Jesus was asking why to paul

JESUS WAS ASKING WHY TO PAUL
EDITED BY GLENN PEASE
Acts 26:14 14
Weall fell to the ground, and I heard a
voicesaying to me in Aramaic, 'Saul, Saul, why do you
persecute me? It is hard for you to kick againstthe
goads.'
BIBLEHUB RESOURCES
Pulpit Commentary Homiletics
The Reckless Rushing To Assume The Moral Responsibilities Of Others - An Exceeding
Madness
Acts 26:11
P.C. Barker We are to understand this extraordinary verse to reveal rather what Paul
confesses it was in his heart to do, and in the nature of his own actions to cause others to
do, than what he succeededin doing, in all respects. The two or three touches give us a
wonderfully and strangely vivid picture. And suggest, not so much for Paul who confessed
and forsook his evil way, but for many others who do neither the one nor the other, how
suicidal their course, when, uncontent with the weight of their own responsibilities, they
would presume to tamper with the conscience of others, and lade themselves with some
share in all that is most dread of the moral nature of their fellows. Let us notice that those
who will forcibly seek to interfere with the moral and religious convictions of others do -
I. RUN THE GREAT RISK OF INFLUENCING OTHERS TO SIN AGAINST THEIR
OWN CONSCIENCE.
II. PRESUME TO SUPPOSE THEIR OWN CONSCIENCE TO BE THE ABSOLUTELY
SAFE STANDARD.
III. EXPOSE THEMSELVES, ON NO GREATER WARRANT, TO STAYING A GOOD
WORK THAT OTHERWISE WAS GROWING IN THE HEART OF ANOTHER.
IV. VERY POSSIBLY AVAIL TO MAKE PRONOUNCED BLASPHEMERS,
BACKSLIDERS, APOSTATES.
V. BECOME AT LEAST STUMBLING-BLOCKS TO OTHERS, AND CAUSES OF
LOSS AND PERHAPS OF INFINITE MENTAL PAIN AND DISASTROUS CONFLICT
TO THEM. Against every one of these courted responsibilities Christ's own clearest

warnings are offered, and his calmest, most solemn judgments pronounced upon those who
taught them. - B.
Biblical Illustrator
Whereupon as I went to Damascus.
Acts 26:12-18
The conversion of Saul of Tarsus
Essex Congregational Remembrancer.I. HIS CHARACTER BEFORE HIS
CONVERSION.
1. He was a moral man (Philippians 3:6). Yet he needed conversion. The necessity of
conversion arises from the depravity of human nature, and not from a greater or less
degree of immorality.
2. He was a Pharisee. He was zealous for his religion, made long prayers, and did many
deeds of charity. And have you any better religion?
3. He was a hater of Christ, notwithstanding his morals and his zeal. So still men will attach
such undue merit to their own actions, that salvation through Christ alone becomes
offensive.
4. He was a persecutor of the people of God. As from love to Christ springs love to His
people, so from hatred to Christ springs the spirit of persecution to His people. The spirit of
Saul is inherent in the human mind (Galatians 4:29). Can you despise and revile the devout
spirit of the true believer?
II. THE EVIDENCES OF THE TRUTH OF HIS CONVERSION.
1. Penitence. He fasted three days. What a change from the haughty Pharisee! If God the
Spirit has changed our hearts, we shall have a deep sense of sin. We shall "look on Him
whom we have pierced and mourn."
2. Prayer. The prayer which evidences conversion is humble, sincere, fervent, and offered
only in the name of Christ.
3. Humility. From this time the man who had previously said "I thank God that I am not as
other men," felt himself to be the chief of stoners, and less than the least of all saints.
4. Faith. Ananias was sent to baptize him — to initiate him into the Christian faith.
5. Love. We have seenhis enmity to Christ and His people. Now they form the objects of his
warmest affections. With regard to Christ, he could sincerely say, "I count all things but

loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord," etc. With regard to the
people of God, "I endure all things for the elects' sake."
6. Obedience. "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?"
III. THE WAYS OF GOD MANIFESTED IN HIS CONVERSION.
1. Sovereignty. Was there evera more unlikely subject? God accounts for his conversion on
this principle. "He is a chosen vessel unto Me" (Acts 9:15).
2. Power. What but the power of an almighty arm could have wrought so wonderful a
change?
3. Mercy (1 Timothy 1:12-17). And who shall despair of mercy when Saul of Tarsus
obtained it?
4. Wisdom. How were the designs of the devil and the malice of men here defeated? Not by
destroying the enemy, but by converting him.Application:
1. Let the true convert strive to gain more adoring thoughts of God's ways towards him,
and aim to become more holy and live more to the glory of God.
2. Let the unconverted guard against mistaken notions of conversion, and seek the
influences of the Spirit, to create within them a clean heart, and renew a right spirit within
them.
3. Let the careless and the obstinate be sure that their damnation will be just, if they live
and die in the neglect of a God so gracious, and a salvation so great.
4. Let the sceptic consider the unreasonableness of his objections to the gospel.
(Essex Congregational Remembrancer.)
The conversion of Saul: its genuineness
Canon Liddon.It cannot be explained by the supposition that the account was in any way
forged. What motive had St. Paul for inventing it? Was it, as has been supposed, some
private pique or annoyance with the Jews, that led him to change his religious profession,
and to account for the change in this kind of way? But there is no trace of any feelings of
this kind in his early life. It would have been a sin against natural feeling, since the Jewish
people had singled Paul out for a place of special confidence and honour; and, as a matter
of fact, when the Jews were persecuting him afterwards to death he expressedin more ways
than one his deep love for his countrymen. He deplores their blindness; he excuses their
conduct as far as he can. Even if, in one place, he paints it in dark colours he would gladly,
he says in another, were it possible, he accursed in their place. Was it the spirit of a
sensitive independence which will sometimes lead men to assert their own importance at
the cost of their party or their principles? That, again, is inconsistent with his advocacy of
the duty of subjection to existing authority, in terms and to a degree which has exposedhim
to fierce criticisms from the modern advocates of social and political change. Was it, then, a
refined self-interest? Did the young Jew see inthe rising sect a prospect of bettering
himself? But Christianity was being persecuted — persecuted, as it seemed, to the very
verge of extermination. It had been crushed out by the established hierarchy in Jerusalem
itself. It was doomed to destruction, every intelligent Jew would have thought, as well by
the might of the forces ranged against it as by its intrinsic absurdity. It had nothing to
offer, whether in the way of social eminence or of literary attraction. It was as yet, in the

main, the religion of the very poor, of the very illiterate. On the other hand, the young
Pharisee had, if any man had, brilliant prospects before him if he remained loyal to the
synagogue. The reputation of his great master, his own learning and acuteness, his great
practical ability, would have commanded success. If his object was really a selfish one, no
man ever really made a greater, or more stupid mistake, to all appearance, for no Jew
could have anticipated for a convert to Christianity, within a few years of the Crucifixion,
such a reputation as that which now surrounds the name of St. Paul.
(Canon Liddon.)
Christ's remonstrances
A. Maclaren, D. D.My object is to trace the stages of the process set forth here, and to ask
you if you, like Paul, have been "obedient to the heavenly vision."
I. THE FIRST OF THESE ALL BUT SIMULTANEOUS AND YET SEPARABLE
STAGES WAS THE REVELATION OF JESUS CHRIST. The revelation in heart and
mind was the main thing of which the revelation to eye and ear were but means. The
means, in his case, are different from those in ours; the end is the same. "Saul! Saul! why
persecutest thou Me?" They used to think that they could wake sleepwalkers by
addressing them by name. Jesus Christ, by speaking his name to the apostle, wakes him out
of his diseasedslumber. What does such an address teach you and me? That Jesus Christ,
the living, reigning Lord of the universe, has perfect knowledge of each of us. And more
than that, He directly addresses Himself to each man and woman in this congregation. We
are far too apt to hide ourselves in the crowd, and let all the messages of God's love, the
warnings of His providences, as well as the teachings and invitations and pleadings of His
gospel, fly over our heads as if they were meant vaguely for anybody. And I would fain
plead with each of my friends before me to believe that the gospel of Jesus Christ is meant
for thee, and that Christ speaks to thee.
II. Secondly, notice, as another stage in this process, THE DISCOVERY OF THE TRUE
CHARACTER OF THE PAST. "Why persecutest thou Me?" Saul was brought to look at
all his past life as standing in immediate connection with Jesus Christ. Of course he knew
before the vision that he had no love to Him whom he thought to be a Galilean impostor.
But he did not know that Jesus Christ counted every blow struck at one of His servants as
being struck at Him. Above all, he did not know that the Christ whom he was persecuting
was reigning in the heavens. If I could only get you, for one quiet ten minutes, to lay all
your past, as far as memory brought it to your minds, right against that bright and loving
face, I should have done much. One infallible way of judging of the rottenness or goodness
of our actions is that we should bring them where they will all be brought one day, into the
brightness of Christ's countenance. If you want to find out the flaws in some thin, badly-
woven piece of cloth, you hold it up against the light, do you not? and then you see all the
specks and holes; and the irregular threads. Hold up your lives in like fashion. Again, this
revelation of the past life disclosed its utter unreasonableness. That one question, "Why
persecutest thou Me?" pulverised the whole thing. If you take into account what you are,
and where you stand, you can find no reason, except utterly unreasonable ones, for the
lives that I fear some of us are living — lives of Godlessness and Christlessness. There is
nothing in all the world a tithe so stupid as sin. Wake up, my brother, to apply calm reason
to your lives while yet there is time, and face the question, Why dost thou stand as thou
dost to Jesus Christ? You can carry on the questions very gaily for a stepor two, but then

you come to a dead pause. "What do I do so-and-so for?" "Because I like it." "Why do I
like it?" "Because it meets my needs, or my desires, or my tastes, or my intellect." "Why
do you make the meeting of your needs, or your desires, or your tastes, or your intellect,
your sole object?" Is there any answer to that? Further, this disclosure of the true
character of his life revealed to Saul, as in a lightning flash, the ingratitude of it. "Why
persecutest thou Me?" That was as much as to say, "What have I done to merit thy hate?
What have I not done to merit, rather, thy love?" But the same appeal comes to each of us.
What has Jesus Christ done for thee, my friend, for me, for every soul of man?
III. LASTLY, WE HAVE HERE A WARNING OF SELF-INFLICTED WOUNDS. The
metaphor is a very plain one. The ox goad was a formidable weapon, some sevenor eight
feet in length, shod with an iron point, and capable of being used as a spear, and of
inflicting deadly wounds at a pinch. Held in the firm hand of the ploughman, it presented a
sharp point to the rebellious animal in the yoke. If the ox had readily yielded to the gentle
prick given, not in anger, but for guidance, it had been well. But if it lashes out with its
hoofs against the point, what does it get but bleeding flanks? Paul had been striking out
instead of obeying, and he had won by it only bloody hocks. There are two possible
applications of that saying, which may have been a proverb in common use. One is the
utter futility of lives that are spent in opposing Divine will. There is a great current
running, and if you try to go against it you will only be swept away by it. Think of a man
lifting himself up and saying to God, "I will not!" when God says, "Do thou this!" or "Be
thou this!" What will be the end of that? It is hard to indulge in sensual sin. You cannot
altogether dodge what people call the "natural consequences." It is hard to set yourselves
against Christianity. But there is another side to the proverb of my text, and that is the self-
inflicted harm that comes from resisting the pricks of God's rebukes and remonstrances,
whether these be in conscience or by any other means; including, I make bold to say, even
such poor words as mine tonight. For if the first little prick of conscience, a warning and a
guide, be neglected, the next will go a great deal deeper. And so all wrong-doing, and
neglect of right-doing of every sort, carries with it a subsequent pain.
(A. Maclaren, D. D.)
Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?
Christ and Paul
C. H. Spurgeon.I. THE QUESTION. It was personal. When I preach to you, I am obliged
to address you all in the mass. But not so our Master. If He had spoken in general terms, it
would have glanced off from the heart of the apostle; but when it came personally — "Why
persecutest thou Me?" — there was no getting off it. I pray the Lord to make the question
personal to some of you. There be many of us here present who have bad personal
preaching to our souls. Do you not remember, dear brother in Christ, when you were first
pricked in the heart, how personal the preacher was? I remember it well. It seemedto me
that I was the only person in the whole place, as if a black wall were round about me, and I
were shut in with the preacher, something like the prisoners at the Penitentiary, who each
sit in their box and can see no one but the chaplain. I thought all he said was meant for me;
I felt persuaded that someone knew my character, and had written to him and told him all,
and that he had personally picked me out. Why, I thought he fixed his eyes on me; and I
have reason to believe he did, but still he said he knew nothing about my ease. Oh, that men

would hear the Word preached, and that God would so bless them in their hearing, that
they might feel it to have a personal application to their own hearts.
2. It contained some information as to the persecuted one. If you had askedSaul who it was
he persecuted, he would have said, "Some poor fishermen, that had been setting up an
impostor." But see in what a different light Jesus Christ puts it. He does not say, "Why
didst thou persecute Stephen?" but "Me?" Inasmuch as you have done this unto one of the
least of My brethren, you have done it unto Me.
3. It demanded an answer. "What have I done to hurt thee? Why art thou so provoked
against Me?"
II. THE EXPOSTULATION. "It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks." For —
1. You do not really accomplish your purpose. When the ox kicks against the goad, it is to
spite the husbandman for having goaded him onward; but instead of hurting the
husbandman it hurts itself. If thou thinkest, O man, that thou canst stop the progress of
Christ's Church, go thou and first bid the universe stand still! Go, stand by the winds, and
bid them cease their wailing, or bid the roaring sea roll back when its tide is marching on
the beach; and when thou hast stopped the universe, then come forth and stop the
omnipotent progress of the Church of Christ. "He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh,"
etc. But put it as a personal matter, have you ever succeededin stopping the work of grace
in the heart of anyone? Aye, young man, you may laugh at your own shop mate, but he will
beat you in the long run. If Christians are but faithful, they must win the day. It is no use
your kicking against them; you cannot hurt them.
2. You get no good by it. Kick as he might, the ox was never benefited by it. Suppose you
say you don't like religion, what have you evergot by hating it? You have got those red
eyes sometimes on the Monday morning, after the drunkenness of the Sunday night. You
have got that shattered constitution, which, evenif you had now turned it to the paths of
virtue, must hang about you till you leave it in your grave. But you are moral. Well, have
you evergot anything eventhen by opposing Christ? Has it made your family any the
happier? Has it made you any the happier yourself? Will it quiet your conscience when you
come to die that you did your best to destroy the souls of other people?
3. But kick as the ox might, it had to go forward at last. If anyone had told Saul when he
was going to Damascus, that he would one day become a preacher of Christianity, he
would, no doubt, have laughed at it as nonsense; but the Lord had the key of his will, and
He wound it up as He pleased. "Then why persecutest thou Me"? Perhaps you are
despising the very Saviour you will one day love; trying to knock down the very thing that
you wilt one day try to build up. Mayhap you are persecuting the men you will call your
brothers and sisters. It is always well for a man not to go so far that he cannot go back
respectably.
III. THE GOOD NEWS. Paul, who persecuted Christ, was forgiven. He says he was the
very chief of sinners, but he obtained mercy. Nay, more, he obtained honour. He was made
an honoured minister of Christ, and so may you.
(C. H. Spurgeon.)
It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.
Kicking against the pricks

C. F. Childe, M. A.I. THE CONDUCT WITH WHICH SAUL WAS UPBRAIDED. He was
involved in one continuous struggle against the will, the power and the cause of Christ. The
expression does not mean striving against the convictions of his own judgment, for Saul
acted upon principle, and was most conscientious when he was most bigoted. Hence he
says, "' I verily thought with myself, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of
Jesus of Nazareth." This expression indicates one main ground of the apostle's prejudice.
Like Nathanael, he was persuaded that no good thing could come out of Nazareth, and that
it was his duty to seek the extirpation of the rising sect. In Acts 22:8, express notice seems
to be taken of this. Hence we discover, not only the amazing grace vouchsafed in the work
of his conversion, but the consummate wisdom displayed in its mode. Saul's grand error
had been the entertaining low thoughts of Christ; it was essential, therefore, that the new
apostle should be possessedwith a deep sense of the power of Christ, as risen and received
into glory. The conduct thus exposedis not peculiar to Paul. We kick against the goads —
1. When we seek to stifle the convictions of conscience and strive against the constraints of
Divine grace. Saul was not guilty in this respect; but are none of us?
2. When we rebel against the dispensations of God's providence.
3. When we oppose the truth of God, or hinder the work of God.
II. THE WARNING WHICH HE RECEIVED may be considered to characterise his
course as —
1. Sinful. Saul might have learned this from the counsel of his master Gamaliel.
2. Foolish; for his resistance was fruitless.(1) His object was to extirpate the Church of
Christ. Little, however, did the oppressor understand that each true disciple was a
missionary. "They that were scattered abroad, went everywhere preaching the Word."(2)
The apostle, at the instant when the text presents him, was made to realise this to the full.
Like some rash fencer, who has provoked a stronger and more skilful than he to mortal
combat, and is but instantly disarmed, and lies helpless in the dust, with his adversary's
weapon pointed at his heart, the self-righteous and infuriated bigot now lay trembling and
astonished, completely at the mercy of the despised Nazarene. The power which frustrated
this proud Pharisee was exerted in pity; the defeat itself was love; but still, viewed as a
defeat, and merely so, nothing could be more entire and abject.
(C. F. Childe, M. A.)
The ox and the goad
C. H. Spurgeon.Jesus evenout of heaven speaks in parables, according to His wont. To
Paul He briefly utters the parable of the rebellious ox. Note the tenderness of the appeal: it
is not, "Thou art harming Me by thy persecutions," bat, "Thou art wounding thyself." He
saith not, "It is hard for Me," but "hard for thee." Observe —
I. THE OX. A fallen man deserves no higher type.
1. You are acting like a brute beast, in ignorance and passion. You are unspiritual,
thoughtless, unreasonable.
2. Yet God values you more than a man does an ox.
3. Therefore He feeds you, and does not slay you.

4. You are useless without guidance, and yet you are unwilling to submit to your Master's
hand.
5. If you were but obedient you might be useful, and might find content in your service.
6. You have no escape from the choice of either to obey or to die, and it is useless to be
stubborn.
II. THE OX GOAD. You have driven the Lord to treat you as the husbandman treats a
stubborn ox.
1. The Lord has tried you with gentle means — a word, a pull of the rein, etc. by parental
love, by tender admonitions of friends and teachers, and by the gentle promptings of His
Spirit.
2. Now He uses the more severe means —
(1)Of solemn threatening by His law.
(2)Of terrors of conscience, and dread of judgment.
(3)Of loss of relatives, children, friends.
(4)Of sickness, and varied afflictions.
(5)Of approaching death, with a dark future beyond it.
3. You are feeling some of these pricks, and cannot deny that they are sharp. Take heed lest
worse things come upon you.
III. THE KICKS AGAINST THE GOAD. These are given in various ways by those who
are resolved to continue in sin. There are —
1. Early childish rebellions against restraint.
2. Sneers at the gospel, at ministers, at holy things.
3. Wilful sins against conscience and light.
4. Revilings and persecutions against God's people.
5. Questionings, infidelities, and blasphemies.
IV. THE HARDNESS OF ALL THIS TO THE OX. It hurts itself against the goad, and
suffers far more than the driver designs.
1. In the present. You are unhappy; you are full of unrest and alarm; you are increasing
your chastisement, and fretting your heart.
2. In the best possible future. You will feel bitter regrets, have desperate habits to
overcome, and much evil to undo. All this if you do at last repent and obey.
3. In the more probable future. You are preparing for yourself increased hardness of heart,
despair and destruction. Oh, that you would know that no possible good can come of
kicking against God, who grieves over your infatuations!Conclusion:
1. Yield to the discipline of your God.
2. He pities you now, and begs you to consider your ways.
3. It is Jesus who speaks; be not so brutish as to refuse Him that speaks from heaven.

4. You may yet, like Saul of Tarsus, become grandly useful, and plough many a field for the
Lord Jesus.
(C. H. Spurgeon.)
Striving against conviction
U. R. Thomas.This sentence was one of the oldest of Greek proverbs, and being addressed
to Saul in the Hebrew language, is an instance of the voice of Religion rightly using the
tones of everyday life. That Christ should use a figure here was consistent with His habit,
who used His parables to speak to men in figures. And doubtless the statement applied to
many of Paul's recent experiences, which were finding their climax in that crisis. Doubtless
the reflection of one who knew the Scriptures as Paul did, and who had the warning
Gamaliel gave him, and the recollections he must have had of the martyrs he was making,
and preeminently his recollection of Stephen, must have brought many misgivings like so
many goad thrusts, which found their full force in the vision and voices of that hour.
Anyhow, the text tells that, whether for a longer or a shorter time, Paul had been resisting
conviction. This is —
I. COMMON. We see it —
1. In continuance in outward sin which is felt to be evil.
2. In cherishing secret evils known to be wrong.
3. In postponing allegiance to claims of religion felt to be just.
II. PAINFUL. It is "hard" because a man is —
1. In collision with the best social influences — in church, in godly family, etc.
2. In conflict with his own higher nature. Reason, conscience, have been goad-thrusts.
3. In opposition to God.
III. WRONG.
1. It is "fighting against God." So Gamaliel warned.
2. It is persecuting Jesus. The noblest, tenderest, best Being.
(U. R. Thomas.)
The sinner his own enemy
Dean Vaughan.The first glance at the words shows us a proverb. Even from heaven, God, if
He speaks at all, must adapt His speech to man's usages. The risen and ascended Saviour
spake not on earth only in parables. That before us is taken from the very commonest life
of man. With a goad in his hand, headed by a long sharp spike of iron, the farmer drives
before him the reluctant animal which would loiter or deviate from its way. In the
obstinacy of an untamed will, the bullock unaccustomed to the yoke will evenkick against
his driver; and then the iron, other. wise harmless, enters into the recalcitrant foot. So in
human life, in the affairs of the soul, there is a Hand which directs, and there is also a wilt
which it seeks to guide. So long as the human will moves along the straight furrow of duty,
so long the goad of punishment is unfelt. But if man will refuse the Divine influence, and
stop or hedge aside, the guiding impulse must become a painful goad of discipline, and
resistance must be coerced and, if necessary, punished into acquiescence.

1. "The way of transgressors is hard." So speaks Solomon. He had found it so. And so
speaks Christ. The young man thinks it a sign of independence to forget God that made
him, and to walk in the way of his own heart. He learns to forsake the rule of his father,
and to despise the law of his mother. He forms new associates; his habits become more and
more such as a Christian parent would mourn over. Does he find his new life a freedom?
Are his new ways ways of pleasantness? He calls them so in his hours of mirth. But
somehow he feels to be more in bondage than ever. The old rules of his parents, if they were
restraints, at least had no sting in them. But now, these pleasures of sin, not only are they
short lived, they are anxious in the indulgence, and torturers in the retrospect. His
conscience is everwarning and lashing him. And when sickness comes, when grey hairs are
upon him, when death is imminent; how then? Young men — young women — be
persuaded of this; that there is a God over you; if you will have it so, a God of love; if you
will not have it so, then at least a God of power! It is hard for thee now, as well as
dangerous eventually, to kick against the pricks.
2. There are those who are kicking against the goad of a fatherly discipline, who do not
understand and love the method by which God is training them for Himself. They are
denied many things which they desire: they are subjected to many things which they
dislike. When they seemedto have evenattained, the prize was wrenched from them. When
they did attain, the coveted fruit has turned to ashes in the mouth. By these means the
world was made a world of nothingness to them. Perhaps they were too eagerfor it. They
were of that nature which would have been satisfied to "sit by the fleshpots and eat bread
to the full." And therefore the discipline needful for them was desert life. Sinai, with God
speaking from it, was necessary to their soul's safety. And yet scarcely were they in it, when
they began to find fault. Their "soul loathed this light bread," the bread of eternity and of
the Spirit. The smitten rock yielded only a spiritual supply; and they were athirst for
something more luscious, more earthly. Thus again and again they were rebellious against
the hand that guided, and forced it to become a hand that drove. Why? "Even because He
had a favour unto them." To kick against that Hand, evenif it was forced by their
waywardness to hold a goad, was rebellion as much against happiness as against strength. I
address some tonight who are in definite trouble. My friend, "it is the Lord. I form the
light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil." "Shall the thing formed say to
Him that formed it, Why hast Thou made me thus?" "Humble yourselves" rather under
the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time. It is hard for thee, painful now,
eventually ruinous, to kick against the goad.
3. There is yet a further use of the proverb, that in which it was originally spoken. St. Paul
was moral and conscientious; but be was kicking against the goad because he was refusing
the revelation of Christ. He saw not his own sinfulness. He knew not his own want of a
Saviour. He was not willing that others should trust in One whom he knew not. Can there
be any here whose sin is that of Saul? Certainly there are those who are willing to take
everything of the gospel save the very gospel itself; moral, conscientious, earnest men, yet
who suffer themselves to repudiate altogether the revelation of the forgiveness of sin
through the Atonement, and of renewal by the Holy Spirit. Depend upon it, you are kicking
against a goad. You do want a Saviour for forgiveness, cleansing, strength, comfort and
grace in daily life. Why, then, will you keepout of your heart that bright light? Why will
you compel Him to drive, who would lead and guide? Conclusion: Scripture gives us
examples of every kind of direction. Mark the order.

1. There is the sharp iron for the refractory. "It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks."
2. There is the bit and bridle for the unreasoning.
4. There is the guidance, not evenof voice, but of the eye only, which suits the ready,
anticipating will of the entirely tractable and sympathising child.To kick against the goad is
the extreme of disobedience; to watch the guiding eye, to wait not for the word or the sign,
much less for the spur of authority, is the perfection of obedience. In all senses, may that
last be ours!
(Dean Vaughan.)
Opposition to the truth fatalThe swordfish is a very curious creature, with a long and bony
beak projecting in front of his head. It is also very fierce, attacking other fishes, and trying
to pierce them with its sword. The fish has been known to dart at a ship in full sail with
such violence as to pierce the solid timbers. But what has happened? The silly fish has been
killed outright by the force of its own blow. The ship sails on just as before, and the angry
fish falls a victim to its own rage. But how shall we describe the folly of those who, like
Saul, oppose the cause of Christ? They cannot succeed: like the swordfish they only work
their own destruction.
Opposition to the truth, self-destructiveDr. John Hall compares the attacks of infidelity
upon Christianity to a serpent gnawing at a file. As he kept on gnawing he was greatly
encouraged by the sight of a growing pile of chips; till, feeling pain, and seeing blood, he
found that he had been wearing his own teethaway against the file, but the file was
unharmed.
COMMENTARIES
EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(14) It is hard for thee to kick against the
pricks.—See Note on Acts 9:5. Here there is no doubt as to the genuineness of the reading.
MacLaren's ExpositionsActs
CHRIST’S REMONSTRANCES
Acts 26:14.
‘Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots?’ No. But God can change the
skin, because He can change the nature. In this story of the conversion of the Apostle Paul-
the most important thing that happened that day-we have an instance how brambles may
become vines; tares may become wheat; and a hater of Jesus Christ may be changed in a
moment into His lover and servant, and, if need be, His martyr.
Now the very same motives and powers which were brought to bear upon the Apostle Paul

by miracle are being brought to bear upon every one of us; and my object now is just to
trace the stages of the process set forth here, and to ask some of you, if you, like Paul, have
been ‘obedient to the heavenly vision.’ Stages, I call them, though they were all crowded
into a moment, for eventhe lightning has to pass through the intervening space when it
flashes from one side of the heavens to another, and we may divide its path into periods.
Time is very elastic, as any of us whose lives have held great sorrows or great joys or great
resolutions well know.
I. The first of these all but simultaneous and yet separable stages was the revelation of
Jesus Christ.
Of course to the Apostle it was mediated by miracle; but real as he believed that
appearance of the risen Lord in the heavens to be, and valid as he maintained that it was as
the ground of his Apostleship, he himself, in one of his letters, speaks of the whole incident
as being the revelation of God’s Son in him. The revelation in heart and mind was the main
thing, of which the revelation to eye and ear were but means. The means, in his case, are
different from those in ours; the end is the same. To Paul it came like the rush of a cataract
that the Christ whom he had thought of as lying in an unknown grave was living in the
heavens and ruling there. You and I, I suppose, do not need to be convinced by miracle of
the resurrection of Jesus Christ; but the bare fact that Jesus was living in the heavens
would have had little effect upon Saul, unless it had been accompanied with the revelation
of the startling fact that between him and Jesus Christ there were close personal relations,
so that he had to do with Jesus, and Jesus with him.
‘Saul, Saul! why persecutest thou Me?’ They used to think that they could wake sleep-
walkers by addressing them by name. Jesus Christ, by speaking His name to the Apostle,
wakes him out of his diseasedslumber, and brings him to wholesome consciousness. There
are stringency and solemnity of address in that double use of the name ‘Saul, Saul!’
What does such an address teach you and me? That Jesus Christ, the living, reigning Lord
of the universe, has perfect knowledge of each of us, and that we each stand isolated before
Him, as if all the light of omniscience were focussedupon us. He knows our characters; He
knows all about us, and more than that, He directly addresses Himself to each man and
woman among us.
We are far too apt to hide ourselves in the crowd, and let all the messages of God’s love, the
warnings of His providences, as well as the teachings and invitations and pleadings of His
gospel, fly over our heads as if they were meant vaguely for anybody. But they are all
intended for thee, as directly as if thou, and thou only, wert in the world. I beseech you, lay
this to heart, that although no audible sounds may rend the silent heavens, nor any blaze
may blind thine eye, yet that as really, though not in the same outward fashion as Saul,
when they were all fallen to the earth, felt himself to be singled out, and heard a voice
‘speaking to him in the Hebrew tongue, saying, Saul, Saul!’ thou mayest hear a voice
speaking to thee in the English tongue, by thy name, and directly addressing its gracious
remonstrances and its loving offers to thy listening ear. I want to sharpen the blunt
‘whosoever’ into the pointed ‘thou.’ And I would fain plead with each of my friends

hearing me now to believe that the gospel of Jesus Christ is meant for thee, and that Christ
speaks to thee. ‘I have a message from God unto thee,’ just as Nathan said unto David.
‘Thou art the man!’
Do not lose yourselves in the crowd or hide yourselves from the personal incidence of
Christ’s offer, but feel that you stand, as you do indeed, alone the hearer of His voice, the
possible recipient of His saving mercy.
II. Secondly, notice, as another stage in this process the discovery of the true character of
the past.
‘Why persecutest thou Me?’ Now I am not going to be tempted from my more direct
purpose in this sermon to dwell evenfor a moment on the beautiful, affecting,
strengthening thought here, of the unity of Jesus Christ with all the humble souls that love
Him, so as that, whatsoever any member suffers, the Head suffers with it. I must leave that
truth untouched.
Saul was brought to look at all his past life as standing in immediate connection with Jesus
Christ. Of course he knew before the vision that he had no love to Him whom he thought to
be a Galilean impostor, and that the madness with which he hated the servants was only
the glancing off of the arrow that he would fain have aimed at the Master. But he did not
know that Jesus Christ counted every blow struck at one of His servants as being struck at
Him. Above all he did not know that the Christ whom he was persecuting was reigning in
the heavens. And so his whole past life stood before him in a new aspect when it was
brought into close connection with Christ, and looked at as in relation to Him.
The same process would yield very remarkable results if applied to our lives. If I could only
get you for one quiet ten minutes, to lay all your past, as far as memory brought it to your
minds, right before that pure and loving Face, I should have done much. One infallible way
of judging of the rottenness or goodness of our actions is that we should bring them where
they will all be brought one day, into the brightness of Christ’s countenance. If you want to
find out the flaws in some thin, badly-woven piece of cloth, you hold it up against the light,
do you not? and then you see all the specks and holes, and the irregular threads. Hold up
your lives in like fashion against the light, and I shall be surprised if you do not find enough
there to make you very much ashamed of yourselves. Were you everon the stage of a
theatre in the daytime? Did you eversee what miserable daubs the scenes look, and how
seamy it all is when the pitiless sunshine comes in? Let that great light pour on your life,
and be thankful if you find out what a daub it has been, whilst yet colours and brushes and
time are at your disposal, and you may paint the future fairer than the past.
Again, this revelation of Saul’s past life disclosed its utter unreasonableness. That one
question, ‘Why persecutest thou Me?’ pulverised the whole thing. It was like the wondering
question so unanswerable in the Psalm, ‘Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine
a vain thing?’ If you take into account what you are, and where you stand, you can find no
reason, except utterly unreasonable ones, for the lives that I fear some of us are living-lives
of godlessness and Christlessness. There is nothing in all the world a tithe so stupid as sin.

There is nothing so unreasonable, if there be a God at all, and if we depend upon Him, and
have duties to Him, as the lives that some of you are living. You admit, most of you, that
there is such a God; you admit, most of you, that you do hang upon Him; you admit, in
theory, that you ought to love and serve Him. The bulk of you call yourselves Christians.
That is to say, you believe, as a piece of historical fact, that Jesus Christ, the Son of God,
came into this world and died for men. And, believing that, you turn your back on Him,
and neither love nor serve nor trust Him nor turn away from your iniquity. Is there
anything outside a lunatic asylum more madlike than that? ‘Why persecutest thou?’ ‘And
he was speechless,’ for no answer was possible. Why neglectest thou? Why forgettest thou?
Why, admitting what thou dost, art thou not an out-and-out Christian? If we think of all
our obligations and relations, and the facts of the universe, we come back to the old saying,
‘The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,’ and any man who, like many of my
hearers, fails to give his heart and life to Jesus Christ will one day have to say, ‘Behold, I
have played the fool, and erred exceedingly.’ Wake up, my brother, to apply calm reason to
your lives while yet there is time, and face the question, Why dost thou stand as thou dost
to Jesus Christ? There is nothing sadder than the small share that deliberate reason and
intelligent choice have in the ordering of most men’s lives. You live by impulse, by habit, by
example, by constraint of the outward necessities of your position. But I am sure that there
are many amongst us now who have very seldom, if ever, sat down and said, ‘Now let me
think, until I get to the ultimate grounds of the course of life that I am pursuing.’ You can
carry on the questions very gaily for a step or two, but then you come to a dead pause.
‘What do I do so-and-so for?’ ‘Because I like it.’ ‘Why do I like it?’ ‘Because it meets my
needs, or my desires, or my tastes, or my intellect.’ Why do you make the meeting of your
needs, or your desires, or your tastes, or your intellect your sole object? Is there any
answer to that? The Hindoos say that the world rests upon an elephant, and the elephant
rests upon a tortoise. What does the tortoise rest on? Nothing! Then that is what the world
and the elephant rest on. And so, though you may go bravely through the first stages of the
examination, when you come to the last question of all, you will find out that your whole
scheme of life is built upon a blunder; and the blunder is this, that anybody can be blessed
without God.
Further, this disclosure of the true character of his life revealed to Saul, as in a lightning
flash, the ingratitude of it.
‘Why persecutest thou Me?’ That was as much as to say, ‘What have I done to merit thy
hate? What have I not done to merit rather thy love?’ Paul did not know all that Jesus
Christ had done for him. It took him a lifetime to learn a little of it, and to tell his brethren
something of what he had learned. And he has been learning it eversince that day when,
outside the walls of Rome, they hacked off his head. He has been learning more and more
of what Jesus Christ has done for him, and why he should not persecute Him but love Him.
But the same appeal comes to each of us. What has Jesus Christ done for thee, my friend,
for me, for every soul of man? He has loved me better than His own life. He has given
Himself for me. He has lingered beside me, seeking to draw me to Himself, and He still
lingers. And this, at the best, tremulous faith, this, at the warmest, tepid love, this, at the
completest, imperfect devotion and service, are all that we bring to Him; and some of us do

not bring eventhese. Some of us have never known what it was to sacrifice one inclination
for the sake of Christ, nor to do one act for His dear love’s sake, nor to lean our weakness
upon Him, nor to turn to Him and say, ‘I give Thee myself, that I may possess Thee.’ ‘Do
ye thus requite the Lord, O foolish people and unwise?’ I have heard of wounded soldiers
striking with their bayonets at the ambulance men who came to help them. That is like
what some of you do to the Lord who died for your healing, and comes as the Physician,
with bandages and with balm, to bind up the brokenhearted. ‘Saul, Saul, why persecutest
thou Me?’
III. Lastly, we have here a warning against self-inflicted wounds.
That second clause of the remonstrance on the lips of Christ in my text is, according to the
true reading, not found in the account of Paul’s conversion in the ninth chapter of this
book. My text is from Paul’s own story; and it is interesting to notice that he adds this
eminently pathetic and forcible appeal to the shorter account given by the writer of the
book. It had gone deep into his heart, and he could not forget.
The metaphor is a very plain one. The ox-goad was a formidable weapon, some sevenor
eight feet in length, shod with an iron point, and capable of being used as a spear, and of
inflicting deadly wounds at a pinch. Held in the firm hand of the ploughman, it presented a
sharp point to the rebellious animal under the yoke. If the ox had readily yielded to the
gentle prick, given, not in anger, but for guidance, it had been well. But if it lashes out with
its hoofs against the point, what does it get but bleeding flanks? Paul had been striking out
instead of obeying, and he had won by it only bloody hocks.
There are two truths deducible from this saying, which may have been a proverb in
common use. One is the utter futility of lives that are spent in opposing the divine will.
There is a strong current running, and if you try to go against it you will only be swept
away by it. Think of some little fishing coble coming across the bow of a great ocean-going
steamer. What will be the end of that? Think of a pony-chaise jogging up the line, and an
express train thundering down it. What will be the end of that? Think of a man lifting
himself up and saying to God, ‘I will not!’ when God says, ‘Do thou this!’ or ‘Be thou this!’
What will be the end of that? ‘The world passeth away, and the lusts thereof, but he that
doeth the will of God abideth for ever.’ ‘It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks’-hard
in regard to breaches of common morality, as some of my friends sitting quietly in these
pews very well know. It is hard to indulge in sensual sin. You cannot altogether dodge what
people call the ‘natural consequences’; but it was God who made Nature; and so I call them
God-inflicted penalties. It is hard to set yourselves against Christianity. I am not going to
speak of that at all now, only when we think of the expectations of victory with which so
many antagonists of the Cross have gaily leaped into the arena, and of how the foes have
been forgotten and there stands the Cross still, we may say of the whole crowd, beginning
with the earliest, and coming down to the latest brand-new theory that is going to explode
Christianity -’it is hard to kick against the pricks.’ Your own limbs you may wound; you
will not do the goad much harm.
But there is another side to the proverb of my text, and that is the self-inflicted harm that

comes from resisting the pricks of God’s rebukes and remonstrances, whether inflicted by
conscience or by any other means; including, I make bold to say, evensuch poor words as
these of mine. For if the first little prick of conscience, a warning and a guide, be neglected,
the next will go a great deal deeper. The voice which, before you do the wrong thing, says to
you, ‘Do not do it,’ in tones of entreaty and remonstrance, speaks, after you have done it,
more severely and more bitterly. The Latin word remorse, and the old English name for
conscience, ‘again-bite’-which latter is a translation of the other-teach us the same lesson,
that the gnawing which comes after wrong done is far harder to bear than the touch that
should have kept us from the evil. The stings of marine jelly-fish will burn for days after, if
you wet them. And so all wrong-doing, and all neglect of right-doing of every sort, carries
with it a subsequent pain, or else the wounded limb mortifies, and that is worse. There is no
pain then; it would be better if there were. There is such a possibility as to have gone on so
obstinately kicking against the pricks and leaving the wounds so unheeded, as that they
mortify and feeling goes. A conscience ‘searedwith a hot iron’ is ten times more dreadful
than a conscience that pains and stings.
So, dear brethren, let me beseech you to listen to the pitying Christ, who says to us each,
more in sorrow than in anger, ‘It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.’ It is no
pleasure to Him to hold the goad, nor that we should wound ourselves upon it. He has
another question to put to us, with another ‘why,’ ‘Why should ye be stricken any more?
Turn ye, turn ye; why will ye die, O house of Israel?’
There is another metaphor drawn from the employment of oxen which we may set side by
side with this of my text: ‘Take My yoke upon you, and ye shall find rest unto your souls.’
The yoke accepted, the goad is laid aside; and repose and healing from its wounds are
granted to us. Dear brethren, if you will listen to the Christ revealed in the heavens, as
knowing all about you, and remonstrating with you for your unreasonableness and
ingratitude, and setting before you the miseries of rebellion and the suicide of sin, then you
will have healing for all your wounds, and your lives will neither be self-tormenting, futile,
nor unreasonable. The mercy of Jesus Christ lavished upon you makes your yielding
yourselves to Him your only rational course. Anything else is folly beyond comparison and
harm and loss beyond count.
Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary26:12-23 Paul was made a Christian by Divine
power; by a revelation of Christ both to him and in him; when in the full career of his sin.
He was made a minister by Divine authority: the same Jesus who appeared to him in that
glorious light, ordered him to preach the gospel to the Gentiles. A world that sits in
darkness must be enlightened; those must be brought to know the things that belong to
their everlasting peace, who are yet ignorant of them. A world that lies in wickedness must
be sanctified and reformed; it is not enough for them to have their eyes opened, they must
have their hearts renewed; not enough to be turned from darkness to light, but they must
be turned from the power of Satan unto God. All who are turned from sin to God, are not
only pardoned, but have a grant of a rich inheritance. The forgiveness of sins makes way
for this. None can be happy who are not holy; and to be saints in heaven we must be first
saints on earth. We are made holy, and saved by faith in Christ; by which we rely upon
Christ as the Lord our Righteousness, and give up ourselves to him as the Lord our Ruler;
by this we receive the remission of sins, the gift of the Holy Ghost, and eternal life. The

cross of Christ was a stumbling-block to the Jews, and they were in a rage at Paul's
preaching the fulfilling of the Old Testament predictions. Christ should be the first that
should rise from the dead; the Head or principal One. Also, it was foretold by the prophets,
that the Gentiles should be brought to the knowledge of God by the Messiah; and what in
this could the Jews justly be displeased at? Thus the true convert can give a reason of his
hope, and a good account of the change manifest in him. Yet for going about and calling on
men thus to repent and to be converted, vast numbers have been blamed and persecuted.
Barnes' Notes on the BibleSee this passage explained in the notes on Acts 9:5, etc.
Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary9-15. (See on [2119]Ac 9:1, &c.; and compare
Ac 22:4, &c.)
Matthew Poole's CommentaryIn the Hebrew tongue; whereby it appears, that Paul spake
not now before Agrippa in the Hebrew tongue, as he did before the Jews at Jerusalem, Acts
21:40.
It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks: this is a proverb borrowed from the Greeks,
as some think, but used in many languages, denoting any who endeavour such things as will
ruin or detriment themselves: and so do all persecutors; for they cannot harden themselves
against God, his truth, or servants, and prosper, Job 9:4. Not to speak of other pricks, there
is never an attribute in God, nor evera faculty in their own souls, but they kick against,
and will be themselves at last pricked by.
Gill's Exposition of the Entire BibleAnd when we were all fallen to the earth,.... Saul, and
the men that were with him, for fear of the divine Majesty, who by this extraordinary light
was thought to be present: the other narratives only relate Saul's falling to the earth; how
this is to be reconciled to their standing speechless, in Acts 9:7; see Gill on Acts 9:7.
I heard a voice speaking unto me, &c. See Gill on Acts 10:4. See Gill on Acts 10:5.
Geneva Study BibleAnd when we were all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice speaking unto
me, and saying in the Hebrew tongue, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? it is hard for
thee to kick against the pricks.
EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)
Meyer's NTCommentaryHYPERLINK "/context/acts/26-14.htm"Acts 26:14-15. See on
Acts 9:4 ff.; comp. Acts 22:7 f.
τῇ Ἑβρ. διαλ.] It was natural that the exalted Christ should make no other language than
the native tongue of the person to be converted the medium of his verbal revelation.
Moreover, these words confirm the probability that Paul now spoke not, as at Acts 21:40,
in Hebrew, but in Greek.
σκληρόν σοι πρὸς κέντρα λακτίζειν] hard for thee, to kick against goads! i.e. it is for thee a
difficult undertaking, surpassing thy strength, and not to be accomplished by thee
(compare Gamaliel’s saying, Acts 5:39), that thou (as my persecutor) shouldest contend
against my will. Ἡ δὲ τροπὴ ἀπὸ τῶν βοῶν· τῶν γὰρ οἱ ἄτακτοι κατὰ τὴν γεωργίαν
κεντριζόμενοι ὑπὸ ἀροῦντος, λακτίζουσι τὸ κέντρον καὶ μᾶλλον πλήττονται, Schol. ad Pind.
Pyth. ii. 173. Comp. Aesch. Agam. 1540 (1624): πρὸς κέντρα μὴ λάκτιζε. See other

examples from Greek and Roman writers in Grotius and Wetstein; also Blomfield, ad
Aesch. Prom. 331; Elmsl. ad Eur. Bacch. 794.
Expositor's Greek TestamentHYPERLINK "/acts/26-14.htm"Acts 26:14. See notes on Acts
9:7 and Acts 22:7, and reading above in β.—τῇ Ἑβραΐδι διαλ.: this is intimated in Acts 9:4
and Acts 22:7 by the form Σαούλ, but here the words are inserted because Paul was
speaking in Greek, or perhaps he spoke the solemn words, indelible in his memory, as they
were uttered, in Hebrew, for Agrippa (Alford).—σκληρόν σοι κ.τ.λ.: a proverb which finds
expression both in Greek and in Latin literature (see instances in Wetstein): cf. Scholiast on
Pind., Pyth., ii., 173: ἡ δὲ τροπὴ ἀπὸ τῶν βοῶν· τῶν γὰρ οἱ ἄτακτοι κατὰ τὴν
γεωργίανκεντριζόμενοι ὑπὸ τοῦ ἀροῦντος, λακτίζουσι τὸ κέντρον καὶ μᾶλλον πλήττονται.
Cf. also Aesch., Agam., 1633 (cf. Prom., 323), Eur., Bacch., 791, and in Latin, Terence,
Phorm., i., 2, 27; Plautus, Truc., iv., 2, 59; and there may have been a similar proverb
current among the Hebrews. Blass, Gram., pp. 5, 6, thinks that the introduction of the
proverb on this occasion before Festus and Agrippa points to the culture which Paul
possessed, and which he called into requisition in addressing an educated assembly. It is
not wise to press too closely a proverbial saying with regard to Saul’s state of mind before
his conversion; the words may simply mean to intimate to him that it was a foolish and
inefficacious effort to try to persecute Jesus in His followers, an effort which would only
inflict deeper wounds upon himself, an effort as idle as that described by the Psalmist,
Psalm 2:3-4. At all events Paul’s statement here must be compared with his statements
elsewhere, 1 Timothy 1:13; see Witness of the Epistles, p. 389 ff., and Bethge, Die
Paulinischen Reden, p. 275.
Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges14. I heard a voice speaking unto me, and saying]
The oldest MSS. have only “a voice saying unto me.” Saul alone gathered the import of
what was said. His companions only heard the sound, not the words. Cp. Daniel 10:7.
in the Hebrew tongue [R. V. language] Which is therefore represented by a different
orthography of the proper name, not “Saulos,” the usual Greek form, but “Saoul,” a
transliteration of the Hebrew.
it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks [goad] This is the only place where the oldest
MSS. give these words. See note on Acts 9:5. The figure is from an ox, being driven on in
his work. When restive or lazy, the driver pricks him, and in ignorance of the
consequences, he kicks back, and so gets another wound. The words would imply that God
had been guiding Saul towards the true light for some time before, and that this zeal for
persecution was a resistance of the divine urging. It is not unusual for men who are moved
to break away from old traditions at such times, by outward acts, to manifest evenmore
zeal than before for their old opinions, as if in fear lest they should be thought to be falling
away. This may have been Saul’s case, his kicking against the goads.
Bengel's GnomenHYPERLINK "/acts/26-14.htm"Acts 26:14. Τῇ Ἑβραΐδι διαλέκτῳ, in the
Hebrew tongue) Paul himself, in this instance, did not speak in Hebrew. For in ch. Acts
22:7, which narrates the same incident, he did not, when speaking in Hebrew, add this, in
the Hebrew language. The Hebrew language was the language of Christ on earth and from
heaven.—σκληρόν σοι, it is hard for thee) Lightfoot observes, it is a Hebrew adage.

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 14. - Saying unto me in the Hebrew language for speaking unto
me, and saying in the Hebrew tongue, A.V. and T.R.; goad for pricks, A.V. I heard a voice
saying, etc. (see Acts 9:7, note). In the Hebrew language. This is an additional detail not
mentioned in Acts 9:4 or Acts 22:8; but recalled here, as tending to confirm St. Paul's claim
to be a thorough Jew, a Hebrew of the Hebrews, and, moreover, to represent Christianity
as a thing not alien from, but rather in thorough harmony with, the true national life and
spirit of Israel. It is hard for thee to kick, etc. This, also, according to the best manuscripts,
is an additional detail not mentioned before. The proverb Πρὸς κέντρα λακτίζειν, to kick
against the ox-goads, as the unbroken bullock does to his own hurt, instead of quietly
submitting, as he must do at last, to go the way and the pace his master chooses he should
go, is found in Pindar, AEschylus, Euripides, Plautus, Terence, etc. The passages are given
in Bochart, 'Hierozoicon.,' part 1. lib. it. Acts 39; in Kninoel, and in Bishop Wordsworth.
The passage in Eurip., 'Baach,' 1. 793, 794 (750, 751), brings out the force of the proverb,
viz. fruitless resistance to a superior power, most distinctly: "Better to sacrifice to him,
than, being mortal, by vainly raging against God, to kick against the goads." Saul had
better yield at once to the constraining grace of God, and no longer do despite to the Spirit
of grace. It does not appear clearly that the proverb was used by the Hebrews. Dr.
Donaldson ('Christian Orthodoxy,' p. 293) affirms that" there is no Jewish use of this
proverbial expression." And this is borne out by Lightfoot, who adduces the two passages,
Deuteronomy 32:15 and 1 Samuel 2:9, as the only evidences of the existence of such a
proverb, together with a rabbinical saying, "R. Bibai sat and taught, and R. Isaac Ben
Cahna kicked against him" ('Exereit. on Acts,' 9:5). It is, therefore, a curious question how
this classical phrase came to be used here. Bishop Wordsworth says, "Even in heaven our
Lord did not disdain to use a proverb familiar to the heathen world." But, perhaps, we
may assume that such a proverb was substantially in use among the Jews, though no
distinct evidence of it has been preserved; and that St. Paul, in rendering the Hebrew
words of Jesus into Greek, made use of the language of Euripides, with which he was
familiar, in a case bearing a strong analogy to his own, viz. the resistance of Pentheus to the
claims of Bacchus. This is to a certain extent borne out by the use of the words θεομάχος
and θεομαχεῖν (Acts 5:39; Acts 23:9); the latter of which is twice used in the 'Bacchae' of
Euripides, though not common elsewhere. It is, however, found in 2 Macc. 7:19.
Vincent's Word StudiesIt is hard for thee to kick against the pricks
Or, goads. The sharp goad carried in the ploughman's hand, against which the oxen kick
on being pricked. The metaphor, though not found in Jewish writings, was common in
Greek and Roman writings. Thus, Euripides ("Bacchae," 791): "Being enraged, I would
kick against the goads, a mortal against a god." Plautus ("Truculentus, 4, 2, 55): "If you
strike the goads with your fists, you hurt your hands more than the goads." "Who knows
whether at that moment the operation of ploughing might not be going on within sight of
the road along which the persecutor was travelling? (Howson, "Metaphors of St. Paul").
PRECEPT AUSTIN RESOURCES

SPURGEON
The Conversion Of Saul Of Tarsus
“And when we were all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice speaking unto me and
saying in the Hebrew tongue, Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me? It is hard for
you to kick against the pricks.”
Acts 26:14
HOW marvelous the condescension which induced the Savior to take notice of such a
wretch as Saul! Enthroned in the highest heavens, amidst the eternal melodies of the
redeemed and the seraphic sonnets of the cherubim and all the angelic hosts, it was strange
that the Savior should stoop Himself from His dignity to speak to a persecutor. Engaged as
He is both day and night in pleading the cause of His own Church before His Father’s
Throne, it is condescension indeed which could induce Him, as it were, to suspend His
intercessions in order that He might speak personally to one who had sworn himself His
enemy.
And what grace was it that could lead the Savior’s heart to speak to such a man as Saul,
who had breathed out threats against His Church? Had he not hauled men and women to
prison? Had he not compelled them in every synagogue to blaspheme the name of Jesus
Christ? And now Jesus Himself must interpose to bring him to his senses! Ah, had it been a
thunderbolt which quivered in its haste to reach the heart of man, we should not have
marveled. Or had the lips of the Savior been heaving with a curse we should not have been
astonished. Had He not Himself in His own lifetime cursed the persecutor? Did He not say,
whosoever shall offend one of the least of these My little ones, it were better for him that a
millstone were hanged about his neck and that he were cast in the sea?
But now the man that is cursed by that language is yet to be blessedby Him whom he had
persecuted. Who though he had stained his hand in blood and had now the commission in
his hands to drag others to prison–though he had kept the clothes of those who had stoned
Stephen–yet the Master, the King of Heaven, must Himself speak from the upper skies to
bring him to feel the need of a Savior–and to make him partaker of precious faith. I say
this is marvelous condescension and matchless grace.
But, Beloved, when we come to recollect the Savior’s Character, it is but little wonder that
He should do this for He has done far more than this. Did he not in Person leave the starry
thrones of Heavenand come down to earth to suffer–and bleed and die? When I think of
Bethlehem’s manger, of the cruel Garden of Gethsemane and the yet more shameful
Calvary, I do not wonder that the Savior should do any act of grace or condescension. That
being done, what can be greater? If He has stooped from Heaven into Hades, what greater
stoop can He accomplish? If His own Throne must be left empty, if His own crown must be
relinquished, if His Godhead must be veiled in flesh and the splendors of His deity clothed

in the rags of manhood, what wonder, I say, that He should stoop to speak evento Saul of
Tarsus, to bring his heart to Himself?
Beloved, some of us do not wonder either, for although we have not had greater grace than
the Apostle himself we have had no less. The Savior did not speak out of Heavento us with
a voice that others might hear, but He spoke with a voice that our conscience heard. We
were not bloodthirsty, it may be, against His children, but we had sins both black and
heinous. Yet He stopped us. Not content with wooing us or with threatening us, not content
with sending His ministers to us and giving us His Word to warn us of duty, He would
come Himself. And you and I, Beloved, who have tasted of this grace, can say it was
matchless love that savedPaul–but not love unexampled. For He has saved us also and
made us partakers of the same grace.
I intend, this morning, to address myself more particularly to those who fear not the Lord
Jesus Christ, but on the contrary, oppose Him. I think I may be quite certain that I have
none here who go the length of desiring to see the old persecution of the Church revived. I
do not think there is an Englishman, however much he may hate religion, who would wish
to see the stake again in Smithfield and the burning pile consuming the saints. There may
be some who hate them as much, but still not in that fashion. The common sense of the age
reviles against the gibbet, the sword and the dungeon. The children of God, in this country
at least, are quite safe from any political persecution of that kind. But it is highly probable
that I have here this morning some who go to the full length of their tether and who
endeavor as much as lies in them to provoke the Lord to anger by opposing His cause.
You will perhaps recognize yourselves if I try to paint a picture. It is seldom that you ever
go into the house of God–in fact you have a contempt for all the gatherings of the righteous.
You have a notion that all saints are hypocrites, that all professors are cants and you do not
at times blush to say so. However, you have a wife, and that wife of yours has been
impressed under the sound of the ministry. She loves to go to the house of God–and Heaven
and her heart alone know what grief and agony of mind you have caused her. How often
have you taunted and jeered her on account of her profession?
You cannot deny but that she is a better woman for it. You are obliged to confess that
although she cannot go with you in all your sports and merriments, yet as far as she can go
she is a loving and affectionate wife to you. If anyone should find fault with her, you would
right manfully defend her character. But it is her religion that you hate. And it is but lately
that you threatened to lock her up on Sunday. You say it is impossible for you to live in the
house with her if she will go up to the house of God.
Moreover there is a little child of yours. You had no objection to that child going to the
Sunday-School, because she was out of your way on the Sunday when you were smoking
your pipe in your shirt sleeves. You did not want to be bothered with your children, you
said, and therefore you were glad to pack them off to the Sunday-School–but that child has
had her heart touched. And you cannot help seeing that the religion of Christ is in her
heart–therefore you do not like it. You love the child, but you would give anything if she
were not what she is. You would give anything if you could crush the last spark of religion
out of her.
But perhaps I can put your case yet. You are a master. You occupy a respectable position,
you have many men under you and you cannot bear a man to make a profession of religion.

Other masters you know have said to their men, “Do as you like, so long as you are a good
servant, I do not care about your religious views.” But perhaps you are a little the reverse.
Although you would not turn a man away because of his religion you give him a jeer every
now and then. And if you trip him up in a little fault, you say, “Ah, that is your religion! I
suppose you learned that at Chapel.” You grieve the poor man’s soul, while he endeavors
as far as he can to discharge his duty to you.
Or, you are a young man, employed in a warehouse or a shop and there is one of your shop
mates who has lately taken to religion. He is to be found on his knees in prayer–what fine
fun you have made of him lately, haven’t you? You and others have joined in like a pack of
hounds after a poor hare and he being of rather a timid turn of mind, perhaps is silent
before you. Or if he speaks, the tear is in his eye because you have wounded his spirit. Now
this is the self-same spirit that kindled the firebrand of old–that stretched the saint upon
the rack–that cut his body in pieces and sent him to wander about in sheepskins and in
goat skins. If I have not exactly hit your character yet, I may do it before I have done. I
wish to address myself especially to those of you, who in word or deed or in any other
manner, persecute the children of God–or if you do not like so hard a word as “persecute”–
laugh at them, oppose them–and endeavor to put an end to the good work in their hearts.
I shall in the name of Christ, first put the question to you, “Saul, Saul, why do you
persecute Me?” In the second place, I shall in Christ’s name expostulate with you–“It is
hard for you to kick against the pricks.” And then if God shall bless what is said to the
touching of your heart, it may be that the Mastershall give you a few words of comfort, as
he did the Apostle Paul, when he said, “Rise and stand upon your feet. I have appeared
unto you for this purpose–to make you a minister and a witness both of these things which
you have seenand of those things in the which I will appear unto you.”
1. In the first place, then, we will consider THE QUESTION WHICH JESUS CHRIST
PUT OUT OF HEAVEN TO PAUL.
First, notice what a personal question it was, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?”
When I preach to you, I am obliged to address you all as an assembly. It is not possible for
me, except on rare occasions, to single out an individual and describe his character,
although under the hand of the Spirit it is sometimes done. But in the main I am obliged to
describe the character as a whole and deal with it in the mass. But not so our Master. He
did not say out of Heaven. “Saul, why does the synagogue persecute Me? Why do the Jews
hate My religion?” No–it was put more pertinently than that–“Saul, Saul, why do you
persecute Me?”
If it had been put in general terms, it would have glanced off from the heart of the Apostle–
it could have been like an arrow which had missed the mark and barely grazed the skin of
the man in whose heart it was intended to find a home. But when it came personally–“Why
do you persecute Me?”–there was no getting off it. I pray the Lord to make the question
personal to some of you. There are many of us here present who have had personal
preaching to our souls. Do you not remember, dear Brother in Christ, when you were first
pricked in the heart, how personal the preacher was? I remember it well. It seemedto me
that I was the only person in the whole place, as if a black wall were round about me and I
were shut in with the preacher–something like the prisoners at the Penitentiary–who each
sit in their box and can see no one but the Chaplain.

I thought all he said was meant for me. I felt persuaded that someone knew my character
and had written to him and told him all–that he had personally picked me out. Why, I
thought he fixed his eyes onme. And I have reason to believe he did, but still he said he
knew nothing about my case. Oh, that men would hear the Word preached and that God
would so bless them in their hearing, that they might feel it to have a personal application
to their own hearts!
But note again–the Apostle receivedsome information as to the persecuted one. If you had
askedSaul who it was he persecuted, he would have said, “Some poor fishermen, that had
been setting up an impostor. I am determined to put them down.” Why, who are they?
“They are the poorest of the world. The very scum and draff of society. If they were princes
and kings we perhaps might let them have their opinion. But these poor miserable ignorant
fellows–I do not see why they are to be allowed to carry out their infatuation–and I shall
persecute them.”
“Moreover, most of them are women I have been persecuting–poor ignorant creatures.
What right have they to set their judgment up above the priests? They have no right to
have an opinion of their own and therefore it is quite right for me to make them turn away
from their foolish errors.” But see inwhat a different light Jesus Christ puts it. He does not
say, “Saul, Saul, why did you persecute Stephen?” or “Why are you about to drag the
people of Damascus to prisons?” No–“Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?”
Did you everthink of it in that light? You have got a poor man who works for you, who
wears a fustian jacket. He is nobody. You may laugh at him. He will not tell anybody, or
evenif he does, you will not be called to book about it, because he is nobody. You dare not
laugh so at a duke or an earl. You would mind your behavior if you were in such company
as that–but because this is a poor man, you think you have a license given you to laugh at
his religion. But remember, that beneath the fustian jacket there is Jesus Christ Himself.
Inasmuch as you have done this unto one of the least of His Brethren, you have done it unto
Him. Has the thought everstruck you that when you laughed you were laughing, not at
him, but at his Master? Whether it struck you or not it is a great truth that Jesus Christ
takes all the injuries which are done to His people as if they had been done to Him. You
locked your wife out the other night, did you, because she would frequent the house of
God? When she stood there shivering in the midnight air, or entreating you to let her in, if
your eyes had been wide open, you would have seenthe Lord of Life and Glory shivering
there. And He might have said to you, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?” And then
you would have seenit to have been a very much greater sin than you imagine it now to be.
You laughed at a little child the other day, because the child sang its simple hymn and
evidently sang it from its heart. Did you know–or if you did not know it then, know it now–
did you know that you were laughing at Christ? That when you mocked her you were
mocking her Master, and that Jesus Christ has set down that laugh in His great book, as an
indignation done to His own real Person. “Why do you persecute Me?” If you could see
Christ enthroned in Heaven, reigning there in the splendors of His majesty, would you
laugh at Him? If you could see Him sitting on His great Throne coming to judge the world,
would you laugh at Him?
Oh, as all the rivers run into the sea, so all the streams of the suffering Churches run into
Christ. If the clouds are full of rain they empty themselves upon the earth–and if the

Christian’s heart is full of woes it empties itself into the breast of Jesus. Jesus is the great
reservoir of all His people’s woes and by laughing at His people you help to fill that
reservoir to its brim. And one day it will burst in the fury of its might and the floods shall
sweep you away. And the sand foundation upon which your house is built shall give way
and then what shall you do when you shall stand before the face of Him whose Person you
have mocked and whose name you have despised?
We will put the question in another way. It is a very reasonable one and seems to demand
an answer. “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?” “Saul,” the Mastermight have said,
“what have I done to hurt you? When I was on earth did I say a word against your
character–did I damage your reputation–did I injure your person–did I evergrieve you–
did I ever say a hard word against you? What hurt have I everdone you? Why are you so
provoked against Me? If I had been your bitterest enemy and had spit in your face, you
could not have been more angry with me than now.
“But why, man, will you be angry against One who has never hurt you–who has never done
you a displeasure? Oh, why do you persecute Me? Is there anything in My character that
deserves it? Was I not pure and holy and separate from sinners? Did I not go about doing
good? I raised the dead, I healed the lepers. I fed the hungry. I clothed the naked. For
which of these works do you hate Me? Why do you persecute Me?” The question comes
home to you in the same manner this morning. Ah, Man, why do you persecute Christ?
What hurt has He ever done you? Has Christ everdespoiled you, robbed you, injured you
in any way whatever? Has His Gospel in any way whatever taken away the comforts of life
from you, or done you any damage? You dare not say that.
If it were the Mormonism of Joe Smith, I wonder not that you should persecute it, though,
eventhen, you would have no right to do so, for that might take the wife of your bosom
from you. If it were a filthy and lustful systemthat would undermine the foundations of
society, you might think yourself right in persecuting it. But has Christ ever taught His
disciples to rob you, to cheat you, to curse you? Does not His doctrine teach the very
reverse and are not His followers, when they are true to their Masterand themselves, the
very reverse of this?
Why hate a man who has done you no injury? Why hate a religion that does not interfere
with you? If you will not follow Christ yourself, how does it injure you to let others do so?
You say it injures your family. Prove it, Sir. Has it injured your wife? Does she love you
less than before? Is she less obedient? You dare not say that. Has it hurt your child? Is
your child less reverent to his father because he fears God? Is he less fond of you because
he loves his Redeemer best of all? In what respect has Christ everhurt any of you?
He has fed you with the bounties of His Providence. The clothes you wear today are the
gifts of His bounty. The breath in your nostrils He has preserved for you and will you curse
Him for this? It was but the other day that an avenging angel seized the axe and the Master
said, “Cut it down, why cumbers it the ground?” And Jesus came and put His hand upon
the auger’s arm and said, “Stay, stay yet another year until I have dug about it and fed it.”
Your life was spared by Him and you curse Him for this? You blaspheme Him because He
has spared your life–and spend the breath which His own grace has given you in cursing
the God that allows you to breathe?

You little know from how many dangers Christ in His Providence protects you. You can
little guess how numerous the mercies which, unseen by you, are poured into your lap
every hour. And yet, for mercies innumerable, for grace that cannot be stopped by your
iniquity, for love that cannot be overpowered by your injuries, do you curse the Savior for
all this? Base ingratitude! Truly, you have hated Him without a cause. You have
persecuted Him though He has loved you and has done nothing to injure you.
But let me picture the Masterto you once more and methinks you will never, never
persecute Him again, if you do but see Him. Oh, if you could but see the Lord Jesus, you
must love Him. If you did but know His worth you could not hate Him! He was more
beautiful than all the sons of men. Persuasion sat upon His lips, as if all the bees of
eloquence had brought their honey there and made His mouth the hive. He spoke and so
did He speak, that if a lion had heard Him, it would have crouched and licked His feet. Oh,
how roving was He in His tenderness! Remember that prayer of His when the iron was
piercing His hand–“Father, forgive them.”
You never heard Him, all His life long, once say an angry word to those who persecuted
Him. He was reviled, but He reviled not again. Even when He was led like a lamb to the
slaughter, He was dumb before His shearers and He opened not His mouth. But though
fairer than the sons of men, both in Person and in character, yet He was the Man of
Sorrows. Grief had plowed His brow with her deepest furrows. His cheeks were sunken
and hollow with agony. He had fasted many a day and often had He thirsted.
He toiled from morning to night. Then spent all night in prayer. Then rose again to labor–
and all this without reward–with no hope of getting anything from any man. He had no
house, no home, no gold, no laver. Foxes had holes and the birds of the air had nests, but
He, the Son of Man, had not where to lay His head. He was the persecuted man, hunted by
His enemies from place to place, with scarce a friend to help Him. Oh, had you seenHim!
Had you seenHis loveliness and His misery united, had you seenHis kindness–and yet the
cruelty of His enemies–your hearts must have melted!
You would have said, “No, Jesus, I cannot persecute You! No, I will stand between You and
the burning sunshine. If I cannot be Your disciple, yet at any rate I will not be Your
opposer. If this cloak can shelter you in Your midnight wrestlings, here it is. And if this
water pot can draw You water from the well, I will let it down and You shall have enough.
For if I love You not, since You are so poor, so sad and so good, I cannot hate You. No, I
will not persecute you!” But though I feel certain if you could see Christ, you must say this–
yet you have still persecuted Him in His disciples, in the members of His spiritual body–
and I therefore put to you the question, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?” God help
you to answer that question and the answer must be shame and confusion of face.
II. This shall bring me to the second point–EXPOSTULATION. “It is hard for you to kick
against the pricks.” There is a figure here. There is an allusion to the ox goad. When the ox
was yoked for plowing, if he did not move on in as sprightly a manner as was desired, the
husbandman pricked him with a long rod that ended with an iron point. Very likely, as
soon as the ox felt the goad, instead of going on, he struck out as hard as he could behind
him. He kicked against the goad, sending the iron deep into his own flesh.
Of course the husbandman who was guiding him kept his goad there still. And the more
frequently the ox kicked, the more he was hurt. But go he must. He was in the hand of man

who must and will rule the beast. It was just his own option to kick as long as he pleased–he
did no harm to his driver–only to himself. You will see that there is a beauty in this figure,
if I pull it to pieces, and ask you a question or two.
It is hard for you to kick against the goad. For, in the first place, you do not really
accomplish your purpose. When the ox kicks against the goad it is to spite the husbandman
for having goaded him onward. But instead of hurting the husbandman it hurts itself. And
when you have persecuted Christ in order to stop the progress of His Gospel, let me ask
you–have you everstopped it at all? No. And ten thousand like you would not be able to
stop the mighty onward rush of the host of God’s elect. If you think, O Man, that you can
stop the progress of Christ’s Church, go and first bind the sweet influences of the Pleiades
and bid the universe stand still instead of circling round those fair stars!
Go, stand by the winds, and bid them cease their wailing, or take your station upon a hoary
cliff and bid the roaring sea roll back when its tide is marching on the beach. And when
you have stopped the universe–when sun, moon and stars have been obedient to your
mandate, when the sea has heard you and obeyed you–then come forth and stop the
omnipotent progress of the Church of Christ. But you can not do it. “The kings of the earth
set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord, and against His
anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder and cast away their cords from us.”
But what said the Almighty? He did not evenget up to combat with them. “He that sits in
the heavens shall laugh. The Lord shall have them in derision. Then shall He speak unto
them in His wrath and vex them in His sore displeasure. Yet have I set My king upon My
holy hill of Zion.” The Church cares not for all the noise of the world. “God is our refuge
and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will we not fear, though the earth be
removed and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea. Though waters
thereof roar and be troubled, and though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof.”
Ah, in your hosts you have not prevailed. Think you, O puny Man, that one by one, you
shall be able to conquer? Your wish may be strong enough, but your wish can never be
accomplished. You may desire it anxiously, but you shall never attain thereto.
But put it as a personal matter–have you eversucceeded in stopping the work of grace in
the heart of anyone? You tried to laugh it out of your wife, but if she really was converted,
you never would laugh it out of her. You may have tried to vex your little child. But if grace
is in that child, I defy you and your master the devil to get it out. Yes, young man, you may
laugh at your shop mate, but he will beat you in the long run. He may sometimes be
abashed, but you never will turn him. If he is a hypocrite you will–and perhaps there will
be no great loss–but if he is a true soldier of Christ, he can bear a great deal more than the
laugh of an empty-headed being like yourself.
You need not for a moment flatter yourself that he will be afraid of you. He will have to
endure a greater baptism of suffering than that. And he will not be cowed by the first
shower of your poor, pitiful, malicious folly. And as for you, Mr. Merchant, you may
persecute your man, but see if you will get him to yield. Why, I know a man whose master
had tried very hard to make him go against his conscience. But he said, “No, Sir.” And the
master thought, “Well, he is a very valuable servant. But I will beat him if I can.”
So he threatened that if he did not do as he wished he would turn him away. The man was
dependent on his master and he knew not what he should do for his daily bread. So he said

to his master honestly at once, “Sir, I don’t know of any other situation. I should be very
sorry to leave you, for I have been very comfortable, but if it comes to that, Sir, I would
sooner starve than submit my conscience to anyone.” The man left and the master had to
go after him to bring him back again. And so it will be in every case. If Christians are but
faithful they must win the day. It is no use your kicking against them. You cannot hurt
them. They must, they shall, be conquerors through Him that has loved them.
But there is another way of putting it. When the ox kicked against the goad, he got no good
by it. Kick as he might, he was never benefited by it. If the ox had stopped and nibbled a
blade of grass or a piece of hay, why, then he would have been wise, perhaps, in standing
still. But to stand still simply to be goaded and to kick–simply to have iron stuck into your
flesh–is a rather foolish thing. Now, I ask you, what have you ever got by opposing Christ?
Suppose you say you don’t like religion–what have you evergot by hating it? I will tell you
what you have got. You have got those red eyes sometimes on the Monday morning, after
the drunkenness of the Sunday night.
I will tell you what you have got, young man. You have got that shattered constitution,
which, evenif you had now turned it to the paths of virtue, must hang about you till you
leave it in your grave. What have you got? Why, there are some of you who might have
been respectable members of society, who have got that old broken hat, that old ragged
coat, that drunken, slouched manner about you–and that character that you would like to
let down and run away from, for it is no good to you. That is what you have got by
opposing Christ.
What have you got by opposing Him? Why, a house without furniture–for through your
drunkenness you have had to sell everything of value you had. You have got your children
in rags and your wife in misery. And your eldest daughter, perhaps, running into shame–
and your son rising up to curse the Savior, as you yourself have done. What have you got
by opposing Christ? What man in all the world evergot anything by it? There is a serious
loss sustained–but as for gain–there is nothing of the sort.
But you say though you have opposed Christ, still you are moral. Again I will put it to you.
Have you ever got anything eventhen by opposing Christ? Has it made your family any the
happier, do you think? Has it made you any the happier yourself? Do you feel after you
have been laughing at your wife, or your child or your man, that you can sleepany
sounder? Do you feel that to be a thing which will quiet your conscience when you come to
die? Remember, you must die. And do you think that when you are dying, it will afford you
any consolation to think that you did your best to destroy the souls of other people? No.
You must confess it is a poor game. You are getting no good by it. You are doing yourself a
positive injury.
Ah, drunkard, go on with your drunkenness–remember that every drunken fit leaves a
plague behind it–and you will have to feel one day. It is pleasant to sin today, but it will not
be pleasant to reap the harvest of it tomorrow. The seeds of sin are sweet when we sow
them, but the fruit is frightfully bitter when we come to house it at last. The wine of sin
tastes sweet when it goes down, but it is as gall and vinegar in the bowels. Take heed, you
that hate Christ and oppose His Gospel, for as certainly as the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son
of God and His religion is true–you are heaping on your head a load of injury, instead of
deriving good. “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me? It is hard for you to kick against the
pricks.”

But kick as the ox might, it had to go forward at last. We have seena horse stand still in the
street and the driver, who had not very much patience with him, has so belabored him that
we wondered how the poor horse could stand still under such a torrent of blows. But we
have observed at last that the horse is obliged to go on and we wondered what he got by
standing still. It is just the same with you. If the Lord means to make a Christian out of
you, you may kick against Christianity, but He will have you at last. If Jesus Christ intends
your salvation you may curse Him, but He will make you preach His Gospel one day, if He
wishes you to do so. Ah, if Christ had willed it, Voltaire who cursed Him, might have made
a second Apostle Paul.
He could not have resisted Sovereign Grace if Christ had so determined. If anyone had told
the Apostle Paul when he was going to Damascus, that he would one day become a
preacher of Christianity, he would no doubt have laughed at it as ridiculous nonsense. But
the Lord had the key of his will and He wound it up as He pleased. And so it will be with
you–if He has determined to have you as one of His followers–
“If, as the eternal mandate ran
Almighty grace arrest that man,”
almighty grace will arrest you. And the bloodiest of persecutors will be made the boldest of
saints. Then why do you persecute Him? Perhaps you are despising the very Savior you
will one day love. Trying to knock down the very thing that you will one day try to build
up. Maybe you are persecuting the men you will call your Brothers and Sisters in Christ.
It is always well for a man not to go so far that he cannot go back respectably. Now do not
go too far in opposing Christ. For one of these times it may be you will be very glad to come
crouching at His feet. But there is this sad reflection–if Christ does not save you, still you
must go on. You may kick against the pricks, but you cannot get away from His dominion.
You may kick against Christ but you cannot cast Him from His Throne–you cannot drag
Him out of Heaven.
You may kick against Him, but you cannot prevent His condemning you at last. You may
laugh at Him, but you cannot laugh away the Day of Judgment. You may scoff at religion.
But all your scoffs cannot put it out. You may jeer at Heaven. But all your jeers will not
take one single note from the harps of the redeemed. No, the thing is just the same as if you
did not kick. It makes no difference except to yourself. Oh how foolish must you be, to
persevere in a rebellion which is harmful to none but your own soul–which is not injurious
to Him whom you hate–but which, if He pleases, He can stop, or if He does not stop, He can
and will revenge.
III. And now I close up by addressing myself to some here whose hearts are already
touched. Do you this morning feel your need of a Savior? Are you conscious of your guilt in
having opposed Him and has the Holy Spirit made you willing now to confess your sins?
Are you saying, “Lord, have mercy upon me a sinner”? Then I have GOOD NEWS for
you. Paul, who persecuted Christ, was forgiven. He says he was the very chief of sinners,
but he obtained mercy. So shall you. No, more–Paul not only obtained mercy–he obtained
honor. He was made an honored minister to preach the Gospel of Christ–and so may you.
Yes, if you repent, Christ may make use of you to bring others to Him. It strikes me with
wonder when I see how many of the very greatest of sinners have become the most useful of
men.

Do you see John Bunyan yonder? He is cursing God. He goes into the belfry and pulls the
bell on Sunday, because he likes the bell ringing, but when the Church door is open, he is
playing bowls upon the village green. There is the village tap. And there is no one that
laughs so loud there as John Bunyan. There are some people going to the meeting house.
There is no one curses them so much as John. He is a ringleader in all vice. If there is a hen
roost to be robbed, Jack’s your man. If there is any iniquity to be done, if there is any evil
in the parish–you need not guess twice–John Bunyan is at the bottom of it.
But who is it stands there in the deck before the magistrate? Who is it I heard just now
say–“If you let me out of prison today, I will preach the Gospel tomorrow, by the help of
God”? Who was it that lay twelve years in prison? And when they said he might go out if
he would promise not to preach, replied, “No, I will be here till the moss grows on mine
eyelids, but I must and will preach God’s Gospel as soon as I have liberty”? Why, that is
John Bunyan, the very man who cursed Christ the other day! A ringleader in vice has
become the glorious dreamer, the very leader of God’s hosts! See what God did for him!
And what God did for him He will do for you, if now you repent and seek the mercy of God
in Christ Jesus. “He is able, He is willing, doubt no more.”
Oh, I trust I have some here who have hated God, but who are nevertheless God’s elect.
Some that have despised Him, but who are bought with blood. Some that have kicked
against the pricks, but yet Almighty Grace will bring them onward. There are some here, I
doubt not, who have cursed God to His face, who shall one day sing hallelujahs before His
Throne. Some that have indulged in lusts all but bestial, who shall one day wear the white
robe and move their fingers along the golden harps of the glorified spirits in Heaven.
Happy is it to have such a Gospel to preach to such sinners! To the persecutor, Christ is
preached. Come to Jesus whom you have persecuted–
“Come and welcome, Sinner, come.”
And now bear with me one moment if I address you yet again. The probability stares me in
the face that I may have but very few more opportunities of addressing you upon subjects
that concern your soul. My Hearer, I shall arrogate nothing to myself, but this one thing–“I
have not shunned to declare the whole counsel of God.” And God is my witness with how
many sighs and tears and prayers, I have labored for your good. Out of this place I believe
thousands have been called. Among you whom I now see there is a large number of
converted persons. According to your own testimony you have had a thorough change and
you are not now what you were.
But I am conscious of this fact–there are many of you who have attended here now almost
these two years who are just what you were when you first came. There are some of you
whose hearts are not touched. You sometimes weep, but still your lives have never been
changed. You are yet “in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity.” Well, Sirs, if I
never address you again, there is one favor that I would crave of you. If you will not turn to
God, if you are determined to be lost, if you will not hear my rebuke nor turn at my
exhortation, I ask this one favor at least–let me know and let me have this confidence–that I
am clear of your blood.
I think you must confess this. I have not shunned to preach of Hell with all its horrors, until
I have been laughed at, as if I always preached upon it. I have not shunned to preach upon
the most sweet and pleasing themes of the Gospel, till I have feared lest I should make my

preaching effeminate, instead of retaining the masculine vigor of a Boanerges. I have not
shunned to preach the Law. That great Commandment has wrung in your ears, “You shall
love the Lord your God and you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” I have never feared
the great, nor have I courted their smile. I have rebuked nobility as I would rebuke the
peasantry and to every one of you I have dealt a portion of meat in due season.
I know that this much can be said of me–“Here stands one that never feared the face of
man yet.” And I hope never will. Amidst contumely, rebuke and reproach I have sought to
be faithful to you and to my God. If then, you will be damned, let me have this one thing as
a consolation for your misery, when I shall think of so frightful a thought–that you are not
damned for the want of calling after. You are not lost for the want of weeping after–and
not lost, let me add–for the want of praying after in the name of Him who shall judge the
quick and dead according to my Gospel. And of Him that shall come in the clouds of
Heaven and by that fearful day when the pillars of this earth shall totter, and the heavens
shall fall about your ears–by that day when, “Depart, you cursed,” or “Come, you blessed,”
must be the dread alternative–I charge you, lay these things to heart!
And as I shall face my God to account for my honesty to you and my faithfulness to Him, so
remember–you must stand before His bar to give an account of how you heard and how
you acted after hearing. And woe unto you if, having been lifted up like Capernaum with
privileges you should be cast down like Sodom and Gomorrah, or lower still than they,
because you repented not. Oh, Master! Turn sinners to Yourself. For Jesus' sake! Amen.
BRUCE HURT MD
Acts 26:14 "And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying
to me in the Hebrew dialect, 'Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me? It is
hard for you to kick againstthe goads.'
Amplified - And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice in
the Hebrew tongue saying to me, Saul, Saul, why do you continue to
persecute Me [to harass and trouble and molest Me]? It is dangerous
and turns out badly for you to keepkicking againstthe goads [to keep
offering vain and perilous resistance].
NET Acts 26:14 When we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice
saying to me in Aramaic, 'Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? You
are hurting yourself by kicking againstthe goads.'
GNT Acts 26:14 πάντων τε καταπεσόντωνἡμῶνεἰς τὴν γῆν ἤκουσα
φωνὴν λέγουσαν πρός με τῇ Ἑβραΐδι διαλέκτῳ, ΣαοὺλΣαούλ, τί με
διώκεις;σκληρόν σοι πρὸς κέντρα λακτίζειν.
NLT Acts 26:14 We all fell down, and I heard a voice saying to me in
Aramaic, 'Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is useless foryou
to fight againstmy will. '

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