The title of this message is How God
Transforms Your Life.
To me it is a very, very encouraging
message.
So many today are looking for a transformed
life in the world in which we live.
They go about this in a plethora of
ways.
Psychology in the last several decades has been
thrust forth as an answer to change your
life.
The whole idea of psychology, the whole field
of psychiatry has its benefits, but in the
end there is one problem, and that is
someone can analyze you, but they cannot change
you.
Only Jesus Christ can change a life.
And there is, of course, a lot of
change that happens with AA.
Alcoholics find change in AA, but in the
end when it's all said and done, and
it's a good thing to get an alcoholic
off of alcohol, but in the end when
it's all said and done, what you have
is a sober sinner.
They still need to know the changing power
of Jesus Christ in the depths of their
life.
In the last several decades the whole idea
of the entire prison institution has gone toward
the philosophy that what prisoners need is to
be educated.
And so now you have people in prison
that educate themselves until they find loopholes in
the law to educate themselves right out of
prison.
And now we have these people that were
in prison because they were dangerous on the
street.
They're back out on the street and they're
far more dangerous than they ever were because
they're far more educated.
So they're smarter at being criminals.
And that doesn't work, obviously.
Then there is the whole idea of positive
thinking.
It comes in many packages.
It's called by many names, but positive thinking.
In Jeremiah 13, 23, God said, Can the
Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard it
spots?
Then may you also do good who are
accustomed to doing evil.
It is also in Jeremiah that God says
the heart of man is deceitful and wicked
above all things.
Who can know it?
The answer is not you, but God.
In John 3, 4, Nicodemus came to Jesus
Christ, the teacher in Israel.
The Bible says one translation says the teacher
in Israel, perhaps the finest.
He came to Jesus Christ by night, wanting
the answers to life.
And Jesus said to him, he went straight
to his his need and he said, You
must be born again.
And that is the answer.
You must be born again.
That is where the transformation begins to take
place, because it's the change on the inside,
not on the outside.
So we have that great transformation here in
the life of Saul of Tarsus, one of
the most unlikely individuals to ever undergo such
a change.
And it happened because Jesus Christ loved him,
came to him and changed his life.
Let's read in Acts chapter nine, verse 10.
Pick up where we left off last time.
Saul was converted and then led by the
hand, blinded by the light of Jesus.
He was led by the hand into Damascus,
dropped off at a house where he sat
there for three days, didn't eat and drink.
Now, verse 10, chapter nine.
Now there was a certain disciple at Damascus
named Ananias and to him, the Lord said
in a vision, Ananias.
And he said, Here am I, Lord.
So the Lord said to him, Arise and
go.
Just like he said to Paul, Saul on
the road to Damascus, he said, Arise and
go.
Here he says, Arise and go.
God says that a lot.
Arise and go, he says to the street
called straight and inquire at the house of
Judas for one called Saul of Tarsus, for
behold, he is praying and in a vision.
This is amazing.
Ananias is having his own vision.
He says now Saul of Tarsus is praying
and he's having a vision and in a
vision he has seen a man named Ananias
coming in and putting his hand on him
so that he might receive his sight.
Then in verse 13, Ananias answered.
He said, Lord, I have heard from many
about this man.
How much harming is done to your saints
in Jerusalem?
It's late.
Lord, do you know it's that whole attitude
we sometimes bring to the Lord?
Well, do you know?
Have you heard about this man, Lord?
How much harm he's done to your saints
in Jerusalem?
And do you know that he has authority
from the chief priest to come here and
bind all who call on your name?
But the Lord said to him, Go.
I'm sure there was a pause for he
has a chosen vessel of mine to bear
my name before the Gentiles, kings and the
children of Israel, for I will show him
how many things he must suffer for my
name's sake.
Verse 17 and Ananias went his way and
entered the house, laying his hands on him.
He said, Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who
appeared to you on the road as you
came, has sent me that you may receive
your sight and be filled with the Holy
Spirit.
What a marvelous passage.
Basically, four things I want to draw out
from here, and they all have to do
with how God transforms a life.
It begins with faith in Jesus Christ.
Then you will find that God will always
send those faithful disciples to you to help
you.
You will find fervent prayer always involved, faith
in Christ, fervent prayer, faithful disciple.
And then ultimately you will discover God has
a fantastic plan for your life.
These are the components of a transformed life.
Let's take them one at a time.
It all begins as it began with Saul
here with faith in Christ.
God met him.
Jesus Christ met him on the Damascus Road,
and it was Christ who converted him.
Do you realize that Saul was converted by
the glorified Christ himself?
Do you know that he was traveling with
an entourage of Christian persecutors?
There wasn't anybody with him that loved the
Lord.
They were all the way down the road.
Damascus was saying, Do you know that the
Lord loves you and he wants to convert?
You know, he was traveling to arrest and
imprison and kill Christians.
Jesus Christ appeared to him in his glory,
risen from the dead, and he converted Saul
to Christianity into a relationship with him.
That is so encouraging to me.
You know why?
Because no believer was there to pray with
him.
It was Christ alone.
What an encouraging thought, because the risen Christ,
this is what it tells me.
The risen Christ can save an individual directly
himself anywhere on Earth.
That is so encouraging to me because you
wonder so much relationally about what about this
loved one in my life that no one's
ever had the opportunity to share Christ with.
What's going to happen?
Is it fair?
What about those people out there?
I have relatives on the other side of
the world.
Jesus Christ can come to a person and
save them personally without anybody else's help.
Isn't that great?
It's right there in the passage.
It's always been there in the passage.
And I'll tell you the truth, it didn't
really come to me that clear until last
time when we were studying it.
And theologically, it's comforting to me because, you
know, in the world, China, the Philippines, Japan,
etc., Japan is less than one percent born
again Christian, less than one percent.
You look at statistics like that, and as
you begin to think about it, it troubles
your soul.
And then you begin to think about how
many missionaries are there and how many people
are in the churches there and how many
missionaries are going out from America.
And then you start to think about the
state of the church in America.
What kind of preaching comes from the pulpits
in America?
What kind of a gospel is given even
when the gospel is given?
And it becomes very encouraging to me theologically
that Jesus Christ is, in the end, the
one who saves souls.
You realize you are given the gospel, but
the gospel doesn't save you.
In the end, it's Christ himself who saves
you.
He saves you.
He rescues you.
So theologically, as I as I survey the
world, as I look at world history and
I think, Lord, what about the poor people
out there that never heard about you?
And what about the children who died in
the third world countries?
Jesus Christ has it all covered.
Isn't that comforting to your soul?
Our God is a rescuing God and he's
well able to do it.
Saul was converted, converted by the glorified Christ
himself.
And then Saul came to believe.
This is fascinating.
Saul came to believe on the human Jesus,
on the human Jesus, by first seeing the
God Jesus.
First, he saw the risen, glorified Christ.
Then he came to believe that the human
Jesus was indeed the Messiah.
Isn't that fascinating?
The disciples, the apostles, they spent three years
with the human Jesus Christ.
And during that time, they went through a
whole process of change in their thinking to
come to the point where finally Peter makes
his declaration at Caesarea Philippi.
He says, Jesus says, who do men say
that I am?
Peter said, they give him, you know, the
disciples are spouting off some say, some say,
some say.
Peter says, you are the Christ, the son
of the living God.
And Jesus says, the father has revealed that
to you.
But it took them this whole period of
time to believe that the human Jesus was
in fact, God with Saul of Tarsus.
It was exactly the opposite.
The first encounter he had with Jesus Christ
was face to face as God.
Isn't that amazing?
And then he came to believe that the
human being, Jesus of Nazareth, was the Christ,
the Messiah, the king of the Jews.
All of that is to say this, make
it your business from this day forth to
never put God in a box again, never
put God in a box again.
And so the faith in Christ is where
it all begins with the conversion experience, with
Christ saving you himself.
And then he begins to work in your
life.
It begins with faith.
Now, anytime you mention faith and camp on
it for a little bit, somebody begins to
think, and it may be you, but you
know, you're talking about transformation and change.
I have faith, but my faith is so
weak.
I wonder if God will honor my faith
because it's so weak.
Then you need to hear these words from
John Rogers.
Weak faith is true faith as precious, though
not so great as strong faith, but as
precious for the same Holy Spirit, the author
of the same gospel, the same instrument is
the one who brings it about for it
is not the strength of our faith that
saves, but true faith.
Isn't that great?
So your faith may be little, but if
it's true, it's precious.
And that's what God looks at.
You know what mustard seed faith is?
Yes, mustard seed faith is this little tiny
faith that moves mountains.
When was the last time you moved one?
Oh, man, don't condemn me, brother.
I have never moved a mountain.
Does that mean I don't even have faith
the size of a mustard seed?
It means you've never moved a mountain.
What is mustard seed faith?
Jesus came down from a mountain, the Mount
of Transfiguration, he found the disciples, they could
not cast out this demon that was throwing
this boy into the into the fire and
trying to drown him all the time.
And so the father says to Jesus, help
me.
Your disciples can't cast this demon out.
And Jesus says, if you had faith as
a grain of mustard seed and so on,
you'd say to this mountain and it's like
everybody reads that we all go that I'm
disqualified because I haven't moved any mountains lately.
Lord, someday can I have mustard seed faith?
I remember being a young Christian and practicing
on moving mountains.
I was commanding them to move and none
of them moved.
I was so condemned when I was all
done.
Then move.
Then I tried a dirt clog, you know,
because I didn't have any success with a
big mountain.
Jesus cast out the demon and then he
went on to say this kind does not
come out, but by prayer.
Another translation says and fasting.
You know what he was saying?
He was saying this to them.
You gave up too soon.
Mustard seed faith, to put it simply and
quickly, is faith that starts small and grows
bigger and stronger in the face of opposition.
That is mustard seed faith.
Starts small and grows bigger and greater in
the face of opposition and it grows stronger
by the power of the Holy Spirit within
you.
Faith in Christ is where the transformed life
begins.
The next thing is fervent prayer.
Fervent prayer.
Acts 9 11.
So the Lord said to him, arise and
go to the street called straight.
Inquire at the house of Judas or one
called Saul of Tarsus, for behold, he is
praying.
Behold, he is praying.
I know the street he's on, the house
he's in, and I know that he's praying.
Fervent prayer is such a big part of
a transformed life.
It really is.
And I think that the foundational aspect of
fervent prayer to keep it, to give it
birth in the beginning and keep it going.
Frankly, I think it's the blood of Jesus.
I'll tell you why.
Hold your place here and turn to James
chapter 5 verse 16.
James chapter 5 verse 16.
James 5 16 says, confess your sins or
trespasses to one another, pray for one another
that you may be healed.
Then this the effective fervent prayer of a
righteous man avails much.
Now we know that verse, right?
We quote that verse, right?
But how many of us really believe that
it's for us?
If the truth were known, I want you
to say that many of you believe that
it's true for righteous individuals and thus you
just you just disqualify yourself.
Well, we all know that the effect of
fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.
You know, prayer is so powerful.
But in your heart, you're saying, oh, would
to God that I was righteous so that
I could have effective prayer, too.
But until I am, I'm out.
So I got to find some people like
that to do some praying for me.
Are you like that?
You see, because the effect of fervent prayer
of a righteous man avails much.
Yes, that's true.
It has to be true.
It's in the Bible.
Want to know the truth?
How does God regard even your finest seasons
of righteousness?
Just as it stands alone with you as
a human being.
Yes.
You know, what is it?
Filthy rags.
OK, so.
What kind of righteousness is this?
It has to be the righteousness based on
the blood of Jesus Christ.
Paul, writing to the Corinthians, says that we
are given as a free gift in salvation
by God in exchange for our sin.
The righteousness of God in Jesus Christ, what
kind of righteousness are you imputed in salvation
and justification?
You're justified in a moment of time.
It is an act of God takes place
in the mind and the heart of God,
not in the emotion of the believer, but
in the mind and the heart of God.
When you are justified in a moment of
time, he declares you righteous.
How righteous does he declare you?
He gives you the righteousness of Jesus Christ.
He takes your life and all that you
have lived out and he takes it away
and he imputes to you a righteousness as
though you lived the life that Christ lived.
The righteousness of God in Jesus Christ is
given to you as a free gift because
Christ bore your sin and mine on the
cross and rose again.
So positionally, I am in Christ, righteous in
Christ clothed in the robes of his righteousness.
If I could put it that way, when
God looks at me, he sees me ever
and always in Christ.
If I am born again, I am always
in Christ.
I will always be in Christ.
He will always see me in Christ.
So he sees the righteousness of God in
Christ.
Oh, I love that.
Now I can come back to James 516
and start praying and believe that it will
avail much.
You say, well, wait, you're talking about positional
righteousness.
Yes, I am.
Isn't there such a thing in the Christian
life as.
Practical righteousness.
Yes, there is.
So let me ask you, do you think
God puts the heavy emphasis on practical righteousness,
the way you live to answer your prayers,
or does he put the heavy in on
your positional righteousness?
Let me just put it to you like
this.
God honors your prayers because he's honoring his
son.
That's why every prayer that was ever answered
in the final sense that you prayed was
because God honored the fact that you are
in Christ and Christ is eternally righteous.
The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man
avails much.
And guess what?
As you continue to thank God that you're
righteous by the blood of Christ and fervently
pray, what's going to happen to you if
you fervently pray a lot?
You'll get more practically righteous.
You will in the process.
God is good the way he works things
out, isn't he?
I'm so glad.
So fervent prayer begins with the blood of
Christ and it presses on through the pauses
of Christ.
So what is that?
That's what we have right here.
Saul of Tarsus is converted on the road
to Damascus.
He is led by the hand into Damascus
to the house of one called Judas, a
different Judas, of course, and he's on a
street called Straight.
And he's there for three days.
Now, look at this.
Here he is.
He's going along.
God suddenly, dramatically works in his life and
he does nothing for three days.
By comparison, he's just sitting alone.
He's not eating.
He's not drinking.
Listen, if you think that when he got
to Damascus, born again, Christians ran out from
behind buildings and embraced him, lifted, hoisted him
to their shoulders and carried him through the
streets to this house and sat him down,
said, well, we're going to take care of
you.
Listen, if that's your picture, forget it.
He was on his way to Damascus to
arrest and take people away, drag them to
Jerusalem, imprison them and see them put to
death if he could.
He's taken into Damascus by a bunch of
Christ rejecters who aren't sure what happened.
They dump him off at this place and
they split.
And he sits there for three days, that's
a pause.
This huge work of Christ on the Damascus
Road and then for three days there's this
pause on the part of Christ and he's
just sitting there.
And then Christ speaks to Ananias and then
at the same time, Christ is revealing himself
to Saul in a vision and speaking to
him.
But there is a pause.
Have you found that he pauses in your
life?
He will act in such marvelous ways and
then he'll pause and you're going, Lord, this
the longest pause yet.
You know, when are you going to act
again?
You see, fervent prayer presses on through the
pauses of Christ.
In the book of Revelation, we studied it
recently, a hand came out from the throne
holding a scroll and a voice came saying,
who is worthy to take the scroll and
loose its seals?
And everybody was silent and nobody stepped forward.
And there's a long pause.
And in the long pause, John said, I
began to weep and he wept and he
wept.
You see, what happens to us is very
much like what happened to John.
We get caught in a pause with Christ
and nothing is happening and we start to
weep.
Lord, this the longest pause ever.
In fact, I'm pretty sure you're not going
to pick up where you left off and
I'm going to be left here.
Listen, let the Lord pause.
Because in his pauses, he's still active and
in his pauses, he's really wanting us to
meditate.
Meditation, let me tell you, meditation will bring
application to your life from what you of
what you know.
It will be bring healing to your life
as you reflect on your life with God
and Christ and other people you know.
And it will bring instruction to you as
you digest the things you've learned.
Listen, how many things have you been taught
from the Bible and how many of them
do you really apply?
It's a rhetorical question.
You don't have to answer it.
I'm not going to ask for a show
of hands.
We know a lot more than we apply
because we meditate so little, right?
So.
Pauses on the part of God are good
times to meditate.
And to continue to pray, and that is
why you find in the Bible it says
it is good to wait on the Lord.
It is good to wait on the Lord
whenever he has acted and he pauses, he
will act again.
But in the meantime, he's acting behind the
scenes.
You just don't see it.
So we continue on through the pauses.
Do you know that when God rejected Saul
as being king because he was so disobedient?
He chose a man after his own heart,
right?
And Samuel was there and he brought in
all the brothers of David, sons of Jesse.
He brought them all in and he filed
them by and he's going, nope, nope, nope,
nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, not the one,
not the one, not the one.
And he goes, isn't there another one around
here somewhere?
Yeah, but he's young.
He's little.
He's a ruddy youth.
You know, King James talk.
And so they bring in David and Samuel
goes, yeah, he's the one.
Fantastic.
And he takes out this big thing of
oil and he dumps it all over his
head and anoints him to be the king
of Israel.
And about 12 years later, if not more,
he became the king of Israel.
Long pause, huh?
David goes out drenched in oil.
Who feeling good, Lord, going to be king.
Pause.
Long time later, after over way over a
decade, moving toward another decade, he finally becomes
king.
You know, Lord, that was the longest pause
yet in my life.
Yet you find in that time.
If you read your psalms, what do you
find?
Saul persecutes David, doesn't he?
All over the place.
A psalm of David written in and getty
as Saul was persecuting him.
And they're full of prayers, aren't they?
Fervent prayer presses on in the midst of
the pauses of God.
It's one of the greatest things we can
ever learn in the Christian life.
John Bunyan said John Bunyan, who wrote Pilgrim's
Progress, he said, you can do more than
pray after you have prayed, but you cannot
do more than pray until you have prayed.
Get it?
You can do more than pray.
After you have prayed, but you cannot do
more than pray until you have prayed, because
praying is the greatest thing you can ever
do.
Prayer sets in motion the omnipotent power of
God.
Because he has chosen and ordained that it
should be so in your life, that's why.
Now, because he's our genie, because he's not.
He doesn't respond to formulas and, you know,
naming and claiming and commanding him what to
do.
But he does respond to real faith in
the heart.
Lord, could you do this?
Will you do this?
And I love what John Trapp said.
God never denied that soul anything that went
as far as heaven to ask for it.
Ooh, that is so good.
So how is the life transformed?
It is transformed by faith in Christ and
by fervent prayer and then by God sending
a faithful disciple to you, somebody who's ahead
of you in the Christian life.
So practical, so lovely.
And Ananias is that man for Saul who
becomes Paul.
God will bring faithful disciples who are ahead
of you to help you grow in the
Lord.
And I'm going to give you five words
fairly quickly that I find that rise to
my heart.
They're not necessarily in the text, but it's
what's going on here.
Five words that describe this faithful disciple, Ananias,
who was sent to Saul to help him
go forward and grow in the Lord.
First one is certainty.
What you find about a faithful disciple is
certainty.
Acts 9, 10, now there was a certain
disciple named Ananias.
Do you realize that all disciples that are
real disciples are known to God?
They are all certain disciples to the Lord.
This man is known in Damascus as a
converted Jew.
We find that out from Paul preaching later
in the book of Acts, Acts chapter 22.
He's known throughout Damascus as a converted Jew
who really knew the Bible.
He is, in fact, a certain disciple.
You are a certain disciple.
You're not just a number in the kingdom
of God.
Isn't that good to know?
I mean, Jesus said God knows the very
hairs, the number of the hairs on your
head.
Now I know how hair falls out every
day when you wash and brush and stuff.
I know that when God comes to recount
on mine, he's like done, done really quick
for some of you, takes longer.
But isn't it good to know that you're
not just a number in the kingdom of
God?
You are a certain there.
Every disciple is a certain disciple.
And this man is a certain disciple in
Damascus.
He is a certain disciple because he is
known there as one who really knows the
word of God.
And he is a certain disciple because he
is certainly chosen by God to go and
to help Saul.
It's not a random choice.
It is a certain precise choice on the
part of God.
Because of the man's background.
We find out in Acts 22, as I
said, that he knew the law.
He was a converted Jew who knew the
law.
He is the perfect one to go and
talk to Saul.
And in fact, Acts 22, 14, when he
goes to him, Paul's recounting the story and
he says, then he said, the God of
our fathers has chosen you.
He's the perfect one to go and relate
to this man.
I've I've often seen him as just some
random guy who's praying and gets a vision
and then he gets to go be the
one to pray for him.
No, it's because of his background, because of
what he knew, because of the way he
was converted and because of how he could
relate to this man.
He is sent by design, precise and certain.
Another thing is that it's not only a
certainty, but his availability in Acts chapter nine,
verse 10.
Now there was a certain disciple at Damascus
named Ananias and to him, the Lord said
in a vision, Ananias.
And watch this.
He said, here I am, Lord.
You know what it literally means in the
original.
I am all here, Lord.
Oh, I love that.
Ananias, I'm all here, Lord.
What do you want me to do?
I'm all yours.
That's exactly what he said.
It isn't just here present.
No, I'm all here, Lord.
I'm all yours.
That's so great.
Certainty, availability.
I'm all here.
Clarity.
Those that God uses to take you forward
have clear direction from the Lord.
Clarity in verse 11.
So the Lord said to him, this is
clarity.
Arise and go to the street called straight
and inquire at the house of Judas for
one called Saul of Tarsus, for behold, he
is praying.
And in a vision he has seen a
man named Ananias coming in and putting his
hand on him so that he might receive
his sight.
Clear direction.
God loves to give clear direction by the
work of his Holy Spirit.
In Jeremiah 33, verse three, God says, call
to me and I will answer you and
I will show you great and mighty things
that you do not know.
Do you realize?
Do you realize there are Christians walking around
that are learning great and mighty things they
didn't know before?
Those are the ones that we call on
fire.
Because they are seeing great and mighty things
they did not see before.
Believe me, the Bible broadens and deepens with
years, and there are so many great and
mighty things there that we have not seen
before that he wants to open up to
our souls and then apply them to our
hearts and come to us by the spirit
and speak to us.
When you read that word in Jeremiah 33,
three mighty, it could be rendered fenced in,
cut off or inaccessible.
Those things that are in the heart of
God, not only to God, he makes known
to us at just the right time.
Certainty, availability, clarity.
Then comes the difficulty.
What he's asking him to do is not
easy.
He is as Ananias is going along in
his life.
He's loving the Lord.
He's known around town as a guy who
loves the Lord, knows the word.
Suddenly God comes to him with the greatest
difficulty market, the greatest difficulty of his life.
He says in verse 13, I have heard
from many about he calls him this man,
this man.
Which you don't get in the Bible, you
read the words, this tone of voice.
I have heard from many about this man,
how much harm he has done to the
saints in Jerusalem and how here he has
authority of the chief priest to bind all
who call upon his name.
It's difficulty because of who Saul was.
Further, it's difficulty because of how fast he
had to obey Ananias, arise and go.
How fast he had to obey verse 17,
it says, and Ananias went his way.
He went further, it's difficult because of get
this, how much he had to forgive.
You know, it's possible that this Ananias, he's
a Jew, it's possibly is driven to Damascus
because of the persecution of Saul.
It's possible he lost a brother or a
sister or a wife or a mother or
a father or an uncle or a cousin
to Saul's persecution.
That is very possible.
And because there was such close people, it
is highly possible that he lost someone who
died, was dead because of this man.
Now he is to go in and of
all things, lay hands on him.
You mean I have to touch him?
Do you realize how hard that would be?
And so it's difficult because of who Saul
was, of how fast he had to obey
and because how much he had to forgive.
And in verse 17, we find that he
did forgive.
Ananias went his way and laying his hands
on him, he said, what does it say?
Acts 9, 17.
Brother Saul, you imagine how comforting that was
to Saul's heart.
Oh my, for three days he's been blinded
by the light of Christ.
He's not eating, he's not drinking, he's not
doing anything but meditating and thinking about his
life, where he's been and what he's done.
And you imagine how bad he felt because
now he knows how wrong he was, how
many people he killed, he murdered them.
He was inhaling murder, we saw last time.
He had to be feeling as bad as
a human being can felt.
I know it's true because at the end
of his life, he said, Jesus Christ, 2nd
Timothy, he wrote, Jesus Christ came into the
world to save sinners of whom I was
chief.
No, I'm chief, I'm chief.
Why?
Because he persecuted the church and he did
irreparable damage.
Listen, when someone's dead, it's final, isn't it?
So Ananias had to go to this man
and say, brother, Saul, he went with the
forgiving heart of Jesus Christ.
Can you imagine the comfort?
But you see, that is our Christ.
No matter how much you have sinned, no
matter how far you've gone into the darkness,
there is still forgiveness for you in Jesus
Christ.
And you need to know that today and
come to him today and receive that forgiveness.
Brother Saul, the Lord has sent me, the
Lord Jesus, who you saw on the road
to Damascus.
He has sent me one more confirmation that
what happened was true.
And the Lord does that in your life.
He'll convert you and then he'll send others
to confirm to you that it's real.
It really has happened.
So the certainty, the availability, the clarity, the
difficulty you see being used of God to
lead others and disciple them is not easy,
but it sure is rewarding.
Finally, when that fifth word nobility, I guarantee
you.
Though this was the most difficult thing he
ever had to do, it was the noblest
thing he ever did.
Can you imagine being the one to lay
hands on the man who becomes the greatest
man who ever lived?
Saul of Tarsus became the apostle Paul.
Other than Christ, he's the greatest man who
ever lived.
Can you imagine being the one to go
and pray for him so his eyes are
open and then the life of God, the
Holy Spirit comes upon him to empower him,
the one who effectively launches him?
Can you imagine how many times he told
that story later in his life that I
ever tell you about the time I was
there praying and God appeared to me and
he said, I want you to go down
a straight street and lay hands.
Did I ever tell you?
Did I ever tell you that he became?
Well, you know, he became the greatest apostle
of them all.
He wrote into the letter to the Corinthians.
I labored more abundantly than them all, though
it wasn't me, but the grace of God
within me.
By the grace of God, I am what
I am.
Can you imagine being the one to do
that?
God is so good at surprising us with
blessings that are above and beyond what we
would ever imagine he would do with us.
And sometimes between that great blessing and where
we are is the biggest difficulty of our
life.
And we have to step out and faith
and believe in the sufficiency of Christ to
see us through it, to get us to
the blessing he wants to give.
And finally, we come.
How is the life transformed?
We'll end with this by faith in Christ,
by fervent prayer, by faithful, forgiving disciples who
lead us.
Some of the greatest people who have ever
helped me in my life have been the
greatest forgivers I've ever known.
And I have learned more about the love
of Jesus Christ through those people than almost
any other source.
So faithful disciple.
And finally, the fantastic plan God has for
your life.
Ananias was commissioned by God to lay out
his plan for Paul's life.
And I want you to see basically this
before we end that the plan included the
positive as well as the negative.
I wish somebody would have told me before
I came to Christ, it wasn't going to
be just all answers to my problems.
And my felt needs.
But rather that there would be difficulties as
well.
And all they would have had to say,
you know, you're going to really suffer.
But you'll suffer anyway, whether you know Christ
or not.
So at least it'll be suffering.
It'll be used for your good.
And when God sends this man, he gives
him the negative and the positive.
He goes to him and he tells him
in verse 15, the Lord sent me.
The Lord said to him, go and tell
him he is a chosen vessel of mine.
Vessel elected is literally what the original language
says.
Vessel elected.
And how much in keeping that is with
his ministry and his teaching.
He taught so much about election, didn't he?
No wonder he is a chosen vessel.
Go tell him he is to bear my
name.
Verse 15, a chosen vessel to bear my
name before Gentiles, kings and the children of
Israel.
And I might add in that order, that's
how he did it.
Do you realize that in the process, what
happened to this man?
Never put God in a box because you
don't know how much he can do with
you or will do with you.
What happened to him?
Well, just to give you a brief list,
he became a great preacher.
He immediately goes forth and preaching right in
Damascus that Christ is the son of God.
He became a great preacher.
He became a great soul winner.
He became a pastor.
He became a traveler.
Those of you like to travel, the Lord
may have you travel.
I'll tell you what, I didn't travel hardly
at all.
I don't think I went anywhere except Wyoming
and back to California before I knew Christ.
And after since I've come to know Christ,
I've traveled all over the world and I
wasn't looking for.
He led me.
He became a traveler and an author.
What do we know most about?
Paul.
Well, we've read his books, but there was
also the suffering wasn't there.
Where did he write most of his epistles?
Prison, the prison epistles.
Oh, he suffered.
He was a prisoner.
He was persecuted.
He had heartbreak.
Do you realize that as soon as he
came to Christ, he was an outcast to
the Jewish people, that it was family, friends
and relatives.
They would even have a burial service.
The family that were not converted to Christ,
they would have a burial service for you.
If you were married, your spouse would be
part of that burial service and that'd be
the end.
So he had heartbreak, that's for sure.
He saw wolves in sheep's clothing come into
the churches he founded and bring in false
doctrine and everything else.
A lot of heartbreak in this man's life
and a lot of physical affliction, a lot
of blessings, preaching the name of Jesus Christ,
preaching the name of Jesus Christ, preaching the
name of Jesus Christ, preaching the name of
Jesus Christ, preaching the name of Jesus Christ,
preaching the name of Jesus Christ, preaching the
name of Jesus Christ, preaching the name of
Jesus Christ, preaching the name of Jesus Christ,
preaching the name of Jesus Christ, preaching the
name of Jesus Christ, preaching the name of
Jesus Christ, preaching the name of Jesus Christ,
preaching the name of Jesus Christ, preaching the
name of Jesus Christ, preaching the name of
Jesus Christ, preaching the name of Jesus Christ
and a lot of suffering.
And that's the truth about walking with Jesus
Christ.
There are many, many blessings and there are
many, many sufferings, but the blessings outweigh the
suffering.
And in the end, when you look at
his list, he has a long list.
Second Corinthians 11, that he lists off all
the things he suffered.
And in the end, he sums it up
by saying this, you know, this light affliction,
light affliction is working for me and for
you, an eternal weight of glory, light affliction
working for you.
Your affliction, because of the way God's Holy
Spirit works in your life and the plan
he has for you, your affliction is working
for you.
Once you see that, it'll change the way
you face your affliction.
George said a sanctified person like a silver
bell, the harder he is smitten, the better
he sounds.
That is rich.
Do you realize that when Job?
Lost everything.
He fell down on his face and the
Bible says he worshiped.
And he said, the Lord gives and Satan
takes away that we said.
He did not say that he said the
Lord gives.
And the Lord takes away.
Blessed be the name of the Lord.
Because he saw God is all sovereign, all
powerful.
And he knew that he used affliction to
refine him in his life.
All things work together for good for those
who are the called of God.
And they work together for you.
You're good.
Romans 8, 29 says to conform you into
the image of Jesus Christ.
It's the refiners fire.
Refiners fire.
God's good, isn't he?
And he's going to keep on showing you
that he's good.
And if you're in a pause, you'll come
out of the pause.
And you'll find out he's been working on
a long.
Let's pray, shall we?
Father, thank you for your goodness to us
that you do change our lives and you
do such a good job of it.
When you make us free, we are free
indeed.
And thank you, Lord, that.
You, Lord Jesus, ever live to make intercession
for us, and even when we don't feel
you or see you or hear you, you
are still working.
And we bless you and we praise your
holy name, that there's new life in Christ
and there is always, ever and always, forgiveness
in the blood of Jesus.
Forgive us, Lord, for our sins this day.
Wash us clean as the driven snow, and
may we rejoice in that forgiveness.
May we go out with great joy this
day from this time with you, and we
ask it in Jesus' name.
Amen.