Acts 26:19

Whither, O Christ? The vision did not say; nor did Paul ask, but started on the way. If Paul had asked, and if the Lord had said; if Paul had known the long hard road ahead; if with the heavenly vision Paul had seen stark poverty with cold and hungry mien, black fetid prisons with their chains and stocks, fierce robbers lurking amid tumbled rocks, the raging of the mob, the crashing stones, the aching eyes, hot fever in the bones, perils of mountain passes wild and steep, perils of tempest in the angry deep, the drag of loneliness, the curse of lies, mad bigotry’s suspicious peering eyes, the bitter foe, the weakly, blundering friend, the whirling sword of Caesar at the end—would Paul have turned his back with shuddering moan and settled down at Tarsus, had he known? No! and a thousand times the thundering No! Where Jesus went, there Paul rejoiced to go. Prisons were palaces where Jesus stayed; with Jesus near, he asked no other aid; the love of Jesus kept him glad and warm, bold before kings and safe in any storm.

Whither, O Christ? The vision did not say. Paul did not care. He started on the way. AMOS R. WELLS