Category: Devotions

Stand by me

Acts 22:13 “He stood beside me and said, “Brother Saul, receive your sight!” And at that very moment I was able to see him.”

The focus is definitely on the fact that Saul received his sight back and it was Ananias who God used. However, I have not been able to move from the words, ‘He stood beside me’.

Maybe today like me you are thankful for those who stood beside you even for a season. They may not be here anymore but you remember with fondness when it just seemed like God sent them to you to stand beside you. Much was achieved as you were strengthened by their presence.

Luke only uses these words in his gospel when 2 angels stand beside the women outside the tomb, to announce Jesus was not there (24:4) and at the ascension when they stand beside the disciples and announce Jesus will return (Acts 1:10) and finally when an angel stood beside Paul in a dream and said he would survive the storm in order to stand trial before Caesar (Acts 27:23). On each of these occasions other than Ananias it was angels standing beside God’s people. The wording is Luke’s only, it is not used elsewhere.

Ananias stood beside Saul and did what the angels had done, he announced good news, ‘receive your sight’. Healing was coming from God and the announcement was also an instruction to receive this gift.

I pray today we will stand beside someone and that we will be able to announce good news to someone.

The art of storytelling

Acts 22:12 “A man named Ananias came to see me. He was a devout observer of the law and highly respected by all the Jews living there.”

Paul doesn’t give the full version, that Ananias was in fact a disciple of Jesus. Stories must be told to illuminate a message and to convince the listener. Stories don’t need the whole story. The aspects of the story most relevant to the listener must be told. The rest can be put to one side. In fact if everything is told then it could prevent the listener hearing because aspects may offend. If Paul had said Ananias was a disciple then the Jewish crowd would not have listened.

The key is to focus primarily on those who are listening and not the story itself. What do you need the people to hear? Tell them that aspect of the story and leave the rest.

We all tell stories in some arena of life. But we all need the wisdom to know what part of the story to tell.

It will seem strange at first, especially if you have to leave out the parts of the story that matter the most to you. However, the listener is always more important than the communicator and the story. You may feel that you haven’t done the story justice enough. You may think that the people have not benefited from everything. Yet have they heard what God wanted them to hear? If so, then the story has worked.

You may be able to take a story and tell it in a different way in a number of settings. May God give you the wisdom to use the experiences He has given you in this life.

God blinds

Acts 22:11 “My companions led me by the hand into Damascus, because the brilliance of the light had blinded me.”

The devil didn’t do it, God did it!

He who opens blind eyes also can blind them too.

The light didn’t blind Saul’s companions, good job really otherwise it would have been the blind leading the blind!

They all looked into the brilliance of the light. But only one was blinded.

The presence of God can heal you and harm you. The determining of that is His will for your life.

If God has blinded you then it is for His higher purpose.

Perhaps if Saul hadn’t been blinded then he may have shrugged off the experience.

I do think that Saul who was riding into Damascus thinking he was Gods representative on earth to kill and imprison Christians is now humbled in such a way that he could never recover to being the arrogant self-obsessed Pharisee that he was. The murderer coming into Damascus is now a blind man being led into Damascus. God is greater!

And yet in this humiliating situation there is a sense that God is there and He was. Those who fall often fall into the arms of judgment but they experience the arms of grace. If you are going to fall, then fall into His arms. Fall knowing this is His will and purpose. This is His process of transformation for your life.

There is no place I’d rather be than in God’s place for my life whatever that looks like.

 

 

The right question comes from the right place

Acts 22:10 “What shall I do, Lord?” I asked. ‘“Get up,” the Lord said, “and go into Damascus. There you will be told all that you have been assigned to do.”

There are so many prayers: This is what I want to do, Lord! Please make this happen for me, Lord! Bless my vision, Lord!

One of the most important questions we can ever ask God is the one that Saul asked.

The question comes as a direct result of being in the place of surrender, caught and brought low into submission, where God is greater and mightier than us and we dare not move, we can hardly whisper a prayer: What do you want from me, Lord? What shall I do, Lord?

What is the response from God?

Get up.

Go.

You will be told your assignment once you have done the first 2 things.

This is the missionary call: Get up, leave where you are, Go and as you do those 2 things along the way you will know what I have called you to do.

The missionary call can only come from the surrendered place.

The missionary call comes from a desire to do what God wants not what our desire is.

Get to the right place and ask the right question.

Spectators

Acts 22:9 “My companions saw the light, but they did not understand the voice of him who was speaking to me.”

Acts 9:7 Luke wrote, “ The men travelling with Saul stood there speechless; they heard the sound but did not see anyone.”

So …

• The men accompanying Saul/Paul saw the brightness of the light but couldn’t see the person of Christ.
• The men heard the voice of Christ but they did not understand it.
• The men saw the effect upon Saul/Paul but they themselves do not fall to the ground.

They were there in the thick of the action but they could not see, they did not understand and they were not affected.

The reason being is this is Saul’s experience. The call was not to “men, men” it was “Saul, Saul”. Everyone needs their own personal experience of God. You cannot ride on the back of someone else. Sadly there will always be spectators of the moves of God.

God moves small.

Acts 22: 8 “Who are you, Lord?” I asked. “I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom you are persecuting,” he replied.

Why did the voice not say, “I am Jesus Christ, born of the Virgin Mary in Bethlehem, raised in Nazareth, but the Son of the Living God”?

Why was it simply, “Jesus of Nazareth”?

I believe it shows hat Christ demonstrates his divinity in the lowliest and most ordinary despised places of this world.

1. Paul has no doubt been using the title ‘Jesus of Nazareth’ in a slanderous way. He is now on the floor stunned by the brightness of the light of the One he slandered.
2. Nothing good came out of Nazareth, apparently (John 1:46). It was a very small village. It typifies the many places in the world that are forgotten, unimportant and struggling. Paul is now hearing a heavenly voice who says he is from an earthly place that is so small it is never mentioned in the Jewish Scriptures.
3. After Jesus had been put to death Paul had continued to threaten and then imprison and kill any followers of this Nazarene. He has now been stripped of his authority and power and realises that persecuting the followers was futile because Jesus cannot be stopped.

It is better to find divinity in the ordinary, heaven on earth and the true power within persecution that sustains.

Not everyone finds this. But on this Damascus Road Paul was one who did. He would never be the same again.

I stand amazed in the presence of Jesus the Nazarene.

God moves small, don’t miss Him.

HE & I

Acts 22:7 “I fell to the ground and heard a voice say to me, “Saul! Saul! Why do you persecute me?”

So Paul has begun his defence to the Jewish crowd and gives his testimony of what happened on the Damascus Road. It is a repeat of what Luke wrote in Acts 9.

Except it isn’t actually the same of course. Luke wrote “He fell to the ground …” and Paul is now speaking of himself, “I fell to the ground … a voice say to me …”

Is what people say about you the same as what you say? An autobiography and a biography are not the same, though some autobiographies are ghost-written, but a memoir is different to both of them.

Have you ever listened to someone talk and you become confused because the detail isn’t the same as you remember? You know there is an inaccuracy because you were there! Can history be wrong?

Here Paul and Luke are agreeing. “He fell, I fell, a voice spoke to him, a voice spoke to me.”

Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine!
Oh, what a foretaste of glory divine!
Heir of salvation, purchase of God,
Born of His Spirit, washed in His blood.

This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Saviour all the day long;
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Saviour all the day long.

This is my story.

I fell in surrender and submission of my life to Jesus.

I heard the gospel message, I was a sinner and He came and rescued me.

This is it my friends, your story.

Let people write this about you because this is what happened.

Let your He and I be the same.

Protect history.

Brightness

Acts 22: 6 “About noon as I came near Damascus, suddenly a bright light from heaven flashed around me.”

Madam X is an Elim Church planter in an Islamic nation. One Saturday in September 2016 having never been told the truth about Jesus she began to meditate on a verse from the Quran in Surah 1:6 “Guide us in the right path”. Suddenly in the corner of the room a ‘bright light’ filled the room as Jesus revealed His identity to her. She fell to the floor and her life was never the same again!

Paul in his testimony remembers the time of the bright light. It wasn’t the middle of the night and the light shone in the darkness. This was noon, it was light, but THE light was so much brighter.

I have heard first-hand accounts from many who have met Christ and every one of them saw a bright light. The light of Christ is more than just shining brightly in the darkness, any light can do that, but it shines brightly at noon, in the light. That is bright! Christ can penetrate the light, any light. He is brighter than the mid-day sun.

Whatever hope this earth can produce or joy and power, Jesus beats them all!

 

How is not as important as what happens.

Acts 22:5 “…as the high priest and all the Council can themselves testify. I even obtained letters from them to their associates in Damascus, and went there to bring these people as prisoners to Jerusalem to be punished.”

“There are people still alive who know what I was like. They know what I did. I got reference letters from them to introduce me to their counterparts in Damascus. They recommended me to them so that I could bring back the Christians to torture and imprison them.”

It is the high priest!

It is the whole Council of the Sanhedrin!

It is the leaders in Damascus!

So what?

The outcome is not justified by how important the means of getting there is.

Let us not be fooled!

1. Just because the most respected of leaders brings a good reference, it doesn’t make it right.
2. Just because there is a consensus of opinion, it doesn’t make it right.
3. Just because there is an agreement and the door opens, it doesn’t make it right.

Don’t be deceived.

 

Zeal alone is never enough.

Acts 22:4 “I persecuted the followers of this Way to their death, arresting both men and women and throwing them into prison”

“This is what I did with my zeal …

I persecuted …

I put to death …

I arrested men and women …

I threw them into prison …

I did all this with my zeal for God.

My zeal would go to any lengths to protect the Torah and His Name.”

All Paul had was zeal for God. He did not have love for humanity.

Sole passion can be dangerous. It can blind us to the truth and most definitely to grace and mercy. Passion can hurt people.

Be careful what you are passionate for. Don’t just hold on to that and nothing else as it will lead you to do things you never thought you would do.