Saul of Tarsus was a formidable enemy of the church of Jesus Christ and of the doctrine of free grace. He despised Christ as the way of salvation and he cherished the law as a means of righteousness. When we first meet Saul he is debating and reasoning with the followers of Jesus. He was convinced they were merely simple, deceived fools whose convictions would soon evaporate under his searching arguments and the weight of centuries of Jewish tradition. The trouble was these disciples of Christ were slippery debaters and Saul soon learned to his shame that he was neither able to deny the wisdom of their testimony nor resist the Spirit by which they spoke. 

I was many years a professing Christian before I ever encountered the phrase ‘The Doctrines of Grace’. When I did hear the term and was introduced to the teaching I was appalled at the ‘doctrines’ the phrase encompassed. They seemed to contradict just about everything of the Christian faith I had been taught. Fancying myself a trainee student in the Lord’s school, I was busy learning how to argue against Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons and how to debate with atheists and argue with agnostics. Little had I realised there was such folly within the camp I thought myself a part of.