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Source: https://www.sermonindex.net/speakers/greg-cliff/paul-witnessing/
We've been hearing about David and Daniel. I'd like to speak for a few moments with the help of God, please, and the Apostle Paul. Acts 26. Then Agrippa said unto Paul, Thou art permitted to speak for thyself.
And Paul stretched forth the hand and answered for himself. I think myself happy, King Agrippa, because I shall answer for myself. This day before thee, touching all the things whereof I am accused of the Jews, especially because I know thee to be expert in all the customs and questions which are among the Jews.
Wherefore, I beseech thee to hear me patiently. My manner of life from my youth, which was at the first among mine own nation at Jerusalem, know all the Jews, which knew me from the beginning. If they would testify that after the most straightest sect of our religion I lived a Pharisee.
And now I stand and am judged for the hope of the promise made of God unto our fathers, unto which promise our twelve tribes instantly, serving God day and night, hope to come. For which hope's sake, King Agrippa, am I accused of the Jews?
Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you that God should raise the dead? I verily thought with myself that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth, which thing I also did in Jerusalem.
And many of the saints did I shut up in prison, having received authority from the chief priests. And when they were put to death, I gave my voice against them. And I punished them off in every synagogue and compelled them to blaspheme.
And being exceeding mad against them, I persecuted them even unto strange cities. Whereupon as I went to Damascus with authority and commission from the chief priests at midday, O King, I saw in the way a light from heaven above the brightness of the sun, shining round about me and them which journeyed with me.
And when we were all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice speaking unto me, saying in the Hebrew tongue, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? Is it hard for thee to kick against the pricks? And I said, Who art thou, Lord?
And he said, I am Jesus, whom thou persecutest. But rise and stand upon thy feet, for I have appeared unto thee for this purpose, to make thee a minister and a witness, both of these things which Saul has seen and of those things in which I will appear unto thee.
Delivering thee from the people and from the Gentiles unto whom I now send thee to open their eyes and to turn them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me.
Whereupon, O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision, but showed first unto them of Damascus and at Jerusalem and throughout all the coast of Judea, and then to the Gentiles that they should repent and turn to God and do works meet or fitting for repentance.
For these causes the Jews caught me in the temple and went about to kill me. Having therefore obtained help of God, I continue unto this day, witnessing both to small and great, saying none other things than those which the prophets and Moses did say should come, that Christ should suffer and that he should be the first that should rise from the dead and should show light unto the people and to the Gentiles.
And as he thus spake for himself, Festus said with a loud voice, Paul, thou art beside thyself, much learning doth make thee mad. But he said, I am not mad, most noble Festus, but I speak forth words of truth and soberness.
For the king knoweth of these things before whom I speak freely, for I am persuaded that none of these things are hidden from him, for this thing was not done in a corner. King Agrippa, believest thou of the prophets?
I know that thou believest. Then Agrippa said unto Paul, Almost, thou persuadest me to be a Christian. And Paul said, I would to God, that not only thou, but also all that hear me this day were both almost and altogether such as I am, except these bonds.
And when he had thus spoken, the king rose up and the governor and Bernice, and they that sat with him, and when they were gone aside, they talked between themselves, saying, This man doeth nothing worthy of death or of bonds.
Then said Agrippa to Festus, This man might have been set at liberty if he had not appealed unto Caesar. And God will bless the reading of his word. We're touching a little bit on character studies today.
There can't be any greater ones to study their character than those that were indeed faithful to God. As I was driving up here today, I was listening to a CD that I really appreciate. And in that CD, I sort of convicted my heart, even listening to a hymn or a song that a particular individual was singing.
And this individual said, As I read this word of God, O God, O Lord, search my heart. And when I pray, Lord, search my heart. And when I sing praises, Lord, search my heart. And so on. And that's what we're here at a conference for.
We're not just here for a social gathering, I hope. I hope as we open up the word of God today, that we are searching our hearts. Because this portion, search my heart, as I've been looking at it this past week.
A lot of times we take up Paul in Acts chapter 9, and we touch his conversion there. And we touch the developments in his Christian experience. But I want to look for a few moments here and challenge my heart and challenge our hearts today when it comes to a day in the life of Paul as the gospeler, a man with the gospel.
You know, we have great news that we have in our hands. It's the good news of God's great salvation. And we've already been hearing the importance of the gospel as it was related to a testimony when it comes to Daniel of old.
And when I look at this portion here, I notice here in verses 1 to 3, there are going to be times when we're confronted with the opportunity to speak of our blessed Lord Jesus Christ. And I come to verses 4 to 16, I see the conversion and his willingness to tell how God reached and saved him.
In verses 4 to 11, we hear of his conversation or his manner of life prior to being saved. When we come to 12 to 16, we see when there was a how, a when, and where that the apostle Paul had in his life when God had reached and gloriously saved him.
Then we see his commission to preach the gospel, to herald the cross of Christ in verses 17 to 18. Then we see his continuance in verses 19 to 23 in preaching the gospel. And in verses 29, 24 to 29, we see the apostle Paul with his concern for those that are not saved.
And then in verses 30 and 32, we have the consensus of those that have heard the message. Now, I give you that simple outline because I have not time to develop this outline, but I want to maybe highlight a few things to encourage us, to exercise our souls, why we are here.
Now, I just was touched when I thought about the apostle Paul. Here's a man and he was confronted. Why do you believe, Paul, what you believe? What is this all about? What is this truth about sharing the gospel?
There was an opportunity for him to speak about how that God had changed his life. I wonder sometimes how many times is it in our life's experience that we take time to tell others how God has reached and saved us.
Here Paul was, and it says here that he says, I'm happy to do this. I'm happy to tell how I was saved. There's not a week goes by I say this, I speak to my shame that I am not able to tell someone how God reached and saved me.
But it shouldn't be that way. There shouldn't be a day goes by that I shouldn't be happy to be able to tell how God reached and saved me. Somebody maybe comes along the way and we have these opportunities and here was an opportunity in the day of Paul.
He said, not only was I happy, but that word also has a thought of being supremely blessed or fortunate. You know, there's no accidents in our lives. There's no accidents when it comes to the providence of God when we introduce to somebody or we come in contact with someone.
But we have a blessed special opportunity to speak well of our beloved Lord Jesus Christ. After all, why are we here? What is our purpose? You see, that's the way it was with the Apostle Paul. Why was he here?
We're going to look at that in just for a few moments. But what does he do? He goes right away. He said it was not always this way. He said there was a day when I had a very much of a religious upbringing.
He said that there was a day when I lived contrary to the Word of God. In fact, I even lived in opposition to the Word of God. There was a time when his life, when he thought he was doing his religious activity is unto God, but he was blind.
It's not the way it is with all of us. And doesn't it touch our hearts that there are others out there as well? There are others out there that have never heard this truth. 21 years of my life, I didn't know I had to be born again.
I didn't know I had to be saved. I didn't know I had to be converted. But I thank God for a little old lady that had an opportunity to tell me of the cross of Christ and a Christ that paid the price for my sins there upon the cross.
It's precious when it comes to these truths of the gospel. And when I look at this and I see here Paul, and he tells about his pre-conversion experience. And maybe there's someone here today, and you have religion and you feel uncomfortable about speaking to others about your conversion.
There's something wrong. There's something drastically wrong. Maybe it's just you're away from God. But there's a reason why you're uncomfortable. It's like I was hearing coming up here. Let's search our hearts.
Let's search our hearts. It's a wonderful thing to tell others of how we were reached and saved. And here's Paul. And then he says his commission here when it comes to the truth of the gospel. That was the whole purpose of Paul being saved.
He was to take the gospel to the Gentiles, to the nations. And here that's the purpose of God saving us too. It's not just to take us to heaven. I want to encourage this because God has given us a great privilege, a great honor to be able to speak well of his son, and tell those that are perishing, those that are going to hell, the reality of the truth of this matter of being saved.
I tell you, we have a great workplace around us. We have a great field ready unto harvest. And the laborers are few. And I'm not just speaking about the full-time servants here. We are all called to speak of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Sometimes we have a gospel series comes along. We expect the preacher to come along and wave his magic wand, and there's supposed to be all these people saved. No, I tell you, where it is, is we're failing today, brothers and sisters.
We are failing in telling out this message to others. We are failing when it comes to telling out this glorious, grand story of the gospel, the grace of our God to others, and to encourage them to be under the word of God, because faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
I was very humbled six days ago. I had the precious opportunity in a small building south of here to be able to tell how God reached and saved me. And there was, from three different continents, there were people there.
There was a person from Spain. There was a person from Argentina. There was a family from Mexico. And there was those from the United States, five different countries from three different continents. And here I had the privilege as well of having a brother that knew Spanish.
And I got to tell how God reached and saved me, and it was translated. But why? We had a crowd there. But why were they there? Why was that crowd there in a little town in the United States? We say things can't be done here in the United States.
That's not true. There was a crowd there because there was a number of people. It wasn't because of me or anybody like that. But it was because there was a number of people there that had it upon their heart to get others under the word of God, under the sound of the gospel.
You see, it was others that brought them in. Was I happy? I was joyful to be able to tell how God reached and saved me. But it was because of the exercise of others. You know, brothers and sisters, we're saved.
Are we saved? If we're saved, why don't we have the heart for others? I see the Apostle Paul. He's in difficult circumstances. He's standing before King Agrippa and Governor Festus and Agrippa's wife.
I tell you, his life was in his hands, and they want to hear something of why there was such trouble concerning him. But what does he do? What does he speak about? He speaks about Christ, doesn't he? He tells them about not only his conversion, but he speaks about how God has sent him with a purpose to speak to others, speak unto the Gentiles, speak unto the nations.
He says, and Christ told Paul, he says, to turn them from darkness unto light. Who is going to tell them that they have to turn from darkness unto light except they are hearing it from you and me? Who is going to tell them that they have to be turned from the power of the authority of Satan unto God?
Who is going to tell them if it isn't you and me? Who is going to tell them that they can receive the forgiveness of sins if it isn't you and me? Who is it that is going to tell them that they can hear the word of God by coming to a certain place, and maybe there's a man that is gifted in the gospel, and that they can tell them the way of salvation?
Who is going to tell them but you and me? We need men of God today and women of God and boys and girls of God to tell others about this great salvation. We see the pattern here, and we see here the continuance, and we've already heard enough about our lives today.
That should be in keeping and suitability with a repentant life towards God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. What kind of lives are we living today? Are there lives that people are going to believe us, or are we living lives of worldliness?
May God help us while we're here. And I'm not sitting here and trying to chastise anybody. Anybody needs to be chastised, it's me. And I'm here to encourage us of our purposes of being here. And here the apostle Paul is.
What does he do? He has concern for souls. Does it grip our souls? Does it grip us as far as reality, that everybody that we may see, it may be the last time they hear the gospel? Sometimes I wonder if it grips our souls when there are those that are young that go out into eternity, those that we come into contact.
It may be the last time that we may ever see them on this face of the earth. I know a brother in the Lord of mine just recently, he says, I'm leaving. He says, I'm leaving with a heavy heart. And he's leaving and he has gone to another country temporarily.
He has family members here, and he had other contacts here, and he brought forth the word of God last week, and he says, I may never see you again. He's a man that was burdened for souls. These individuals that we see on every day, it may be the last time.
It may be their last opportunity. And yes, it's a sad thing, even though Paul had a care for King Agrippa and for Festus and Bernice. Agrippa says, almost, I'll persuade me to be a Christian. But he was faithfully warned.
And that was his purpose. Not everybody that we're going to see is going to respond to the love of God towards us. The God so loved this world that he gave his only begotten son. Not everybody is going to respond to it.
But it is of the utmost importance, at least we tell them, and that we're faithful to tell out the great gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Yes, when I read down through this book here of chapter X26, I see Paul had the gospel in his heart, and he had sinners in his heart.
And may God help encourage us that we might be exercised about these things, of why we're here, what is the purpose. If it's not to tell others, and it's not to honor God here, he just as well take us home too.
May it touch our hearts today as we read the word of God. Lord, search my heart. And when we preach the gospel, Lord, search my heart. And when we praise God, Lord, search my heart. And when we understand why we're here, Lord, search my heart.
I think that's enough. I think you know what my burden is today. May we learn something of the apostle Paul, and encourage us to speak to others, and to encourage them to get under the word of God, to hear these truths, and this gospel might be spread.
I thank God of the exercise in other countries, but there is absolutely no other reason why it can't be the same in this United States of America, other than the fact of our own failures, our own pride, our own worldliness.
May God help us that we might all be in repentance towards God, and bring forth that lovely truth. There are souls that can be saved, souls put on the king's highway, on the road to glory. What a great day it would be just to hear of another soul coming to know Christ as their Savior, because I invited them.
That's all I did, I invited them to at least hear. May God exercise our hearts to encourage us more and more to speak of the saving grace, and the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.