Conversion - Week 14 - Study Notes

English

Conversion

ACTS 9:1-31

We are focusing today on the possibility of people changing – on people's lives being completely turned around. (Do you think that is possible?) This is one of the parts of the Christian faith that has been most attractive to people throughout the centuries. We declare that God knows about where we have messed up and loves us anyway. And, God has found a way to forgive our sins and make us right with him. Just as much, God is ready and able to make transform our thoughts, attitudes and behavior. Yes, there is hope for me – and for you – according to God. And that is good news! Your life can move in a new and altogether better way today because of Jesus.
We call it conversion. When we use that word in church, we mean that our lives were once headed in one direction, usually directed by our own desires or by the expectations of others – and then we turn around completely to follow Jesus. That means we choose to obey his teaching and his ways.
Of course, there still are a number of people in our world who believe we cannot change. Ever since Sigmund Freud said that personality is fixed at the age of five or six, people have argued that human beings establish traits and directions of life that are intractable. This conviction has led to a lot of damage in our world. Some use it as an excuse saying, "Well, what if I live in a certain way? That's just how I am. God made me this way." I've heard people excuse being destructively angry, relationally ungracious and even sexually immoral by saying, "Well that's how I am so it's OK."
But, of course, others have been plunged into despair thinking that either they or those they love cannot change. Maybe you feel that way today about yourself – or about your child – or about your spouse. I want to declare to you in this message that God has the power to turn things around in people's lives.
Today, we have heard a number of stories about peoples' lives being turned around in our church. And, as we come to our time in the Bible, we read the story of what may be the most famous conversion in history, i.e., that of the Apostle Paul. Some people are confused by the fact that our text calls him Saul – but that was his Jewish name. Paul was almost certainly his more public name. An, it's the appropriate name for the rest of his life because he was going to be the man who would carry the message of Jesus to the non-Jewish world. Paul's story is so significant that it's told three times in Acts (cf, Acts 22, 26). Note this: according to Paul's own testimony, his conversion ultimately was a complete redirecting of his will from his life being driven by his own desires to being led by Jesus. Hear his words in 2 Corinthians 5:15: when we place our faith in Jesus, "we no longer live for ourselves but for him who died and rose again."
Let's look at his story.

#1: The Convert – A person who really needed to change
In some of the strongest language used in the Bible, Luke tells us about the vehemence with which Paul hated Christians. Vv. 1-2: Saul, breathing murderous threats against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.
Do you remember that Paul had been the man who had held the coats of those who had murdered young Stephen in Acts 7? You might think that he'd gotten his hatred out of his system by being an accomplice to that killing. But, no – contrary to some schools of therapy, simply venting your anger does not rid you of it. To the contrary, when we act in hatred, we soon find that the hatred grows. Here, Paul wanted more Christians to be incarcerated and to die.
But then, by vv. 20-21, this is what we read: Paul proclaimed Jesus in the synagogues, saying, "He is the Son of God." And all who heard him were amazed and said, "Is not this the man who made havoc in Jerusalem of those who called upon this name? The answer to their question is yes. Yes, this is the same man – but his life has been completely turned around. He has been converted.
And, this was not simply a short-term emotional religious experience for Paul. What we see in Acts 9 is the beginning of a complete re-direction of one man's life. Two of the most important points about true conversion are these: 1) our lives really change and 2) the change lasts. Jesus told a parable about this. When the seed of the Gospel comes into some lives, it seems to spring up with life at first but then is quickly choked out. The weeds and entanglements of that are still in that person's life do not allow for real growth. In those situations, there may be a quick emotional response in which a person says, "I'm saved!" on one day but then goes right back to the old ways on the next. Listen clearly: One way that you know that conversion is real is that you begin a "long journey in the same direction." Conversion is real – and it lasts. Let me tell you again: Your life can be different from what it is. Change is possible.
That's my first point: Paul was a man filled with self and with hatred. He needed to change. In that way, he was just like you and me. And, he was able to change. How did it happen?

#2: The Converter – A person knocked down and turned around by God
In 9:3, we read: As Paul went on his way, he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven shone around him. And falling to the ground he heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?"
I want to make something clear right now, i.e., the way people are converted in this world is almost always different. Some conversions happen after years of looking into the faith while others are immediate. In some conversions, there is great emotion while others are as objective and rational as an engineering course. Some conversions are very public and filled with drama while others are quiet and private. Matt Barnes talked to me this week about "testimony envy", i.e., hearing of a dramatic turn from a life of evil toward God such as we see in Paul and then wishing my story was as exciting as his. Have you ever felt that way when you've heard another person's story? Note this: all conversion stories are different. But all have one element in common. People are converted when they meet and surrender to God – and the God they meet is the God who is.
Paul was literally knocked to the ground when he met God. What knocked him down? The light? The loud voice? I think he was knocked down by the truth. When Jesus spoke to him, Paul realized that what he had been living for was not true. The main thing he had to accept was that what he had believed about God was off base. Let me put it this way: Paul, as a conservative Jewish theologian, could never have imagined 1) that God could take on human form – 2) that God could be one and yet three – and 3) that God's Messiah could be crucified. That was not his God. In Acts 9:1-2, Paul was out to destroy "people of the way" (i.e., Christians) because they believed those things about God. And then he met the resurrected Jesus and he knew. He knew he had been wrong about God. Paul was turned around by the God who is!
This is not unlike Dr. Steve Cunningham who, after all his years of training in the sciences, was a convinced materialist believing miracles could not happen in this world. He was convinced of that until one day -- God did a miracle before his eyes. And, Steve had to re-think everything about this world.
We know that Paul had already heard Christians making claims about God's Messiah being crucified and then being resurrected from the grave. But, Paul had thought, "This cannot be true about the God I believe in." And then, Paul met the resurrected Jesus who had been crucified. Or – more correctly – Jesus met him! From that point on, things could never be the same for Paul.
So, listen carefully now. There are countless things I could talk about from this chapter in the Bible. But what I'm going to say now is the most important thing for me to address here in Southern California. When I ask people here in SoCal if they believe there is a God, many say something like, "Oh yes, I believe there may be a god. My god is a god of love. I'm a spiritual person. But my religion doesn't dictate morality or make demands of people."
But, learn today from Paul that your god may only be a construct of your own making. If God is, then God is as he is. If you make your own god, what you will make is a god who gives you your own way. But, a god of your own making will never contradict you. Your own created god will not change you.
Let me illustrate my point this way: If you know there is something wrong with you physically and you go to the doctor, a doctor who just wants you to feel good about yourself will say, "Oh, I think you're good as you are. Just keep doing what you really enjoy doing. Keep eating all the sweets you want, smoke 10 packs of cigarettes a day, move up from marijuana to cocaine. You'll love it!" I tell you: That kind of doctor won't help you. But, go to a good doctor who cares about you and she'll say, "I see in you the beginning stages of cancer and heart disease. Many of the things you're doing are making things worse. You have to change your ways or you'll die. I can help you, but you have to change!"
Well, here in SoCal, many people have constructed the kind of god who doesn't care whether we destroy ourselves. But, I tell you that that's not the who God is. God is and he is who he is! He loves you with an everlasting love. He loves you too much to let you keep destroying yourself. He is ready and able to save you but you must meet him as he is and surrender to him.
Dr. Julie Gorman told me this week that we've created a "cozy Jesus" who just wants us to be comfortable. But the Jesus Paul met in Acts 9 wasn't cozy. Paul met the resurrected Jesus and was knocked down and turned around by him. And that changed things. Paul surrendered to Jesus. When, in v.16, Paul would have to learn "how much he must suffer in Jesus' name", Paul simply said, "Lord." This is what happens when we meet Jesus as he is. We are converted from being followers of self to being followers of Jesus. When we meet him, we say, "Lord. What would you have me to do? How will you have me live?" And we will trust that his way is better than our way.
Have you met this God?
One of the best-known stories of conversion of the past century was that of CS Lewis. He was a committed and outspoken atheist while he taught at Oxford University. Then, God began surrounding him with Christians. Soon, Lewis began to re-think all that he had thought about God, about himself and about this world. Some of his testimony is found in his autobiography, Surprised by Joy. He wrote:
The odd thing was that before God closed in on me, I was in fact offered what now appears a moment of wholly free choice... I could open the door or keep it shut... I chose to open it... . I say "I chose," yet it did not really seem possible to do the opposite...For the first time I examined myself with a seriously practical purpose. And there within me I found what appalled me; a zoo of lusts, a bedlam of ambitions, a nursery of fears, a harem of fondled hatreds. My name was legion.
Lewis began to realize that God is – God is a God who knew him and came after him. The adversaries to this kind of God kept telling Lewis that God could not be like that. But, Lewis learned that this is exactly what God is like. He wrote:
My Adversary waived this point before me. But it sank into utter unimportance. God would not argue about it. He only said, "I am the Lord"; "I am that I am"; "I am." People who are naturally religious find difficulty in understanding the horror of such a revelation. Amiable agnostics will talk cheerfully about "man's search for God." To me, as I then was, they might as well have talked about the mouse's search for the cat. CS Lewis, Surprised by Joy
Here's the beautiful part: The fact that God wanted to rescue a passionate atheist like Lewis or a hate-filled anti-Christian like Paul tells us a lot about God. The fact that God took the initiative to save the least likely of people shouts out to us that we cannot pronounce anyone hopeless as far as conversion is concerned. Our prayer should be that those we consider to be far from God will actually meet Jesus – encounter him – be arrested by him as Paul was. Have you met him? Let me tell you this: We have hope in this world because of this – God is and he is who he is. And he is ready to save and re-make... you.

#3: The Community of Converted People – A person who finds a place to belong, to grow and to serve
When we read the rest of Paul's story, we learn that, even though the turnaround in his life began on the road to Damascus, it was not completed in a day. Biblical conversion starts us on a journey that lasts for our whole lives. Even near the end of his life, Paul would write, "I'm not saying that I have attained or become all I should be yet, but I am saying that I press on toward that high calling..." So, it's evident that when Paul placed his faith in Jesus, Paul would have a lot to learn to learn and a lot to change about his thinking, his attitudes and his behavior. The same is true of us all.
I think of it this way: When we meet Jesus we turn the whole of our journeys around toward following him wherever he leads us. As we do, we find one thing after another inside ourselves that needs to be turned around and surrendered to him. Each of those smaller "conversions" within our larger conversion come about when we meet God as he is and say to him, "Lord!" "Lord, I will not live that part of my life for myself any longer. I surrender is to you. I will follow you." That ongoing process of surrendering to God happens as we do life within a church made up of people all of whom have met been turned around by God, received mercy from God, and are committed to walking together toward becoming complete in Christ.
In order for God's converting work to become complete in Paul, he had to become a part of a church community. When we are converted, we are converted to follow Jesus and we are converted to live that life with God's eternal family. For Paul, of course, the family he had to be a part of was the family that he had wanted to incarcerate and kill in 9:1-2. So, two things were necessary for this to happen:
#1. The new convert had to make a commitment to join the family – And Paul did. No one in history has loved the church of Jesus Christ more than Paul. He planted churches. He was an active part of local churches. When he became a Christian, many in his biological family and his circle of friends probably disowned him. In fact, we see plots to kill him as early as in 9:23 and again in 9:29. He needed a new family and a new community. That's what the church is. In order for our lives to change, we need to be a committed part of a local church family – and worship weekly with people, learn from one another, and serve alongside one another. It's absolutely essential to a completed conversion.

#2: The community had to welcome the new convert – And this was not easy. When God told Ananias to go and help Paul, Ananias told God in 9:13, "Lord, there are some things about this man that I think you don't know. He's trying to kill us! He has the authority to seize us!" But God told Ananias, "Go. I have called Paul. He is mine. I have a task for him so you have to welcome him."
And Ananias obeyed. In fact, it's likely that the first words Paul heard after his conversion were Ananias' saying, "Brother Saul." John Stott wrote, "It must have been music to his ears. The archenemy of the church was welcomed as a brother; the dreaded fanatic was received as a member of the family."
But the rest of the church had to welcome Paul too and that was also hard. In v. 26, when Paul went back to Jerusalem, the church people were afraid of him. They didn't believe his conversion was genuine. But, Barnabas, perhaps the most respected man in the early church, went personally with Paul to church and made sure he was welcomed.
Brothers and sisters, this is the way we must be. We must have a culture in our church in which people seeking God are welcomed. Paul could not stay the way he had been, i.e., a man out to murder Christians. He had to change. But, he needed a new community who would not exclude him. And that's what the church must be. Every church in history has been made up of self-confessed Pauls. We all need God's mercy – and we've found it in Jesus. That kind of community is not exclusive or proud. That kind of community can learn to be a place in which we welcome one another, pray with and for one another, and hold one another accountable to live lives pleasing to the Lord. We are a recovery community.
For us to be that, each one of us needs to be an Ananias and a Barnabas. When you meet people in our community, I want you to be a person who speaks of Jesus and invites people to be a part of the family. Listen to how Paul Mumo Kisau puts it in the Africa Bible Commentary:
"Ananias and Barnabas show us what a community is like in which past enemies are able to become friends and call each other brother. They are examples to those who find it hard to invite their enemies into the Christian family. With Africa riven by wars and ethnic animosity, African Christians desperately need these examples of what God expects of us. How else will believers in countries like Rwanda call each other "brother" after experiencing genocide? Such a change is only possible through the power of the risen Savior, who has broken down the barriers of enmity."
It's not just Africa that needs this kind of community. Are you ready to welcome anyone who is in Christ into our church family? God welcomes them. Believe it or not – God welcomes people like you and me!
And I must end with this question: Have you been converted? Have you met God? You can. More than that, according to Jesus own words, you must! Truly I tell you, unless you are converted and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
Jesus, Matthew 18:3
Turn around today and follow Jesus – and then join us in this "community of the converted" as we grow together to become what Jesus died to make us to be.

To His glory,

Dr. Greg Waybright
Senior Pastor