Galatians 1:17-24
17 nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me, but I went away into Arabia, and returned again to Damascus.
18 Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him fifteen days. 19 But I saw none of the other apostles except James the Lord’s brother. 20 (In what I am writing to you, before God, I do not lie!) 21 Then I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia. 22 And I was still unknown in person to the churches of Judea that are in Christ. 23 They only were hearing it said, “He who used to persecute us is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.” 24 And they glorified God because of me.
We have already noted Paul's reason for stressing that he had but little intercourse
of any kind with the other apostles. He wishes to make it clear that he had received his
gospel by direct revelation from Christ Himself, not from any man. In doing so, however,
he reveals something that is of the first importance in spiritual life. Following his conversion he withdrew - or, rather, was withdrawn - from the public gaze. A careful examination of the references in Acts and in this epistle to his visits to Jerusalem makes it seem
likely that the reference in 2:1 to 'fourteen years' is to a time following his conversion
and before he was commissioned as a missionary of the gospel in Acts 13:1ff. What is
the explanation of this lapse of years, exciting and critical years in the young Church's
life which one would have thought needed a man of Paul's calibre? The simple answer
is: God is not in a hurry; He takes time to prepare His vessels. The pattern in Paul's life is
plain: he had to think out the implications of the gospel that had apprehended him, and
this takes time, and intellectual energy of a sustained order. He also needed to unlearn
so much wrong thinking in his past, and so many wrong presuppositions. There was so
much to undo in his mind, before he could be the man God had called him to be.
Above all, he had to get to know Christ, in the power of His resurrection, and establish
His sovereignty in his heart and life. When he came forth from that God-appointed
seclusion, he could say, 'To me to live is Christ'. But it takes time to come to that place;
and, all too often this is what we have never given ourselves in our spiritual lives, and
we need look no further than this for an explanation of our fruitlessness and barrenness
in Christ's service. We have not given ourselves a chance.