In Acts chapter 9, I'm going
to read verses 1 through 6. And then we're going to work
from our outline again from points 3 forward if you have the outline. Acts 9, verse 1-6, And Saul,
yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples
of the Lord, went unto the high priest and desired of him letters
to Damascus, to the synagogues, that if he find or found any
of this way, whether they were men or women, he might bring
them bound unto Jerusalem. And as he journeyed, he came
near Damascus, And suddenly there shined round about him a light
from heaven. And he fell to the earth, and
he heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest
thou me? And he said, who are you, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus,
whom you persecuted. It is hard for you to kick against
the prick. And he trembling, and astonished
said, Lord, what will thou have me to do? And the Lord said unto
him, arise and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what
thou must do. And verse 7 will be an appropriate
verse to close with. And the men which journeyed with
him stood speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man. Thus is the reading of God's
word. In your outline under point number three, which is where
we are now contemplating this interruption into Saul's life. His name is still Saul, as we've
said before, as we contemplated last week, Saul under the rubric
of an emissary of the devil. We saw how that he played a major
role, a major role in opposing the church of the living God,
a major role. And as I was working through
some information around Saul's zeal and Saul's passion and Saul's
drive to exterminate the church, I was reminded of what happens
when religion without Christ is given free reign to exercise,
invent itself. religion without Christ. Saul
was a very religious man. You guys know that. In fact,
he was of the Sanhedrin. He was a Pharisee of the Pharisees,
as he noted himself. He grew up under Gamaliel, one
of the prominent theological schools of that time. Gamaliel
was a conservative scholar in the Hebrew. And so Saul was very
educated, very knowledgeable, and very, very, very zealous. But what we must mark is that
this zeal, as he even articulated in Romans chapter 10, was without
knowledge. And zeal without knowledge is
dangerous. So a person may be passionate,
but if your passion is not anchored, anchored, anchored in principles
that are rooted in the will of God, your passion actually can
be used by the enemy for great harm. And if you will, I want
you to see Saul as a personification of the whole nation of Israel
and its hostility against Jesus Christ. You have to actually
see it that way for several reasons. The personhood of Saul is very
unique because he actually defined himself as being of the tribe
of Benjamin. And being of the tribe of Benjamin,
Saul had a sense of pride about himself. Because Benjamin was,
he was the baby boy of Jacob. He was a child of Jacob's love.
In fact, Benjamin being the son of his joy. Benoni was the way
his mother wanted to name him because she had him in sorrow.
And she died having Benjamin. and so jacob named him benjamin
because that was the son of his joy and it was the son of rachel
whom jacob loved remember that that twisted uh relationship
between jacob uh leah and rachel and rachel has joseph and rachel
has benjamin right so benjamin becomes the 12th child of the
12 nations, 12 children of Israel, 12 boys, one girl, Dinah. And
Benjamin is a very interesting character throughout the scriptures.
And we did a biographical of Benjamin. What we would find
about Benjamin is that Benjamin was always a warrior. Benjamin was always one who was
proficient in fighting. Benjamin fought a lot. If you
were to find any book in the Bible which really would highlight
that, it would be two texts. One would be the book of Judges.
You can find Benjamin in the book of Judges. And for those
of us who are going through the book of Judges in our men's meeting
on Saturdays, you will see this when we get there. Benjamin was
a tribe out of which Saul, the first king of Israel, came. Now
Saul was a warrior type as well. He was very aggressive, very
assertive. And the Benjamites were known for being able to
handle weapons of war, especially slings. And they like fighting. And so sometimes the fruit doesn't
fall far from the tree. And so the apostle Paul was zealous
like his patriarchal fathers, the Benjamites. And in fact,
there was a prophecy in the book of Genesis by Joseph concerning
Benjamin. The latter part of Genesis 49,
Joseph says of Benjamin, Benjamin shall be like a wolf on the prowl
devouring its prey, rising up to devour and at night dividing
the spoil. This was Jacob's prescient vision
of the attitude and character of this boy when they were going
to the land of promise, from Egypt to the land of promise,
another 400 years or so from that prophecy
given by Jacob. I say that to say this, when
you look at this man Saul and you notice what the text tells
us that he did, He went to the high priest to get letters. Look
at verse two. He desired letters, letters of
the high priest to Damascus. I told you last week, Damascus
was about 150 miles away from Jerusalem. But Damascus was a
prominent city before Jesus came. And Damascus is a prominent city
now in the midst of the news and the mess and the hoopla that's
going on in the Middle East. Damascus was always a very central
city for rulers to exercise dominion and power. And the Jews resorted
to Damascus frequently for refuge. And in this context, the Jewish
Christians had gone to Damascus to escape the persecution that
we read about in Acts chapter 8, verse 1. Look at chapter 8,
verse 1. Just in case you're new, you
need to know the context so that as we go into our text, we can
benefit. And Saul was consenting unto
Stephan's death. Remember that? And at that time,
there was a great persecution against the church. Word they're
great persecution is the only place where you have the two
words great persecution tied together We keep talking in our
end time Sort of emphasis about great persecution are the great
tribulation and Well, the term the Great Tribulation is not
found per se anywhere in the New Testament with the exception
here great persecution and one time in the book of the Revelation
out of Great Tribulation not out of the Great Tribulation
out of great or mega tribulation but the text says here and At
that time there was great persecution against the church, which was
where at Jerusalem And they were all scattered abroad throughout
the region of Judea and Samaria, which is where Damascus is in
the region of, except the apostles. And so now going back to Acts
9, how zealous must you be to want to hunt Christians down
150 miles away from Grand Central Station? How passionate must
you feel to chase them down? Well, this doesn't surprise us
if in fact, Saul bears the attribute of a wolf pursuing its prey as
far as it needs to go. If you know anything about wolves,
when they're hungry, they will follow their prey for miles and
miles and miles to get them. But this is a description of
false religion. Remember what our master said
in Matthew chapter seven, beware of wolves who come in sheep's
clothing. devouring wolves, seeking the
sheep to destroy them. And so our text is alluding to
this passion on the part of Saul, of which he agreed himself when
he reflects upon his own conversion in 1 Corinthians 15. Over in
1 Corinthians 15, this is what we mark. I just want you to see
this because once we look at the narrative in Acts 9, go to
1 Corinthians 15, And think through what's taking place. A lot of
theological reflection has to be considered. And I just want
to do a biographical. How much of an impact did Saul's
coming into contact with the Lord Jesus Christ made in his
life? In 1 Corinthians chapter 15,
this is what he also stated as he reflected upon God having
saved him. He says over in verse, 7 describing
the witnesses of Christ after his resurrection and after that
he was seen of James and then of all the Apostles and Last
of all he was seen of whom me also Saul says, I was the last
one to see him of the apostolic order. Now watch what he says.
As of one born out of what? Due time. Meaning Paul is saying,
I have no reason to be among the apostolic band. I was, as
it were, a stillborn child and God still adopted me and brought
me in. I am perfectly aware that my
behavior prior to my conversion was that of an antichrist personage
and I have no intrinsic right to be among the apostolic band.
And the reason why I share this with you is so that you can know
that it wasn't something that Saul or Paul took lightly when
he thought about how he persecuted the church before he was saved. He really bore a great weight
of personal guilt as to what he did. Now notice the language.
He says, as one born out of due time, verse nine, for I am the
least of the apostles. Do you see that? This is what
he says about himself. I am the least of the Apostles
now watch the language That am not worthy to be called or meet
are Appropriate are fitted to be called an apostle Ladies and
gentlemen what's going on in his head? He is keenly aware
that God has in his free grace elected Saul to be part of the
band of New Testament apostles over against a resume that none
of us would have accepted. Saul knew that deep down in his
heart, not only did he persecute the Christians, he blasphemed
them and he forced them to blaspheme God. Now, this ought to teach
us something about how we are to negotiate Sin nature over
against the grace of God in Christ So I'll use this as a point of
application for those of us who are true believers and honest
with ourselves We know that we are sinners But you have to know
more than that you are a sinner because you can be an arrogant
sinner and go to hell You have to know more than I'm just the
sinner. You have to actually be an honest sinner and be a
humble sinner, and be a real humble sinner before God, knowing
that you don't deserve the grace that you're in. That's the disposition
and attitude that a mature believer in Christ walks with. And it's
a tension because what this awareness does for us as believers is it
keeps us from forgetting what we are by nature, And how apart
from God's grace, we could still act as heinous as we were prior
to conversion. This is true. And what restrains
the believer from going overboard and clowning, we use that colloquialism
clowning, is him or her or them remembering how vile they were
when God's hand of grace was not on their life. And how we
blasphemed God and stuck our fist in God's face cussed him
out and cussed everybody like him out and dared anybody to
stop us from doing what we did. And God in his mercy still touched
us anyway. So the Puritans would say that
it is a healthy disposition for the man or the woman to remember
always the pit from which you were dug and the rock from which
you were hewn. and to hold that coexistingly
or simultaneous with the fact that you are the righteousness
of God in Christ. It is wholly appropriate to know
what you are in Christ and what you are in yourself. This will
keep your feet on the ground. Because in some of our theological
circles, we swing too far to one end. Woe is me, woe is me,
woe is me, like God doesn't live. Then on the other end, I am the
righteousness of God. And I've told you, whenever you
use that phrase, I am the righteousness of God, and don't add the preposition
and the proper noun in Christ, you are stealing God's glory.
Because you are not righteous in yourself. None of us are righteous
in ourselves. We are only righteous in Christ. And that's the place wherein
we stand. And the apostle Paul's theology
poured out of that tension. The whole of his New Testament
theology poured out of this tension, out of this reality. I am simultaneously
simple and righteous at the same time. And my hope is fully in
the person and work of Jesus Christ, from which I am given
the energy to do what I do. So he says here, I'm the least
of the apostles. And I am not fit to be called
an apostle because I persecuted the church. Do you see that? You guys see that last line?
This is many, many years after he had persecuted the church,
that he's writing letters to the churches that he's established,
that he loves. and he's writing this letter
to them. I have no reason to be writing to you as an apostolic
authority because I persecuted the church. Now, that phrase
persecuted the church is going to be key in our study because
he's echoing what his master said he had done. He's remembering
that crucial revelation that the master revealed to him of
his behavior at that point of his conversion. And he's echoing
it now. He's echoing it now. So let's
go back, because what I want you to see in the conversion
of Saul to Paul is what it means to truly be saved. That's what
we're going to take our time and develop. And we are on sensitive
ground when we talk about regeneration, which is a theological term,
being born again. It's a Christian colloquialism
that comes out of the scripture or what it means to be saved
in the experiential sense, a critical truth not believed by most today. Nevertheless, essential to your
salvation, except you be born again, you will not enter into
the kingdom of God, you will not see it, you will not comprehend
it, you will perish under the wrath of God. So the whole doctrine
of rebirth is a critical doctrine that every professing Christian
ought to take with the utmost seriousness. So now we'll get
a chance to work this through. I'm going to be making a number
of propositions We'll go to a number of scriptures because these next
four verses verses three and following Is going to describe
to us his conversion and it's going to inform us as to what
conversion really is He went and got letters to go to the
synagogues so that in the synagogues he would find christians What
kind of christians would these be? jewish christians Because
only Jewish Christians would be in synagogues, right? And
they would be Jewish Christians in the synagogues in obedience
to whom? Christ. Because they would still be going
into Jerusalem to preach the gospel to their Jewish brethren
in the synagogue. Going into all the world to preach
the gospel. Beginning where? At Jerusalem. So they are agents
for Christ. in an Old Testament system that's
already defunct, but still operating as if Jesus didn't come, looking
for an opportunity to witness and evangelize their Jewish brethren. That means they understand their
mission. They have more going for them
than we do today. They understand their call was
to share the gospel with the very people that crucified Christ.
What a powerful, powerful mindset. I am going to church in order
for God to open the door for me to share the gospel with my
Jewish brother, the very Jewish people that are killing Christians
from Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and now Damascus. Are you hearing
me? So witnessing requires a level
of boldness that says, I actually believe the gospel enough to
die for the claims of Christ because I love both God and man. And so we see the enemy working
through Saul to send him all the way to Damascus to bind and
bring back to Jerusalem and change those who are professing to be
Christians. This is very serious, isn't it? This is very serious,
particularly if you and I are sensitive to and aware of the
persecution that's going on at this present time around the
world, we're Christians. And as I've said so many times,
you and I are so bereft of the real danger and ominous nature
of persecution because we're free from it in America. I mean,
at best, we watch our televisions or get on the internet and we
see a clip here or there, and then we go on about our merry
business. When what we should be doing is praying all the time
for those people and then preparing for it to come here. Because
Jesus said in John 16, 33, in the world, you will have tribulation.
If they did it to me, they'll do it to you. And so the Christian
church ought not to think, well, that's some unique dispensation
that's going on with them that has nothing to do with us. It
does have every, every has everything to do with us since we are the
body of Christ. They are members of the body
as we are, and we ought to be praying for them as they would
pray for us. And so as we reflect upon the
text, this is what I want you to know. Verse three, And as
he journeyed, that is Saul, he came near Damascus, that long
run, and he was drawing near. He was not in Damascus. He was
drawing near to Damascus. And suddenly there shone round
about him a light from heaven. Do you guys see that? Powerful,
powerful, powerful, powerful, powerful piece of information
of which liberal scholars do not believe. They do not believe
that this event actually occurred. Either Saul fabricated this lie,
embellished upon an anomaly of a physical event that really
did not amount to this much sort of startling phenomenon, or Luke
was just having his way when he gave us this information.
Liberal scholars do not believe that there was a special phenomena
whereby Saul was interrupted Intercepted by the presence of
his glory and yet ladies and gentlemen, this is exactly what's
happening the presence of his glory The presence of God's glory
so a number of things are going to be elicited from our text
first and foremost in your outline under point number three the
imposition of a sovereign power the imposition of a sovereign
power Power. Do you see that? That's back
to our PowerPoint. Keep our PowerPoint up there.
The imposition of a sovereign power. So now you, you'll work
with me through this, uh, through this, which are outlined. Why
do I say an imposition of a sovereign power? Because we are still dealing
with the tension between two authorities, a false authority
and God's true authority. Who is the false authority? The
high priests and the Sadducees and the Pharisees hunting down
Christians. to extirpate the message of the
gospel and discredit the claims of Christ and to reverse the
impact of his resurrection, ascension, and the spirit of the gospel.
So the devil is working through the high priest and the rulers
to stop Christianity everywhere because it's spreading. So here
comes Saul, the emissary of the leadership of Israel, this false
authority, and he's intercepted by a sovereign imposition. Do you see it? A sovereign imposition. The imposition of a sovereign
power. And what I would say under that
consideration are three things, and there are many here. One
is Saul was operating according to his own will, his own volition,
and his own bent against the truth. And Saul now stands for
you and me as a model of every human being who does not know
God in a saving way. So we'll start right here. You
and I are no different than Saul by nature until we're born again.
And prior to our rebirth, we are hostile towards God. Prior towards salvation, we are
hostile towards God. In fact, the Bible is very clear
that the carnal mind is enmity. Romans 8, 7. That means it's
hostile, the carnal mind. So Saul serves as just someone
for whom the reins have been let go, and he's having his way
at those who are closest to God, and that is Christians. He's
a God-hater at this point. And his will is to destroy them.
Now, if Saul had his way, he would kill every Christian he
possibly could. And with that kind of heart, the only person
that could stop him would be God, because he's been given
right to do what he did. But what I would assert to you
is this, every man, woman, child, and boy are just like him. None
of us come to God on our own. None of us desire God by nature.
None of us serve God in an unregenerate, unsafe state happily. We're all
running from God. If we're not running from God,
we're fighting God. We're opposing God, we're resisting God. Do
you guys believe that? By nature, I'm just like Saul.
Just by nature. Now, Saul has a little added
help, granted. Like I said in our opening message,
our opening points, religion without Christ is very aggressive,
very virulent, very hostile, religion without Christ, because
it has to sustain its own life. And the Christian gospel demolishes
every other religion from this premise that the Christian gospel
claims to be the true gospel. And that salvation is exclusively
through this one means, and that is Jesus Christ. And so why wouldn't
religion under the power of the devil seek to destroy the true
gospel? And even you and me, when we
operate out of a basic secular sort of existential, me, myself,
and I, I've told you we all in our own right, consider ourselves
kings and queens. If we had the power, we would
exterminate God too. Why wouldn't we? Since every
time we hear about the God of the Bible, he tells us that we
are in trouble with him. Why would not, if I had the power
to get rid of God, get rid of God. They're doing it in our
schools. They're doing it in the educational system. They're
doing it in the halls of Congress. They're doing it all over America
and all over Europe. They're getting rid of the true
and the living God. Do you guys understand that? And you and
I would too because his truth is a threat to our existence.
You see what God says to you and me is that we're sinners
and that's the wages of sin is death. So we got to stop that
mess. And then when we put on religion
as Saul did, and we say, I can get to God by my good words.
And somebody tells me it's not by works of righteousness, which
I have done, but by his mercy, does he save us? Now, all of
a sudden you're saying that all of the good works I do don't
merit anything before God. You got it. Now, unless God does
a work of grace in my heart, you just made me mad. Are you hearing me? And this
is why religion has fought for thousands of years to kill anything
that discredited its claims. We might even raise the question
while we're thinking about that particular proposition as we
work through our first point, the imposition of a sovereign
power over against the will of man. What happened during the
days of the Inquisition? What happened during the days
in the rule of Christianity when Christendom was the prominent
religion in the Far East, in the Middle East? What happened
when they took up the sword and started killing people? Well,
what happened was they became religion without Christ. That's
what happened. Anything that becomes religion
without Christ will have to sustain itself by its own power. But
Christianity is clear in its source and in its claims. Christianity
was established by Jesus Christ. And what Christ said is, go ye
into all the world and preach the gospel. And what he taught
us, according to what we learned last week, he that kills with
the sword shall himself also be killed with the sword. That
we have no ethic, no biblical ethic to kill people with the
sword in the name of conversion. Am I making some sense? You don't
dominate nations with the sword and then force them to believe
on your God just because you have a sword hanging over your
head. If I was an average Joe, I'd believe your God too. You
got a sword hanging over my head. I'm going to accept your God
too. I'm going to go through all the outward forms of accepting
your God too. But you can't make a man or a
woman believe your God by a sword hanging over their heads. And
this is the problem with Islam. It will fail miserably in terms
of false conversions because you cannot convert a person by
the force of a sword. Conversion can only take place
by the force of reason, the penetration of the heart by a truth that
is overwhelming and compelling in its argument. And this is
why what you see in our text is God not sending soldiers to
get Saul, but he sent himself by his spirit to get Saul. And
this is what must happen with every sinner. The spirit of God
must hunt the sinner down as Saul is being hunted down by
God himself. And this is what keeps the Christian
from putting on physical and material armor, because we know
unless God actually does the work, our labor is in vain. Do
you guys believe that? And so we see the sovereign imposition,
uh, the imposition of a sovereign power and that sovereign power
is thwarting the will of Saul. Saul is bent on killing the Christians. Jeremiah chapter 17 verse nine.
You don't have to go there. You guys have heard this before.
If not mark it down. The heart is deceitful and desperately
wicked above all things who can know it. The heart is deceitful
and desperately wicked above all things who can know it. This
is the disposition of our hearts prior to our salvation. And what
Saul is doing is saying, no, no, no, I will not have this
Christian God in my midst. I'll do everything I possibly
can to destroy it. And God has to overcome our will.
If we're going to be brought into compliance with the gospel,
is that true? God has to overcome our will. When we talk about
being born again, do you know we're not talking about an individual
having within themselves the ability to simply reason through
Christianity as being better than Islam or Hinduism or shamanism
or all of the other religions in the world. When we're talking
about being born again, we are actually talking about a work in the heart
where the heart is renewed by the Spirit of God and you and
I are brought to a place whereas formerly we resisted that truth.
Now we are submitting to that truth, but it's just as dynamic
as what you're seeing in this account. So here's what happens. The Apostle Paul is going his
way, then God meets him in the person of Christ and stops him
dead in his tracks. That means there was a power,
uh, imposed upon Saul's will. Is that true? Now notice what
it says. And as he journeyed, he came
near Damascus and suddenly there shined round about him a light
from heaven. A light from heaven. This is
an amazing proposition because three times in the book of Acts
is this, uh, this statement, uh, a light from heaven is used.
Saul has to testify Acts 22 to the Jewish people of what happened
and then he has to testify again in Acts 28 to King Agrippa and
in our initial account it says a light shined round about him
and It was from heaven and that brings us to our second point
the pulverizing light you see that in your outline the pulverizing
light Well, what do I mean by that? When you begin to analyze
the text, what happened was something of a phenomena on a miracle level.
It was such an overwhelming light that it knocked him down and
brought him to his knees. In other words, it was not merely
natural light. And I want you to see that in
our text, because there are three times that this is mentioned
once here, and then in Acts 22, go with me in your Bible in Acts
22, and I want you to see how the author Luke renders it in
Acts 22. In Acts 22, this is what he says.
As he is recalling to the brethren in Jerusalem, because he's there
at a feast, this is what he says in Acts 22. I'm gonna start at
verse six. Are we there? Acts 22, six. And
it came to pass that as I made my journey, And I came near unto
Damascus, that it was about what? This is the other piece of information.
So what happens, as is the case with all of scripture, when the
scriptures gives accounts of things more than once, it gives
accounts of things with the objective of adding more information to
give you a more comprehensive understanding of what took place. So a lot of times in the world
of scholarship, there are arguments about how accounts are rendered
by Matthew versus Mark versus Luke versus John and others.
And they will talk about how Mark saw it one way, Luke saw
it another way, John saw it another way. And we would say, yes, they
saw it that way because that's the way in which the Spirit of
God operated to give them a piece of information that would augment
the information that the other brothers have. Be a redundancy
of the same information over again. Why do we need three pieces
of information? When there's no more information
added by any of the other two in this account We are told that
the time was noon wasn't it? notice what it says he says and
it was about noon verse 6 and Suddenly they're shown from heaven. Here's another piece of information.
Are you ready a great light? Round about me So Paul has now
had a number of years from Acts 9 to Acts 21 where he has been
able to reflect upon the revelation of Jesus Christ in this experience
of him coming as the light. And this is why John says it,
this is why Paul says it, Christ is the light of the world, is
he not? He comes as this light and in Acts 22 He calls it a
great light round about me verse 7 and I fell unto the ground
And I had a I heard a voice saying unto me Saul Saul why? Persecutors thou whom now that
was verbatim He is repeating and he'll do it again in Acts
26 And this is what I meant earlier that in Saul's conscience. He
made the connection between his persecuting the church and in
him persecuting Christ. For what Christ did not say was,
Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting the church? But Saul knew very
well what he meant when he said, why are you persecuting me? Ladies and gentlemen, what happens
to the church, Christ takes personally. And this is one of the ways you
can know your own immaturity and your own lack of awareness
and affirmation of identification with Christ in any healthy sense.
And I've seen this over the multitude of years of being in ministry.
The idea that salvation is exclusively between you and Jesus is unbiblical. You will never learn the Bible
a right if you think your salvation is just a matter of you and Jesus
and not you. Jesus and the church. You will
never interpret the Bible accurately or comprehensively or cogently
or coherently if it's just you and Jesus. When it's just you
and Jesus, you have a false gospel. You have a consumer-oriented
gospel that is basically me, myself, and I, whereby you think
you can actually exist as a branch apart from the tree. And that
notion will actually have you actually, uh, defeating your
own purpose in existence. You are not to view yourself
exclusively as an individual with you and Jesus, just making
your way through the world. The scriptures are so very clear
that when we are saved first Corinthians chapter 12, by the
work of the spirit of God, he takes us and places us in the
body of Christ. So it's inside the body politic
that we are nurtured, that we are rooted and grounded, and
that we are built up. And the church is a multitude
of things by way of what we call indicatives or analogies. The
church is a house. The church is a temple. The church
is an army. The church is a family. You believe
that? The church is a tree. The church
is a mountain. The church is a kingdom. The
church is many things. The church is a flock of sheep.
But what you will never mark is that the church is one person.
Not even Christ came for himself. He does not identify himself
as merely the head without a body. That would be a monstrosity.
So when he came to Saul, here's what he said. Why are you persecuting
me? And so he told his disciples
in Matthew chapter 10, if they persecute you, they persecute
me. And if they persecute me, they persecute him that sent
me. There is an ontological union from the church to Christ to
the father that cannot be broken. What interests the church interests
the son and what interests the son interests the father because
true believers are ontologically connected to God through Jesus
Christ just as if we were God's own son. And this is how significant
the union of the church is. And so if you're going to be
a healthy Christian, become very clear on your ecclesiology, because
if you're like a lot of people I know that love to just kind
of stay on the sidelines and do their own thing and are not
attached to the body, you are a sick, effete Christian that
can never do the will of God. God didn't design you to do the
will of God by yourself. It can't be done, by the way.
Are you hearing me? It can't be done. This is why
when we get the last book of the Bible and Jesus Christ speaks
to the world, he speaks to his people, he speaks to seven churches. He doesn't speak to an individual
Christian. He speaks to the church. Let him that hath ears hear what
the spirit says to the what? Churches, plural. So Saul here
is recounting how that Christ personally acknowledged his ontological
union with the body. whom Saul was persecuting and
I answered I said who are you Lord and he said unto me I am
Jesus of Nazareth whom you persecuted a double portion I am part of
the body I am Jesus of Nazareth you are persecuting me this cut
him to the core this cut him to the core Let's cut him to
the core. So under in your outline the
pulverizing light we saw in chapter 9 There was a light that shone
around about him in chapter 22. It was noontime and the light
was great now I want you to see it in chapter 26 verse 13 a bit
more of the information and we will start making our progression
as to Saul's witness of his conversion and what it means for you and
me then ask chapter 26 and The apostle is again called upon
to bear witness to Christ through his own conversion. As we open
in verse one of chapter 26, then Agrippa said unto Paul, thou
art permitted to speak for yourself. Then Paul stretched forth his
hand and answered for himself. This is what we call a defense
of the gospels. This is the word of Paul of Gaea.
He answered for himself. And in Acts chapter 26, we're
going to start at verse, um, I'm going to start at verse 11.
Are we there? Because in verse 10, he admits
he received authority from the chief priest. And when they were
put to death, I gave my voice against them. That's the latter
part of verse 10. So he admits that he consented
to their death. Verse 11. And I punished them
often in every synagogue and compelled them to blaspheme.
Do you see that? And being exceedingly what? I
want you to get that. Now, what I said earlier, he
was angry. He was angry. He was exceedingly
mad. The zeal of the Benjamite, that
warrior spirit, ready to go to war like a wolf after its prey,
not anchored in the integrity of biblical truth. He's just
now fighting for religion. He says, I'm exceedingly mad.
This is the zeal, mad, irrational, illogical zeal of religion without
Christ. Now mark this, Saul is a personification
of the whole nation of Israel. And you're gonna see this all
the way through your Bible. You must keep in view that when you
read in the New Testament, Paul's commentary on Israel, he was
one of them. He knew them perfectly because
he was one of them. He said, I was exceedingly mad
against them. Watch this, I persecuted them
even to strange cities. That's over the top, isn't it?
Whereupon, as I went to Damascus with authority and commission
from the priest, chief priest, at midday, there it is again,
O King, I saw in the way a light from heaven. Added information. Not just a light, not just a
great light, a light from heaven. Piercing through the heavens
shining upon him watch this ladies and gentlemen above the brightness
of the Sun Now you help me How Pulverizing must that light
have been for him to describe it as above the brightness of
the Sun add this at noonday So see, we're talking about a level
of revelation in the person of Christ that exceeds the light
of the sun, of which none of us can look upon directly without
it blinding us. And that light stopped on him
and the men that were with him in that one place. It apprehended
them. It pulverized them. It knocked
them to the ground. Light is substantive. You do
know that, right? Light has substance to it. It has weight to it. And
he says, this light shone round about me. Here it is, there's
another piece of information. Are you ready? And them, which
journeyed with me. Here's the other piece of information,
ready? And when we all fall into the earth. Got it? This is how you build your case
in the courtroom. Witness upon witness, upon witness,
upon witness, from the several angles. Well, Saul, you said
it was you. Yeah, it was me, but not only me. It was me and
them you said it was a light. Yeah, but it was a great light
No, it was more than a great light. It was a light that was
great above the Sun So what you are hearing this man doing his
witness is telling you how the gospel impacted him And I am
an asserting to you that unless the gospel impacts you the same
way you haven't met Christ I Know that's a challenging proposition,
but it's true Unless the gospel has shined in your heart to give
unto you the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus
Christ, just as it did Paul, you haven't met him yet. Unless
the gospel has penetrated your dark heart and expose you to
his majesty and his glory and his fullness in the same way
it did Saul, you haven't been converted yet. You're just still
religious. See, this man was passionate for false religion,
and the only thing that could stop him was God. And now he's
going everywhere telling the story. He's telling the story,
a pulverizing light. Going back to our PowerPoint,
let me see if there's any propositions under that that I need to deal
with. It was a pulverizing light that he saw, a pulverizing light.
And you guys can go back to Acts 9 so we can work through this.
What did it do? That's point number three. Go
to the next point. What did it do? What did that pulverizing
light do? It knocked him down. It knocked
him down. I don't know what that is. There
it is. I guess. No. There it is. There
it is. Point number B. The pulverizing
light. What did it do? Going back to Acts 9. It knocked
him down. It knocked him down. Now let's follow through what
this talks about here. As it says, when they all fell
down to the earth, it says, he heard a voice saying unto them,
unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? And he said, who are
you, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus, whom you persecutest.
It is hard for you to do what? Okay, so now in our PowerPoint,
the next thing that I'm dealing with is, not only was his will
thwarted, not only was he pulverized by this light, him and those
other men, but Christ spoke to him directly. And I would assert,
if we were to go back to the other cases, He spoke to him
exclusively, meaning that there was a conversation between Christ
and Saul that those other two men were not privy to. They saw
the light, but they heard no voice. You understand? They saw the light. So they were
exposed to this phenomenon on a miraculous level, but the light
didn't do anything by way of a personal conversion. They were
there and a light occurred and they heard something, but they
didn't hear the voice of him that spoke with Saul. Which means
what's taking place here is while there's a general revelation
of a phenomena, there is a special revelation of a clear voice speaking
to the target of God's grace. And this is very important as
well. Let's listen to what it says over verse 7 and the men
which journeyed with him stood speechless Hearing a voice but
seeing no man you guys see that Well, yeah, and then when we
go back to our other two accounts what they will tell us is that
they heard a voice But they didn't understand what understand what
they heard Something was going on, but there was no clarity
there. You guys understand that something was going on, but there
was no clarity there It may be stated in Acts chapter 27 that
way here, let me see. And maybe he put it here, no,
or maybe back in Acts 22, in Acts chapter 22, let's go back
there and see, I just wanna make sure because there's an argument
here around that, yes. In verse nine, and they that
were with me indeed saw the light and were afraid, chapter 22,
nine. but they heard not the voice of him that spake with
me. They heard a voice, but not the voice of him that spake with
him. In other words, what they heard was a sound that they could
not interpret. Something was happening. Now,
this is not hard for us to put together because frequently in
the scriptures, things like this happen, particularly in the gospel.
In the gospels, we would have the father speaking from heaven
and Jesus hearing the voice of the father clearly. And the people
saying, was that Elijah? Was that Elijah talking? Was
that thunder? They've never heard a specific
articulation of the voice. So they heard a sound, but there
was no clarity. Now, what I would submit to you
with that distinction is this, that all time in the work of
the spirit of God, when it comes to dealing with saving people,
particularly under the preaching of the gospel, you will have
groups of people who will come under the general sound of the
gospel. like the light shining down, but only those who are
targeted for conversion will actually hear the voice in their
soul where God is talking to them, where God is talking to
them. This is why warm people don't
ever think that in the matter of conversion that you can be
converted simultaneously with whole groups of people. It's
always personal in the sense of God speaking to you. And don't
be surprised when you go away from the worship with an individual
where they were not impacted the way you were impacted. Are
you hearing what I'm saying? It's so very important to understand
that the impact here, as I'm gonna demonstrate in a moment,
was internal for Paul. For the rest of the people, it
was just circumstantial. It's like just being involved
in a great event and kind of knowing it in general, but it
not having an impact in your life. Now what you and I are
talking about is very important because what we often have done,
if we have been faithful to the command of Christ is to call
men and women to the gospel. We bring people to church and
we invite folks to church. That's for those of us who still
believe in the command. And most of the time we don't
see anything happening. People hear the gospel, hear
the gospel, hear the gospel, hear the gospel, and nothing
really happens. Well, nothing will happen until Christ intentionally
allows that word to penetrate their heart. People will just
go through the motions of religion. And sometimes because you and
I are not sensitive to that reality, we will get frustrated with loved
ones, especially a husband trying to convert his wife, or wife
trying to convert her husband, or parents trying to convert
their children. You can't make your children hear You can't
make them hear. That's not your job. All you
can do is expose them to it and let God do what God will do when
God will do it. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
Now, what you don't do is what a bunch of religious folks say.
Well, because they're not here and I'm not going to invite them
to church. Well, you're inviting them to hell when you do that.
No, you want them under the gospel because you never know what day
that word will penetrate their heart. Are you hearing what I'm
saying? But it's very critical for you
to understand that this is salvation is not the consequence of your
will be done, but God's will. Now we cooperate by bringing
them near, but only God can penetrate the heart. And the Bible is very
clear about this whole issue of conversion, that it is a work
of grace. Now I want you to mark how this
process works in Acts chapter nine. When our master tells Saul,
Saul saw why persecuted I mean, and he says, who are you Lord?
And the Lord responds. He says, I am Jesus. Clarity. The person is revealed, right?
Are you there? Now watch this. You have not preached the gospel
if you have not preached Christ. The person of Christ must be
revealed to an individual for there to be any hope of a conversion. Jesus reveals himself not as
some type of generic God or generic being. He doesn't even say, I'm
the light. Hinduism would say that. Buddhism would say that. Other religions would give Christ
the nomenclature of a light, like all illuminaries are lights,
right? He says, I'm Jesus. whom you
are persecuting. You know what he's doing? He's
actually now hinging, a clear indictment into the conscience
of Saul about a pattern that's been going on in Saul's life
for some time now. Do you know what that pattern
is? Saul has been persecuting believers who say Jesus Christ
is Lord. He is Messiah. He is the one
of whom the scriptures have been preaching from Genesis to Malachi. He's been fighting against that
revelation because he's been consenting to their death. He
stood there when Stephen said, I see the heavens open and Jesus
standing at the right hand of God. He saw that. So what was
the spirit of God doing? And this is the other part of
conversion that you and I have to be sensitive to when we are
desiring God to work a work of grace in the life of people.
What is the spirit of God doing? The spirit of God in his providence
is allowing Saul to be exposed to the gospel at length, right?
So he's heard the gospel a lot, hasn't he? He's heard the gospel
from all these new Christians who are Jewish, who are boldly
proclaiming it, but it heretofore has done nothing but arouse his
enmity and hostility towards God, right? Except on this day,
this is the day that the Lord Jesus decides to show up. In
the meanwhile, here's what's happening. When we allow men
and women to hear the word We are allowing their conscience
to bear record with the testimony of scripture And we know that
faith comes by what? But it doesn't automatically
come by hearing It doesn't come by hearing the first time It
doesn't necessarily come the second time or even the 20th
time or in some of our brothers cases the 500th time I baptized
my little brother last month after 30 years of preaching to
him. 30 years. And I can tell you, up to the
last two years ago, he was adamant against my gospel. He wouldn't
have darkened these churches. He never darkened our church.
Those who have been with me for 27 years, my brother never darkened
the church. But from time to time, he has had to hear the
gospel. He's had to hear me function in our family as a minister of
the word. And so he's had to be confronted. When I buried
my dad, I told everybody in the room the God honest gospel truth,
and it made folks want to kill me, including him. Are you hearing
me? And he had to endure the light
of biblical truth until it finally broke his heart, finally broke
his heart. And this is where believers have
to be patient, not careless, patient, not careless, persistent. Do you understand what I mean
by persistent? You take the lame man and lay him at the feet of
Jesus every day, every day until Jesus does something for him. And God in his providence was
driving Paul. Now watch what he says. He uses
the analogy. A goat with an ox and this is critical for you
and I to understand that Salvation is of the Lord that you and I
do not bow the knee to Jesus Christ easily Here's what he
says Saul Saul Whom thou persecutors is Jesus it is hard for you to
kick against the pricks see that do you see that? Well, first
of all when he says it it is I Jesus whom you are persecuting.
He's convincing him of sin Because it was sin what he did See, he's
resisting the claims of the gospel, and that's the greatest sin you
can commit. Here, Stephan. Here, Philip. Here, the early
church. Paul, Peter, James, and John are going everywhere preaching
the gospel. Acts 1 to Acts 9, right? Telling
men and women to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall
be saved the promises unto you and unto your children and unto
all that are far off Whosoever shall call upon the name of the
Lord shall be saved. Is that not gospel preaching?
That was the appeal Paul heard over and over and over again.
Guess what? He rejected those claims over and over and over
again and persecuted the people of God. Is that not sin? John
16 verse 13 and when he the spirit of truth has come he will convince
the world of sin So the spirit of truth works through the preaching
of the gospel to put a man and a woman in a position where they
have to deal with God in terms of the enmity of their own heart.
Are you with me? See, Saul had to see that his religion was
not a legitimate refuge against the claims of the gospel. And
what happened was as the gospel was being preached and as people
are coming to Christ, he's actually waxing. Remember, we read the
text and I was mad. Well, what was he mad at the
claims of the gospel calling him a sinner? In fact a radically
hell-bound sinner because he is asserting that he can be saved
by his own good words Over against the claims of his Jewish brethren
that salvation is found in no other name under heaven given
among men But Jesus Christ, so Saul is fighting against that
but guess what's happening while he fights There's a gold poking
him in his side That's the stick that's used to prod the ox and
the ass to force him in a direction that he should go. Are you hearing
me? That stick is the law of God. The Spirit of God prodding
Saul, keeping Saul on a course to lead him somewhere. God wasn't
just leaving him free. This is why you have to believe
in the work of the Spirit of God in preparing people for conversion
as well. Some of you with your sons and
your daughters you just swear they don't hear a thing You have
no idea what they're hearing. You have no idea what they're
struggling with you have no idea how the Spirit of God could be
taking the gold of biblical truth and poking them in their side
and Forcing them to have to come to the conclusion that they're
right. My mom is right I'm a rebel So
You may not believe that, but I've seen God subdue the vast
majority of my kids. I have eight kids. I've watched
him subdue them one at a time. I fully believe in the patient
work of the spirit of God and the conversion of children. I
fully believe. And I watched all of them act
as if, you know, the gospel was a leave it or take it gospel.
But all along, the spirit of God was breaking them down and
preparing them to bow the knee to the crown rights of Jesus
Christ. And when they did, guess what
they said? Dad, you were right. And I didn't even know I was
wrong. Are you hearing me? I thought
I was cool with my babies, but they were hating me all along.
because until you're born again, you hate the messenger. Do you
understand that? You hate the messenger. And they
had to bow the knee as an eternity bound soul. And I was not their
father at that time. I was just a brother in Christ.
See, when we're talking about the reality of conversion, this
is not about nepotism, our family, our blood. This is about the
work of the Spirit of God in converting an individual who
is owned by God. He is not even yours. These children
are not ours. They're God's. And in the matters
of salvation, that becomes vividly real to us. That's God's child. And we quake in our boots at
the thought of them going to hell. We quake in our shoes at
the thought of our children going to hell, but they can. They can
and we have nothing we can do about it in ourselves. This is why it's required that
we continue to be obedient to the gospel ourselves if our children
are going to have any hope of conversion. What brought paul
to this point the faithful preaching of philip the faithful preaching
of stephan the faithful preaching of paul of peter And of john
and james the faithful preaching i'm going to show you that here
in a moment It's faithful preaching that brings you to a place where
you collapse before the crown rights of jesus christ. It's
not disobedience You want to send people to hell live like
hell? You want to send your kids to hell live like hell? Don't
ever think you're living like hell will aid them in coming
to Christ. Are you hearing me? Don't ever
do that Don't ever think well, I can just live like I want they
have to answer to God and so that no don't ever think like
that Don't ever think like that. So long as you're breathing your
Assignment was to be a model to those children whom the Lord
had giving you That's right Till you breathe
your last breath And then when you die, if you didn't see them
converted after you die, you can have hope in the grave that
your testimony will hunt them down in the time of love and
break their heart and bring them to Christ, which happens. I can tell you stories. It happens
long after people have died, pray for their children for years
and years and years and die. Year after they die, the child
comes to know Christ. Two years after they die, 10
years after they die, they come to know Christ. So we sow in
tears and we reap in joy, but we plow in hope and we plow in
faith. We do not give up. We do not give up on the conversion
of people we love and care about. So This pulverizing light brought
about a conviction of sin. This is very clear. Saul, Saul,
it is hard for you to kick against the goat. Now he's going to kick,
that's his nature, isn't it? We're going to kick, but eventually
you're going to break. You're going to break. Hebrews
chapter 4, 12, the word of God is alive, it's quick, it's sharper
than any two-edged sword, is it not? able to divide us under
soul and spirit, marrow and bone. It's the discerner of the thoughts
and intents of the heart. And so what we know is that that
word was penetrating in the life of Saul. It's hard for you to
kick against the prick. It's hard for you. In fact, you
can't ultimately win when God's purposing to have you, you're
going to be his. Do you know that? When God's
purposing to have you, you're going to be his. God will never
start a work of bringing you to a point of salvation where
he aborts and you become a stillborn. God will always bring it to conversion. You will always be brought to
a saving knowledge of Christ if God begun it, if God begun
it. And this is where the next idea
comes in under the pulverizing light, the wheel broken in true
conversion. I like this. Look at what it
says in verse 6, after the master had said to him, Saul, it is
hard for you to kick against the pricks. And he, what? Trembling. This is how you know
you have come into the presence of God. This is why I tell church
folk all the time, we got a bunch of religious church folk think
they're in the presence of God. When you're doing back flips,
you ain't in the presence of God. Sorry, you're not in the presence
of God. You might be in the presence of church folk, but you're never
in the presence of God. You won't read anywhere in the scriptures
where people just went off in some jubilant expression in the
presence of God. Now the post presence is a rightful
place of joy. What I mean by the post presence
when his omnipotence has approved of your person and has accepted
you on the grounds of the blood and righteousness of Jesus Christ,
you better rejoice. But until then, while you're
standing in the presence of his majesty, you bow before him,
acknowledge his crown rights and hope he lets you breathe.
If you don't know what I'm talking about, just ask God to show up
one time in his omnipotence in your life. And you won't be able
to get your head deep enough in the cement to acknowledge
the power of his presence. That's why it's so important
for us to make sure we have the true God and to make sure we're
not playing religion. Listen to what he says. And he
trembling and astonished. Do you see it? He trembling and
astonished. This is the language the New
Testament uses frequently when a person is brought into the
presence of God. Trembling and astonished. Boy, you two up in a church service
when it brings you to that point, right? Trembling and astonished. But that's what happens when
you are in what we call a culpable condition. See, because he's
not saved yet. He's not free to go. God has
not said to him, I have accepted you. He's on the brink of eternity
right here. He knows he's met something greater
than a mere human being. And he's apprehended by the presence
of Christ. Now listen to what he says. And he trembling, astonished,
said, Lord, what will you have me to do? You see it? So under Uh, our third point,
uh, under the pulverizing light, we deal with conviction of sin.
That's critical in the preaching of the gospel. Go back to our
PowerPoint. I want to just make sure I highlight this. What's
critical in the preaching of the gospel is to make sure we
deal with people's true condition. Cause in our present churches,
we talk about the love of God, the love of God, the love of
God, how God loves everybody. Right? You hear everybody. God loves
everybody. I would assert to you, you may not believe this,
but I would never tell someone of whom I am fairly sure they
don't know God, that God loves you. I just would never tell
them that. Now you can tell them that all you want to, but you
have to deal with this reality that if they die in their sins,
they have to actually struggle with God loving them and letting
them go to hell. And I will challenge you on the
proposition of what love is. See, I think that the evangelical
church today has bastardized the word of God in the area of
love and made it a consumer element by which it can attract people
to church and actually keep people's integrity intact. Of course,
God loves me. I'm the best thing since sliced
bread. But as soon as you make that
statement and assessment of yourself, what we know is you don't know
the Bible. Am I telling the truth? So again, I've stated this so
many times, you don't find this kind of proposition rendered
in the 16th, 17th century church where they were serious about
the souls of men and women. You don't find this set forth
as the proposition in scripture. The proposition in scripture
is not, smile, God loves you. The proposition in scripture
is this, you are a sinner under the wrath of God. And you need
a savior. And the only savior in the world
is Jesus Christ. For God so loved the world that
he gave his only begotten son. See? Are you hearing what I'm
saying? See? Otherwise, you're all right.
So long as God loves you. And so you never see that proposition
as the methodology by which Paul or Peter or James or even Christ. Christ didn't go around proposing
to people that God loves you, God loves you, God loves you,
God loves you. He didn't propose that. He let them know. that
you are under the wrath of God. He plainly said that. And this
is what he's doing with Paul. He's saying to Saul here, it's
hard for you to kick against the gold, Saul. It's very hard.
You are a sinner and trembling. Saul said, what would you have
me to do now in this proposition? What we have insight into right
now is something that's critical in our conversion. And you know
what that is, ladies and gentlemen, the wheel being broken, the wheel
being broken again, The parent-child paradigm is very clear. This
is the parent-child paradigm. We as parents become keenly aware
that our children's will are obstinate and hostile towards
us. It becomes the perpetual grief of our soul most of our
life while as yet our children do not know the Lord. Is that
true? And not only in the area of just being saved, I'm just
talking about living in life. Because what we know is when
our children are walking around presumptuously that they're all
right when they're not all right with God, and they're not even
all right with their parents. What we know the Bible teaches
is the ways of a transgressor are hard. That when men and women
do not walk in a humble, compliant, conciliatory way, and this is
maturity and wisdom, that you're gonna have a difficult life.
If, in general, children are rebelling against their parents,
as the book of Exodus puts it, they will not live long upon
the earth which the Lord has given them. And many of us have
grown up in rebellion against the authority of our parents,
and we know that. It's very, very difficult. Unless God arrests
us early in our conversion, we are going to tear it up. We are
going to be miserable. And parents have to bear in their
heart the sad reality that my child is a rebel. My child is
a rebel. My child is a rebel. Now think about that with you
and I and our heavenly father. If you're born again, you may
not believe this, but God chose you in Christ before the foundation
of the world. And even though you were born in sin and iniquity,
God placed his hand over you to protect you until the day
of your conversion. I mean she lets you live the
life of rebellion that you did all your life and you tore it
up You really did tear it up But you didn't tear it up as
much as you could have tore it up because God had his hand on you
You remember those times where you really wanted to tear it
up? But you couldn't tear it up like you wanted to tear it
up and you were even a mystery to yourself Because you tried
to do it, but something kept you from doing it. That was the
mercy of God in your life That was the mercy of God in your
life because you wanted to outdo Hitler Mussolini and all of those
cats you really did and You wanted to be the biggest dog, but for
some reason you just couldn't make it to the top of the ladder,
just couldn't make it to the top. And God will never allow
any of his elect to make it to the top. See, failure is critical
to your conversion. Failure is critical to your conversion. And this is why we want our children
to fail. We want them to fail so that
the only place they can look to is God. Are you hearing me? This is hard stuff. I'm praying
for you parents to see. I'm on my grandkids now. I'm
on my grandkids now. I'm going to war for them now.
But I know what kind of faith you have to have to believe in
the brutal mercies of God to save your kids. You can't have
this weak, weak faith that basically is a license for our kids to
do anything they want to. God has every right to send our
children to hell. That's right. He has every right
to. They have to answer to him for
their sins. You do know that right? and that
he lets them live every day, we can wake up saying, Lord,
I thank you that you let my kids live every day. And by the way,
if you don't do it every night before you close your eyes to
sleep, you better count your children one by one and pray
for them personally. One by one. Lord, put your hands
on her. Lord, put your hands on her.
Lord, get a hold of her. Lord, open his eyes. Lord, open
their eyes. Lord, keep them. That's what
your job is to do. Somebody did that for Saul. That's good. Somebody did that
for Saul. And then God marshaled all his
providences to bring together this critical event to where
now he is saying, Lord, what will you have me to do? Now,
ladies and gentlemen, you may bear record with me on this.
When God breaks the wheel and brings a man or woman, a young
person, older person, to a place of submitting to Christ, isn't
that a radical change in their life? Don't you see a major shift,
a major paradigm in the softening of their heart? They become much
more reasonable. They become much more compliant.
They become rational. They become helpful. The one
thing that you'll see when a person is truly born of God is once
that will is broken, they are now ready to reason. So long as the will is not broken,
through the pride of their confidence, they will not see God. And even
if you're right in your arguments, they will not agree with you.
But when once God breaks the wheel, then you don't have to
argue with them like you used to. You know how you used to
fight and argue and toil and wrestle? You don't have to do
that. Once God breaks their heart,
you don't have to do that. You have to do that. Listen to
what he says. Listen to what this man says. Lord, what will
you have me to do? I submit to you that the Spirit
of God has turned his heart. He has converted him. Go with
me in your Bible to Jeremiah 31. I've got 10 minutes and I'll
let you go. Jeremiah 31, I'll show you something here. So yes,
you can also marvel at the mystery of how God works when he begins
to deal with someone. And you and I might quickly agree
with this proposition, that God has been working in the life
of Saul for a long time to bring him to this point. Do you believe
me on that? He's been working with him for
a long time to bring him to this point. And see, until actually
the conversion takes place, What you and I will do is we will
stay in proximity of the will of God or of the people of God
in proximity. Jeremiah chapter 31. I'm gonna
read a few verses in chapters 18 through 20. Until God actually
brings about a breaking, we'll stay in the proximity, but we
won't submit. And we'll argue and debate, but
we won't submit. And we might go to church from
time to time, but we won't submit because we cannot submit until
God breaks our heart. You cannot submit. You might comply from time to
time, hit and miss religion. This is what we call it. But
you will not submit until God breaks your heart. So now think
about this. Saul has been going to bed and
waking up with the church on his mind all these years. Are
you hearing me? But because his will was still
hostile towards God, his goal was to try to cut the lights
off Not knowing that he's getting ready to run into the power source
of the light And so sometimes In god dealing with us and dealing
with our children. He'll keep us in the sphere and
realm of the true This is why you never cut them off You let
him call You let him come You let him hang you let him are
you guys hearing what i'm saying? You let him talk you let him
stay in the proximity You don't know. God may have already put
the handcuffs of grace on him. He's already put that tow line
on him and given a much room. He may be slowly towing him in.
Are you hearing me? Slowly towing him. But they too
far out there for you. Because you know, you religious.
They too far out there for you. You ain't going way out there.
No more honky-tonk joints. No more running in the streets.
But God's towing him in. And that's all right. I'm with
you. Listen. I'm not gonna run the streets to come get you I'm
gonna let God get you but I'm gonna be right here when you
need me. I'm not going anywhere I'm talking
about my kids and this is where Discipline and this is where
structure and this is where consistency on the part of the Christian
comes in at the Christian must be like Jesus Jesus Had a custom
and a pattern to his life He he went to prayer at a certain
time He went into isolation at a certain time. His pattern was
so predictable and consistent, even Judas Iscariot knew where
to catch up with him to betray him. I've told the story many
times about rebels against the gospel who knew where I was,
where they could find me. I've been doing Friday Bible
studies for 25 years now, Friday Bible studies. And I have seen
people come and go from grace and almost end up in hell, who
on their deathbed call Pastor, I need you. You know why? Because they know where they
can find me. See Christians aren't, mature Christians aren't running
all over Timbuktu, getting lost, acting a fool, clowning. You
ought to be where people know they can find you. Are you hearing
me? Where they can find you. Because
in the time of trouble, when they don't know God, they're
calling on you. They're not calling on God. They're calling on you.
They're going to try to find your number. Text you come knocking
on your door. Ain't that right mama? They're
gonna call on you That's why you want to be right there for
him. You want to be right there After all you only got so many
breaths to breathe So many days to live Your days are winding
down. So it's mine. We're out of here
in a moment. We're gonna punch our time clock
And we headed out of here So every day that you and I live
we want to be in position to be able to help somebody when
they call I want to be there don't you? You see what I'm saying?
So you don't live unto yourself. You don't just live unto yourself.
You live predictably in a pattern consistent with what it means
to be the people of God. You don't let them throw you
out of your lane. You stay in your lane. But if you want to
come and run alongside of me, here's where I am. Let's go.
That's the way you want to be. That's the way you want to listen
to this. This is an interesting analogy of which Israel is submitting
to the proposition that I'm laying out to you now, that unless God
changes our hearts, we will never come to him. We will never turn
to him. Here's the confession. Jeremiah 31, 18. This is Jeremiah
speaking under inspiration of the spirit for Israel. Israel
is bemoaning the fact that God is chastening her. And yet the
chastening has not brought about a change as of yet. By the way,
let me work this because after this I'm going to close. This
will help you too in your patience. On two sides of the equation,
for people whom God is bringing to himself, he will begin the
process of tearing up their life. When he loves you, he will stop
you from your agenda. Are you hearing me? And you will
lose that job and you will lose those opportunities and those
doors will close and things will get difficult in your life. He
will bring about afflictions in order for you to call on him. And mom and daddy cannot rescue
you because if you try to rescue them, you are thwarting God's
methodology of bringing them to Christ. Now you're playing
their savior. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
And what will happen is they will have grown up under biblical
truth If they did like our kids in this church grow up under
biblical truth and in their conscious what they will know is they know
what's right But they don't do it And they're in a crisis of
conscious because they know in their hearts their hearts as
are as hostile to god As anything but in their conscience, they
know this is not right They have to be brought to what we call
the crisis or the Krinos the point of criticism proper assessment
of self and cry out God Help me break my heart Change this
heart Are you hearing me? No, watch it. This is in our
text. I Have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself see it Ephraim
is a phrase or a nomenclature that actually describes Israel
in its utter idolatrous state. Now Ephraim was one of two boys
of Joseph, remember Manasseh and Ephraim. And Ephraim was
proud because he got the birthright when he was actually his second
born. And in his idolatrous pride, he lived a major idolatrous life. and the 10 northern tribes got
wrapped up in it and they were just proud and pompous until
God destroyed them. So in their pride, they are bemoaning
themselves. Listen to what he says. You have
chastened me. Do you see that? You have chastened
me and I was chastised as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke. You know what the metaphor is
using? You put your yoke on me and you constrain me and you
stop me from doing what I'm used to doing. I ain't used to no
yoke. I'm not used to you having this
kind of weight in my life. I'm used to me going when I want
to go, coming when I want to go, come, saying what I want
to say, being what I want to be because I'm big dog and now
I'm feeling a yoke on my neck. Are you hearing it? I'm not accustomed
to it. But you didn't put your yoke
on me. And now that you put your yoke on me now watch this. Here
it is. Watch this. This is Saul in our text. This is Saul. Saul
was doing what he wanted to. He got letters to kill the Christians
everywhere. God intervened. He said it's hard Saul for you
to kick against this gold. When you put a yoke upon the
neck of the oxen, it's designed for you to employ them in your
will. But initially they're trying to break off the yoke and do
it their own way and you got to goad them. That's hard stuff. That's hard stuff. Watch this.
Turn thou me, and I shall be turned. Do you see it? Do you
see? You see what he's doing, what
Israel is doing? Israel is now acknowledging that
even though the external yoke of God's constraint is on him,
inwardly his heart is still rebelling against that yoke because he's
not accustomed to it. But there's something in him
now that capitulates, that says, turn me, turn me. You know what
you just read in Acts 9? Turn me. What will you have me
to do? Do you see? Go back to our text. Verse 6, and we'll take this
up next week. And he trembling, astonished. Ladies and gentlemen, he's astonished
because running through his mind now, the memory of all the occasions
where he blasphemed God and destroyed the Saints and Blaspheme the
gospel and opposed everything that was true It's all it's all
rushing in all at once right now. And you know what he's saying
in his mind my goodness. It was true Are you hearing me
Christ is real and They were telling the truth all along.
And in his blind religious ignorance, he couldn't see it at all. He
sees it clear as day now. He sees it clear as day. He sees
it clear as day. And intuitively, while he was
opposing it, something way deep down inside was telling him they
were telling the truth back then. He was sensing intuitively the
truth in an unregenerate state. where his will would not allow
him to submit to the reasonableness of the claims of the gospel preached.
But now that Christ has come himself, he cannot forbear or
deny the reality of the lordship of Jesus Christ. And see, until
Christ comes to the center himself, they cannot know what we know
in terms of the reality of Jesus Christ. But when once Christ
comes to them, as he came to Saul, you won't ever have to
persuade a person that Jesus Christ is Lord. They will know
themselves. Are you hearing me? They will
know themselves. Here's what he does. And we're
gonna pick this up next week. He says, Lord, what would you have
me to do? And the Lord said unto him, arise. This is what we call an imperative.
You know what that means? Christ has now owned Saul as
his own. He is now giving him instructions
like a master would to his servant, to tell him specifically what
he is to do, knowing now that Saul, who will become Paul, will
comply with his every directive. And that's what happens when
a soul is converted. We'll see next week that Saul
does exactly what Jesus says. And when we look at that, we'll
see what will be typical of the beginnings of conversion and
the baby steps of being led by others until the scales fall
from your own eyes. Let's close in prayer. Father,
thank you for this time. Thank you for our brothers and sisters.
Thank you for the gospel of your sovereign grace. Thank you for
saving us. Thank you for allowing our hearts to bear record with
what happened to Saul. It happened to many of us. And
if there are those of us in here for whom it has not happened,
we pray with great earnestness that you would be so gracious,
oh Lord, to shine your light into their dark heart and manifest
your glory in a personal saving way to them. We pray this for
them, our children, our grandchildren, our great-grandchildren, and
all that we love and care about, oh God, As we go our way, give
us traveling mercies. Prepare us to worship you on
Sunday, we pray in Jesus name, amen. God bless you.