Leftovers - Acts 9

Happy Monday, we are back with the ERC Leftovers podcast.

Fresh off another full weekend, Summer's still here.

It got a little warm. It's finally starting to feel

like summer outside. Yeah, yes it is.

No, it's true. Cool days are good great message

yesterday we're just rolling right through the book of acts

and we got to kind of AI mean there's been a lot of momentous

moments. Can I use that word to?

Describe momentous moments. That's pretty good.

But we get we get to Paul, we get we get to Saul into Paul and

the the the one that God has chosen to to be his instrument

of bringing the gospel to the early church to the the world at

this time in dramatic fashion. Oh, my gosh, yeah.

I mean, what? I think I kind of brought it up

yesterday. You know, I think some of us

would like to think that we would want a conversion this

dramatic. I don't know, maybe, maybe not.

But clearly God picks his, picks his moments wisely.

Yeah, but, and I love how you brought up Ananias too, though,

that with the whole PR thing, like there's there's no God,

there's no way that I can spin this that makes sense.

There's there's no way I can say, hey, this guy who was

trying to murder you last week, he's fine.

He's we're good, we're good now. Like we got over it.

Yeah, we hashed it out, you know, we did.

We did the bro hug. We're good now.

Like really, I don't. I don't know about all this.

Yeah, so and that kind of brought the question about which

was the greater, which was the greater leap of faith, like

Saul's turn or the early disciples, apostles, the early

Christians having to take now God at his word that that Saul

was now Paul and was supposed to be this champion for the gospel.

One of the things I didn't bring up yesterday, but makes a lot of

sense is that, you know, if you if you're going to question God,

you're good. In some ways, you would almost

expect God to get angry about you like, you know, questioning

him and like his will. Ananias does.

And I think I think God clearly understands, like, you know,

Ananias sees a real threat and it's legitimate.

And so God does doesn't like, rebuke him when Ananias pauses

for a second, he's like, hey, do you, do you actually know this

guy You want me to go to God doesn't say, hey, how dare you

question me? And he's like, no, no, no.

Like he, he gets it. He understands that this is a

legitimate threat. And so he doesn't rebuke Ananias

for asking the question. And I thought that was really

good. But you know, no time to talk

about that yesterday. Yeah, it's a big ask and you

related it to Moses and and that scenario too with Moses.

Moses didn't have all the answers either.

He was just walking on and he objected.

He had these are Are you sure? God, do you know the guy that

you're talking to? I'm not able bodied to to do

this. No one's going to follow me.

I can't really talk to people. I he had every excuse.

This fall, we'll actually get to dig into some of those excuses,

I think, because we're going to spend a couple months with

Moses. So that'll be really fun, yeah.

That'll be great. So we're going to dive a little

deeper into Acts Chapter 9 here on today's episode.

Acts 9 · chapter mention

Before we get there, we're back to would you rather as a segment

this week. And the question comes in kind

of our sci-fi fantasy adventure movie Nerddom, if we can, if we

can say that, would you rather go on an adventure with Han Solo

or Indiana Jones? So.

Both fictional characters played by Harrison Ford.

Star Wars universe, Indiana Jones, pretty much set in, I

mean, our world. Yeah, yeah.

I've never talking about the Crystal Skull.

I don't know how it gets how weird that actually gets, but.

I don't. I don't know if I remember that

specific one first. 3 movies are they Indiana Jones Canon for me

so. That's fair anyway.

Wait, you're not a which? Which one was the one where he

Sean Connery? He's in the third one.

That's the third one. I couldn't remember if that was

the 3rd or the 4th because I was like, if you're not going to

include that one, man, that's it.

It hurts me a little bit because that's the one I grew up most

watching. Right.

No, the first one is Raiders of the Lost Ark and then the second

one, Temple of Doom also isn't really good.

But then the third one is the Last Crusade and then they

skipped like 20 years and made Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

Is Shia LaBeouf in that I. I think so.

I can't remember who the young kid is anyway.

I don't really count. Even Temple of Doom probably

that wasn't it wasn't a great. Movie.

Let me actually I got to ask you a question about the question.

Oh boy. Here's here's the question.

About the question, I think it's fair that because I think

there's a few qualifiers. Well, actually this is even pre

the question kind of. You'd mentioned to me that like,

yeah, your wife Emily was like, hey, this would be a good

question and it is. But let me ask you something

about that. Like my wife, like she, she's

not going to watch Star Wars with me.

That's not happening. Like she's tried once or twice

and fallen asleep and, you know, it's just not her world.

I will say that Lissa is kind enough to like, you know, watch

some of the Marvel movies with me and stuff and she's pretty OK

with that, that fictional world. But like is is is your spouse

more into like kind of the I guess you use the phrase nerd

dump like that kind of no. I can't recall that we've made

it all the way through an Indiana Jones movie.

I think she's endured some Star Wars movies, but no, it's not

her. She can do Marvel like she'll do

Avengers, and that's about it. Star Wars is not something that

will captivate her and maybe kind of Lord of the Rings baby

kind of Harry Potter, but no, that's not her default mode.

I was just curious because you know, you know, somebody for a

number of years, but maybe you don't know that kind of thing

about them. Like, oh, what do you like for

entertainment? You know, what genres do you

enjoy? That's interesting.

It's not. It's not what you'd pick.

OK, sure, but she knows I care about it so she asks the

question. Oh, see, that's, see, that's a

good spouse. Like, hey, I will at least kind

of be into what you're into enough to support you even if I

don't participate. That's awesome.

I think that's actually a really good spouse.

Yeah. Yes, it is.

So now I think there's a couple qualifiers for the question to

properly answer them, because they do take place in different

realities. And one of them is even, I would

argue, a different reality. This is going to be a completely

different country. So, So the way that the Star

Wars universe does hyperspace, I feel like it's just not ever

really feasible for for us to have, right?

No. Matter, the technological

advancements, we can't really travel like that ever.

So are we just throwing that at like we're throwing practicality

out? We're just adventuring in the

fictional Star Wars universe because the Indiana Jones

universe really isn't fictional. It's it's yeah, it's real life.

Yeah, sure. But I think, like, you know, for

anybody who's going to spend any time in movies or books like

this, like if you are not the kind of person who can actually,

I mean, full stop, suspend your disbelief, you're not going to

enjoy these movies and books and things like that.

You're going to have to have the ability to do that.

And I understand that not everybody does.

OK, so I'm going to we're. Suspending disbelief.

OK, that's. I guess that was the root of the

question was are we are we doing that?

Let's just do that. Which would totally, yeah, would

maybe entirely change the appeal of Han Solo then if if

lightspeed didn't work. So.

OK great. So where are you?

You. Know what actually, as I was

thinking about this in in a way that I, I maybe don't want to

suspend my disbelief and like live with me as I am.

I actually I'm leaning towards Indiana Jones.

And the reason why is because like the archaeological things

that he's working through and finding proof for are things

that I am in my real life self really interested in.

And so like, now, do I want to fall into a pit of snakes?

Absolutely not. That sounds terrifying.

Nor do I want to be, you know, chased through a temple by a

giant boulder that is going to crush me if I don't run fast

enough. Like, those are things that I

may not love, but like the intrigue of actually like

finding these things that like we believe are out there and we

or rather in there maybe somewhere in the earth.

Like, that's really intriguing to me.

So I'm right now I'm leaning that way.

So, and with that, my, I think my initial leaning is also

Indiana Jones somewhat for the danger reason, even those

dangers that. You brought up.

I think pale in comparison to the threat that Han Solo pretty

regularly encounters throughout the Star Wars saga.

And what did like the adventures that he was on.

They were more like battles. He's never really any riches he

had were either for I mean, bringing, rescuing Princess Leia

successfully. Pretty much everything else was

things that he smuggled or stole.

So his adventures were pretty much just like running away from

the people who are trying to kill him.

That's that's his active adventures is what I kind of

thought of Han Solo. So.

Well, and he's actually like, if you want to jump over to the

Marvel Universe, if you can make that jump mentally, he's

basically a ravager. He's kind of like Star Lord

before Star Lord found his team, right?

He's he's just a thief. Absolutely.

Yeah, that's all he does. Yeah, and we don't really, I

don't know in the main Star Wars saga ever.

He never has even Star Lord in in The Avengers saga at least

like was tasked with finding the power stone was tasked with

finding something of value. Is am I misremembering?

There's not like, find that Han Solo has that is just this

hugely desirable thing. No, he he ends up being very

much inundated in this like socio political world of, you

know, major wars. And I'm like, I don't, I don't

know that I want that. Let me give you one more thing

that some of people who are listening might disagree with.

I find that his major key companion, Chewbacca, I find him

painfully annoying. I like every time.

I'm not even going to attempt to make the noise that he makes

because it's going to turn off really bad and people are just

going to shut this off if I start.

Your Wookie accent is worse than your British accent.

I mean, you might think, how is that even possible?

I think it would be possible. So I'm not even going to try,

but I just, I, I, I actually went through and watched some of

those movies recently and every time Chewbacca does whatever he

does, whatever noise he makes, I'm just like, Oh my gosh,

please Fast forward like this, this, this character drives me

nuts. Wow.

I know. I think he's more annoying than

Jar Jar Binks. Wow.

Yeah, hot take. Hot take.

I disagree. I disagree very much with that.

There is not a character more annoying than George anywhere.

Anywhere. Interesting.

OK, so all right, Yep. And this is where I knew we

could devolve in the in our in our nerddom here.

We've gone down, yeah, hyperspace theories and

character flaws, side flaws in plot, plot holes in movies, but.

The psychic matters. You got to have one that isn't

like super obnoxious. Yeah, So despite the relative

unexcitement of the proximity of the adventures of Indiana Jones,

I do think they'd just be far more interesting.

I think most of the Han Solo adventures are you running for

your life or running directly into a war zone is is really

what you're doing. So if that's if that's your

thing, I think you can go Han Solo.

But as far as the practical, the actual adventures that are being

had, I think I'm in the Indiana Jones camp.

I'm going to land there too. The only appeal to the other one

is being in space. Right.

Which I don't know that I want that for my I mean.

OK. Maybe in the Star Wars, the Star

Wars world, it's easy. In our world, it still seems

wildly dangerous. Like.

We haven't mastered space travel at all.

So yeah, I guess Star Wars universe, maybe it's fine, but

still, I don't know. I, I, I'm all of a sudden, I'm

instantly thinking about a couple people in our midst who

are going to say, you guys are ridiculous.

How? How could you even think about

choosing Indiana Jones over that?

Like over space travel, Yeah. Yeah, I've got a couple people

in mind and if they end up listening to this, I'm

definitely going to hear. About it on the on the surface,

I think that's the major draws. Of course, why wouldn't you have

an adventure in space? I.

Don't know I'm I'm held back by the significance of those

adventures in space. Yeah.

And I'm also the kind of person who's like, you know what I

don't need to ever do? Like go visit that Titanic at

the bottom of the ocean. Like I'm just, I'm quite happy

being a surface dwelling human and I'm good with that.

Yep. Agreed.

Agreed. All right.

We are delving further into Acts Chapter 9 here.

Acts 9 · chapter mention

Saul on the road to Damascus and just to kind of set up the

overview a little bit more from yesterday, you went through the

1st 22 verses. You kind of covered honing in on

some more than others. But so Saul's still breathing

threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord went to

the high priest and asked letters from him to the

synagogues of Damascus so that if he found any who were of the

way way capitalized, whether men or women, he might bring them

bound to Jerusalem, setting up this whole sequence.

And of course, Paul has been routing and murdering and and

persecuting the early church to this point.

So this isn't entirely out of place, but we get an extra

detail from Luke here. He was.

He wasn't just some random bounty hunter antagonist just

like doing whatever he wants. He's actually tasked here by a

high priest, by a religious leader to go squash this

movement of this early church, right?

Yeah, and we we know historically speaking, that

religious leader would still be Caiaphas.

Same guy who's leading when Jesus is crucified.

Same guy. And so, you know, there's a,

there's a level of consistency there, which I think is helpful

because, you know, had some. Of this hasn't been converted.

No, and as far as we know, that never happened.

I I would be shocked, you know, the lead of the Jewish nation

being converted, that would have really changed everything.

But yeah, it's it's historically, we know that

that's still Caiaphas. And so it rings true that, you

know, if Saul is really pretty adept at chasing down these

Christians or so-called or people of the way, Caiaphas is

probably going to be on board with that pretty.

Quick. Yep, I'll rubber stamp this

thing. You go, You go do the deed, man.

Yep. So but these breathing threats

and murder against that's that's quite a way to describe this

picture of an angry, violent man absolutely convinced that he's

right, right that he's you. You couldn't really come to this

degree of murdering people, right, unless you were wholly

convinced that what you were doing is correct.

And within that, that kind of sets up the context for this

conversion. He's holy rightly in this way of

of Christianity is is wrong. It's evil, probably in his mind

to the point of just it needing to be extinguished and then the

people made extinct from it. And Paul, as Paul, Saul has has

this hatred of those who follow Jesus.

And that picture, that's, that's severe picture.

I think Luke doesn't call it out as that, but for when, when

we're wrapped up in a life of sin, of rebellion of God, Like

that's the same degree to which we are positioned in opposition

to God, right? Oh, absolutely.

Well, and you brought it up a little bit earlier today before

we got on the show. This this sense of like, man,

you are actually actively persecuting God when you do this

not in and I mean, we talked a little bit about that yesterday.

Jesus says, why are you persecuting me?

And we kind of walk through like, Hey, God dwells in those

who trust and believe in him. And that's one aspect of it.

But the aspect that you brought up this morning that I didn't

bring up yesterday is no, you are actively working against

God. And that should be scary.

Yeah. I mean that.

I don't know, man. Like that's.

That's a lot. No, that that cut through me

yesterday. You were talking about the at

the beginning of your message. You're talking about the sins

that we justify and how it's you didn't have to go very deep into

into your mind to think to think of sins that we justify.

But then you followed it up with jumping into this Saul, Saul,

why are you persecuting me? And I just heard, I heard that

personally within these sins that we that we choose or that

we justify or that we get wrapped up in Jesus, just having

that voice to to each of us of you're you're choosing this

thing, you're rebelling in sin. Why are you persecuting me in

this choice? And that just, I don't know,

man, that I know that's not what the words are saying in this

badge, but that's how it cut through me in the moment.

Yeah, and The thing is, like, you know, what does it mean to

persecute God? Well, certainly one of the

things it has to mean is I am persecuting the one who created

me by saying that there is another thing that's worth

worshipping, right? It's idolatry.

The first commandment have no other Godspeed.

You know, so like we have all of this stuff and like we've even

been talking about in the Bible study before our service, we've

been going through Jeremiah and Ezekiel.

So we're, we're in, in very much the, the problem, the main

problem and the reason why God is actually using these other

armies to just destroy Israel and leave barely anything left

of it is because of idolatry. And so as we worship anything

other than God. And, and I think like that's

what that feels like and that's what it sounds like.

God, God is being persecuted. Like I created you, I'm

sustaining you. The only reason why you have

breath in your lungs is because of me.

And now you're going to fight against me.

Are you serious? That's that's a problem.

Yeah, no, that's and that's how it kind of cut through me as

just that active rebelling. Are you actively persecuting me

and the and the choices that you're making in day-to-day

life. And so that was good.

I thought you. Came out swinging.

Came out with conviction. And and.

And went yeah, and went from there.

So what's interesting in the the, in setting up this

background here of, of the lengths that Saul Paul was going

to and even the social support that he had and during word

commentary points out about his background, then this wasn't

this conversion wasn't like a memory wipe reset moment, which

makes sense because I haven't really met anyone who at the

point that they become a Christian, they're, they're

like, they don't have any memory of their life before they came

to faith, right? So of course we don't see that

with Saul and Paul here, but that that means he has, he has

all these experiences still locked away in in his memory, in

his mind. He has this terribleness of this

past life that that he was when he was actively fighting against

Christians. And now he is 1 and I don't, I

don't know that I've ever really processed that.

But it is an interesting picture of what we today can still war

against. It's an interesting reminder of

we still have that life behind us.

We have, we have that old life or the, OR that guilt or the, OR

those things. But with what we know, what we

now know about Paul and the path forward, none of that really

hung him up, right? Like he, he wasn't, he wasn't

anchored to those past sins or those past guilt or that past

life. It was from this point on, this

is my life now. And, and I think there are times

that we can get wrapped up in that we can, we can make excuses

for who we were or how or how we're not qualified because of

what we've done or, or things like that.

And we didn't see any of that here in in Paul's or here or in

any of his letters, any of how Paul talks about himself or how

others talk about him in the New Testament.

None of that is holding him back, despite having having all

that still in in his experiential mind.

Well, and you're completely right.

You know this when when the Bible talks about in Christ, you

are a new creation that that's not just, you know, fun Ted talk

words on a page. No, God calls you a brand new

creation. Now the the thing where this is

actually weirdly positive is let's say you became a

Christian. Your mind was wiped clean of

your previous life. In some ways that would probably

be terribly unhelpful simply because those those things that

we were hung up on prior to our relationship with Jesus Christ,

those things end up being incredibly helpful for our

witness in our testimony of where I've been.

Now I don't get hung up on where I've been in terms of like I

feel guilty or shameful of it. No, I get to look back where

I've been and see and, and now say, see how far God has moved

me forward by his power. Not because like, Oh well, I

just had a change of heart I got, you know, like we, we do

stuff like that and we have the willpower to do it.

Like, hey, I'm tired of not fitting in my pants.

So I'm going to change myself. OK.

But as far as like faith and understanding and seeking God,

the Bible makes it very clear that God is the one doing the

active work and changing us when he does that.

And so to be able to look back and give God all the credit for

where I now sit and where I will sit in another 5-10, fifteen, 20

years, I think that's actually a phenomenal thing that we get to

remember how broken and faulty we were, how much we rebelled

against God, how much we were instruments of sin rather than

instruments of grace. And in all of those ways, it's

actually really good to remember, but not stay there in

shame. Amen.

Amen. I want to jump into in the next

couple verses, actually something that a phrase that

isn't in the original text in verses 3 through 6 here, but is

later on when Paul is recounting his experience to to other

Christians all the way up in chapter 22.

There's something that happens kind of between verses 5 and 6.

He he asked, and this is in the original Chapter 9 text.

Paul from the ground asks, who are you, Lord?

I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.

And and Paul has this response, or at least he tells it this way

in Acts 22. He says in verse 8 after Jesus

asked, why are you persecuting me?

Saul's response is who are you, Lord, what shall I do?

And this is in Acts 22, eight through 10.

And that question that isn't, it's not in the original text

here in Chapter 9, but we can kind of piece it together from

his account later on in Acts 22. Man, that question is, is a big

1. And in that moment, it takes a

lot of faith in that moment, even we don't even have this

whole conversion of him yet, But to ask that question, incredibly

dangerous, incredibly faith filled, like to be able to

sincerely follow through. If you're asking that question

of God, what do you want me to do?

You got to be ready to go, right?

Like you got to. You got to be ready to saddle up

for the response. Oh, that's a yeah, that's a

great way to put that. You know, I've heard so many

Christians, excuse me, kind of jokingly say, hey, don't pray

for patience because then God is going to build the situations

that are going to. Make you more things.

Yeah. But I actually think this is,

this is far more dangerous. It's it's a way bigger and more

difficult question because as it's pointed out in the Enduring

Word commentary, which the show notes are there that have this,

you know, if you dare to really ask God this question, but when

we ask it, you must ask it with submission and determined

obedience, buddy. Yeah, that's a dangerous prayer.

It's a dangerous question. That's what's catchy about that

question. The obedience kind of has to

already be there. That determined obedience has to

be there before you ask it. So if you ask the question and

then your obedience is determined by what?

The response to the question, then you're not, then you're not

asking my question obedience. You're not asking it in faith.

You're not just ready to follow God's leading in that moment,

You're still kind of. Well, yeah, I could.

That works for me. I, I I.

It works. For me, but that's what the

response is. If you're not willing to just

follow what he's what he's answering that question with.

And so that was amazing to me. And I I've never really pieced

that together from him from his later account, like he was even

before he goes to this house and and Ananias, he gives him back.

Jesus gives him back his sight. But like after he's healed and

converted and sent out, he's already asking this question of

obedience in this moment, just from this encounter with with

Jesus. What do you want me to do?

And maybe This is why God knew ahead of time that Paul was such

a well, some, some translations use the word instrument.

I think I used that one yesterday out of the ESV that

that Paul is going to be such a helpful instrument despite his

background, because clearly he had a determined obedience to

what he believed prior to meeting Jesus.

And so God who sees the heart, who knows our character and

understands us more deeply than we understand ourselves, He's

like, Oh no, this is my guy. Like I, I know what, I know how

I built him. I know his convictions.

And so he's going to be my instrument to use.

Yeah. So that that's amazing that we

already see it's not that God had to be validated, but we

can't even as Ananias is asking, we kind of needed some

validation. Well, you know what?

He was already. He was in before he even got

sent to Damascus. He's asking, all right.

He said he's the Lord. What do you want me to do?

You're revealing yourself to me as the Lord.

And he was somehow like Psyche shifted in that moment already,

even before his sight is restored, even before he goes

down this road to Damascus and meets Ananias and all those, and

is in his whatever accepted into the community, which is still

wild. That that.

It's all that that's all that it took.

But and he and he did make it personal like he what what do

you want with me? What do you want me to do?

Another note from this this commentary, he says we are often

quite interested in what God wants others to do.

But the surrendered heart asked, Lord, what do you want me to do?

What? We're not supposed to be

sideline Christians, right? And that's maybe an extreme way

to say it, but we're called to get in the game.

And God was putting Paul in the game.

And when, when his number was called to drop out, the sports

metaphor, like when his number was called, he was ready to go.

I know it doesn't always feel like our numbers are being

called necessarily that we're upward, but we're, we're called

to be active. We're called to be vigilant.

We're called to live with eyes open.

So in those opportunities, in those Holy Spirit whisperings or

leadings, or even we, we talked about last week about the how

the spirit instructed, but Philip still needed to act

right? Like that's that's those moments

that that's those OK, go down this road, you're going to meet

the guy. But when we have those moments

and then that's the point that we got to go that we got to do

that in the in the shore uncertainty of the prodding of

of the leading of God. So what do you want me to do?

Especially when it's directed at you.

Our response should not be someone else's got that right.

It's. And I actually, I'm, I'm just

thinking now, like we just started, it was just announced

yesterday, 40 by fall, which which is a fun, snazzy way to

say like, Hey, we want each individual to look at how God

has crafted them, look at how God has gifted them, and then

ask the question, what do you want me to do?

And so like as a, as a community of believers, man, it's really

important for us to give opportunities for people to ask

that question and then to work out what that question looks

like in their local faith community.

And so I think it's really important that we that we do

that, that we ask the question and that as church leaders we

provide opportunities to have that question answered.

So yeah, we're starting with that within our own the

community here, the Wednesday nights and and Sundays, both

serving the people that make up our church.

But but out of that, I mean the greater goal being OK, how do we

how do we impact our community with this?

How do we have a place that is we use the tagline house for the

broken home for the healed. Can we can we be positioned to

to testify, to serve, to be able to live out that yes, this is

what my life used to be, but now it's this.

Now I'm healed now I'm changed and this is something for you to

be a part of to the same gift of Jesus is is available for you.

Can we can we make it? I'm not and I'm not saying it's

all about like building a shrine or a place here, but we've grown

a lot in the past in the past couple years to the point of we

do need to start thinking about having greater volunteer

involvement. We, we have to shore up some

systems, as it were, that word, like maybe people bristle at

that word a little bit, but we, we do need to have ways of, you

know, what if someone's here for the first time, they're, they're

new or, or they, whatever they have, they have kids that are

coming in the nursery or children's church or they're

dropping kids on Wednesday nights or the, the parents

themselves are looking to get connected with, with other

couples or small groups or things like that's part of

that's part of ministry too. We have to have like those

opportunities ready to go. And, and we do that best, I

think by having the people, you people who've, who've

experienced it, who've experienced the community here,

being able to say, yeah, this is, you know what?

I was new here two years ago and this person gave me a handshake

and invited me to this thing. And now I'm, I'm here to do the

same thing. And, and, and we want you here

and we want you as part of this community.

And we think that there's life changing power in, in the truth

of God's word here and in the and in the Christian community

we have. So it's not just serving to say

we've got a children's ministry or serving that we have, we have

greeters or hospitality ministry or whatever else it it might be.

It's, it's how we serve well. It's how we meet and accommodate

people who don't know Jesus well.

You know, and actually a significant part of my own

personal testimony is that like, OK, so came to this church, you

know, a number of years ago and like at some point God really

kind of broke through to me mentally, emotionally,

spiritually, whatever. And that's and that's great.

And so like I'm, I'm sitting there as a believer on a Sunday

morning. But one of the things that I

cannot deny about my own personal experience and time

with God thus far is that man, my heart was really more so set

on fire for life as a Christian when somebody gave me

opportunities to participate. I mean, honestly, like it was

great coming on Sunday mornings and just like consuming and

taking in what I was hearing. And that was really good.

But at the point that I was able and encouraged to participate,

man, things really started changing for not just myself,

but our entire family pretty quickly when that happened.

And it, it has put us on this journey of like, not just being

a casual Christian. I, I don't know if I'm saying

that right. Not just, hey, I, I, I believe

this intellectually, but like, no, now I'm living this thing

out. And actually going back to when

early Christianity wasn't called Christianity, it was called the

way. And as so we talk about the way,

that's not just, hey, here's what I intellectually believe.

No, this is how I walk. This is how I live.

This is how I exercise my faith in my daily life.

I'm, I'm walking the way of Jesus in everything that I do.

And so, yeah, to be able to participate in what our faith

community is doing, that's pretty powerful.

Yeah, no, it's amazing. And this, this conversion, this

experience that's all had. There's there's another little

interesting nuance. Galatians 111 through 12 Paul

now writing this letter to Galatians, writes that the

gospel that was preached to me is not according to man, for I

neither received it from man nor as I taught it, but it came

through the revelation of Jesus Christ.

It makes it seem like and and there's the little doubt that

Paul, though he was blinded like saw Jesus revealed himself to

him. But he also in in verse 17 of

chapter 22, again, when Paul himself is is recounting this

interaction, verse 17 of 22, he he says, when I returned to

Jerusalem was praying at the temple.

I fell into a trance and saw the Lord speaking to me like he's

He's had almost this downloaded experience of the gospel where

it was just all I don't. Know that's a good way to say

that, actually. Yeah, I kind of get visions of

the Matrix plug in like he was just like he just downloaded the

Gospel one point O pack, but like he not only had this

experience with Jesus, but but it had it.

It was so fast and the impression that Jesus made on

him was just so instantaneous. His life was radically changed

in that moment. There wasn't this trial period

of Yep, sit down with Ananias once a day for two hours for the

next two weeks and then you'll be trained up and ready to go

or, or make sure you meet with these guys and they'll lay hands

on you and Commission you to to go out and make sure they pray

over you and all there. There weren't these qualifiers.

He in this one radical moment and experience, he was equipped

and ready to go just by encountering Jesus, right.

So I think we can also make much to do about nothing.

Yes, there can be next steps things at church.

And of course there's there's questions that we want to answer

and we want to learn more about the Bible.

I understand people wanted to have a deeper faith, but also,

as we've said before, and as we see in this passage,

encountering Jesus and believing that qualifies you to go, that

that qualifies you to serve and engage and share this gospel,

right? Absolutely.

And the, and The thing is like, you know, you can always, you

can always learn more. I mean, I, I think that's true.

And like, even after, you know, years of seminary and stuff,

like, you know, honestly, I learn more every single week.

You know, I even learn more sitting down and talking with

you during this podcast, like, because you'll say things and

I'm like, Oh, my gosh, I guess I hadn't thought of it that way or

hadn't heard that before. So yeah, you can always learn

more. But, you know, I think I've

heard it this way. If if you wait for the exact

right moment to start your family, in other words, like

have kids, you're never going to have kids.

And in the same way, like if you wait until I think I know enough

and now I can go, you know, actually be an ambassador for

Christ, you're never going to do it because there's always more

to know. There's always more to learn.

There's always somebody smarter than you.

And so, you know, depending on what kind of a high bar you set

for yourself, you may never do anything but study and study and

study. And those things are great.

But God calls us to be active ambassadors, not people who sit

on the sidelines as I think you said earlier.

And we have this, so we have this immediate conversion, we

have this three days without sight that he he wasn't healed

of his blindness for three days. And it says he neither ate nor

drank. The thought from the enduring

Word commentary here that this was a humbling experience for

Saul and a time where he must have challenged all his previous

ideas about who God was and what pleased God.

In these three days, Saul was dying to himself.

It would be only after the three days of dying that he would

receive resurrection life from Jesus.

We have this picture. And of course, to live to live

as Christ, to die as gain to to pick up our cross daily and

follow me. We have we have these other kind

of parallels to this idea. He does have this instant

transformation, but his immediate experience following

that is kind of the the deconstruction of the life that

was right that that old life has passed away.

The new has come. We see in this this kind of

three days drawn out, not relying on food or water,

neither ate nor drank. He's blind.

He has no, I mean every everything he knew about his

world, right was, was was sense and sight and touch and rage and

anger and all of a sudden it's just his life.

His world is crashed down upon in humility.

He's helpless. He's he's not gaining

sustenance. All he has quote UN quote.

All he has is Jesus right and and right but but isn't isn't

that the point that we can be brought to where it?

Where it finally clicks when when all we have left is Jesus,

we we see that in Saul's experience here.

And of course, something powerful worked out of it.

Yeah. And you know, nobody, nobody

gets excited about, you know, having very difficult seasons or

times in your life. Nobody gets excited about that.

However, what is exciting is what could come out of that.

It has the potential. So if I, if my bank account is

drained, which I've experienced before, and all the the

resources that I thought I had, which were holding me up, if, if

all those things are taking away, all of a sudden I'm, I'm

going to have to ask the question, is God really

faithful? And it will be answered.

But man, it's getting there, getting to the point where I'm

willing to ask that question, Is God really faithful to me?

Is he going to prove it? Yeah, that's, it's a tough place

to be, but on the other side, on the other side of that is

something fantastic that we would have never known had we

not fallen into that place. Again, I've recounted it before

and I won't do the whole thing. But listen, I and our family

seminary experience was exactly that.

We had all these things holding us up and they were all taken

away financially or otherwise. And then, you know, not that God

wasn't there before, but like he started showing up in ways that

we would have never even thought to look until we had nothing but

him. And that changed our entire it

changed my world, absolutely. And despite this vision here we

also so he gets instruction and go to Damascus to meet Ananias

and Ananias is given a vision and even God does explain to him

a little bit of what Paul's experience.

It's not just hey, there's a dude's going to show up at your

door and he needs your help like God.

God does inform him a little more with unbelievable items.

I mean to to Ananias his objection of I've heard from

many about this man verses 13 through 16 how much harm he has

done to your Saints in Jerusalem and here he has authority from

the chief priest to bind all who calling your name again.

And so this was well known that saw he wasn't just doing this

thing on his own, supported by the religious leaders and powers

that would be. And, and it's it's common

knowledge that that he has this support and God just responds,

this is my chosen vessel, man, deal with it right?

Like. That's, that's, that's, that's a

hard answer to hear. But but I, I love, you know, we

don't get to hear anything else about Ananias after this moment.

And as far as we can tell, and I think the enduring word

commentary points us out is that Ananias is not a pastor, He's

not a priest, he's not a prophet.

He's, he's, he's your everyday Christian.

And yet God uses him in this remarkable way to go lay hands

on Saul, to brave what he knows is an incredibly dangerous

moment. And God's like, yeah, but I'm

going to be with you. And it doesn't matter if you

don't have the right title or this or that.

Like, I can still use you to do amazing things.

And that's exactly what God does to randomize.

He uses them to do this amazing thing and to actually create

reconciliation for an entire community.

Now that I think is maybe one of the more interesting parts about

Ananias is he's the first one who looks at Saul and says, you

know what? I accept you as part of my

community. I'm not afraid of you.

In fact, we are now brothers in Christ.

That's a big leap. And bringing it up yesterday,

like what if somebody had done that to us or our family?

Like the last thing most of us would want to do is put our

hands on them and and call them family.

But that's exactly what God calls us to do.

He calls us to radical forgiveness and radical

reconciliation. And that's, that's a remarkable

thing. And that makes the God of the

Bible very different than any other quote UN quote God of any

other religion. Right.

And despite Ananias initial objections to what's happening,

he after God kind of responds and and informs him of what he

is to do. He does jump in with both feet.

Verse 17 brother Saul and and he came and laid hands on him and

the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road as you came and

sent me that you might receive your sight and be filled with

the Holy Spirit. So there does come a point

again, this was prodded by God and and I still had to take

action. It wasn't the Holy Spirit that

just did the thing. It was the Holy Spirit leading

the thing. And Paul was filled with the

Holy Spirit. He was healed from his physical

blindness. Some would say he was also in

this moment healed from his spiritual blindness, which he

had been to that point. And there's, there's parallels

there too of him being physically blind to mimic his,

his spiritual blindness as well. And he had to cast all of that

off in these, in these three days of yeah, of deprivation

that he had in this experience. He rose and was baptized.

And when Saul could see again, both physically and spiritually,

he immediately wanted to identify with Jesus and the

disciples of Jesus by being baptized.

This was the next step. Why here's water.

Why should I not be baptized? And we're, we're not going to

hang out in this baptism thing forever.

But it, it is. We see this traditional

significance of being washed with water at whatever point in

the an infant in the care of of parents of a Christian

household, a grown child, an adult child, a young adult

middle it whatever it might be. We, we see this as as a pattern,

as a washing, as a declaration of what God has done in your

life. And I do say it that way because

yes, it's maybe you making the declaration, but it's still

about what God has done. It is very little to do with

what we you have done in baptism.

It's all about declaring what is God, God has done in your life.

Yeah, absolutely. We and I and I, it's, it's

interesting that the baptism part, it comes so quickly, but

man, the second that we accept and believe in Jesus Christ as

our Lord and Savior, that is the next logical step.

Like you brought it up a couple weeks ago in your sermon and

it's I, I think it's great to build parties and have

celebrations around this stuff. So maybe we plan it out weeks or

months in advance. Nothing wrong with that, but at

the same time, like the very second that God calls us into

his grace and into his mercy, let's do that.

Let's do that. And so, yeah, I do want to

continue to normalize, hey, if God's calling you right now, if

this is the first time that like you're really meeting Jesus and

let let's let's be baptized, Let's wash away your sins by the

word of God and through water and through washing.

And let's pronounce by the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

that you are now a part of His family because of what he's

done. And that's really the conversion

experience that we see just acted out here in Paul.

It's it's why I believe God chose him as this instrument.

If he, if he could change, if, if Jesus could breakthrough and

have an impact on this life, who was a sworn enemy of God.

There's nothing that any of us have that could be such a turn

out that could remove us from the love of Christ.

He writes in Paul, writes in his letter to Timothy, First Timothy

1. He was a blasphemer, A

persecutor and insolent man. But I obtained mercy because I

did it ignorantly in unbelief. And this reason I obtained mercy

that in me first Christ Jesus might show all long-suffering as

a pattern for those who are going to believe in him for

everlasting life. Paul even acknowledged it.

If he can change me, there's no one beyond saving if I was

changed. So you listener out whatever is

in the past, whatever neighbor or acquaintance or family member

that you might have, none of them are beyond saving from

this. And, and we have this pattern of

Paul's conversion, I think for for the early church in that

moment, for us now today, that that even if God's love could

reach him, there's nothing we can do to separate ourselves.

And and I don't, I don't think we always like hearing this

because we feel the personal effects of other people's sins.

But let's be honest, Paul was a murderer, right?

Hard stop. Like he's, he was a murderer.

And God still says, you know what?

My grace is bigger than that. It's just bigger than that.

And So what, what sin is their greater?

I mean, of course the Bible will tell you that idolatry is a you

know, but like as far as human to human man, you stop

somebody's life, that's as bad as it gets.

And if God can look at that and say, yeah, but my son, there's,

there's nothing that can stop us.

There's nothing that is too big for God to forgive as as we

believe in Jesus Christ, there just isn't anything.

And I think that's an important part of this, this story, this

account to this life of Paul. God simply could have broken

him. God, God simply could have just

eliminated him from the playing board.

So I would also speak to any, any of you out there who either

feel empty spiritually, emotionally, whatever it might

be in in life, that emptiness isn't from God.

It it could be from things that we either justified in our lives

or, or things that we reasonably filled our lives with, because

that's that's what Paul was doing.

And then God emptied him of those things, but he didn't

leave him there. He then had the news of Jesus.

He he had Ananias alongside him. He even says he also had, he

also had physical needs. Obviously he hadn't eaten for

three days, eaten or drank and he did receive food.

After he received food, he was strengthened.

God filled his spiritual and physical needs in this moment.

He didn't just leave him helpless, right?

So God uses our brokenness as as a precursor, as as a prelude to

being filled by the things we need, being strengthened in the

things that we truly need. However long we live in that fog

of, of justification, of of self justification or, or confusing

ourselves of what we might need, God tears the God's ready to

tear that away and fill it with what we actually need.

I think is what we see in this in Paul here.

Amen. That was Yep, absolutely.

I can add nothing to that of substance.

That was fantastic. Do you have anything else to add

of of substance as we wrap out this Chapter 9 here?

Anything else that you wish you could have said yesterday?

Oh, well, I mean, I think you know, you, you get to you get to

verse 20 and you just see the instantaneous He is the Son of

God. Look at that.

He is the Son of God and to whatever extent and degree that

we can say that publicly and in freedom and with joy having our

having our hearts, you know, they've been changed.

That's an, you know, because we proclaim, we proclaim it with

our mouth and we believe it in our hearts.

And so that proclamation, whatever form that comes into

the outside world around us, like it's important to proclaim

that, that, hey, I'm nailing my colors to the Mass right here on

Jesus. And you're not going to move me

off that because I've experienced it, I've seen it,

I'm living it out now. And you know, there's just

nothing that's going to change that for me.

And so accept me. Don't accept me, but this is

what I believe. Yep, and he unabashedly

proclaimed it. He had the freshness of of

having experienced this new conversion.

I think that's that's something that I often wrestle with, or at

least I think especially, especially you and I in our

positions or even if you want to say whatever mature seasoned

Christians, we we have to stay sharp in understanding how how

unbelievers think to in in order to communicate the gospel well

to them. So Paul in this moment still had

that freshness, that life, as we said before, it wasn't erased

from his mind. He still had a very fresh

recollection of what his life as an unbeliever was like, right?

Like so he was still, he was still able to be of like mind,

even of, of unbelievers of the people that he was ministering

to. A I think we have to often

consider that too, even in, in living out our actions, the the

words that we say, we we still have to stay sharp and vigilant

of how to communicate with a world that maybe considers us

enemies. That is not like minded in in

Christian thinking. And interestingly enough, and I,

I don't want to get too far down the rabbit trail 'cause we're

probably getting towards the end of the show, but interestingly

enough, that statistic we brought up yesterday that

168,000,000 self identifying Christians, 168 million people

will also also will also tell you, yeah, I don't know that I

believe that the Bible is the inerrant word of God that I need

to take at face value. And so yes, you're right, we

need to be able to know how to talk to unbelievers with fresh

eyes that remember what our life was like prior.

But we also have 80% of self identifying Christians who maybe

need to hear the authentic message too because they, you

know, they don't believe that the Bible is the inherent word

of God. And that's where we're not.

You and I as a church, we're not.

We're not going to bring ourselves there.

We're not cherry picking or throwing out passages that maybe

aren't culturally relevant anymore or things like that.

There are potentially parts of the Bible that we don't fully

understand. They're not meant to be just

discarded and and castaway. Yes, we are pursuing truth each

week. We're pursuing knowledge each

week in and I'm not, I'm not saying we should just give up

and not try to understand it, but we also hold it above

ourselves. Even the things that we don't

understand There are, I do believe there are some things

just reserved for God's understanding this side of

heaven. Maybe even when we're in heaven,

there might still be things that we don't have.

I feel like we have that conception that once we go to

heaven, we'll just know everything.

I don't, I don't know that we will.

Will we just like be all knowing like God in heaven?

I don't think the Bible promises that.

We'll have all. The time in the world to maybe

ask those questions and learn all the knowledge we want to.

But I don't think it'll be an instantaneous thing.

We're like, yeah, OK, I understand this now.

Yeah. I don't know, probably not.

Anyway, all right, this was good.

We're enjoying the series in acts with you all.

And hey, we got some requests if you're, if you're listening, we

weren't on all the podcast platforms, but we got a couple

requests for iHeartRadio and to make sure that we are on Amazon

podcast. So we were on Spotify and Apple

for sure. We were on Amazon, but I just, I

made sure the RSS feed was working on that and that should

also be filling there. And now we're on iHeartRadio

podcasts as well. So if there's anything else or

people that you know of who want to listen to it that they can't

find our podcast or listen to our podcast on their platform,

just hit me up, let me know. I'll figure out how to get the

RSS feed working for the podcast and we'll do that.

Thanks for doing the technical side of things that I.

I say a bunch of words that maybe a bunch of people don't

understand, but if if people can't find it, just talk to me

and I'll make sure they can. So fantastic.

All right, thanks for hanging with us.

Have a blessed week, Church.