle who betrayed Jesus. This was not that Judas, because that Judas killed himself. Yet, Saul was going to be converted in a house owned by a man named Judas. Saul was in a house on a street named Straight. Saul was not living a straight and a righteous life. He was living a crooked spiritual life. However, he was about to be straightened out.
There is an interesting passage in the Old Testament that Saul would have known. One wonders if, during the three days he was waiting and praying in Judas’ house, he thought of it. Isaiah 42:16 reads, “And I will bring the blind by a way they knew not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known: I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them, and not forsake them.” Saul was literally blind and waiting to be healed, but he had also been spiritually blind and was about to be healed of that as well.
Study your Bible. Learn what God wants you to know. Be straight and not crooked. If any of this is hard to understand, ask an adult to help you.
