11/18/2001

Let's bow in prayer:

Father we thank you that of all the things we can do this week and have done this week there is a time and place where we gather together for a very specific purpose and that is to life your name and to lift your attributes, to lift your person above ourselves and to see you as you really are. Father we thank you that songs can do that for us, they can say the things in a poetic manner that we can't say. But we can sing them, we can appreciate them and the music carries us to a place that helps us to honor you. Father I pray that this morning this would not be just a matter of act on our part but a matter of truth in our heart. That you would search our heart and you would know that we love you, you would know that we honor you and that the words are not words. You said the people of Jesus' day said with there lips they honor me but there heart is far from me. Father we don't want that to be true about us. We want to truly be here as an expression of true worship and true obedience to you. Father set all the things aside this day that could cloud our minds and our thinking, would you break through Father as the sun breaks through the clouds, and through the fog that we see aside, as the sun breaks it away and melts it, pray that you would break away the clouds of our heart and look into our heart and help us to see you and to know that when we leave this place we have truly been in the very presence of God. In Jesus Name, Amen.

How many of you know your future, or would like to? OK I know mine, at least the eternal future, right. There was a fellow who was on the oh every once in awhile you see him, his name is Steve Wright. Anybody know Steven Wright? He is called the master of monotone. He is a comedian who speaks only in monotone. Anyway Steven Wright is very interesting because his mind travels various pathways and all of them are strange. He is the one of says, why do they call them apartments when they are all stuck together. And if it on ship they call it cargo, if it is on the road they call it shipment. Why is that? He said he was going to commit suicide, he jumped from a building but on the way down he changed his mind so we flipped over and landed on his feet. And he saw a kitten over there saying, see that is how it is done. He said why to they put permanent press on an iron as a label? Why do they have a setting for permanent press on an iron? You probably have an answer for that one I don't. Let's see, if you are traveling at the speed of light and you turn on your headlights, what happens? He said a pretty girl looked at him once and said you have two colors of socks, he said that is ok they are the same because I go by thickness. Maybe that is how you work? If you melt dry ice can you take a bath without getting wet? If any word in the dictionary was spelled wrong how could you tell? In one apropos for the day his girlfriend ask him one time if you could know how you are going to die would you like to know? And he said no, she said well never mind then.

Do you know your future? Do you know how you are going to die? We don't know some of these things. It is always an interesting question to raise, however, and try to answer. Of course, we have seen lots of movies about it, Back to the Future, Back to the Future II and maybe three, four, and five. We have seen Bill and Ted's excellent adventure where they kind of go the other way and recently a movie was out called Frequency, just a really fascinating concept about a father and son who were able to communicate through strange solar spots and things like this over time. This really interesting concept to think about say now if I could know, would I want to know? Would I like to know what my future holds if I could know what it holds and would it change things as to how I act if I knew?

If you turn to the Book of Acts, Chapter 22 and we are going to read an account of a fellow who knew his future. Cause his future was laid out for him before it got there obviously. At the very beginning of his ministry, if you are listening to the New Testament on tape you are in Chapter 22 of Acts today through Chapter 24. If you are behind times I have no clue where you are and if you are ahead I don't know where you are either. But if you are following the schedule of listening that we have been using, the ninety day schedule, you should be in Acts 22 to 24 and listening today to this passage. And you will have already heard about Paul, because he is much of what Acts in written about. The Apostle Paul and his travels. We know quite a bit about Paul from the writings because he wrote about one fourth of the New Testament. He wrote letters to individuals, he wrote letters to churches, he wrote general epistles, he wrote doctrine, he wrote practical application. He tells us about himself. In Philippians Chapter 3, he says, I am a Hebrew of Hebrews, means both of his parents were Hebrews from the tribe of Benjamin. He said I was a Pharisee, very zealous for good works, righteous in all the Pharisaical laws. I was zealous for my faith even persecuting the church. And so Paul was trained under Gamaliel the best teacher of the Pharisees, he was highly educated in his day, in the education of the Jewish culture. He was very very conversant in every aspect of life. Very philosophical, able to argue with philosophers in Athens. He was able to do many different things. He was, also, a Roman citizen by birth from Tarsus and Cilicia. Now we don’t know for sure how that happen except some cities were designated by Rome, by the Emperor quite often, to be a Roman colony and everyone in that city was given Roman citizenship even if they were not Romans by birth. But anybody who thereafter was born of those parents became Romans by privilege. So Paul, himself, was a Roman who was also a Jew by birth, both of them. And so Paul was a very well equipped man for almost any area of life. We know that he was a tent maker by trade. That is how he paid is bills so he could be missionary. He took three missionary journeys throughout the culture, as a pioneer missionary. He goal was to take the gospel to people who had never heard it before in the Gentile world. The Bible calls him the Apostle to the Gentiles because God said I want you to specifically target Gentile nations. And so he tried to go where nobody else had gone with the gospel. Many believe that he went as far as Spain, in fact, with the gospel. He was traditionally, at least, martyred under Nero. At least one of the Caesars, most likely Nero. He was arrested at least once, in fact, we are going to hear part of his defense here in a second. He was arrested, he was most likely released and then went back to preaching and his missionary work and was re-arrested and taken before Caesar, finally and was sentenced to death eventually. And we understand at least traditionally that he was beheaded by the Caesar of the time.

Where we pick up the story here he has been arrested in Jerusalem the Jews were thinking he was stirring up all the people with a false theology, a false doctrine, worshiping some other God than Jehovah, even though Jesus of course, was God in the flesh, God with us, Emmanuel. So Paul was arrested here and he is giving his defense now in Chapter 22, he was standing on the stairs it says in Verse 40 of Chapter 21. Now in the Hebrew dialect. “Brethren and fathers, hear my defense which I now offer to you.”

When they heard that he was addressing them in the Hebrew dialect, they became even more quiet; and he said, “I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, and brought up in this city, educated under Gamaliel, strictly according to the law of our fathers, being zealous for God, just as you all are today. And I persecuted the Way to the death, binding and putting both men and women into prisons, and also the high priest and all the Council of the elders can testify. From them I also received letters to the brethren, and started off for Damascus in order to bring even those who were there to Jerusalem as prisoners to be punished. And it came about that as I was on my way, approaching Damascus about noontime, a very bright light suddenly flashed from heaven all around me, and I fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to me, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?’ And I answered, ‘Who art Thou, Lord?’ And He said to me, “I am Jesus the Nazarene, whom you are persecuting.’ “And those who were with me beheld the light, to be sure, but did not understand the voice of the One who was speaking to me. And I said, “What shall I do, Lord?’ And the Lord said to me, ‘Arise and go on into Damascus; and there you will be told of all that has been appointed for you to do.’ “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. And 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, came to me, and standing near said to me, ‘Brother Saul, receive your sight!’ And at that time I looked up at him.’ You see he is referred to as Saul here, we call him Paul. Well, as I understand his name was actually Saulos Ho Qi Polos and so either name would be appropriate but with his change of life he took on his other name. So he became known as Paul.

Verse 14, ‘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. And now why do you delay? Arise, and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on His name.’ “And it came about when I returned to Jerusalem and was praying in the temple, that I fell into a trance, and I saw Him saying to me, ‘Make haste, and get out of Jerusalem quickly, because they will not accept your testimony about Me!’ And I said, ‘Lord, they themselves understand that in one synagogue after another I used to imprison and beat those who believed in Thee. And when the blood of Thy witness Stephen was being shed, I also was standing by approving, and watching out for the cloaks of those who were slaying him.’ And He said to me, ‘Go! For I will send you far away to the Gentiles.’” And they listened to him up to this point, and then they raised their voices and said, “Away with such a fellow from the earth, for he should not be allowed to live!” They were crying out and throwing off their cloaks and tossing dust into the air.’

Well, the story continues, he is taken from there to the next authority to Festus and then to Felix and then to King Agrippa and then finally, not in Acts here but in history, taken to Caesar because as a Roman citizen he had the right to appeal to the highest authority, to the supreme court of the day, which was the Caesar. And so as the court went along each one stopped and said, Hey Paul come and talk to me and tell what you believe, And he talked to Felix, the governor, and to Festus, and then the next governor, Felix, and then to the King Agrippa who came in who was actually very well versed in the law as kinda being a half Jew he was very well versed and had been King of that area for some time. And then finally on to the Caesar. But he knew his future before he got there.

Turn back to Chapter 9 of Acts. There is a very interesting statement that God makes, actually Jesus to him and to Ananias. He doesn’t give us the whole story here, he doesn’t give all the words that were spoken at the time of his conversion. So in Chapter 9 we see in Verse 3, ‘It came about that as he journeyed, he was approaching Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him; and he fell to the ground, and heard a voice saying to him, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?” And he said, “Who art Thou, Lord?” And He said, “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting, but rise, and enter the city, and it shall be told you what you must do.” And the men who traveled with him stood speechless, hearing the voice, but seeing no one. And Saul got up from the ground, and though his eyes were open, he could not see and leading him by the hand they brought him to Damascus. Verse 10 says, ‘Now there was a certain disciple at Damascus, named Ananias; and the Lord said to him in a vision, “Ananias.” And he said, “Behold, here I am Lord.” And the Lord said to him, “Arise and go to the street called Straight, and inquire at the house of Judas for a man from Tarsus named Saul, for behold, he is praying. And he has seen in a vision a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands on him, so that he might regain his sight.” But Ananias answered, “Lord I have heard from many about this man, how much harm he did to Thy saints at Jerusalem; and here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who call upon thy name.” But the Lord said 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.”

So he says, you are my chosen instrument to bear my name before the Gentiles and kings and the sons of Israel and I will show him how much he must suffer for my name sake. How would you like that to be the first information you got upon your conversion to Christ? By the way, Yes you accepted Jesus Christ, now you are going to suffer. You are going to take my name before kings and the Gentiles. Of course, Paul who was a Jew, the Gentiles were considered unclean to even be in their presence to touch them made him ceremonially unclean. For Saul to hear this and say, you are going to be taking my name before the hated people of the world and not only that you are going to suffer as a result. But you are going to stand before kings and rulers. Wow, what a mixed message. The standing before kings and rulers was after he was arrested even sometime before that he had a chance to talk to some very influential people of the day. He knew his future before it got there.

The question is do we know our future? Luke the writer of Acts tells us that Paul was chosen by God, a chosen instrument. He was already equipped for the ministry in terms of his personal equipment. Now God has equipped you to and he has equipped me. Each of us has a certain background, each of us have certain education, each of us have certain parentage, each of us have a mental framework in such to work. We have experiences, we have thoughts, we have education, we have all the different things that make us unique. By the way, you are unique, there is nobody each like you in the whole world. One interesting question that I have pondered, what about cloning? Is it ok to clone? No. Could you clone somebody and make them just like them? No, because of experience, because of time of birth, because of all different kinds of things they would not be the same person. I have real trouble with genetic engineering trying to become God and that sort of thing but some of these questions are very difficult questions to answer because we live in a time when our technology has taken us beyond where our morality has taken us, I believe many times and our ethics. So some of these are very difficult questions. But even if we exactly the same genetically we would still become different people because of experiences and all the different things that take place to make us unique. So God has equipped you in a very special way. Turn to Ephesians, Chapter 2, this tells us believe it or not that we have a future that is laid out before us. God doesn’t give us the same information that he gave Paul but he gives us a skeleton at least of information about our own future. And that there is a future that is ours to work toward God is pleasure.

Ephesians 2:10, ‘For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.’ So he says you are God’s workmanship, you are particularly created as who you are so that God can give you a step by step plan to fulfil. I kind of see it as a paint by numbers. He has given us the outline and he has given us the pattern for our life and it is our work to seek his will and to follow his will and to fill in the colors as life goes along. Says we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works which God has prepared beforehand. Means God has prepared beforehand things that we should be going. A ministry for us, an area of obedience, a path for life and it is up to us to follow that path that we should walk in them. So God has equipped you to be the particular person that you are. Has chosen you in Christ, he says we are created in Christ Jesus for good works. He has chosen us who are Christians to be his spokesmen. Which is obviously the best way. I mean why would he chose somebody who doesn’t trust Christ, speak for Christ. He just doesn’t to that. Every once in awhile it can happen I am sure, he can step out of the normal way of doing things any time he wants to but we are his primary spokesmen. The question is are we his primary spokesmen? Because Paul was to take the message to the people of Israel but also to the Gentiles. Where are we to take the message? Where we are! There is an old song that says, ‘bloom where you are planted.’ You know light in the corner where you are, right in the corner where you are. You are in a place that nobody else is in life. You are at a particular place of work with certain co-workers, you have a certain family, you have certain relatives, you have certain place in life that nobody else is there but you. God has called you, has chosen you to minister in that place in a very special way. God has laid out beforehand. So our work is to seek his will. Say ok God what do you want me to do with my life? But God is also a general work for all Christians. He says we are to make disciples of all nations. We are to go into all the world and make disciples. Baptize him and teach him to obey Christ in all his commandments. That is generally true about every Christian. Specifically he has given you a place of worship, a place of ministry, a place, a skill, a body of knowledge, a way of thinking, a personality that shapes who you are, then makes it so you can do what nobody else can do. So he shaped you, he has called you, he has given us a general work but he has also given us a specific work.

He holds an instrument to carry my name where? Where do you work, who do you see, you are your relatives. You are my chosen ones to carry my word here. And to be before kings and rulers or where are you, before bosses and things like that. Who is it that God has called you to minister to? We all have an arena in which we live, we have a place of life. Sometimes you meet with just about only the people you work with throughout the week. Sometimes you see strangers every day, depending on what kind of work you do. Some of you who are teachers see the same kids everyday and that same teacher and the same surroundings pretty much every day. Different events, of course, but the same people. Some of you see new people every day, some of you see them only for a day and only have chance meetings with them. They only come and go, customers maybe patients, who knows what they might be but you see them for only a moment in time. How does God use you to effect them? Do you know about your place in God’s work? We should be able to fill in the blanks and say. My name is such and God has chosen me to do this work in his work. Is it possible that you need to say, ‘God I’m listening tell me what it is.’ I know sometimes we struggle with that. We struggle with that over time. In fact, Saul, if you notice history you know from Galatians, he says, in fact in Acts here he says, ‘After he was converted he went immediately to the synagogue’s and began to persuade people that this Christ that I used to persecute is the one that you should worship now. And it was such a strange story, such a strange reversal that people could not accept his new teaching because they had heard his old reputation. And so he was actually sent away back to Tarsus and in fact it was many years later that Barnabas actually went and brought him back and then they began their missionary journeys. As many as eleven or fourteen years later he came back and so God in a sense set him aside so his reputation died down so he could come back as a new teacher. The persecuting Saul was gone and the preaching Paul came back. And so he may need to set us aside once in awhile so we can get more training, some more learning, some more education. They were in that place.

He has called us to a particular place of ministry. Do you know what it is? Do we know what it is? Do you know where you serve in the body of Christ? We are none of us exempt from his calling us to service. We are all his servants, it says we have been bought with a price so therefore we should glorify God with our body. We are his servants. Where are we serving? There are very few of us who come into a new job and don’t have a job description and know what it is we are supposed to do. Most farmers know what to do, most teachers know what to do, most people who are in any kind of work, they know what they are supposed to do. They have some sort of job description. God has a job description for you. Have you figured it out yet? You may have get away all by yourself and say, Lord what is it you want me to do with my life? Where do you want me serving you? It is possible too that he has already told you and you have said, ‘No, I don’t like that one. Do you have something else for me. Something more glamorous maybe. In fact, it says in I Corinthians Chapter 12 and 14, There are many different gifts in the body and each one has its own important but they are not all as visible. There are some who have great importance but all almost invisible to the naked eye. But they are very important. He says, we are not all the nose, we are not all the eye, we are not all the same thing but we are all very important to the body of Christ. So what is it that God has called you to do? Many times people want the visible ones, and those with the visible sometimes want the invisible ones. So where has God called you?

It is possible, also, that this might have happened. You might have started doing the work and said ok this is what God has called me to do and you got discouraged. Most of our discouragement comes because we start working with people. And we find out the people we hoped would be wonderfully Christian in their attitude and action we find out they are normal. And then we get discouraged, we get burned out, we get over loaded sometimes, we get doing things we are not called to do and get pilic because we don’t know how to say no. And so we get discouraged and we just back off from all ministry. In fact we were talking the other day and this is a large area of our society of people who are of retirement age. Retirement age used to be 65 to 70, now it is 45 to 55 or some where in there anyway. So what do you do when you retire? Do you retire from all things ministry included. John Maxwell says you don’t retire, you re-enlist. We may have a new way of ministering, a different way but we don’t quit on Christ. He hasn’t quit on us. In fact I heard one guy say about vacation he says, ‘God never takes a vacation but he would be glad to go on yours with you.’ So when your retirement how are you serving Christ? It doesn’t mean we give up everything we have done, we may stop certain things and start new things, might be a different form of ministry. But what has God called you to do? What is he doing with you? See Saul became Paul, Paul became Paul the Apostle, Paul the Apostle became Paul the prisoner. And so many of his writings came from prison. He said I can’t be out there anymore but I can still encourage you who are. And so his place of life changed over time and in that change he also became more effective to different people. That happens with retirement, that happens with changes of jobs and changes of environment, changes of places of residence. God calls us and we make changes as we go because of our circumstances.

The only place to be, the only place to be satisfied is in the center of God’s will. Knowing that gives us confidence. Knowing what he wants us to do and knowing that we are doing it. That gives us confidence, that gives us peace with God. There are a number of peace’s that we can have in life. One is peace of God because he gives us the salvation of Jesus Christ. We have the peace of God in our hearts but he also gives us peace with God if we are in obedience to him. We may be at peace with God in the sense that we are saved, we may be in turmoil because we are not serving him. He says I can only bless those who know my will and do it. So if you are finding your Christian life becoming less than satisfactory it may be because God has a will and you are not in it. You may need to seek it or you may need to step into it and you already know what it is. But the only place to be satisfied and truly at peace with God and at peace with the world is in the center of God’s will. Are we there, do we know our future in God’s life for us?

Let’s pray:

Father we thank you that you are a God who has a plan for us. You said we are your workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works that you have laid out beforehand that we should walk in now. So you have a future for us. You have a future of good not of calamity. You have a future for our welfare not for our hurt. So Father we know that you have a future that is effective and good and powerful because of who you have made us to be. You have a paint by numbers picture out there of our life and it is up to us to seek your will and figure out which colors go where and to fill in the blanks that are there, Father and we pray that you might help us to do that. You said that you have predestined us to become conformed to the image of Jesus Christ your son. You have an image of us looking just like Christ. Effective in ministry, effective in your will, knowing you and responding to your will, obedient in everything. Father help us to become that. You have a will for our lives, help us to follow it. Help us to be able to fill in those blanks, say Yes my name is this and this is how I serve God and I know this is where he wants me in this point in life. Father help us to find that place in our will and be truly at peace with you.
In Jesus Name, Amen.

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