Acts 22
1"Brothers and fathers, listen now to my defense." 2When they heard him speak to them in Aramaic, they became very quiet.
Then Paul said: 3"I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, but brought up in this city. Under Gamaliel I was thoroughly trained in the law of our fathers and was just as zealous for God as any of you are today. 4I persecuted the followers of this Way to their death, arresting both men and women and throwing them into prison, 5as also the high priest and all the Council can testify. I even obtained letters from them to their brothers in Damascus, and went there to bring these people as prisoners to Jerusalem to be punished.
6"About noon as I came near Damascus, suddenly a bright light from heaven flashed around me. 7I fell to the ground and heard a voice say to me, 'Saul! Saul! Why do you persecute me?'
8" 'Who are you, Lord?' I asked.
" 'I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom you are persecuting,' he replied. 9My companions saw the light, but they did not understand the voice of him who was speaking to me.
10"'What shall I do, Lord?' I asked.
"'Get up,' the Lord said, 'and go into Damascus. There you will be told all that you have been assigned to do.' 11My companions led me by the hand into Damascus, because the brilliance of the light had blinded me.
12"A man named Ananias came to see me. He was a devout observer of the law and highly respected by all the Jews living there. 13He stood beside me and said, 'Brother Saul, receive your sight!' And at that very moment I was able to see him.
14"Then he said: 'The God of our fathers has chosen you to know his will and to see the Righteous One and to hear words from his mouth. 15You will be his witness to all men of what you have seen and heard. 16And now what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on his name.'
17"When I returned to Jerusalem and was praying at the temple, I fell into a trance 18and saw the Lord speaking. 'Quick!' he said to me. 'Leave Jerusalem immediately, because they will not accept your testimony about me.'
19" 'Lord,' I replied, 'these men know that I went from one synagogue to another to imprison and beat those who believe in you. 20And when the blood of your martyr[a] Stephen was shed, I stood there giving my approval and guarding the clothes of those who were killing him.'
21"Then the Lord said to me, 'Go; I will send you far away to the Gentiles.' "
Paul the Roman Citizen
22The crowd listened to Paul until he said this. Then they raised their voices and shouted, "Rid the earth of him! He's not fit to live!"
23As they were shouting and throwing off their cloaks and flinging dust into the air, 24the commander ordered Paul to be taken into the barracks. He directed that he be flogged and questioned in order to find out why the people were shouting at him like this. 25As they stretched him out to flog him, Paul said to the centurion standing there, "Is it legal for you to flog a Roman citizen who hasn't even been found guilty?"
26When the centurion heard this, he went to the commander and reported it. "What are you going to do?" he asked. "This man is a Roman citizen."
27The commander went to Paul and asked, "Tell me, are you a Roman citizen?"
"Yes, I am," he answered.
28Then the commander said, "I had to pay a big price for my citizenship."
"But I was born a citizen," Paul replied.
29Those who were about to question him withdrew immediately. The commander himself was alarmed when he realized that he had put Paul, a Roman citizen, in chains.
Before the Sanhedrin
30The next day, since the commander wanted to find out exactly why Paul was being accused by the Jews, he released him and ordered the chief priests and all the Sanhedrin to assemble. Then he brought Paul and had him stand before them.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion:
Ephesians 2
Made Alive in Christ
1As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. 3All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature[a] and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. 4But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. 6And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. 8For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9not by works, so that no one can boast. 10For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
May 30, 2008
From Here To Heaven
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READ: Ephesians 2:1-10
We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works. —Ephesians 2:10
Pro athletes and coaches sometimes get something for nothing. Let’s say a coach signs a 3-year contract, and the team agrees to pay him $1 million a year. But in his first season, the team is terrible and management fires him. So, the coach leaves but still has 2 more years of pay coming to him. He gets the next $2 million without doing a thing.
We as Christians have to be careful that we don’t view our saving faith like that. We must never think, “Hey, I’m saved. I’ve got eternal riches coming my way. I don’t have to do anything for God.”
That’s partially right but very wrong. In one regard, our journey from here to heaven is paid for in full by Jesus’ sacrifice. There’s nothing we can do to earn salvation. But there’s another part of this that we must consider.
In Ephesians 2:8-9, after Paul clearly says that we do not have to “do” anything and that salvation is a “gift of God,” he goes on. Verse 10 says we indeed have a job to do. As believers, we are “created in Christ Jesus for good works.” God has tasks planned for us to do while we are on this earth—not to pay our debt but to honor our Savior.
Life from here to heaven is not a vacation cruise—it’s a wonderful privilege and calling to serve God.
— Dave Branon
Must I be carried to the skies
On flowery beds of ease,
While others fought to win the prize
And sailed through bloody seas? —Watts
We are not saved by good works but for good works.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers:
May 30, 2008
"Yes— But . . .!"
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READ:
Lord, I will follow You, but . . . —Luke 9:61
Suppose God tells you to do something that is an enormous test of your common sense, totally going against it. What will you do? Will you hold back? If you get into the habit of doing something physically, you will do it every time you are tested until you break the habit through sheer determination. And the same is true spiritually. Again and again you will come right up to what Jesus wants, but every time you will turn back at the true point of testing, until you are determined to abandon yourself to God in total surrender. Yet we tend to say, "Yes, but— suppose I do obey God in this matter, what about . . . ?" Or we say, "Yes, I will obey God if what He asks of me doesn’t go against my common sense, but don’t ask me to take a step in the dark."
Jesus Christ demands the same unrestrained, adventurous spirit in those who have placed their trust in Him that the natural man exhibits. If a person is ever going to do anything worthwhile, there will be times when he must risk everything by his leap in the dark. In the spiritual realm, Jesus Christ demands that you risk everything you hold on to or believe through common sense, and leap by faith into what He says. Once you obey, you will immediately find that what He says is as solidly consistent as common sense.
By the test of common sense, Jesus Christ’s statements may seem mad, but when you test them by the trial of faith, your findings will fill your spirit with the awesome fact that they are the very words of God. Trust completely in God, and when He brings you to a new opportunity of adventure, offering it to you, see that you take it. We act like pagans in a crisis— only one out of an entire crowd is daring enough to invest his faith in the character of God.
"A Word With You" by Ron Hutchcraft
Choosing the Fire
Friday, May 30, 2008
Smoking is bad for humans and for mountains. When a mountain is smoking, it usually means it's about to blow its top, as in volcano erupting. Probably the most dramatic American eruption in our lifetime was the one on Mount Saint Helen's in Washington State. It devastated and really recreated the landscape for many square miles. It literally blew a major portion of the mountain away. Not that you could exactly call it a surprise. For two or three months in advance, the mountain kept sending out smoke and eventually a big lava dome began to form at the top. Everybody knew it was going to blow, including a colorful old lodge owner with the colorful name, Harry Truman. But when everyone evacuated the area, Harry refused. He stayed right there on Mount Saint Helen's, no matter how many times he was warned about what would happen. When the smoke finally cleared from the volcano's massive eruption, there was no trace that would ever suggest that lodge or that man had ever been there. The tragedy of something like that is obvious; someone died who didn't have to die.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft, and I want to have A Word With You today about "Choosing the Fire."
Someone might say, "The volcano killed that man." Well, it wasn't really the volcano that killed him, it was his choice to ignore the danger and stay where he was. It is that danger God is warning you and me against in our word for today from the Word of God. It's in Hebrews 2:3. He says, "How shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation?" God says, "I am providing a way for you to have life for all eternity instead of death - heaven instead of hell. If you ignore it, you will not escape. You are choosing the fire."
The word God uses here, salvation, suggests something that is life-or-death. When the rescuers went into Ground Zero, after the tragedy of September 11th, the issue was salvation, it was life-or-death. They were, in a sense, saviors and they were the victim's hope of coming out alive.
For us, the word Savior has a capital "S" and only one person qualifies. That would be Jesus. He knew you and I were under a death penalty for running our own lives instead of God running them. And He knew that the only way you could escape the fire of that penalty was for Him to go to that cross and absorb all the hell of all your sin. The one and only Son of God loving you so much that He would be brutally crucified and totally cut off from God the Father, so you could live. That is a "great salvation." He is your only hope of coming out alive. God says if you ignore that just as that old man ignored the warning about the volcano, you will not escape. You are choosing the fire. Because of what Jesus did, you don't have to die.
God says that so pointedly in John 3:16, "God so loved the world (you could put your name in there) that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life." Jesus is your way out of the fire. He's your Savior reaching to you in the wreckage. But you have to grab Him with total trust. Notice that God said what would cost people eternal life was neglecting Jesus; not just rejecting Jesus. Hell is filled with people who were going to trust Jesus, who believed it all in their head, who needed just a little more time, who meant to get to Jesus someday, but they passed up one too many opportunities. They waited too long. That's why the Bible says, "Now is the day of salvation." You are gambling your eternity if you wait one more day. That is too much to lose. Would you tell Jesus right now that you want Him to be your Savior from your sin while there's still time?
I'd invite you to go to our website where you will find there a simple pathway to begin your personal relationship with Jesus Christ. It's yoursforlife.net. I hope you'll go there right away today.
You've heard God's warnings. You know the way to escape the destruction. Don't just sit there and choose the fire. Jesus took the fire for you.