Heading in a New Direction - Sermon on Acts 9:1-22

1. Introduction

Here is a story of a massive change of direction – a person out to destroy the new emerging Jesus movement, converted on the road to Damascus, to the person who would become Paul … Christianity’s greatest missionary. William J. Larkin calls this “the most important event in human history apart from the life, death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth”.

What made the difference? An encounter with Jesus Christ!

All people, through the journey of life, try, in their own way, to make sense of why they are here. Some will get it pretty close to right early in life, and despite some ups and downs along the way, they will grow and mature in their relationship with Jesus. Others will either not hear about Jesus, or in the form they hear about him … be unwilling to give him any attention. Such people though will still have needs and ambitions, and some will pursue these vigorously. Often such pursuits will still prove to be meaningless, causing frustration, and leading to addictions and depression.

2. The Damascus Road Incident

Saul’s personality type and life experience led him to be a motivated, driven person. Here was a committed man who just needed a credible cause! He had come from Tarsus and excelled at his religious studies in a rabbinical school in Jerusalem. So, when he was under the impression that these Jesus followers were perverting the orthodox message of Jewish religion, he decided to strike out and strike out hard at the Christians (no half measures with Saul); for this Jesus had claimed to be on a par with God, and his followers were claiming that he was resurrected from the dead – this could not be tolerated.

Yet in that scene on the Damascus Road (north of Jerusalem) with the light flashing, do we sense that Saul has already had misgivings about what his life had become. We read in Acts chapter 7, at the stoning to death of the Jesus follower Stephen … that Saul was present, close to the action, looking after the coats of those involved in the execution, approving of this killing. Yet was there something in what Stephen had said, or in the radiance of his appearance, or in the integrity and courage and faith in which he died, that had unsettled Saul, and planted some seeds of doubt about the direction in which he was going. The last thing Saul heard from the lips of the dying Stephen was, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them” (7:60). {Let us be assured that an offer of forgiveness in the face of a gross offence is the most powerful dynamic in the world!}

Sometimes when we’re faced with people who we might judge to be way away from the Kingdom of God, giving them a whole lot of packaged theology will not be helpful. What they need to experience is a life that exhibits integrity and goes to prove that the Gospel of Jesus has merit. We’ll have to earn the right to speak about Jesus through first being able to live him out (in everyday life).

It’s possible that Saul carried the picture of Stephen in the back of his mind, yet, as often is the case, his unsettled feelings multiplied the violence in his heart; we read in verse 1 about the threats and murder Paul was engaged in (against Jesus followers far and wide). Stephen’s representation of Jesus threatened everything that Saul up to this time had worked so hard to achieve. Saul sought and received sanction from Jewish officialdom to carry out a planned assault on those following the Jesus way, whilst the Roman authorities turned a blind eye. Saul would ferret out Jesus followers who were also maintaining their traditional ties with the local synagogue and arrest them.

This was of course until he met Jesus for himself on the road to Damascus! Having completely bought into the concept that a person could only be acceptable to God through perfectly obeying the religious law, Saul had set himself on a path of disappointment. Once he came to understand the grace of God offered through Jesus, Saul would then be on the path of hope and freedom.

It was as if this was an undeniable encounter with God. The remarkable overpowering light that caused Saul to fall to the ground, the voice that cut straight through into the reality of Saul’s violent heart, the authority that impelled Saul to take whatever action was commanded; the impact being that Saul’s spiritual darkness was now matched and symbolised in physical blindness. It was as if the darkness within Saul could not stand up to the intensity of the light from heaven – the light of Jesus.

Saul would now, having been assisted on into Damascus, have time to think through all that had happened to him. And no wonder he couldn’t eat or drink, given the dramatic circumstances surrounding him. What sort of things would Saul be contemplating?

· All the effort he’d put into defending God, and it seems to have turned out that in effect he was actually persecuting God. For a person like Saul, this must have been a tremendous shock to the system – he was actually doing the opposite of what he was intending.
· That Stephen was right – Jesus is the Messiah, the risen Son of God standing at God’s right hand in glory.
· That through his actions in attacking the followers of Jesus, he had revealed his spiritual bankruptcy – something he must now do something about.

Times of quiet reflection on the incidences of our lives, rather than just continually battling on, might help us learn a little more about ourselves, and gain some understanding of what God might be trying to say to us. Saul, in this time of reflection (v.12), was ready to experience the encouragement that his physical sight would soon be restored – through the laying on of the hands of a man named Ananias, who would be coming to Saul in the name of the Lord.

3. Along comes Ananias

So, Saul wouldn’t be left in this blind condition {both physically & spiritually} for too long; he would be confronted again, but this time a human disciple of Jesus named Ananias would be chosen by God to bring to completion this work of conversion. [In this sense, to be converted means to move from self-centred independence to an admitted dependence on God and mutual interdependence with other believers.]

But we can see in verses 13 & 14 that Ananias was understandably reluctant to obey God due to his knowledge of the reputation of Saul and all the damage he had done. God responds that what we see, hear and experience in the earthly realm may not be the total picture. God knows more about people than we know, and if God chooses or calls someone, even if this doesn’t make any sense to us, then we have to get with God’s agenda. God knew that if Saul would only respond positively to the gospel himself, then he was the perfect choice to confront and challenge the whole of the known world with the truth about Jesus.

Having been so reassured, Ananias was up to the task, and became the human vessel through which Saul would experience healing, salvation and the receipt of the Holy Spirit. In the midst of his concern for his own welfare, Ananias approached the one who would have previously put him in chains, and called him “Brother Saul” – for if God had chosen this man, who was Ananias to do anything other than offer hospitality and ministry. This offer of acceptance and fellowship would have been a powerful encouragement to Saul.

Saul would be in darkness no more … he had become a child of the light, and witnessed to this in baptism. Now the confusion and anxiety had passed, he could eat and drink again. Such was the dramatic change in Saul, and the wisdom of God’s choice of servant, that he soon began preaching about Jesus in the same synagogues that just a few days earlier he was planning on arresting the disciples in. Saul would be allowed to speak in these places due to his heritage and training, yet there would be great surprise when the synagogue leaders heard what he now had to say!

Saul had only been with the disciples a couple of days, so this acute understanding of the gospel of Jesus he had already gained … must have essentially been placed within him directly by God. This was truth that Saul could no longer deny, and already it was just bursting out of him.

4. Conclusion

What other things can we learn from this passage?

(a) We learn that if God can turn around the fiercest opponent of Christianity to become its most courageous advocate, then God can save anyone.

(b) We learn, that despite a past that has guilt and shame attached to it (like Paul had), we can be used in the present and future by God to remarkable effect. Whereas we cannot erase the past, we can be totally forgiven for it, and newly empowered for future effectiveness.

(c) We learn that those who become followers of Jesus are not destined for an easy journey. Decisions have to made, not just with ourselves in mind, but with a whole new ethical framework and God agenda factored in. Jesus becoming the centre of our life impacts us in a whole lot of possibly uncomfortable ways. When Ananias complained to God about God’s choice of instrument being an enemy (vs.13-4), God told Ananias that this would not necessarily be a dream result for Saul – that Saul would not proceed through his calling unscathed by the complexities of life (v.16). We know that Paul suffered much in his promotion of the gospel message, yet look at the results!! This begs the question as to whether we limit our full appreciation of the Christian life through an unwillingness to risk some of the cost!

Mothers' Day Thoughts on Psalm 139

Mothers’ Day is a day of love. A mother’s love for her children. A son’s or daughter’s love for their mother. A husband’s appreciation for his wife. A family’s celebration of their connectedness and mutual care. My prayer would be that you are able to express your appreciation and love for your mother today, even if they are far away, or even if they have departed this earth.

Of course these are ideals that are not always the reality. In families where there is tension, and where there has been abuse, such days as Mothers’ Day, can be very problematical. In such situations, my prayer would be that the followers of Jesus could be the ones to embark on a journey toward reconciliation – “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God”.

Celebrating a day of love reminds us of another love within this universe. The love of God toward us. Also, the love we can have for God. Because God is Divine, the perfect creator, God’s love for us is an undeniable reality. It can’t be suppressed, it can’t be shut off – it’s always been there, it always will be there! On the other hand, because we are human, and because we have fallen into rebellion through our freewill to make our own choices, we don’t necessarily love God to our full capacity.

Some people don’t love God even the slightest amount – for a variety of reasons they have closed themselves off to God. Some will love God at some times, and not at others, depending I suspect, on how successfully they are traveling. Such a person hasn’t really signed on to a true relationship journey with God. Others have committed their lives to Jesus, yet find the road of loving God a little rocky, and their lives demonstrate a degree of instability and inconsistency.

Some people can however clearly have the marks of a two-way loving relationship with God reflected in their faces, and demonstrate this in their neighbourliness and compassion. 16th Century Mystic, Teresa of Avila, wrote that one’s love for God can only be truly proven in one way … through our love of neighbour.

So my prayer would be that we can love God more, because God can’t love us any more than He already does! How can we learn to love God more? I think we learn to love our mother more, often by the example of love and care she gives to us. In the same way, we can learn to love God more by coming to even greater levels of appreciation for how much God loves and cares for us. Even if our earthly mother, who is also only human, has let us down sometime, even a just a glimpse of motherly concern can inform our knowledge of God’s perfect and complete and eternal love for us.

Psalm 139 offers an expression of such love – possibly there has never been written a better understanding of God’s intimate love and care as this. This was the experience of God that the psalmist David had, but I think these words serve to show us the immediacy and the depth of God’s concern for each one of us. "O Lord, you have searched me and known me. 2You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from far away. 3You search out my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways. 4Even before a word is on my tongue, O Lord, you know it completely."

Such intimate interest in our lives! Yet could this be a little unsettling or scary … the concept of God knowing us even better than we know ourselves; and their being no place to hide from God. God not only knows that quiet little word of abuse that we might utter to another, but also the violence that lays behind such attitudes even when they’re unspoken. God knows all our motives and attitudes and personal desires … on the face of it this could be scary … but really it should be quite the opposite! We shouldn’t really have any reaction of trepidation – if we fully appreciate that God still loves us even in the face of such negativity; indeed God loves us and seeks us relentlessly.

The psalmist begins with an acknowledgement that God is fully acquainted with him outside and in, yet despite the undoubted instances of inappropriate thoughts and unhelpful behaviour, God has brought the psalmist to the position where such “searching” and “knowing” is interpreted as a good thing. God doesn’t examine us to bring us down, quite the opposite, God searches us so that we will be built up. This journey of understanding culminates at the end of this psalm (v.23-4), with an open invitation for God to keep “knowing” and “searching” and “assessing” the psalmist’s life, and that this process will be appreciated – because it will lead to “the way everlasting”.

We, with the knowledge of Jesus from the New Testament, know that the ramifications of sin have been taken away by the sacrifice of Jesus on our behalf. This psalmist, many centuries earlier, already had a foretaste of God’s heart in this matter.

God wants to embrace us and protect us from harm. When we go in the wrong direction, God doesn’t want us to be eternally condemned for this, or to watch us on an ever downward spiral, rather love us back under His umbrella. God doesn’t want us to destroy ourselves through continuing to make bad decisions, rather love us into desiring more of Jesus – where the living waters flow. When we are spiritually hungry, we have been given the opportunity of knowing Jesus – the ‘Bread of Life’.

Life can take us to some very dark places … through what other people have done to us, and because of our own poor decision-making. Can you see from this scripture, that this will not be the end, because God has not lost interest in us, He will search us out; God’s love for us has not waned, He has been drawn into the places we have gone and still has claims upon our heart. This is why we have a sense of guilt – because such moral integrity has a grip on us.

We all have at least little holes of pain within us. God wants to fill these holes (these voids) with abounding love. We need to reflect on these needs of ours and let God in to them! This will often require being honest about our problems, and owning up to such holes of pain to at least one other person, seeking their prayer support. Then you would have given this other person the right and responsibility of checking up on you periodically to see how you’re going.

Our minds might have drifted somewhat away from ourselves, to those others who we know for sure need a special touch of God’s Spirit. We need to keep praying for them, that they will be willing to let God address the deep holes in their life. But also, we ourselves need to be reflectors of God’s love and light, so that these others might recognize that there is hope after all! They need to recognize the hope and peace that has been placed within us, so that they come to see that such hope and peace is truly accessible (to them). We ourselves need to drink deeply at God’s well of love.

"13For it was you who formed my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. 14I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; that I know very well." Here is one of the most profound appreciations of God’s intimate connection with a human life. From the moment of our conception, God has envisioned a purpose for our life, and begun to weave and to sculpture a person with the capacity to follow the will of God. This is connected with the Genesis 1 “creation story”, where the birthing of male and female human beings in God’s image was declared “very good”. Here was a soul well prepared for life on earth, and ready for ongoing relationship with God.

Without an openness to God any person will struggle. But when the choice is made to accept God’s loving and gracious presence, then life becomes meaningful. We come in all shapes and sizes, backgrounds, personalities and special abilities, but we all have one thing in common – a capacity to relate to a personal God. Despite the fact that God is the creator of the universe, has wisdom beyond our comprehension, and can be with all His people at the same time, we have the opportunity of getting to know (and being in intimate relationship with) this same God … having His undivided attention.

God already knows how the days of our lives will pan out. This is in no way pre-determined, but a fore-knowledge that will allow God to prepare us in such a way that we will be able to cope, even excel, through all the challenges of life. So just think this through – God knows what we will face, and the purpose we can fulfill, and be constantly preparing us with His nurturing Spirit.

We can get to the point where this psalmist has (in vs.19-22) … so locked into God’s purposes in the world, that we just can’t stand those who oppose God and get in the way. David saw many who were the enemies of God as they oppressed God’s people. This is the background of this disturbing outburst that follows. The psalms of course cover all the emotions of human life – even those that, in the cold light of day (and in the sight of Jesus), might be seen as incompatible with the Gospel.

"19O that you would kill the wicked, O God, and that the bloodthirsty would depart from me— 20those who speak of you maliciously, and lift themselves up against you for evil! 21Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord? And do I not loathe those who rise up against you? 22I hate them with perfect hatred; I count them my enemies." These verses were an honest reflection of how David felt in times of persecution, yet he understood that his way of dealing with this was not necessarily God’s way. It just appears that he could not cope with the level of patience that God was actually exhibiting. Our reactive black and white responses are not necessarily in line with God’s approach to what happens in the world.

In returning to his reliance on God’s thinking (at verse 23), the psalmist would have the chance to be liberated from such destructive feelings of anger and revenge. We can easily find fault with others and strike out at them, whilst conveniently ignoring our own shortcomings. We know that David had a very up and down experience in life; most of us have had an up and down experience of life as well. However, we must always be consciously aware of God’s love and design, and allow it to touch the very depths of our being. In this way, our journey will not disappoint us, but rather be growthful and promising and fulfilling.

We need to participate with God in an ongoing and rigorous inventory of our lives, so that we can truly enjoy an eternal life experience in the here and now. Life is a journey, and actually the travel is more important than the destination, because this is where we can make a difference!

"23Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my thoughts. 24See if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." Amen.