Acts 9:10 - 22 From Enemy to Evangelist

From Persecutor to Preacher in Acts 9

Well, good morning. Please take your Bibles and open them to Acts chapter 9 as we continue to examine this particular chapter. I wonder how many of you, if I said the name David Carrier, if that would mean anything to you?

Maybe not too many. If I told you he was from, I'm sorry, I messed up, David McAllister. David McAllister from Florida, and a young man who was 10 years old at the time, his name was Chris Carrier. This is in 1974.

David McAllister was what we might call a disgruntled former employee. We hear about these stories from time to time. Somebody gets fired, and what do they do? They take revenge on whoever fired them.

In this case, Mr. McAllister was the employee of a gentleman who had a 10-year-old nephew who was Chris Carrier. And to get revenge on him, because the older Mr. Carrier was in need of care, and so McAllister was a nurse for him.

To get revenge for being fired, he kidnapped Chris Carrier, 10 years old, took him out in the swamplands of Florida, burned him with cigarettes, stabbed him multiple times with an ice pick, and shot him in the head, left him to die in the Everglades.

He was never convicted for any of this. The bullet blinded young Mr. Carrier, who was found, 10 years old, found six days after this, alive on a rock in the Everglades. He later described the whole ordeal as, quote, a walk in the park.

As for McAllister, he knew that he would eventually get caught. So when the police showed up at his house, but this was 24 years later, or 22 years later, when there was no longer any penalty because the statute of limitations had expired, he confessed.

So here's the scene. Carrier becomes a Christian. He's in his 30s, finds out McAllister is in a rest home, a nursing home, has no friends, no family. 77 years old, he's blind, nobody to care for him. And nobody would have said a word if Chris Carrier had mocked him, done whatever he wanted, laughed at his misery.

But instead, when McAllister apologized to him and started crying, Carrier told him that from now on, there would be nothing like anger or revenge between us. Nothing except a new friendship. And Carrier didn't stop there.

He and his young daughter continued visiting McAllister to read him Bible passages, bring him treats, and ensure that he was being properly cared for in his final weeks on the earth. What could do that?

What could make a man love and care for someone who had done so much harm to him? It's very similar to what we're going to see this morning in Acts chapter 9. Let's read our text, beginning in verse 10.

Ananias and the Lord’s Call to Saul

Now there was a disciple at Damascus named Ananias. The Lord said to him in a vision, Ananias. And he said, here I am, Lord. And the Lord said to him, rise and go to the street called straight. And at the house of Judas, look for a man of Tarsus named Saul.

For behold, he is praying. And he has seen in a vision a man named Ananias come in and lay hands on him so that he might regain his sight. But Ananias answered, Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to your saints at Jerusalem.

And here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who call on your name. But the Lord said to him, go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel.

For I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name. So Ananias departed and entered the house and laying his hands on him, he said, brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.

And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes and he regained his sight. Then he rose and was baptized and taking food, he was strengthened. For some days he was with the disciples at Damascus and immediately he proclaimed Jesus in the synagogue saying, he is the son of God.

And all who heard him were amazed and said, is this not the man who made havoc in Jerusalem of those who called upon this name? And has he not come here for this purpose to bring them bound before the chief priests?

But Saul increased all the more in strength and confounded the Jews who lived at Damascus by proving that Jesus was the Christ. Now, the last time we were in Acts, we saw Saul's world turned upside down.

I called it Paul's or Saul's inversion. Everything he believed was wrong. He was on the road to Damascus. He had been commissioned by the Sanhedrin, the chief priests, to clean the city of Damascus of Christianity.

But Jesus intervened, appeared to him in a vision, blinded him, miraculously appearing so that his companions saw nothing. All they heard was a voice. The Lord identified himself with his church. If you recall, you know, Saul, why are you persecuting me?

And he asked Saul that question. When we last saw Saul, he was blinded. I mean, I feel like saying when we last visited Paul or Saul, you know, I mean, it's like recap. He was blinded, needing help into it to enter into Damascus, right?

He was escorted there and he did not eat or drink. And as we looked at it, I thought, you know, it's almost impossible to think about or to read that passage, to focus on it and to not think about what he was going through during those three days.

Sorrow, you know, as he thought about all the things he had done. It's easy to say, you know, why are you persecuting me? But then to think back on the murder of Stephen, the persecution of so many others, and the implied murder of others.

So the guilt, amazement, and of course, hope in the words of Jesus, who told Saul that he would be told what to do. It's not go into Damascus and wait for your execution, go into Damascus, check yourself into the jail.

No, go into Damascus and wait for instructions. So this morning, I want you to see the utter transformation of Saul into Paul, enemy of Christ into evangelist for Christ. We're going to have five hours to sort of mark, give us markers as we do this.

And I think this is really a very encouraging section of scripture, because as we read it, as we think about it, this is the ultimate message that no one, no one is beyond the salvific reach of our God.

Can you pray for people to get saved? Absolutely. Can God transform, save anyone? Absolutely. I think I said last time, if you can imagine the, you know, the knitting club at the church of Jerusalem, and they're taking prayer requests, and somebody says, well, let's pray for Saul.

I bet there was some murmuring there, but somebody prayed for him. So our first R, it's kind of a tricky one, revision. I thought, well, there's two ways of looking at it. Paul's life is, or Saul's life is revised, or he gets his vision back, revision.

So there you go. Verse 10. Now there was a disciple at Damascus named Ananias. The Lord said to him in a vision, Ananias. And he said, here I am, Lord. So first we see the man. Ananias is a common name.

This isn't Ananias and Sapphira, right? That Ananias is gone. But this is a very common name in that part of the world. But this was really not a common man. He was certainly a Christian. We know that by the word disciple.

He was a follower of Christ. And you can tell by the way he speaks to the Lord here, this is a man who absolutely trusts the Lord in everything. Jesus appears to Ananias in a vision, calls his name, and his response is very simple.

We read it. Here I am, Lord. Now, when you hear that, what do you think? What's your first response? This sounds kind of familiar, I think. It should sound familiar. This is how often Old Testaments would respond to the call of the Lord.

Listen to Genesis 22, verse 1. After these things, God tested Abraham and said to him, Abraham, called his name. And he, Abraham, said, here I am. Genesis 22, 11. But the angel of the Lord, again, God, Christ, called to him from heaven and said, Abraham, Abraham.

And he said, here I am. It's not like God needs this information. This is the response of an obedient heart. I want to respond to whatever God is going to tell me. Isaiah 6, verse 8. And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, whom shall I send and who will go for us?

Then I said, here I am. Send me. This here I am is kind of the raising of the hand. Yes. Yes. I'm here and I'm ready. I'm ready to do your will. Ananias is a man who loves the Lord Jesus Christ and wants to obey him in everything.

So that's the man. How about the mission? Verses 11 and 12. And the Lord said to him, rise and go to the street called Straight, and at the house of Judas, look for a man of Tarsus named Saul. For behold, he is praying.

And he has seen in a vision a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands on him so that he might regain his sight. Now the Lord gives Ananias a specific location. Straight Street was fairly unique in the ancient world.

Why? Can you imagine why? Because it was straight. Kind of like going into Boston. If there was a street in Boston that was a mile long and perfectly straight, it would be called Straight Street. And that's what this was.

Perfectly straight for an entire mile. What a novel concept. And it's still, by the way, it still exists today, which is kind of crazy. Did not twist, wind, or meander. It was just a mile of sheer straightness and beauty.

Like for drag races or something. And apparently it must not have been too difficult to find Judas's house. Maybe he had a fancy mailbox. What do you think? I imagine you probably went and asked, you know, where does Judas live on this street as you walk down the street?

Got directions. He's also told to find a specific man, Saul of Tarsus. Now, it might have been okay when Ananias heard the name Saul. That might not have been too terrible. When he heard where Saul was from, that pretty much eliminated all the other souls in the world.

Saul of Tarsus. That was a name that would have struck fear into the heart of any Christian. His reputation as a persecutor of the church was well established. We see that throughout this passage. The fact that Saul was from Tarsus, though, from our perspective, as we're looking back on it, means several things.

Being born there, being born in Tarsus, conferred citizenship in the Roman Empire. And that's going to be important as we go through the book of Acts, because there are a number of times where the law of Rome is broken with regard to Paul, because even though he's a citizen, he doesn't always get treated like a citizen.

It also meant that the fact that he was born in Tarsus meant that he was steeped in the Greek culture, the Greek language. He knew it well. And the fact that he was a Jew who'd been taught by Gamaliel and was an expert in the Jewish law made him the perfect choice for the role he was chosen to fill.

Now that Ananias was told by Jesus that Saul was praying. Jesus comes to Ananias and says, Saul is praying. Look for him, the guy who's praying. Saul of Tarsus praying. Now his first thought, Ananias, must have been fear.

I don't want to see Saul of Tarsus. I know what he's like. He's probably going to at least deck me, arrest me, do something bad to me. But then he hears what? He's praying. Well, Jesus says he's praying.

There's a logical implication, and that is that he is praying to Jesus. Jesus is telling Ananias that this man, this Saul of Tarsus, this kind of Christian terrorist, terrorist of Christians, has been changed.

But you can just, as he gets this vision, as he's told this by the Lord, you could just imagine his heart just his breathing getting quicker and quicker and quicker. It's like, you have to be kidding me.

This is the job you're going to get me? But Saul's at the same, or we learn here that Saul's had a vision, and it's of Ananias himself coming to lay hands on Saul. So we have this kind of vision within a vision.

Ananias is told about a vision of Saul that we don't even have recorded for us. We just know it because this is Luke's way of kind of compressing the story. So he's also given this specific assignment to go to find Saul of Tarsus, to lay hands on him that he might have his sight restored.

So that's revision. Second R, revulsion. If you're revulsed by something, you want to turn away from it. It makes you sick. It makes you nauseated. It makes you, in this case, kind of petrified. But Ananias answered, verse 13, Lord, I've heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to your saints at Jerusalem.

And here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who call on your name. Now, what's he saying? He's not saying, I won't go. He's just going, hey, just so you know, just FYI, I don't know if you really know who this guy is.

It's kind of like the worst of the worst. He's like a vigilante. He's going to arrest, take care of Christians by any means necessary, including violence. Ananias has heard the stories. He might have even heard about the death of Stephen.

He knows what Saul did in Jerusalem. It's right there in the text. He says, how much evil he has done to your saints at Jerusalem. There's no one more feared and despised by the saints, by those set apart, those Christian people.

And this, by the way, this is the first time the word saints is used in Acts. And then when we think about how many times Paul writes it, Saul writes it, we can kind of see this. There's no one more feared than Saul of Tarsus.

He's the very embodiment of evil. He's the worst of the worst. There's almost kind of a, are you sure you have the right name? Can, you know, can we come up with somebody else that you want me to go see?

Or do you have a list of people I could go see? Because I'd put this guy in the bottom of my list. Ananias doesn't really want to do this. Ananias also calls the presumed targets of Saul, those who call on your name.

Again, interesting, because now Saul, according to this vision here, the Lord telling him, he's already been told that Jesus is calling, or that Saul is calling on Jesus' name. But I think he's having a really hard time wrapping his head around this.

How can Saul, the persecutor, be praying to the same God he seems to hate? So we've seen revision, revulsion, and now restatement. The Lord is going to tell him again without rebuke, but he's just going to make it very plain.

Yes, this is what I want. It's as if the Lord is saying, Ananias, I want you to forget everything you know about who Saul was, and I want you to get to know who Saul is. He's one who will proclaim the gospel.

Look at verse 15. But the Lord said to him, Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel. This is remarkable. No more explanation, just go and do it.

This is not some kind of negotiation. The Lord says go. He knows Ananias will, in fact, go. And he tells him that Saul is a divinely chosen instrument or vessel or container to represent Jesus. Now, I would say, you know, in the parlance of today, tell me that Paul's an apostle without telling me that Paul's an apostle, because that's what Jesus is saying.

This man, this Saul, is going to represent me. He's going to tell people about my name, which is to say everything about me, which has to contain the He's going to do this before Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel.

He's going to be a worker for the cause of Christ, the very cause that he's been trying to destroy. And guess what? He's going to outwork them all. Why? Again, I think this is such a hinge of the New Testament.

As you read the Pauline epistles, you can't help but think this same Paul who's writing this is the one who was visited on Damascus Road, the same Saul who's guilty of much has been forgiven of much. And so what happens as a result of being forgiven of a lot and of knowing how wretched you are on the inside of how black your soul is, essentially, and then you are what?

Cleansed. You're made whiter than snow. Saul, then Paul, where much is forgiven, there is much thankfulness. There's much joy. There's much capacity to even suffer. By the power of the Creator, Jesus Christ, Saul will be charged with preaching the gospel, that is to say, to be his ambassador, to be his messenger, to be his apostle before the Gentiles, before kings and queens and the Caesar, before the Jews.

You could even say this, that Saul essentially is a one-man missionary organization. North American Mission Board, Masters International, TMAI, whatever mission agency you want to say, let's just roll them all up and we'll just say Paul.

He's going to go as far as he can and preach the gospel everywhere. And when I say, you know, as we reach or as we read the epistles, the Pauline epistles, we can't help but frame it through the lens of Saul on the road of Damascus.

Let me just read 2 Corinthians 5. He is a new creation. The old has passed away. Behold, the new has come. Now, when you apply that to Saul, what do you think? It's true and it's amazing. It's like night and day.

This man who was the enemy of the church, the enemy of Christ, the sworn enemy of Christ, who would do anything, who went and got all these documents so that he could go and persecute the church and put an end to it, is now going to be the great ambassador, the great preacher, the great presenter of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Do whatever you want to me, I'm going to tell you about Jesus Christ. That's who he is going to become. So we see the next part of it. One who will suffer for the gospel. He's not only going to be this ambassador, he is going to suffer.

Verse 16, for I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name. He's going to present my name. He's going to be my missionary, my apostle, and he's going to suffer, and I'm going to tell him how much he's going to suffer.

Now, Jesus will show. That word means to give instruction or moral direction, to give direction, prove. He's going to prove to Saul how much he will have to endure. Now, do you think that encouraged him?

Maybe. Think about, let's turn for a moment to 2 Corinthians chapter 11. Verse 23 is where I'm going to start. When we think about the life of Saul, the missionary life of Paul, I mean, we can be impressed, but what we really need to think about is how much the Holy Spirit empowered him, how much Christ transformed him, and how really he was, in fact, this chosen instrument of Christ to do these things.

But he told him, he said, you know, you're going to suffer for me. Now, 2 Corinthians 11, verses 23 to 27, are they servants of Christ? He's talking about the false apostles, but that's beside the point here for a moment.

Let's just stay with Paul. I'm a better one. I'm talking like a madman with far greater labors, far more imprisonments. Listen to, and you know, ask yourself, is this bragging? This is just a recounting of his life.

Far more imprisonments with countless beatings and often near death. Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the 40 lashes less one, which would, that's what Jesus got. It's enough to kill some people.

That's why they stopped at 39. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked. A night and a day I was adrift at sea on frequent journeys in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers in toil and hardship through many a sleepless night in hunger and thirst, often without food in cold and exposure.

You want to know how much you're going to suffer, Saul, later Paul, this. And as he looked back on it, what do you think he thought? Was he upset? Did he think Jesus had done him wrong? No. No. I mean, was he even surprised when he was executed?

Was he disappointed when he was executed? You can go back to Acts. I'm going to read a couple more passages, this out of Philippians. As he's imprisoned, close to execution, listen to what he says in Philippians 2, 17 and 18.

Even if I am to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all. Likewise, you also should be glad and rejoice with me. My death is pending.

Rejoice. Rejoice with me. Verse or chapter 3, verses 7 and 8. But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.

For his sake, I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ. He learned, Jesus taught and he learned what? That this life is well spent in the service of Jesus Christ, whatever the cost.

So, revision, revulsion, restatement. Number four, restoration. Restoration. First notice that Ananias obeyed as we thought he would. Verse 17, so Ananias departed and entered the house. And laying hands on him, that is to say Saul, he said, Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Ananias lays his hands on Saul. Now, Ananias is not an apostle. He's not anointing him. He's not somehow transferring power into him. What's he doing? Well, first of all, he's obeying what the Lord told him.

But in a very kind of physical way, he's establishing the fact that he's not afraid of Saul. If you're afraid of somebody, you don't touch them. Instead, he's trusting the Lord. Without fear, he sets his hands on him.

I believe the Lord. I'm going to show that by putting my hands on him. Now, let this word just kind of hang in the air for a moment. This could be a distraction to me, too, as a preacher. But brother, brother, Saul of Tarsus.

Ananias comes in. He's been petrified of him. He's heard all the stories. He puts his hand on him and he says, brother. Now, who do you suppose that impacted more, Ananias or Saul? Saul's been blind for three days.

Three days he did not eat. It was Saul alone with his thoughts. I mean, I can imagine some of the things he thought. He might have thought this, that I'm the chief of all sinners. I'm the worst of the worst.

The things I want to do, I don't do. The things I do, I don't want to do. He could have thought all those things and more. He could have heard the words of the Lord. Why are you persecuting me over and over?

Guilty of blasphemy, of murder. He knew that he deserved death. But the resurrected Jesus had something else in mind for him. He told him in verse six, way back in verse six, that he was going to do something.

He could have pondered that. What was it? He'd seen Ananias in a vision coming to restore his sight. But that word, brother, kind of broke the spell of the three days. I'm sure that Ananias spoke it in a voice of tenderness and of love and endearment.

Brother, how exhilarating that must have been for Saul to hear that. Ananias tells Saul that he's been sent by Jesus. And he tells something, Saul, that only Saul knew. That in fact, on the road to Damascus, it was Jesus who appeared to him.

So there's instantly a link. Ananias knows what happened to me. Notice also that he regains his sight, which is important. But it's more important that he's filled with the Holy Spirit.

Why?

Because the Spirit is going to empower him, be with him, inform him, even as he writes his letters and everything else, guide him. Notice the text is interesting because it doesn't say that he received the Holy Spirit, but that he was filled with the Holy Spirit, which is an indication of the power to do great ministry.

Then notice Saul obeys verse 18, and immediately something like scales fell from his eyes, and he regained his sight. Then he rose and was baptized. Not scales, but something like scales or flakes. They are a physical representation of what's been going on, the spiritual blindness, the physical blindness removed.

Obviously, if these scales were the cause of his blindness, somebody would have seen them, or even Saul rubbing his eyes, they would have fallen out. But implicit in the first 17 verses of Acts chapter 9 is this truth.

Saul has been born again. His eyes have been opened. He's been given a new heart, new affections. We know that the Holy Spirit wouldn't take up residence, wouldn't fill someone who was unsaved. Now, his first action as a believer is to be baptized.

He wants to obey Christ, but he also wants to be identified with the people of Christ. His whole adult life has been filled with persecuting Christians. And now he wants to be identified with them. He wants to be on that side.

So the question comes, you know, would you like to see the world change? Would you like to see the world get better? What's the answer? Well, it's not to wait for Jesus to appear to people and blind them.

It's to preach the gospel. You want to see somebody's life transformed from death to life? Preach the gospel to them. Trust the Lord for the results, the good news. What is it? Paul himself, via the Lord Jesus Christ, he told us in 1 Corinthians 15, he told us that he learned this from Jesus.

Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures. That's the gospel. Christ died for our sins. Well, implicit in that is the fact that we are sinners.

We do sin. We do fall short of the glory of God. Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scripture. There are many scriptures we could think of. But Isaiah 53 comes to mind, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, because Christ himself said that he would raise himself from the dead, and he did.

Saul’s New Fellowship and Public Witness

Now we see in verse 19, the soul is refreshed. And taking food, he was strengthened. For some days he was with the disciples at Damascus. I mean, certainly eating, drinking, after three days of not eating and drinking, helped him regain his physical strength.

But what's more important? What's more important is he got to have fellowship with the disciples. He was hanging out with the disciples. Text tells us he was with the disciples at Damascus. It seems plain that Ananias, being a faithful man, would have introduced the recent convert to other Christians in Damascus.

Now I did wonder, I do wonder, it's not said in the text here, I wonder if they just kind of kept this whole Saul of Tarsus thing on the down low. You know, maybe that's not the best idea, to just kind of, hey, let me tell you about this new convert, his name is Saul of Tarsus, because then you have to go through this whole thing over and over again.

But we really don't know.

But it did make me think, you know, that longing for fellowship. As soon as you get saved, what do you want? You want to be with the brothers. If we don't love the brothers, then what? That Christ is not in us.

But I thought, have we ever experienced that, of not being able to have fellowship? And the truth is, we all did during the pandemic. Tough times. I had a professor, I probably said this a number of times, but a professor used to say, the lone wolf, and he was talking about Christians, I don't know why he chose wolf.

But the lone wolf, I mean, we could say it this way, maybe I'll change it right on the fly. The lone sheep is what? A dead sheep. Sheep want to be together, their safety in being together. Under, of course, the great shepherd.

Isolation. Being alone as a Christian is spiritual poison. Fellowship is so key to our spiritual health. And by the way, fellowship is much more than hanging around and eating donuts, although that's good.

How about hanging around, eating donuts, and talking about Jesus? But enough talking about Meechum, then. Okay, our fifth R. And again, I had to cheat, because I have this in parentheses, proclaiming the Redeemer.

So Redeemer is the fifth R. He goes from Paulda, Saul, from persecutor to preacher. Look at verse 20. And immediately, he proclaimed Jesus in the synagogue, saying, He is the Son of God. Amazing, right?

Here we have it. In a short period of time, we don't know exactly how long, but it goes from persecutor to preacher. The man who had come to Damascus to carry the professed, all who profess Christ away, take them back to Jerusalem for trial, is now a preacher.

No training, no preparation, not even an evangelism program. I mean, just for a moment, I just thought, well, let's just think what it was like when he entered the synagogue. And you know, maybe the local rabbi recognized him and stood up and said, Hey, let me introduce our special speaker this morning, Saul of Tarsus.

He was a student of the famous rabbi Gamaliel and is one of the most well-versed in the law of God we have ever had the opportunity to hear. That probably didn't go according to plan there. A different kind of synagogue on that Saturday.

And then he's perplexing the population. Look at verse 21. And all who heard were amazed and said, Is this not the man who made havoc in Jerusalem of those who called upon this name, upon Jesus? And has he not come here for this very purpose to bring them bound before the chief priests?

They knew who Saul was. They knew his mission. They knew his devotion to this mission. They hear him and they say, Well, what happened to Saul? And amazed is put at the beginning of this sentence. Amazed were all who heard him.

They were stunned, shocked. And so we have these rhetorical questions. Is this not the man? And has he not come here? The implied question is, Yes, this is him. Yes, he's the one who came here to do that.

And reading between the lines, clearly there's some pushback. Look at verse 22. But Saul increased all the more in strength and confounded the Jews who lived in Damascus by proving that Jesus was the Christ.

I think the New English translation, the net version, gives us a good sense of it. It says, But Saul became more and more capable, capable in handling the scriptures. He already knew them. But now he was like, Okay, he's no longer attacking Jesus, but presenting Jesus.

So how do I take what I know and present Jesus in the best possible light? And then it says,. And was causing consternation. We see confounded and we're like, Well, that almost sounds like confused. No, they were quite upset among the Jews who lived in Damascus by proving that Jesus is the Christ.

Think about it. His knowledge of the Old Testament, Jewish teaching. And he's able to take that and say, Okay, you think it proves that Jesus is not the Messiah. I'm going to show you how wrong you are.

And they couldn't rebut him. This was God's chosen vessel indeed. Now, from time to time, we see celebrities who are said to be converted or said to come to Christ, and they're immediately given platforms to discuss Christianity.

Sometimes they even go on TV shows, or nowadays you can get on YouTubes or podcasts or whatever. And as pastors, we sometimes see this and we go, What a mistake. You don't take a new convert and just shove him out there.

Just make him a teacher or representative of Christ right away. But not everyone is Saul. Not every convert is well steeped in the scriptures and understands doctrine. Not every convert is visited personally by the Lord Jesus Christ, right?

This is just true. So what do we do? What would we say? Time and trials. Let's wait. Think of how many times we've seen new kind of converts or professing converts embarrass themselves or embarrass Christianity by what they do and say later.

So let's go back to our opening question. What can turn an enemy into a friend? What can cause someone to love a man who tried to murder him? To not only forgive him, but to love him, to show great kindness, affection toward him.

What can so transform a man like Saul that he's willing to suffer for the very cause he once sought to extinguish? And the answer is the same, Jesus Christ. Even again, another sort of autobiographical verse, Ephesians 4 .32.

It's not autobiographical. It applies to all of us. But as you think about Ephesians 4 .32, you have to think about who's writing it. Christians are to forgive others as God in Christ Jesus has forgiven you.

This is Saul of Tarsus who wrote this. This is Saul whose life was changed on the road to Damascus by the Lord Jesus Christ. And as he thought about all he was forgiven, he said, here's by the power of the Holy Spirit, here's my command to you, forgive others as God in Christ has forgiven you.

He understood what that meant. We should, too, if we examine ourselves and we understand who we really are and how God has forgiven us in Christ Jesus because of the gospel. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for this powerful example of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit transforming the life of Saul.

Father, may it encourage us. May it give us hope for those we love, for those that we don't love, for those that we think are too odious, too hateful, too sinful to ever be forgiven. Help us to pray even for them because no one is beyond your reach.

We pray in Jesus' name, amen.