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Claim It! - March 10, 2019

Acts 8:3, 9:1-9, 17b-21 We’re starting our Messy Spirituality series with the story of Saul to underscore that God works with the imperfect and the broken. Sometimes we equate people of great faith with perfection. The faithful must be the good ones who get it all right. We have formed this idea of faith that looks a whole lot like the unreachable concept of perfection. We see the faithful as righteous, holy, and better than us.
But the truth of the matter is that the faithful in the Bible, are far from perfect. They do some wonderful and powerful things for the kingdom of God. And they sin and fall short of the glory of God. They stand up for justice and commit their

own injustices. They are liars, murderers, and thieves. Some are prostitutes, others adulterers, and others scoundrels. It’s not just that the people of God—as a group—fall short in following God, but it’s also the leaders, the chosen leaders, the one God calls by name, the ones we know by name who miss the boat—A LOT.
To study them, to learn their stories is to find a way to find our story in God’s story. If they aren’t perfect. If they aren’t full of righteousness or justice or mercy and God still loves and chooses them, then maybe God can love and choose us when we’re don’t have it all together.
Today’s passage focuses on the story of Saul. Saul later becomes known as Paul…which is probably how you know him best. Paul’s one of the most famous leaders in the New Testament. Many of the letters were written by him, and many of the early churches existed because he started them. Paul was a great man. One we might place on a pedestal for all he did for the church. We still use his letters and his advice to help govern how we do church today. And yet, before he was Paul, he was Saul….still a man of great faith, but one with a very different reputation. You see Saul was the guy we heard about in what Connie read. Saul was a Pharisee---a Jewish leader, responsible for helping to keep the laws God had given the Israelites. He was an enforcer. And he took his job seriously. Maybe too seriously. He saw the Christ-followers as rule breakers who were not being obedient to God’s law. And so he set out to whip them into shape…in some ways literally, whipping them and imprisoning them, even until killing them.
Saul was a man on a mission and he had acquired the proper paperwork to travel to Damascus and find the rule breakers there, arrest them, and return them to be jailed in Jerusalem. Even in doing his duty, he made sure to follow the rules and have the proper paperwork! But on his way to Damascus something profound happened. God stopped him in his tracks. A big flash of light. The voice of Jesus. A moment of conviction. Three days blind. It sort of sounds like Saul was stunned by the incident. No eating. No drinking. It doesn’t say he fasted. That’s not how it’s described, but that he didn’t eat and he didn’t drink—almost like his body was in shock. And after three days, God sends a stranger to heal his blindness and invite the Holy Spirit to dwell in him. I wonder if Saul felt that as a moment of grace, or if he experienced more confusion. Was it a gentle touch from God, or more shock and awe. How did Ananias know his name, or where to find him, or that he was blinded? How did Ananias have the power to heal him? To call on the Holy Spirit? And what was going to happen next?
We don’t know the details, but we do know that through it all Saul was convicted to follow Christ. He went with Ananias and spent some time with other Christians and then started preaching. Do you get the sense that Saul is all or nothing? If you’re going after Christians, then you get them and jail them and kill them if you have to? And if you’re following Jesus then you better get up in the morning ready to preach his story!
Saul was rip-roaring and ready to go. God had spoken into his life and done something dramatic and there was no going back. But the people around him weren’t so sure. The Christians knew about him. He was the man who arrested anyone who followed Jesus. He was to be feared. And yet, there he was showing up and preaching. What was going on? Was it a trap? A farce? Or was there something really God-like happening in him?
Now, many of us know the long story of Saul/Paul. So, we probably don’t doubt this story too much. But when we hear other stories that share this kind of profundity, this kind of drama, we tend to doubt. Gangster turned evangelist. Convict turned philanthropist. Wickedness turned for compassion and generosity. Is it real? Is it lasting? Or is it just a show? I think we doubt because we know how hard it is to change. We’re all a work in progress and I’d venture that we all look ourselves from time to time and wonder, “How am I not better about this yet?”
Change is hard. Significant change takes time. And yet, here we are with a man who underwent major changes overnight. This man who hated Christians (or followers of the Way as they were called) and was bent on getting them all locked up and off the street did a 180 and became an iconic leader among them. And if God can transform and use Saul, God can transform and use anybody—including the gangster or the convict.
Which is good news for us, because some of us need a Saul-like conversion….we need to be hit over the head with a message from God that says, “Hey, knock that off! That’s not what I want from you or for you!” Some of us need more than a billboard, we need a 2x4. Some of us know someone who needs a 2x4. We’re praying for that big hit so that they wake up and see the reality of what’s happening. We’re praying for a desperate situation where it seems pretty hopeless. We’re not sure what it’s going to take for change to happen, but we know it’s going to have to be significant…something undeniable. And where convention and culture tell us to give up—it’s not going to happen, God says….if I can get through to Saul, I can get through to anyone!
Others of us would prefer a more subtle approach….we’re good with a quiet whisper….a post-it in our Bible…something less severe than blindness and 3 days of fasting. Not that we don’t need change in our lives. Not that we don’t need the power of the Holy Spirit to take hold of our broken and sinful places, just that we’d like a kinder word from God. And for us too…there is hope…because if God can get through to Saul, surely God can get through to us.
And it’s tempting to say we have to know we need to change before God can do something in us…but Saul disproves that too. He wasn’t praying to be different. He knew what he needed to do and was set to do it. He wasn’t seeking a more holy relationship with God. He wasn’t asking for a gentler heart or more patience for his family. He knew he was good right as he was and then wham! God spoke up. So we don’t have to start knowing what needs to change. We don’t have to have all the answers or a humble or contrite heart. Not that those things aren’t important and not that they might not open a door for a subtler approach, but that they don’t make or break God’s work in our life. God can touch us and change us before we even know we need to be changed.

 

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