Meditations
“His Praise endureth forever”
Psalm 111:10. When may we stop praising the Lord? When God ceases to be God, then we may cease to praise Him. When God no long has all authority then we need no longer spending our lives serving Him. When God stops providing for us, then we may stop giving to Him. When God stops saving souls, then we no longer need to witness to the lost.
But God endures forever, He will always be God, the Creator and Sustainer of heaven and earth and us. He changes not; He will forever be faithful. All authority is His and will forever remain His. He will forever provide for His children and He will always seek to save the Lost. Therefore we should forever be faithful to Him!
Direction in our Lives!
“He is a chosen vessel unto me” (Acts 9:15). To Ananias and the Christians, Saul of Tarsus was the most evil of men, hauling men and women off to prison, even consenting to their deaths. “And when the blood of thy martyr Stephen was shed, I (Saul of Tarsus) also was standing by, and consenting unto his death, and kept the raiment of them that slew him”. (Acts 22:20). Believers in Christ no doubt wished the Lord would take this man’s life and free them from his determined persecutions. They no doubt believed that God could never use a man as evil as he, or even considered that someday he would be a chosen vessel used of the Lord.
They saw the outward hatred of Saul of Tarsus against believers in Christ, but God saw in this man a potential leader. God knew what Paul would be, not what he had been. Christ met Saul of Tarsus on the Damascus Road while he was on the way to throw Christians into prison. It was then that he came face to face with the Lord Jesus Christ. Saul and his companions were struck by a blinding light, he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?” When Saul asked who he was persecuting “Who art thou, LORD? And the LORD said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutes” He was astonished when he realized the one he hated was God Himself and accepted Christ as his Savior. Saul of Tarsus’s name was then changed to Paul following his conversion to Christ and he became probably the greatest Christian missionary and theologian who ever lived.
He was probably more responsible than any other individual for the spread of Christianity throughout the Roman Empire. Acts 9:1-19 and retold by Paul in Acts 22:6-21 and Acts 26:12-18. His life was now lived proclaiming Christ, he lived and died proclaiming Christ.
When we meet a man or woman who hates us, who hates Christ we never know what the Lord will do in that life. ‘Saul of Tarsus’s’ hatred of Christ became love for Christ after his conversion. Let us pray for those who hate us and use us, let us pray for those who hate Christ that they may see and understand who He (Christ) truly is, and who they will see themselves as they truly are and see their need for Christ.
Christ sought us and opened our eyes, may we be used of the Lord to guide others to Christ themselves.