The Complete Story of Paul: The Apostle to the Gentiles

two it's been six years since the virgin mary bore a dark olive-skinned jewish man into the world through the power and love of god himself [Music] this man ended up changing the course of history wrenching the tide of time and splitting the temple curtain he was the most important man to ever live and he told the most important story with his life death and resurrection [Music] but 961 miles north another baby boy is being born [Music] he is not the most important man to ever live but he too will end up changing the course of history forever not by living out the most important story of all time but by telling it to a people who did not deserve it his name is and in time he will become one of the most influential inspiring and divisive men of his century second only to the story he lives to tell [Music] saul is born to a family in tarsus to the tribe of benjamin it is doubtless that he is named after one of his most illustrious ancestors king saul of gibeah a divided man who as the story goes shifted from being a zealous godly man to a murderous traitor saul of tarsus seeks to undo what his namesake said in motion tarsus of modern day turkey was conquered by rome 70 years before saul is born while there are many theories it is likely that saul's grandparents owned land before rome colonized this prosperous city and as any first century person would know if you owned land on roman territory you and your children were granted roman citizenship and you were able to maintain your cultural ties without repercussion a coveted prize to be sure tarsus as the capital of cilicia was a hub of trade wealth and knowledge as it boasted one of the greatest universities in the known world that rivaled only athens saul spends the most influential years of his life in this bustling city and as a roman citizen he had access to much of what the city had to offer but his family was through and through jewish his father a tent maker and a pharisee taught his son the tips of the trade for 14 years when saul turns 14 in about 20 a. d his father likely pushed him to study under an old family friend gamaliel now not just anyone studied under gamaliel gamaliel was one of the top ranking pharisees of his day and was influential in the liberal theology of pharisaic judaism he taught how to apply the law to contemporary social issues facing jerusalem he taught how you could interpret the law for everyday usage making you healthier wiser and more prosperous than your neighbors a theological vein that would have been attractive to the wealthy family in tarsus so in 2018 saul begins his formal pharisaical training now the pharisees were a middle-class only sect of first century judaism that sought to interpret the law through modern issues they were often considered liberal in their theology and came about as a reaction against the elitism of the sadducees and scribes of their day roughly 10 pharisees were selected to sit on the most high council of jerusalem law called the sanhedrin the sanhedrin held the most power in all of judaism and included members from each respected score and the high priest what the sanhedrin passed into law became the law for all of judaism regardless of location paul studies under gamaliel for some eight years before returning to tarsus for service in the local synagogue that is when saul gets the message of a lifetime just a few years later he has been elected by gamaliel to sit on the sanhedrin council thus with an anxious mind and an excited heart saul makes his way back from tarsus to jerusalem to serve with the full force of his knowledge and zeal only when he returns back to his city of study he finds it not as he left it he learns of a new sect of judaism that has arisen in the past several months that has taken the major city by storm they follow a man from nazareth that claimed to be god himself incarnate among men fulfilling the prophecies that saul knew so well they call themselves the way as if the sanhedrin could not provide the light unto the world saul refuses he calls them strictly by a name of embarrassment the nazarenes a new sect of zealous blasphemers saul begins a vicious movement within the sanhedrin to push back on this new thought he begins to seek out and question the early followers fishermen nonetheless common people with no education questioning his authority saul and his contemporaries charge them strictly not to proclaim to jerusalem that jesus is the jewish messiah but the disciples don't listen thus after capturing one of the followers of the nazarene a man named steven saul calls for an emergency council meeting but what comes out of stephen's mouth enrages saul more than he is able to control himself in casting aside his cloak with all reason saul picks up a stone and hurls it at steven's head the rest of the sanhedrin follow laying their cloaks at saul's feet and saul watches as members of jerusalem's highest council of law and order murder a man named stephen this is the martyr heard round the church as members from the church in jerusalem fearing for their lives flee back to their homes in asia minor several months pass as the sanhedrin debate and discuss the best way possible to squash this new movement and upon hearing of its popularity to the north decide that they will pass a law the law that will ban any member of the jewish family living in antioch from participating in the new radical movement under threat of arrest or worse and who better to send these letters to the northern country than their very own saul of tarsus born and raised there a man who would have known the roads well packs his bags and begins the treacherous three-day walk on the road from jerusalem to damascus a journey that will change the course of saul's life a journey that will change the course of human history forever as saul walks with a small council of servants and peers discussing the manners of the torah and life he is struck blind by a burning light saul why are you persecuting me who are you lord i am jesus who you are persecuted but rise and enter the city and you will be told what to do the men who were traveling with him stood speechless hearing the voice but seeing no one saul rose from the ground and although his eyes were opened he saw nothing so they led him by the hand and brought him into damascus and for three days he was without sight and neither ate nor drank at the end of those three days a faithful man named ananias from damascus reluctantly laid his hands on song and through the power of the holy spirit something like scales fell from the eyes of saul and perhaps for the first time in his life he could see clearly who god was now while the events that followed are somewhat muddled we know that for three years saul leaves damascus and heads to arabia while a dark veil does lie over the exact insights of saul's trip to arabia we can assume that while he was there he searched the scriptures and grew in his love and understanding of his newfound savior jesus a man he now called the christ this is what the scriptures say and immediately something like scales fell from his eyes and he regained his sight then he rose and was baptized in taking food he was strengthened for some days he was with the disciples at damascus i did not immediately consult with anyone nor did i go up to jerusalem to those who were the apostles before me but i went away into arabia and returned again to damascus and immediately he proclaimed jesus into the synagogues saying he is the son of god and all who heard him were amazed and said is not this the man who made havoc in jerusalem of those who called upon this very name and has he not come here for this purpose to bring them bound before the chief priests but saul increased all the more in strength and confounded the jews who lived in damascus by proving that jesus was the christ when many days had passed the jews plotted to kill him but their plot became known to saul they were watching the gates day and night in order to kill him but his disciples took him by night and let him down through an opening in the wall lowering him in a basket and after three years he had come to jerusalem in jerusalem saul begins to consult with peter and james for 15 days about the resurrection and about the life and person of jesus the christ but this is not a warm welcome home for saul the sanhedrin have heard of all that saul had been preaching and the jewish men and women have heard of all who saul had been persecuting so for fear of the people the apostles think it best to send saul back to his home town of tarsus saul leaves jerusalem and is gone for three years during those three years however the apostle peter has a profoundly important revelation as he looks to the skies in a dream and sees a sheet being lowered down with a plethora of clean and unclean animals god tells peter the interpretation of this dream meaning that the gentiles can now be entered into the salvation of jesus christ from this universally important message we begin to see god's cosmic plan for the fullness of time unfolding throughout the scriptures we see that god's plan for human culture and flourishing starts and ends with unity through the diversity of his people at the heart of god's kingdom stands the messianic jewish movement jewish and samaritan men and women who have decided that jesus is the long-awaited messiah then we see that first century gentiles like those in antioch or corinth have access to this church and finally we see that non-first century gentiles who are given the grace to know and understand jesus's message are entered into the family of god armed with this new revelation peter and the apostles sent barnabas a faithful and righteous man up to antioch to teach the gentile church that was established there after stephen's persecution the antioch church devoid of jewish culture and customs even has a new name for their movement christians meaning little christs barnabas however realizes that he's out of his element in this new space so he quickly stops in tarsus in recruits saul a man who had grown up steeped in hellenist culture to help him guide the new church up until now the news of jesus christ has spread mostly by way of travelers who have come to jerusalem heard the good news and gone back home however after a year of pastoring the antioch church saul and barnabas get a divine call to go and preach this good news of the absolution of sin to gentile cities all around the known world and if they can get locals to keep up the church then the church will grow into a global kingdom they believe that if they can get this message far enough out west then the kingdom of god will extend all the way even to spain they recruit john mark to help them in their quest and they set off on the first missionary journey of the christian church comparatively the first missionary journey is a simple small circle that goes from antioch into asia minor by water but the impact that this first missionary journey will have on the identity formation of saul and the christian church as a whole cannot be understated the company sets sails from seleucia a port city in antioch and they sail to cyprus here sergios paulus a roman proctor is converted to christianity saul realizes that he might be able to reach more people by taking on a more hellenistic name like their new convert friend and so it is here where saul officially becomes paul of tarsus they leave cyprus in head for pergia and pemphilia where they are met by some severe opposition so severe in fact that john mark fearing for his life retreats from the mission and heads to jerusalem paul and barnabas continue on they go north into another city named antioch but this one is in pisidia here paul gives his first major sermon to a jewish synagogue but after being met with strong opposition again paul renounces preaching to the jewish people and declares that he will take the good news that jesus preached to the gentiles alone and so it is here where saul of tarsus officially becomes paul the apostle to the gentiles they move from antioch of passidia and head east to iconium where they are again met with strong opposition so much so that they are under threat of being stoned so they flee to lystra where the tension of the trip finally mounts the gentiles mistake barnabas for zeus and paul for hermes incarnate after the two heal a crippled man in the name of jesus with all of this blasphemy the local jewish leaders attempt to stone paul to death only this time they're nearly successful they drag paul out of lystra and fleet to durb where they rest and preach the gospel a little more they return back on the northern route visiting some of the more amicable churches in antioch of pisidia before finally landing in italia this task they realize will be more difficult and more worth it than they ever could have imagined when paul and barnabas arrive back in antioch they find men from judea that have come to their church and have been preaching to the gentiles that they must be circumcised under moses law to become christians after a sharp debate over this works righteousness theology paul and barnabas decide to take their issue to the apostles in jerusalem somewhere between 48 and 50 a. d the apostle james presides over the jerusalem council with peter and john and any other apostles who have decided to stay in jerusalem a fierce discussion ensues over the importance of the law of moses for gentiles this will be the discussion that rings throughout the rest of the new testament but here on this day james and the apostles decide in favor of paul that the gentiles do not need to follow certain jewish customs to become followers of jesus christ that the cross of jesus christ has accomplished all we could not do thus fulfilling the law and no longer do they need to keep the law out of obligation but only out of thankfulness and reverence for the god of israel brimming with the exciting news paul and barnabas go back to antioch in that same year decide that they will go on another missionary journey to preach this good news to the gentiles but suddenly a sharp disagreement arises between the two missionaries oddly enough it is more or less over the righteousness of someone's works namely their friend john mark who barnabas has found it within himself to forgive and paul has not paul thinks that mark is a liability and refuses to go with him on another journey instead paul leaves barnabas it goes on his missionary journey with silas in a young man named timothy the idea for their second missionary journey is basically the same as the first they will revisit the churches planted on their first trip only this time by land so that they can go farther west to bithynia they leave antioch and revisit their churches in asia minor lystra iconium antioch ii an attempt to go into bithynia but by some divine and loving force they are driven to troas instead and while asleep in their camp in troas paul suddenly finds himself awake on the shores of the port city and he sees a man on the opposite shore in macedonia calling to him paul concludes that this must be a message from the spirit of god the next day the motley crew of revolutionaries set sail for neapolis a port city in the northern corner of greece here their friend and author luke joins as he's collecting information for a new book he's writing they walk the half day's journey north from neapolis to philippi and it is here where paul and his friends are imprisoned for the first time in ancient cities prisons are nasty brutal places they are cramped damp and smell like horse they often are holes or caves dug right into the middle of the city so as to warn passerbys but warning did not come to those who passed by that night that paul was imprisoned only blessing for from the dark corners of this prison came singing and joy and when the spirit of god shook the jail doors open the jailer himself is even converted to the way that paul is now a leader of they leave from philippi and come to thessaloniki where they create such a riot they have to flee by night to berea from berea they set sail to athens a city paul must have been eager to get to but they don't spend much time there he preaches his famous eriopicus sermon and is laughed out of town so they leave straight away for corinth where they spend an entire year and a half here paul writes his letters to the church in thessaloniki after a year and a half they leave corinth by sea stop at centrea and ephesus before finally heading back to jerusalem a much longer journey to be sure but one that spread the message of the gospel the forgiveness of sins to gentiles all across the mediterranean but paul wasn't finished yet he had plans to leave on a third missionary journey which he set out for one year later in 53 a.

d paul by this point is nearly 47 years old outliving many of his greek brothers and sisters by almost 10 years but he sees that god has given him grace to live as christ lived preaching the kingdom of god to all who will listen and suffering well for his sake when his feet leave his home base of antioch it is sure that he does not realize that he will never come back but he won't for as he will soon write to live is christ and to die is gain when he leaves antioch in roughly 53 a. d he revisits all of the churches in asia minor and then makes a straight line west stopping in ephesus where he spends a total of three labor-intensive years at the church he planted there two years before much happens at this church for one paul writes his famous letters to the corinthians urging them to help ease the burden of a famine in jerusalem he also sends missionaries from ephesus to colosse in laodicea churches that john the visionary will write to in several decades but here paul performs such incredible miracles and gives such impactful sermons baptizing people into the sin forgiving grace of jesus that when he leaves the church in ephesus the entire city bursts like dynamite into an uproar of tumult where a riot breaks out sending the city into disorder paul needs to send back some of his workers just to calm the city from there he heads on to troas where his late night sermon causes a young boy to fall out of a window and die but as beautifully as the message he is preaching paul raises the boy from the dead entering him into the ranks of some of the greatest biblical characters that we can read about when he leaves from troas he passes through macedonia and achaea where he writes the letter to the roman church in his letter to the galatian church but his long 4 year journey is coming to a close paul makes one last stop in a small port city called miletus and for obvious reasons not wanting to re-enter ephesus calls the leaders of the ephesian church to him he discloses a plan that he knows they know will end in his eventual arrest and death he has resolved that it is the lord's plan that he should go to jerusalem and celebrate with the apostles the passover festival that will be the last time he will be able to do so with the jerusalem church while the ephesian council advises against it after many tears and much anxiety they too resolve thy will be done and not their own letting paul go to his death when paul arrives in jerusalem the air is as tense as he predicted the sanhedrin is infuriated that he has left the fold of judaism and has been preaching to the gentiles and more than that they believe paul has been preaching for people to forsake the law of moses and disobey the commands of the lord insisting that this is not the case paul takes a nazarite vow while celebrating the passover feasts but this is not enough the people form a riot and arrest paul in the temple from jerusalem paul is taken to a port city called caesarea but he was not imprisoned there he was on arrest imagine with me that he had free range to roam his barracks that overlooked the mediterranean sea here he would have had access to study materials writing materials and preaching material yet he decided to do none of these things taking a much needed break for two whole years paul watches the waves come in and go out before he appeals to go to rome and write some of his most influential sermons of all time in roughly 60 a. d procures festus takes over the council of judea to which paul appeals sending him to rome his journey to rome was no less tumultuous than his journey anywhere else he went through shipwrecks storms snake bites and belligerent resistance but by 61 a.

d paul lands in rome in his under house arrest for one more year but here after his much-needed break he gets to work writing some of the most famous and impactful doctrines that christians the world over still to this day study letters like colossians ephesians philippians and philemon he takes on the role of pastoring the house he is under arrest in answering questions curbing problems and solving some of the most difficult theological conundrums that faced the church of his day after his year under house arrest he is released by caesar and sent back to macedonia he spent several months traveling around macedonia and into asia minor visiting encouraging and exhorting the churches he helped plant so many years ago he writes his first letter to timothy in his letter to titus but it is in 62 a. d where nero takes over as emperor of rome it is hard to understate the impact that someone like nero had on the first century church his name may not appear in our bibles but he certainly comes up he would burn christians alive for sport and parties he caused most of the persecution found in letters like james and revelation and many scholars would agree that he is the archetypal figure of the beast in revelation his traumatizing and violent resistance to christianity would help explain his absence in the scriptures but when rome is burned nero blames the nazarenes that have sprung up all across his empire in requests that paul the foremost leader of the gentiles be arrested for this atrocity so paul is arrested for his second and final time here he pens second timothy before being chained and beheaded before nero sometime between 64 and 68 a. d the christian dictionary says this on the end of paul's life on the judgment seat clad in the imperial purple said a man who in a bad world had attained the eminence of being the very worst and meanest being in it a man stained with every crime a man whose whole being was so steeped in every nameable and unnameable vice that body and soul of him were as someone said at the time nothing but a compound of mud and blood and in the prisoner's dock stood the best man the world possessed his hair whitened with labors for the good of men and the glory of god and at that paul is killed but his legacy power and message resound throughout the halls of christianity today a man so impacted by the reality of his long-awaited messiah so moved that his messiah would choose him that he brought the message of hope and salvation throughout the known world to the gentiles the message that even though all have sinned and fall short of the glory of god the righteousness of god is available through faith in jesus christ there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in christ jesus but in him we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace in the mystery which has been hidden from the ages past and generations has now been manifested to his saints this mystery is that the gentiles are fellow heirs with the jews if then you have been raised with christ seek the things that are above where christ is seated at the right hand of god and the god of peace will be with you for this was the plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in him things in heaven and things on earth thanks be to god [Music] you would have done well to notice that throughout the duration of this video the images did not always faithfully represent the times or cultures in which certain scenes took place if you would like to support bible unbound in their mission to help everyone better understand the biblical epic you can support us on patreon.