A flash of light, you fall to the ground. Suddenly you hear a loud voice from heaven calling out your name. You realize it’s God. He tells you to stop persecuting Him and to go into town. When the exchange is over you pick yourself up off the ground trying to get your footing but realize you can’t see a thing. Your friends have to lead you by hand into town where you remain blind, hungry, and thirsty for three days. At some point you have a vision about some guy named Ananias. In your vision he comes to you, lays hands on you and you receive back your sight. Meanwhile, while all this is happening, Ananias is told in a vision to go find you. But he is very hesitant to go anywhere near this Saul guy. He’s heard things about you and none of them are positive. But God says something unbelievable to him,
“Go, for he is a chosen instrument of Mine, to bear My name before the Gentiles and kings and the sons of Israel; for I will show him how much he must suffer for My name’s sake.”(Acts 9:15-16)
Ananias decides to obey and shows up at your place where you have been praying fervently for three days. He lays his trembling hands on you and says a prayer. This guy knows all about the vision God gave to you- he prays that you might get your sight back and that you will be filled with the Holy Spirit. Immediately the scales covering your eyes fall to the ground and you can see again! There was no time to waste, you need to get baptized. The next day you go out proclaiming a message very opposite to the one you had been proclaiming four days earlier. People are confused and leery of you. The Jews want you dead. You are now on the receiving end of what you once fought for. Thankfully, your new friends, the Jesus followers, lower you out a window so you can escape to Jerusalem. When you arrive, though, no one believes a word you say. Once a bad guy, always a bad guy, I guess. ‘But don’t they know the grace that God has? He is capable of showing grace to everyone!’ you say. Just when you thought you were completely alone, this guy Barnabas grabs you. He says he knows you- that God told him that He would change you. Finally, someone who believes you! You received his encouragement, support and guidance. You knew this was just the beginning of something big.
“So the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria enjoyed peace, being built; and going on in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it continued to increase.” (Acts 9:31)
Saul was a bad dude. He killed. He manipulated. He hated. He tortured. He lied.
He was a sinner.
But God is bigger. God is bigger than sin. God defeated sin through His Son. No one is out of God’s reach.
Are we praying for the Saul’s of the world or are we just standing back in fear?
Are we praying for the Donald Trump’s of the world or are we just staring hopelessly at the future?
If God can change Saul to Paul, whose to say he wouldn’t change Donald to Ronald?
