Written by: Pastor Mike
2/27/2011 5:36 PM 

Today I’d like to write about the penalty box...  If you’ve never been there, trust me, it’s not a nice place to visit.  Hockey players who fight are sent there to hang their heads in shame while their opponents go on a power play.  Indoor soccer players who foul, or worse, kick the ball into the ceiling panels, serve their time in the penalty box as well.  And then game continues without you.  And all you can do is wait.  You sit and watch helplessly as your team suffers.  Seconds feel like hours.  Why did you do it?  Is the referee being fair?  Will your teammates hate you when you return?  Will the time ever come for you to get back into the game?  Is there redemption from this ungodly place?

I’ve often wondered about Saul’s time in the penalty box.  Acts 9:9 says he spent three days there.  Waiting.  And no coincidences here:  Three days, the same amount of time as Jonah spent in the belly of the fish.  The same time period that Jesus spent in the tomb.  Three days in the penalty box.  And during that time the Bible says he spent it...

Acts 9:9... May Blepown  kai ouk ephagen oude epein.

A literal translation would read something like:

May (Not) Blepown (Seeing) kai (and) ouk (neither) ephagen (ate) oude (nor) epein (drank)

Now, sometimes in Greek, the language is tied together loosely, and sometimes it is tied very tight.  Grammatically, Luke has tied a very tight knot here.  He used a series of verbs and conjunctions to do it.  This provides us with a clear picture of Saul’s time in the box.

Let’s start with the verbs, which indicate the action of the passage, or, in this case, the lack thereof.  Blepown is written here as a present active participle.  As a general rule, a present active participle gets translated with “–ing.”  However, both ephagen and epein are written as aorist active infinitives.  The Aorist in Greek is like our English past tense.  Now, you may wonder why these verbs are written in different tenses (past and present) to describe the same situation.   This is called contemporaneous action.  Think of it like this:  The participle is driving, and the other two verbs are acting like passengers in the back seat.  The three do go together, but the participle is the one in control.  Luke, the author of Acts, wanted to tell us that for the duration of Saul’s blindness, he did not eat or drink.  So he wrote it this way.  But that’s not all he did.

Luke also used the negative correlative conjunctions ouk... oude.  This is Greek for “neither... nor.”  This structure, coupled with the verbs, ties the grammar in a very tight knot.  So Luke is not telling us that Saul lost his appetite or skipped a meal or two during this time in the penalty box.  He is saying that Saul didn’t touch food or water any more than he was able to see.  For the entire three days, nothing... No food, no water, no seeing...  Just waiting.

When you read a passage like this, it’s fair to ask: What drove Saul to behave like this?  Is this a fast?  Or is it brokenness of spirit?  Is he seeking God?  Or trying to punish himself?  Is he worried about his regaining his sight?  Or overcome with the vision on the road to Damascus?  Or is he filled with regret for his malicious treatment of Christians?

As always, good commentators provide valuable perspectives.  Concerning this verse, MacArthur says, “Saul needed time to reflect on the transformation of every aspect of his life... Although salvation is an instantaneous transformation from death to life, darkness to light, it takes time to plumb the depths of its meaning and richness...” (NT Commentary, p. 271).  Robertson suggests, “It was a crisis for Saul... These must have been days of terrible stress and strain,” (NT Word Pictures, p. 118). And Toussaint, “Three days of blindness, fasting, and praying were a time of waiting,” (Bible Knowledge Commentary, p. 376).  Personally, while I agree in principle with these insights, I can’t help but think that regret played a major role in this time of anguish.

So here is a closing thought... While salvation provides instantaneous justification for all sins, sometimes in life, there are still consequences to be had.  Remember, justification is a legal term.  It does not mean you and I are “not guilty.”  We are guilty.  Justification means we believers in Jesus Christ have been declared righteous in spite of our sin, because another has willingly served our sentence.  There is a big difference between “not guilty” and “declared righteous”.    For example, the sins of an IV drug user are washed white as snow when they come to Christ, but they still have to deal with the consequences of Hep-B.  While Saul was blind, perhaps it was the recent images of those he had executed for the faith that stole his appetite away?

The funny thing is, there is no shortage of penalty boxes in life.  I can think of a plenty of places that could qualify.  Police department.  Principal’s office.  Emergency room.  Separation.  Church discipline.  Unemployment.  And the list goes on.  (Maybe not all of these in every case, but you get the point.)  The question is, when you find yourself or someone else in the penalty box, what will you do?

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