Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary Acts 22:21

"And he said unto me, Depart: for I will send thee forth far hence unto the Gentiles." — Acts 22:21 (ASV)

Paul’s commission at Damascus to be God’s witness “to all men” was reaffirmed and amplified in a vision he received as he was praying in the temple, which most likely occurred on Paul’s return to Jerusalem three years after his conversion (cf. 9:26–29; Galatians 1:18–19). At that time, Luke tells us, Paul faced opposition from the Hellenistic Jews of the city, who viewed him as a renegade and sought to kill him (cf. 9:29). At a period in his life when he most needed divine direction and support, the same heavenly personage he met on the road to Damascus, the risen and exalted Jesus, directed him to “leave Jerusalem immediately, because they will not accept your testimony about me” (v.18). More important, the same exalted Jesus also ordered him: “Go, I will send you far away to the Gentiles” (v.21). Jerusalem, therefore, Paul says, was his intended place of witness, and the temple was God’s place of revelation. Nevertheless, his testimony was refused in the city, and by revelation his earlier commission “to all men” was to have explicit reference to Gentiles, those who are “far away” (GK 3426; cf. comments on 2:39).