St. Paul, by Gracie Morbitzer
Everyone in the middle of the story had to be converted.
Even the women.
Mary was greeted by God’s messenger and given the choice to accept a calling that would pierce her heart open, and change her life—and the world—forever. She could have said no. By saying yes, she consented to a massive and heartbreaking conversion.
Mary Magdalene left behind all she knew and took on the identity of an apostle, the first one, gaping in wonder at the person in the garden who turned out to be the risen Christ. She could have run away. She chose instead to go to the others, to tell them she had seen the Lord, and to launch a movement.
Thomas was brash, assertive, opinionated, and quick to jump to conclusions and ask incredulous questions. But when he was confronted by the risen Christ, he was astonished, challenged, and finally transformed into an apostle: “My Lord and my God!” he cried, becoming the first saint to call Jesus God. And he did so because he saw the wounds: he saw vulnerability. And he was changed forever.
Peter wrestled with his worst self, and badly hurt his friend, before it all came together for him, and he reconciled with that friend, and finally held the keys to God’s dominion. Later, Peter learned that he was on the wrong side of an important argument (about whether converts should follow Jewish behavior codes) and he allowed himself to be persuaded; he changed his mind; he let the other side prevail.
And finally Paul: a persecutor of the Church, a known and feared enemy, a potent adversary, a collaborator with empire, a self-confident, maybe even cocky scholar and leader. Paul is thrown to the ground, blinded, and terrified in an overwhelming theophany. He can’t make sense of anything at first, but soon he begins to understand the message from the risen Christ: “Get up and stand on your feet,” he recalls Jesus saying. But in another place we hear this command to Paul: “Get up and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.”
“Get up,” the risen Jesus commands. Get up.
And so we see that everyone in the middle of the story had to be converted.
Our faith is not a warm blanket, a glowing candle, a cozy nap under the afternoon sun. We do find comfort in our faith, surely: the repentant person feels the soothing balm of God’s forgiveness; the sick or injured or dying person is held fast in God’s healing and reconciling embrace; God fills our hearts with love and lifts our voices in song. God speaks to our grief, to our deepest grief. Yes. But first, we have to be converted.
The Queen of Saints is first a young woman confronted with a frightful choice. The First Apostle is first a weeping mourner in the garden before recognizing who is calling her by name. The brazen young disciple who sees God is first a confused and chaotic young man. The founder of the Church is first a cowardly traitor. And the apostle who gives our congregation its name, the co-founder of the Church who taught the world how to do Christology, the peripatetic survivor of shipwreck, the person who started mission after mission, inspiring countless saints down to our own day—he was first a scoundrel, a thug.
We are given the dominion of God; we are washed in Baptism, sealed by the Spirit, marked as Christ’s own forever; the Spirit’s flame dances on our heads and fires our hearts; we proclaim Good News in this beautiful place; but first we have to be converted.
What will your conversion be like? I suspect that for many of us, it will be one of two things. Now, you might see your own conversion much differently than these two options, but I’m betting many of us will find ourselves in one or the other of these.
Here’s the first one: some of us might need to be converted into innocent doves. You are cynical, dry, sharp, and confrontational; you are angry, frustrated, world-wise, and skeptical. Or you are actually—sometimes, at least—corrupt! You are all too willing to ignore your own sense of right and wrong to get ahead, and you’re good at rationalizing the corners you cut. You are good in a conflict—and at your best that’s quite useful, because this world is beset with conflict and we need people on our team who can help us out—but you sometimes go too far, and people get hurt. If any or all of this is true for you, then you may, like the wild Thomas or the ruthless Paul, need to have your heart broken open. You may need to melt. You may need to get in touch with tender longings, aching desires, deep needs. You may need to ask for help, or say you’re sorry, or let another leader guide you.
Your conversion will make you innocent as a dove.
As you might expect, the other way to be converted is to be made as wise as a serpent. I confess this conversion rings true for me personally. I hate conflict … to a fault. I avoid it too much. I can forget Brené Brown’s wise counsel that “clear is kind”—that sometimes I need to be direct, brave, even sharp. I can be inducted by white supremacy and patriarchy to be blasé about human suffering, not because I’m a scoundrel, but because I can be soft, I can be fearful, and I just don’t want to enter the arena. Sometimes I trust too quickly and get burned; other times I can be naïve in ways that undermine others. But I recently got a job that calls me to profound conversion in all of this! (And I want to rush to reassure you truthfully that I wouldn’t have gotten this job if I hadn’t done some of my work on this.) It’s just that this is my default, my starting point. It’s my natural instincts, and it’s how I was raised. It’s the cliff I go over. So I’m pretty solid at the innocent-as-a-dove bit. I vibe with the weeping Mary Magdalene. It’s the wise-as-serpents part that challenges me.
In all of this, our discomfort in the face of God’s confrontation is what spurs us to conversion. The communion of saints is here with us, gathering around whenever we are strengthened at this Table, and to a person I think they greet us with this same unwelcome news: you have to be converted. It’s not going to be easy. Get up.
So be as innocent as a dove: let your heart be broken open. Yield to the searing pain of vulnerability. Or be as wise as a serpent, and “starch your spine,” as an old friend of mine used to say (God rest her innocent-as-a-dove soul). Step into the fray. No matter what your particular challenge is, the risen Christ, full of harrowing grace, will knock you to the ground, change you, and lift you back up, making you ready to proclaim the Good News in ways you never dreamed, with skills you never thought you’d have.
Is this too hard? Sometimes it is, yes. We heard Jesus just a few minutes ago predicting that his converted followers would endure great hardships. Even small conversions—like Peter admitting he lost an argument, and conceding that he was wrong—can be wrenching. Nobody likes to find out that they were mistaken. Nobody likes to do something they have avoided, and therefore aren’t good at doing. Few people like to stick their necks out in a way that might cause good trouble. But again, we do have that communion of saints around us, including Paul, and we also have each other. And God is here. Always, always, Christianity is a communal faith: you have to be converted, but so do I. We’ll help each other out. You help me be wise as a serpent, and I’ll help you be as innocent as a dove.
And this, friends, is the Way of the Risen Christ, who appears to us on the road, confronts us, and converts us. Paul our patron consoles and encourages us along this Way. As he wrote in his second letter to Timothy: “Join with me in suffering for the gospel, in the power of God, who saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works but according to God’s own purpose and grace, and this grace was given to us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light.”
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Preached on the Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul the Apostle (transferred), January 29, 2023, at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Seattle.
Acts 26:9-21
Psalm 67
Galatians 1:11-24
Matthew 10:16-22