Acts of the Apostles Chapter 9 Summary

Saul Is Blinded By The Light

Meanwhile, Saul is still hard at work persecuting Christians. Seriously, Saul, give it a rest.
He's on his way to Damascus to find even more Christians he can throw in jail, when he sees a light suddenly flash from Heaven.
Saul falls on the ground and hears a voice—"Saul, why do you persecute me?" Um, good question.
Saul asks the voice to be more specific. Who's calling, please?
"It's me, Jesus" the voice tells him. Seriously. Did you not see that coming? It's called dramatic irony.
Anyhow, the voice of Jesus tells Saul to keep heading towards the city and that he'll let him know what to do. Maybe stop persecuting people? Just a thought.
Saul gets up and—holy crud—he's blind. Luckily, he's traveling with a couple other guys (really confused guys who just heard a crazy voice from Heaven). They help him into Damascus, but it's three days before Saul can see anything again.

There just so happens to be a follower of Jesus named Ananias (not the greedy, dead one from before… a different guy) living in Damascus.
Ananias has a vision where God tells him to go find Saul and restore his sight.
Ananias is a tiny bit skeptical, though. Um, God, hasn't Saul been rounding up Christians left and right? Are you sure I should just walk in there and introduce myself and heal him in the name of Jesus?
Yeah, it's totally cool, God tells him. He's gonna bring my message to the Gentiles and all that good stuff. And he's gonna suffer quite a bit, too. I kind of dig irony.
So Ananias goes and heals Saul and "something like scales fell from his eyes." Gross.
After that, Saul is baptized and eats a little and then starts to feel better. Heavenly visions are a like a really nasty flu sometimes.

Once he feels better, Saul rushes out into the synagogues and starts talking up Jesus.
The people are pretty astonished. Didn't Saul come to town to arrest Christians? Now he's become one? Weird.
Naturally, after Saul's been preaching for a while and convincing lots of people, the religious authorities hatch a plot to kill him. Don't these guys have anything better to do with their time?
The disciples find out about it, though, and sneak Saul out of town at night by lowering him down the wall outside the city in a basket.
Those disciples are always thinking.
Saul makes his way to Jerusalem to meet up with his fellow disciples, but they're a little bit skeptical. Um, these are the same guys you were just trying to get killed a while ago, Saul.
Barnabas vouches for him in front of the apostles, which puts them a little more at ease. You know what really puts them at ease though? Sending Saul home to Tarsus to do some preaching there instead.

Peter's also having his own adventures all over the country. He heals a man who's been paralyzed and converts loads of folks in the process. Score!
When he hears that a disciple named Tabitha (her Greek name is Dorcas) has died in Joppa, he rushes there and brings her back to life. Whoa. Peter has got Lazarus-level healing powers!