The Conversion of Saul

00:02 I want to greet each one this morning in the name of Jesus. Let the church say Amen. We say Amen to the Word of God that has been read this morning and has been sung. We were talking in the New Believers class this morning about prayer and how you can pray. You can speak your prayers, you can think your prayers, you can write down your prayers, you can sing your prayers. 00:21 And you can sing Scripture and so the Word comes to us, we can express it in different forms. This morning if you would turn in your copies of the Scriptures to the book of Acts chapter 9. I had Ryan read this morning a parallel passage in chapter 26 as Paul gave, or Saul Paul. We'll probably refer to him, 00:41 well, both ways since he's called Saul in chapter 9, but he later on is referred to as Paul. 00:48 And the Scripture in 26 was his testimony of what happened to him in chapter 9. And so this morning we're looking at chapter 9, the conversion of Saul and our conversion experience as well. 01:01 I want you to think this morning of when you came to know Christ and at what point in your life you came to that understanding that Christ is Lord and that Jesus is the Son of God, the Savior from sin, and that we are sinners by birth and by choice and need a Savior. 01:23 And at what point you came to realize that and offered your heart to the Lord and surrendered your heart to the Lord and what all that looked like. Remember years ago asking a group of people where they were, a group of inmates, where were you when you came to know Christ? And I think one fellow ended up saying he was in a cemetery. 01:45 Well, wherever you're at when you come to know Christ, you know when you come to know Him. And what every soul needs, that is in common to all of our salvation experience. What I want to share with you this morning is what happened to Saul can happen to us. Not in the same way, not in the same way. We're not looking for heavenly visions, 02:05 but we are looking for a revelation of Jesus Christ. Amen. To understand who He is, to know who He is, and to surrender our lives to Him. Our story will look different than Saul's. It just simply will. 02:19 In fact, one of the things that may look a little bit different is it's amazing to me how that God just sovereignly chose him with no inkling of Saul having sought after Him. 02:34 I mean, Saul is attempting to persecute the Lord Jesus Christ Himself and is kicking hard against God. And God just sovereignly, miraculously calls him and almost makes it, I don't want to say impossible, but improbable and very unlikely that Saul could resist. 02:56 And so make of that whatever you will. But what we want to look at this morning are some of the key dynamics that we find in Saul's conversion and how that affects us and what that looks like in our conversion experience as well. So in chapters 26, we already read about his conversion on the road to Damascus. 03:16 I want to pick up reading in verse 10. Now there was a certain disciple at Damascus named Ananias, and to him the Lord said in a vision, "Ananias." And he said, "Lord," or, "Here I am, Lord." So the Lord said to him, "Arise and go to the street called Straight and inquire at the house of Judas for one called Saul of Tarsus. 03:37 For behold, he is praying." And in the vision he had seen a man named Ananias coming in and putting his hand on him so that he might receive his sight. Then Ananias answered, "Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much harm he has done to your saints in Jerusalem. 03:55 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 vessel of mine to bear my name before Gentiles, kings, and children of Israel. For I will show him how many things he must suffer for my name's sake." And Ananias went his way and entered the house and laying his hand on him, 04:16 he said, "Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus whom appeared to you on the road as you came has sent me that you might receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit." Immediately there fell from his eyes something like scales and he received his sight at once and he arose and was baptized. So when he had received food, he was strengthened. 04:37 Then Saul spent some days with the disciples at Damascus. Immediately he preached the Christ in the synagogues that he is the Son of God. 04:47 Then all who heard were amazed and said, "Is not this he who destroyed those who called on his name in Jerusalem and has come here for that purpose so that he might bring them bound to the chief priest?" Saul increasing all the more in strength and confounded the Jews who dwelled in Damascus, proving that this Jesus is the Christ. 05:07 Now after many days were passed, the Jews plotted to kill him. But their plot became known to Saul and they watched the gates day and night to kill him. Then the disciples took him by night and led him down through the wall in a large basket. And when Saul had come to Jerusalem, he tried to join the disciples. They were all afraid of him, did not believe that he was a disciple. 05:28 But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles and he declared to them how he had seen the Lord on the road and that he had spoken to him and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of Jesus. So he was gone with them at Jerusalem. 05:45 So he was with them at Jerusalem coming in and going out and he spoke boldly in the name of the Lord Jesus and disputed against the Hellenists, but they attempted to kill him. When the brethren found out, they brought him down to Caesarea and sent him to Tarsus. Then the churches throughout all Judea, Galilee, 06:04 and Samaria had peace and were edified. And walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, they were multiplied. May the Lord add his blessing to his word this morning. So what are some of the things that happened to Saul here in chapter 9 and following? 06:23 The first thing that we see in Saul's conversion experience was that he had an authentic encounter with the living Christ. An authentic encounter with the living Christ. Now we don't know if this is actually the first time that Saul would have encountered Christ. 06:39 It seems very unlikely that in Saul's back and forth between Tarsus and the feasts in Jerusalem, it seems very unlikely that Saul would not have at least seen Jesus before. Maybe he had some interaction with him. We are not told that specifically, so we leave that up to conjecture. 06:56 But nevertheless, at this point, he is having an authentic encounter with the living Christ. And so he falls to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?" And Saul didn't recognize who he was. 07:13 "Who are you, Lord?" Or, "Sir." He's not exactly recognizing his lordship at this point. But who are you, sir? Who are you, master? Someone stronger, someone in authority. Then the Lord said, "I am Jesus whom you are persecuting. 07:29 It is hard for you to kick against the goads." So he previously did not know the living Christ, but he was introduced to him right now, right here. And interestingly enough, he is stripped of his dependence upon the flesh. Because we cannot know Christ according to the flesh, we must know him according to the Spirit. 07:50 And so he's stripped of his dependency on the flesh. His sight is taken from him. He's knocked to the ground from whatever he was riding on. Maybe on a horse or on a donkey, probably. We don't know what it was. 08:04 But he fell to the ground and is immediately stripped of his sight and becomes dependent upon others. He becomes dependent upon God and upon someone to help him, "Help me." And the Lord gives him an instruction. 08:23 And beautifully enough, while this is all happening, to Saul, God is orchestrating a man by the name of Ananias to come and minister to him. So he's encountering the living Christ. He's been kicking against the goads, kicking against the pricks. What is a goad? Well, 08:43 goads are things that urge or drive someone or something forward. If you think about it in terms of an oxen, a team of oxen harnessed together, moving forward or needing to move forward in harmony and oneness, the goads can be a stick or a prod or something that prods them forward. 09:05 It may hurt a little bit. It may hurt a lot in order to get them to do what they're supposed to do. And Saul has been resisting God. He's been resisting Christ. And Saul, I've got a message for you to give and I've got a place for you to give it and I've got a call upon your life. And you're kicking against me. And so it's hard. 09:24 It's going to be harder and harder and harder until you surrender to those goads. The literal meaning of a goad is a pointed stick used to prod animals, especially cattle, to keep them moving forward or even as a team of oxen. Figuratively, it can be anything that provokes, pushes, or motivates someone into action. 09:44 Well, he's being pushed, motivated, and goaded into action. And he's finding himself on the surrender side of things here. Now he's going to be faced with the decision. Am I going to surrender to the Lord or am I not going to surrender to the Lord? 10:04 Am I going to continue to kick against the goads, to continue to kick against the pricks, or will I surrender like all the men of God here to fore that God used in a mighty way? We think about the encounters of God with Moses and Moses needing to surrender to the Lord at the burning bush. 10:24 And even so, Moses had excuses against God. "Lord, send somebody else. Send Aaron. Send anybody else." But then Moses, in his encounter with the living Christ, the living God, said, "Here am I. Send me." Isaiah chapter 6, seeing the holiness of God, 10:43 "Holy, holy, 10:44 holy is the Lord." And to give to his full surrender to God by saying, "Here am I, Lord. Send me. What would that have me to do?" And so Isaiah was called by God. The apostle John, when he was called by Christ to give a message to the church and the seven churches in Revelation, 11:06 oh, he had known Jesus. He had known him intimately. But all of a sudden, he knew the incarnate living Christ in his power and authority on the island of Patmos and fell at his feet as dead. But the Lord, the Bible says, laid his hand upon him and said, "Arise. Fear not, 11:24 for I have given you a message to give to the nations." And so the apostle Paul had that encounter with Christ. 11:33 Peter had that encounter with Christ on the seashore when he said, "Lord, depart from me, for I am a sinful man." And there's something about us when we come in contact with the living Christ. It does something to us. It makes us aware of our sinfulness. 11:52 It makes us aware of his holiness. It makes us aware of our undone-ness and of our uniqueness in God's plan as he says, "I've introduced myself to you for a purpose. 12:06 And that purpose is to send you forth to follow me and to serve me." Many others have come to the similar realization when we've come to know Christ. In his book called Soul Searching, a man by the name of Christian Smith summarized perceptions about God that are prevalent in the church. And he said it like this in contemporary culture, 12:27 that many people today believe about God what could best be described as a moral therapeutic deism. A moral therapeutic deism. Now let's unpack that a little bit. What is Mr. Smith saying? He said, "Well, moral implies that God wants us to be nice. He wants us to be nice. 12:46 He wants us to live a better life. He wants us to rise above our circumstances. He wants us to whatever, fill in the blank." And therapeutic, people mean that God wants us to be happy. And so a lot of people's concept of God and of Christ is that he wants us to be good. He wants us to be nice. 13:06 He wants us to be happy. And then he is a deist. Deism means that God is distant and not involved in our lives. He just shows up every once in a while, gets occasionally involved, but on a whole, God functions like an idea, not a personal being actively present in our world. 13:26 So he's distant. And so if you add moral, he wants us to be nice. He wants us to be happy. And he wants to leave us alone and let us kind of do our own thing. That's the concept that people have of Jesus. But when you come to encounter the living Christ, you realize it's more than about being moral and about being good and about being nice. 13:46 It's about being surrendered to God. It's about dealing with our sin and confession and repentance and surrender to the holiness of God, the person of Jesus Christ, to allow him to be Lord in our lives. 14:02 Not like a grandpa or a Santa Claus that shows up every once in a while or you go to visit in the nursing home and hope he's okay from visit to visit. No, as a life-changing Lord and Savior and Master and King, that we commit ourselves as disciples for life. And that's what. De Cochabarría, entonces había leones. 14:23 Bueno, pues un león. Not just showing up in our lives once in a while, but one whom we follow, one whom we repent to, one whom we confess our sins, and one we live as a disciple of Jesus Christ. According to Smith, this version of God, 14:42 and I quote, "That's prevalent in our culture and in our churches, often without realizing it. Every culture quietly molds and shapes our views of God. But we can't grow in relationship with God when we insist on relating to God as we think he should be." That's the key phrase. We think he should be a certain way. 15:03 It's the same in our human relationships. If I demand that you just meet my needs and conform to my assumptions, you will probably feel manipulated and cheated. That's why our surrender to God as he is, as revealed in scripture, is important. 15:20 Otherwise, we have a God of our own imaginations who is an obese, jolly toymaker who works one day a year. And that's kind of, in our case, one day a week, maybe. And so we see that Paul is having a radical, radical conversion experience here. And I'd like to suggest to you this morning that our conversion, 15:41 when we come to know Christ, while the circumstances may be somewhat different and may be very different, the result is no less radical. Conversion from an ain't to a saint, from a child of darkness to a child of light, 16:01 from a sinner by birth and by choice to a saint who has surrendered his life to the lordship of God. The second thing we see about Paul's conversion here, that also we can see traces of it in our conversion as well, is that this encounter with Christ deals with sin. 16:23 It deals with sin. It must deal with sin because sin separates us from God. We're aware of that. We are separated from God by sin. And by continuing in sin, we continue to be separated from God. Sometimes we ask God to bless us, to bless us, to bless us. 16:42 And yet we're not willing to deal with the hindrances that keep him from blessing us, and that would be our sin. Now, so we know about Saul here and his sin. He was a consenting Pharisee. He consented under the death of Stephen. 17:02 We read that over in a previous chapter. When we were introduced to Saul, he approved and agreed to the death of Stephen. He had warrants out for the arrests of believers. In chapter 9, verse 1, Saul still breathing out threats and murder, 17:24 slaughter would be another term for it, threatenings. He come to realize in his encounter with Christ that the sin of his heart had to be repented of. And he come to realize how deep his sin was. 17:42 His sin was not just a violation of his conscience. I think he was probably following his conscience, but his conscience was misinformed. His conscience was out of order. You see, sin is not just a violation of conscience, although it may be that to alert us to our sin, 18:04 but it is a violation of the word of God. It is a violation of the holiness of God. It is a violation of God's demands and requirements and lordship placed upon our lives. And so he called himself the chief of sinners. I remember reading someone else thought to call themselves the chief of sinners, 18:26 but they realized that Paul already had that office, had already had that wrapped up. And so they had to call themselves something else. Well, we all can call ourselves in some way a sinner in chief, wanting to have control of our own lives. Yes, doing things that may look holy, that may look religious, 18:46 and that may be religious, but that are not under his authority and are not a result of the new nature that is given to us when he inhabits us as his throne and sits upon the throne of our lives. So we must deal with our sins. We must deal with anger, 19:05 bitterness, hatred, lust, covetousness in order for us to really experience Christ. And when we do experience Christ, these things will be dealt with. At the end of the message, we're going to ask you a question. Does your Christian life at times feel like it's missing something? 19:24 Well, it could be missing the full surrender that we're looking at here in the life of Paul, Saul, which leads me to the third thing that is a part of Saul's conversion experience. That is, he had an encounter with Christ that not only dealt with sin, 19:43 but that resulted in surrender. That resulted in surrender. I believe it was Adrian Rogers who was preaching many years ago in Romania after Romania was freed from communism, or maybe about that same time was when I heard the account. 20:02 And he was talking to the Romanian believers about commitment to Christ. And they said to him, "You know, Mr. Rogers, in America, you use the term commitment. 20:16 But in Romania, under communist rule, we use a word that is much older to the vocabulary of the church. And that is, we use the term surrender. Surrender." And so we talk about commitment here in America. They talk about surrender. 20:36 It's a little bit like the difference between the chicken and the hog talking about bringing something for breakfast. The chicken says, "I'll contribute." And so they contribute their eggs. They're committed to it. They commit some eggs to the breakfast. But when the hog says, 20:55 "I'll bring something to breakfast," he's talking about surrender because you cannot bring bacon and pork chops and sausage and all that without laying down your life in surrender to the breakfast. And so think about that when we talk about it. How do I walk with Christ? 21:14 Am I walking with him as a chicken contributing some things? Or am I walking with him as an investor, a hog who has given up the right to life and fully surrendered? You see, in 1 Corinthians 6, verse 19, the scripture says, "Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, 21:35 whom you have from God." And oftentimes, we want to put the period there. Your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, whom you have from God. Period. Whoops, there's no period there. Rather, it says, "And ye are not your own." Don't you recognize that? That your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit? You have the Holy Spirit from God, 21:55 and ye are not your own. Don't you recognize that? For ye are bought with a price. Therefore, glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which belong to God. And so in verse 6, he says, "Lord, Master, Sir, what do you want me to do?" Have you ever said that to the Lord? 22:16 Have you ever said that to the Lord? "Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? What do you want me to do? Lord, here I am. I'm at your service. I'm really incapacitated here, Lord. I can't move forward. I can't move backward. I'm dependent on you and upon others. 22:32 Lord, what do you want me to do?" And then we give him our will. And so the Apostle Paul, Saul here, is given some information over time of how much he's going to suffer, how much he's going to be called upon to give of his life for the case of the church, 22:53 of the case of the Lord, the case of the kingdom. He would be called to preach Christ. In verse 20, immediately he preached Christ in the synagogues, that he is the Son of God. He was called upon to be the subject of continual plotting for his very life. In verse 23, "Now after many days were passed, 23:13 the Jews plotted to kill him." And so, I mean, we're talking about a complete upset of his life here. But we're talking about those who were his friends, now his enemies. Those who were his enemies, now his friends. 23:26 We're talking about one who was not his Lord and was the object of his persecution, now being his Lord and the object of his submission. He's told in verse 26, "They're not going to accept you," even the disciples whom he so wanted to be a part of now. They questioned him. 23:45 They said, "We don't believe him. We're afraid of him." And yet God opened up the door and made the way for him to be a chosen vessel to the Gentiles. In fact, that's interesting. At verse 15, the Lord said, "Go, for he is a chosen vessel of mine to bear my name before the Gentiles." You mean Saul's going to the Gentiles? 24:06 You talk about a conversion. This is a transformation. I mean, he despised the Gentiles. And yet you are a chosen vessel. You will have many different assignments, but you will fulfill those assignments with the passion of a heart that's been transformed. 24:27 Now, you and I have different assignments as well. And the only way we can fulfill our assignments is by surrendering to the Savior. So have we ever actually prayed, "Lord, what will you have me to do? Where do you want me to serve? Where do you want me to go? What do you want me to do? How would you want me to live? How would you want me to behave? 24:46 Who would you want me to talk to today? Who would you want? Just take the sheet of my agenda, Lord, and fill in the details." That's what consecration is. The story is told of a man by the name of Fernie Fernando Aranda, 25:07 referred to in Jim Simba's book. Fernie was in prison for 25 years to life. The prison didn't change him. He was left behind bars. And one day, his mother came to visit him, and she was so discouraged. 25:23 She said, "I don't want to die seeing you in this condition." And Fernie was broken. He offered a simple prayer to God that day, "God, if you get me out of this hellhole, I'll serve you the rest of my life." One year later, after serving only 13 years of his 25-year sentence, he was released with an unexpected release. 25:44 As is often the case with people who get released from prison, they go through a period of that being tested, those commitments being tested. And he went back to his former life. He was back to drugs again. He went back to celebrating his life of sin. One day, 26:03 he was with a group of guys, and he saw the drug task force police pull up alongside this group. And he decided, "I got to get out of here because if he violated his parole by being in drugs, he'd go back to prison for a long time, serve out his sentence, and maybe more." So he faced that return to prison, 26:23 and he says, 26:27 "I don't want to do that." So he pulled into a crowd there where there was a group of people in a nearby park who he sought cover with. Once he was there, something unexpected happened that would change his life forever. A man came up to him and said with no introduction, "Hey, guess what? Jesus loves you." Well, 26:46 that acquainted him again with the fact that God had his hand on his life. Fernie was repulsed, however. He immediately turned to leave, but that's when the police coming toward him, he decided that wasn't an option. 27:00 And so he continued into the side street and alley here where the rally was sponsored by a group called Victory Outreach Ministries. And as he was there, all of a sudden, a man came up to him, approached him, looked like some sort of big, tough man, 27:20 big muscles, big mustache, walked right up to Fernie and said, "Hey, bro, don't you remember the day you prayed in your prison cell that if God would release you from that hellhole, you'd serve him the rest of your life?" Fernie didn't know this man from anything. He said, "I suddenly felt I was no longer hearing the voice of man. 27:39 It was the voice of God." The man pointed a finger right between his eyes and said, "And you know what you need to do." Wow. That was enough to make him crumple to his knees on the grass. He began to weep, "God, I'm sorry. Forgive me of my sins." And the power of God became the driving force in his life. 28:00 That day, Fernie was placed in one of the homes provided by Victory Outreach Ministries where he could be discipled among other men, alongside other men. And that leads us to the third thing, or the fourth thing rather, that the Apostle Paul had in his conversion experience. And that was he had some man to minister to him. 28:22 Now, I made a comment in chapter 8 that it seems to be the precedent in scripture that when someone comes to Christ, there is a human element involved in it. Very rarely do you find someone come to Christ without some sort of human element. 28:42 Maybe it was New Testament that was put there. Maybe it was the translator of the New Testament or the Bible. Maybe it was someone who witnessed to them. A Billy Graham used to say it takes about seven meaningful interactions with a Christian before a person will make a decision for Christ. 29:02 Maybe you're one of those seven. 29:06 Maybe you're the one who gets to lead them to the Lord, like the Ethiopian eunuch. But in chapter 8, you remember the account of the Ethiopian eunuch. He had a copy of the scripture. 29:17 But God still sent Philip, "Join yourself to the chariot and explain to this man the scripture." He got out of the chariot upon his confession of faith, went down to the water, baptized him, and that was the end of Philip's mission. Why didn't God just save him with just the copy of the scripture? 29:39 I don't know. But for some reason, Philip was called upon at that moment. 29:45 And here in chapter 9, again, we have Saul stricken down on the road to Damascus by a vision of Christ. And yet that was not enough. God's working with Ananias and saying, "Ananias, go down there to where Saul is and pray for him. 30:06 Down to the street that is called Straight, to the house of Judas, and pray for Saul of Tarsus. For he is praying." And so Ananias went down there and said, "Brother Saul, I'm here by divine command and divine instruction to pray for you." And he laid hands on him, prayed for him, and the scales fell off his eyes. 30:27 And he was filled with the Spirit. And Ananias baptized him right there. And so Ananias. And then in chapter 10, when we get to that chapter, we're going to find that angelic visitations are also needful for a man. And so God sent Peter to follow up the message of the angels. 30:48 So whatever we make of that, all of it required the human element, the human element of prayer, of baptism, introduction into the community of faith. Barnabas was on board here right shortly to introduce Paul, Saul, 31:07 to the community of faith, ministry partners. We go out and do ministry in partnership, two on two. And discipleship with other believers is imperative for spiritual growth. We cannot emphasize that enough. 31:27 Christian discipleship is the process of learning to follow and become more like Jesus Christ in belief, character, daily life, and to be a learner and a follower of Jesus. And that takes a commitment to each other. 31:46 That takes a commitment to 31:51 not only instruct, but to be instructed. Discipleship involves trusting Jesus and his teachings. It involves developing a relationship with God through prayer and worship. Discipleship involves learning how to study the Bible. 32:11 It involves practicing obedience and love and forgiveness and service. It involves growing spiritually over time. So my question to us today is, what are we doing to become a disciple? What are you doing to become a disciple? 32:27 What are we doing as a disciple to grow as a disciple and to disciple others? You say, "Well, I'm spiritually mature. Then all right. How is your discipling ministry with others going?" Yeah, we are saved to serve. And so it was with Saul. 32:47 What are you doing to become a disciple? Then we have the aspect of baptism here. Several weeks, we'll have a baptism service with a number of young people. We praise the Lord for that. Baptism is important. It's identifying with Christ in his death and resurrection, the ordinance of baptism, 33:08 identifying with Christ and his people, the association of the believer, the disciple, with the church, the local church. Baptism is representing the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon us and within us. Baptism is a way of saying, "I'm done with sin. I'm done with sin. 33:28 I'm done with the old life. I'm done with the world. I'm done with the flesh. I'm done with the devil. I'm fully in. 33:36 I'm in on this." First Peter says that baptism is a washing away of our sins, not the removal of dirt from the body. We don't take—it's not a bath. There's a song that I became familiar with. It said, "Pray for the fish." Maybe you've heard of it. 33:56 I think it was Randy Travis. "Pray for the fish. They're not going to know what hit them when the sin comes rolling off the likes of this fella." Well, that's not exactly the way it is. But symbolically, it is—it's symbolism—to have a cleansing of the conscience, 34:17 the cleansing of the soul, a cleansing of the spirit, not a washing away of the flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience. First Peter 3:21. Here's something else to tie these last two together about a human minister, a human involvement in baptism. 34:39 We don't baptize ourselves. I think somewhere in the back of my mind, I had a question about this some time ago from somebody—it wasn't from somebody here—but can a person all alone baptize themselves? Well, there is no biblical precedent for someone baptizing themselves. It takes the human element, the discipler, 35:00 the pastor, the church elder, the church being involved in that baptism. We don't baptize ourselves. We don't serve ourselves communion. We don't wash our own feet. We do that in the context of community. The next aspect of Saul's conversion is a call to service, 35:23 a call to service. "What do you want me to do, Lord?" "Go," Ananias, "for he is a chosen vessel of mine, to bear my name before Gentiles, kings, and the children of Israel. I will show him how many things he must suffer for my name's sake." God has a call on Saul's life. 35:42 Saul was called to preach, to be an apostle to the Gentiles, to plant churches, to write scripture, to travel the missionary circuit, to bear witness to kings, to governors, to rulers, to suffer a great many things. Saul had a unique call. 36:04 Never was anyone like him. Never one before—never was anyone like him after. He was a unique individual at a unique time with a unique call from God to a unique service. 36:16 By the way, there's never been anybody in the world quite like you or quite like me before us or afterwards or after us. Never anyone that had the same opportunities, never anyone that had the same responsibilities, never one that had the same gifting and the same place in life, the same call in the same way. 36:39 We have been given a call. Our calling may be completely different. Maybe to be a schoolteacher, a homeschool parent, a businessman, a contractor, an electrician, a plumber, a missionary, a board member to some Christian ministry, a VBS helper. Whatever that call is, the way we find out what our call is, 37:00 we just simply ask God, "What do you want me to do?" and wait for the opportunities that he places in front of us. 37:08 Our call is to primarily be disciples, disciples, service, serving as the disciples. That's our primary call. 37:23 There's a man by the name of Lord Kenneth Clark, internationally known for a television series called Civilization. He lived and died without faith in Jesus Christ. He admitted in his autobiography that while visiting a beautiful church, he had what he believed to be an overwhelming religious experience. What we're talking about here this morning is not a religious experience. 37:45 What we're talking here about this morning is about conversion and following Christ. And so he said he had a profound religious experience. He said, "My whole being was irradiated by a kind of heavenly joy far more intense than anything I had ever known before. But the flood of grace," as he described it, 38:06 "created a problem. If he allowed himself to be influenced by it, he knew he would have to change. 38:14 His family, he might think he had lost his mind, and maybe that intense joy would prove to be an illusion." So he concluded, "I am too deeply embedded in the world to change course." And that experience that he had was rejected, and he moved away from it. Was his experience real? 38:32 Probably it was. It was probably a gift of God's grace to call him to faith in a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. But he said, "I'm too deeply embedded in the world." Are you too deeply embedded in the world? 38:48 Are we too deeply embedded to give up what we need to give up in order to follow Christ and to experience his call and his faithfulness in our lives? The final thing I give to you this morning here in Saul's conversion experience and ours is the infilling of the Spirit. In verse 18, 39:07 "Immediately there fell from his eyes something like scales, and he received his sight at once. He arose and was baptized." I made a mistake here. It's in verse 17. "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." We are also given the opportunity to be filled with the Holy Spirit. 39:29 In fact, we're given more than just an opportunity. We're given a command. In Ephesians chapter 5, "Be filled with the Spirit." Imperative. It's an imperative. It's a repeated, ongoing filling. Be being filled, opening our heart to the Holy Spirit, to the power of the Holy Spirit, the promise of the Holy Spirit, 39:50 the gift of the Holy Spirit, the comfort of the Holy Spirit, the baptism of the Holy Spirit, the joy of the Holy Spirit, the sanctification, sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit. All these are taken right out of scripture. The temple of the Holy Spirit, opening our hearts to be his temple, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, 40:11 and whatever gifts that God gives to us from the Holy Spirit. We have access to the Holy Spirit, but we must empty ourselves and ask the Holy Spirit to indwell us, yielding to the Holy Spirit. That's what happened in the life of the Apostle Paul here as we know him today, 40:34 Saul. So what aspect of this list are we missing? What aspect of this list are we missing? As I studied this passage of scripture and the Lord laid on my heart this message this morning, it became obvious to me that these things that Saul experienced, 40:54 while different for us, are the same. They take on a different form, but they are the same essence. We also need an encounter with Christ that deals with sin. We also need to make a total surrender to Christ. 41:12 We also need to have the human element in our walk with God where we are reaching others and others are reaching us. We also need to live a life of discipleship. We also need to be baptized. We also have a call to serve. 41:31 And we also are available to be filled with the Spirit. So what's missing? Have you ever felt like there's something missing in your walk with God? Have you ever felt that? I challenge you to take this list, study Saul's encounter here, and say, "What am I missing? 41:53 What am I missing?" And then receive it by faith, receive it by faith. It doesn't mean that we always feel every day what we want to feel, just like that man who had that experience in the church and then went out and did his own thing. We are also guilty of that. 42:15 So Saul was specially called by God. He needed these things. You also are called by God. We need them too. So this morning, as you think about that, what is missing? Sometimes we just feel like there's something missing in our lives. 42:37 Look at it. Say, "Lord, what would you want me to do?" Maybe there's a place of an area of surrender in my life that I have not yet fully given up. I have not yet fully yielded. Maybe it's an area of anger, bitterness, lust, selfishness, 42:58 self-centeredness. God cannot continue to fill a vessel that is full of itself and that is filled with sin. But also look at his life and his experience here as one that is attainable to us right here today. 43:20 Let's pray. Father, we thank you for the conversion of Saul, who went on to do such wonderful things for your kingdom and to whom we owe such a debt for his faithfulness. But Lord, let us not just glorify him. 43:40 Let us glorify Christ, who also has a call on our life, who says, "I've saved you for a purpose. I want you to encounter me as well. I want to deal with your sin. I want to deal with your will. I want to deal with your baptism, 44:00 with your yieldedness to the Holy Spirit. I offer," the Lord says, "to you that which also Saul received." And Father, I pray that you'll guide us into all truth, guide us into a deeper walk with you. 44:19 And may we find our way, find ourselves in love with you, surrendered to you, enjoying the good things of God that come out of suffering and trials and difficulties, but nevertheless enjoying our walk with you. 44:39 Lord, bring us to a place where we actually enjoy our Christian life, not in a way where we just think of things that we have to avoid or we think of things that we can't do or we'd like to do or we should do or we should, but enjoy our walk with God. Bring us to that place. In Jesus' name. Amen.