SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 8/12/2018
9:38 PM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-2 “The Circumstances of Paul’s
Conversion”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Acts 22:6-16
Message of the verses: “6 “But it happened that as I was on my way, approaching
Damascus about noontime, a very bright light suddenly flashed from heaven all
around me, 7 and I fell to the ground
and heard a voice saying to me, ’Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?’ 8 “And
I answered, ’Who are You, Lord?’ And He said to me, ’I am Jesus the Nazarene, whom
you are persecuting.’ 9 “And those who were with me saw the light, to be sure,
but did not understand the voice of the One who was speaking to me. 10 “And I
said, ’What shall I do,
Lord?’ And the Lord said to me, ’Get up and go on into Damascus,
and there you will be told of all that has been appointed for you to do.’ 11 “But
since I could not see because of the brightness of that light, I was led by the
hand by those who were with me and came into Damascus. 12 "A certain Ananias, a man who was devout
by the standard of the Law, and well spoken of by all the Jews who lived
there, 13 came to me, and standing near
said to me, ’Brother Saul, receive your sight!’ And at that very time I looked
up at him. 14 “And he said, ’The God of our fathers has appointed you to know
His will and to see the Righteous One and to hear an utterance from His mouth. 15
’For you will be a witness for Him to all men of what you have seen and heard. 16
’Now why do you delay? Get up and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling
on His name.’”
We pick up
this SD from verse ten as Paul wants to know what the Lord wants him to do since
he is now blind from the brilliance of the Lord. The Lord replies by saying that he needs to
go on into Damascus, but now as he goes there he will the servant of the Lord
instead of the enemy of the Lord. The
Lord promises Paul that He will tell him what to do when he gets there. The Lord has things that he has appointed for
Paul to do and Paul will soon find out what they are.
The blind
Saul is not led into Damascus by hand since he cannot see as the Lord provides
someone to take him into the city. While
in Damascus he meets a certain Ananias, and Ananias had had a conversation with
the Lord about Paul, and the Lord told him that Paul was a chosen vessel of His
who would do His will, but would suffer much in doing His will as we learned
when we studied chapter nine of Acts.
As Paul
was telling his story to the crowd he mentions some things about Ananias “a man
who was devout by the standard of the Law, and well spoken of by all the Jews
who lived there.” This is the point that
Paul has been trying to drive across to the Jewish people there in Jerusalem as
they thought that Paul was speaking out against the law.
When
Ananias comes to Paul he says to him “Brother Saul, receive your sight!” He was declaring to Paul that this was of the
Lord, this miracle of receiving his sight back.
The first thing that Paul sees with his restored vision is Ananias, and
perhaps Ananias was still a bit frightful of Paul from all that he had heard
about him. Ananias then gives some
marching orders to Paul “The God of our fathers has appointed you to know His
will, and to see the Righteous One, and to hear an utterance from His
mouth. For you will be a witness for Him
to all men of what you have seen and heard.” Those are quite some word to receive to this
brand new believer in Jesus Christ. I
will continue with this section in our next SD, Lord willing, as I want to
quote a paragraph from John MacArthur’s commentary on something that I have not
really seen or thought of and that is the words “to see the Righteous One.”
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “Angel of the Lord” (Matthew 1:21).
Today’s Bible question:
“The people of what place made a “league” with Joshua?”
Answer in our next SD.
8/12/2018 9:59 PM
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