The Word Made Plain

Guest (Male): Welcome to The Word Made Plain with Senior Pastor Tony Clark of Calvary Chapel Newport News in Virginia. Currently, Pastor Tony is teaching a study in the book of Acts. Please open your Bibles to Acts chapter 9, verses 20 through 25.

Tony Clark: Saul retells this story in chapter 22 and verse 9. He gives us the details that he says that the men heard the Lord's voice, but they couldn't understand the words spoken. The Greek word used for voice in this verse is phōnē. It is where we get our English word phonics from, which means the words spoken.

Why is it that they could hear the voice but not understand the words? Because the Lord's words were for Saul's ears only. Please keep this in mind. Sometimes the Lord tells us things that are for our ears only. Maybe the Lord told you to stop doing a certain thing. All because the Lord told you to stop doing something doesn't mean that you tell every Christian that they have to stop.

Or you make people feel guilty about something because the Lord told you that you couldn't do it. Or even worse, coming off like you're more spiritually superior because God spoke to you to stop doing a certain thing. Some things are for your ears only, like we see with Saul here.

I remember there was a period of time when we lived in California, and the Lord was dealing with my life and doing a deeper work. The Lord was speaking to me for a season that he didn't want me watching TV. I thought that meant for my whole house. It was for my ears only. I was very young then, maybe my mid-20s. And I said, "No TV." My wife said, "Well, that was for you." "What do you mean? I said no TV."

We had a little 13-inch black and white TV in the room. It was white, and it didn't have quite as big of a back, but it still weighed about 50 pounds. I said, "No TV!" She said, "That was for you." I said, "Everybody!" She said, "That was for you." I said, "I'll show you. I've got some scissors and cut the cord." I said, "No TV up in here." Next thing I know, I'm going down to the store to get another TV.

There are some things that are for your ears only. We come off like that's supposed to be for everybody. Those other people were not convicted. They didn't hear the Lord say that like these men didn't. It was for Saul's ears only.

Look at verses 8 and 9. It said, "Then Saul arose from the ground, and when his eyes were opened he saw no one. But they led him by the hand and brought him into Damascus. And he was there three days without sight, and neither ate nor drank." In these verses, we see after the Lord told Saul to arise and go into the city in verse 6, he arose from the ground. When he opened his eyes, verse 8 says that he saw no one.

Now he is being led by the hand and brought into Damascus. Saul is entering the city totally different than he expected. Instead of entering like a conquering hero to rescue Judaism from these Christians, he is now blinded and being led into the city like a little child. God can humble anyone.

Jesus told his disciples in Matthew 18 and verse 3, "Unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven." And this is what happened to Saul. All during this time of blindness, verse 9 says that Saul was three days without sight and he neither ate nor drank. He was so shaken by this experience that he neither ate nor drank anything.

Evaluating everything that he once believed and understood about God. I believe when Stephen said in Acts 7 and verses 56 through 59, "I see the heavens open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God." Then he identifies the Son of Man as the Lord Jesus. This really rocked Saul's world. When Jesus identified himself as the one he was persecuting in verse 5, Saul sat stunned for three days as his world collapsed all around him.

This is what should happen to everyone when you're born again. Your old life should collapse all around you. Isn't this what 2 Corinthians 5:17 says? If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things are passed away and all things become new. Isn't that what the word says? This is what happened to Saul. He spent three days watching his old life die right before him.

If your old life has not died since you have called yourself a Christian, then you need to reevaluate your Christianity. There's no way Saul could go back to his old life of Judaism as a Pharisee after this encounter with God. So too there is no way that we can go back to our business as usual lifestyles after our encounter with Jesus Christ. Oh yes, we will fall from time to time, but we cannot go back and live the same life we lived before our encounter with God.

As God is dealing with him, he is also dealing with someone else. Look at verses 10 through 12. "Now there was a certain disciple at Damascus named Ananias; and to him the Lord said in a vision, 'Ananias.' And he says, 'Here I am, Lord.' And 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, for behold, he is praying. And in a vision, he has seen a man named Ananias coming in and putting his hand on him, so that he might receive his sight.'"

In these verses, we see God deal with a man named Ananias. It's very obvious that this is a different Ananias that died in chapter 5 with his wife Sapphira. This is Ananias of Damascus. It is believed that he was one of the leaders of the church in Damascus. If so, then he was one of the main targets that Saul was coming there to arrest.

The Lord says to Ananias in verse 10 in a vision. A vision is a picture or a scene you have while you are awake. A dream is a picture or scene you experience while you are asleep. That's the difference between a dream and a vision. The Lord speaks to Ananias by just gently calling his name: "Ananias." And he said at the end of verse 10, "Here I am, Lord."

Jesus said something amazing in John 10:27. He said that my sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. Do you know the voice of the Lord when he calls you? Will you say as Ananias did, "Here I am, Lord"? Do you know when it's the Lord calling you? Jesus said my sheep know my voice and they follow me.

Do you know the voice of the Lord if he's speaking to you? Many people would shake their heads and say, "Yeah, I know the voice." You have no clue what the voice of the Lord is because you can't hear him. You have so much noise going on all around you. You always have to have some music, something in the background, some TV on just in the background. The silence freaks you out.

You can't stand the quiet. This is why you can never hear the Lord's voice because you always got something booming and bumping going on. You can't hear his voice. You can't hear him calling you. God is always speaking. We're not always listening. Here he called. All he did was just say, "Ananias." And he says, "Here I am, Lord."

Ananias shows us how we should respond to the Lord when he calls us by saying, "Here I am, Lord." Are you available for the Lord to use you? Or are you too busy and preoccupied to hear him calling your name, let alone to respond to his call? Isaiah responded the same way when the Lord said in Isaiah 6 and verse 8, "Whom shall I send and who will go for us?" Isaiah responded and says, "Here I am, Lord, send me."

It is still true that the greatest ability is availability. Are you available like Isaiah, like Ananias? Or would you have responded to the Lord's question, "Whom shall I send?" would you have responded, "Not me"? Or, "Who shall go for us?" "Somebody else but not me, because I have too much going on in my life." I just got too much going on.

Remember Ananias said, "Here I am, Lord." If he is your Lord, then you're supposed to be available for his use. Then the Lord told Ananias in verse 11 what he told Philip and what he told Saul: "Arise and go to the street called Straight." The street called Straight still exists today. It runs east and west through the downtown section of Damascus, which is the oldest city in the world today.

God told Ananias to go there and inquire about a man called Saul of Tarsus. This was a huge test for Ananias's faith, for the Lord had not told him about Saul's conversion. This is another example of God asking us to do something that seems to not make any sense from man's perspective. But we are still called to obey.

God wants for us to obey him one step at a time. Notice he gives Ananias step one in verse 11 to arise and go to the house of Judas and inquire for one called Saul. Please remember the Lord knows your address and knows where you live and what you are doing in your home. That can be comforting or scary, depending upon what you are doing in your home.

He sends him to the house of Judas. God knows what we're doing there because he tells Ananias, "For behold, he is praying." God sees you praying for that wayward child or that spouse that has strayed from God. Singles, God hears your prayer for a spouse. He sees us praying, just like God saw Saul in the house of Judas praying.

It is as if God is saying Saul is praying for the first time in his life. As a religious leader, as a Pharisee, which were the conservative religious leaders of the day, as a religious leader he just repeated formal prayers. He had surely prayed many prayers, but this is the first time he prayed. There are many people today like Saul who pray but have never prayed.

You have repeated prayers in books and pamphlets. But have you ever poured out your heart to the Lord, cried out to him? You are maybe repeating prayers of beads and rosaries, but you never prayed. It was like the Lord was giving Ananias a hint that everything was going to be okay: "For behold, he is praying."

Prayer is a spontaneous response of the believer's heart to God. When our hearts have been transformed by Jesus Christ, we will find ourselves lost in the wonder and the joy of talking to the one who made all of this possible for us. Prayer for the Christian is as natural as breathing. Saul became a man of unceasing prayer, for he was the one who taught us in 1 Thessalonians 5:17 to pray without ceasing.

He never wanted to be out of communion or out of touch with Jesus Christ. This is why he said, "Pray without ceasing." Is this how we feel? Is this our heart that we never want to be out of communion with the one who made our salvation possible for us? Or can we go days being out of touch with Jesus and it never bothers us?

Are we like Mary and Joseph in Luke chapter 2 who went a day's journey and realized that Jesus wasn't with them? Can you go days and you look up and realize Jesus isn't with you, and it didn't bother you? That's what I'm trying to get at. Can we go days without being in touch with the Lord and we're okay with it? He wanted to be in touch with the one who made his salvation possible.

God puts Ananias at ease a little more in verse 12 and says, "In a vision he has seen a man named Ananias coming in and putting his hand on him, so that he might receive his sight." God still doesn't tell Ananias that he is born again or changed. Could you have gone on this mission from God? It would seem like a suicide mission.

Here's the guy coming to arrest Christians. You're the leader of the church of Damascus. And God said, "Ananias, I got somewhere for you to go. I need you to go and pray for somebody. He's at Judas's house. You know the street called Straight?" "Yeah, I'm very familiar with there." "It's Saul of Tarsus."

I'm sure he was just like the Lord just didn't say that. It's as if God sends us to the Middle East and wants us to minister to the head person of ISIS. And God hasn't told us whether that guy from ISIS is saved or not. We just hear he's the leader. That's the kind of mission this was. Could you go?

If you said like Ananias did in verse 10, "Here I am, Lord." He didn't say, "Here I am Lord, but don't send me somewhere difficult." Or, "Here I am Lord, but don't ask me to do something hard." However, Ananias has something to say to God. He was blown away that God was sending him on such a mission. He has something to say to God and we have to wait till next week to see what that is. Because it's going to be really good.

The thing about it, you're going to be hanging for a couple weeks. So we'll get back to this next year, 2018. Let me conclude with this. God can reach anyone. So never write anyone off by saying God can never reach that person. Whenever you think that way, just look in the mirror and say God reached that person.

And he can reach anyone. God can stop anyone in their tracks like he did Saul. We saw how God knows where we live and what we are doing even if we're praying. So keep crying out to God for that loved one or that spouse or for a spouse. Because God sees and hears them. He hears those prayers. He said, "Go to the house of Judas and inquire of one Saul of Tarsus, for behold he's praying in the house. I can see him."

It reminds me of what Jesus told Nathaniel. He said, "Before Philip came and got you, I saw you under the fig tree." The fig tree is where they went and meditated upon the Word of God. He said, "I saw you." Finally, are you available for God to use you and send you to where he wants you to go? Even if it's difficult or hard?

If he is your Lord, you will be available to go. And then the final question is have you been made new? Are you a new person? Have old things passed away in your life? They can be today. Before you leave, you can come and get some prayer and you can leave here a new person, the weight of your sin off of you.

This is what he specializes in. Because if you call yourself a Christian and there's nothing new about you and you're still doing the same old thing you've been doing, you got to check, you got to evaluate your Christianity. The Bible says, "Examine yourself to see whether you're in the faith. Prove yourself. Do you not know yourself unless you have failed the test?" That's 2 Corinthians 13:5.

Examine yourself. For many people Christianity consists of popping into a church whenever it's convenient and then go Monday through Saturday do you. That's not Christianity. You're fooling around. But you can be made new today by the power of Jesus Christ. Repenting of your sin, accepting Christ as your Lord and Savior.

He can make you new. Old things will pass away and behold all things become new. You'll have a new desire for prayer, a new desire for the word, a new desire to tell others about the joy and the peace you have in your life. Christianity is like one beggar telling another beggar where he found bread. And that's what it's all about. Are you new today? You can be.

Father, thank you so much for your word. We pray God that your Holy Spirit will move in our hearts, move in our lives. Change us, Lord. As we sat under your word, we pray God that that word would change us now. Lord, I pray that we will repent of our sin and confess you as Lord of our lives. Your word says we shall be saved. Lord, there are some who have backslidden and they need to come on back home to you. I pray draw your people to you today. In Jesus's name, amen.

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