Acts 9:17-22 English Standard Version

17 So Ananias departed and entered the house. And laying his hands on him he said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” 18 And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes, and he regained his sight. Then he rose and was baptized; 19 and taking food, he was strengthened.

Saul Proclaims Jesus in Synagogues

For some days he was with the disciples at Damascus. 20 And immediately he proclaimed Jesus in the synagogues, saying, “He is the Son of God.” 21 And all who heard him were amazed and said, “Is not this the man who made havoc in Jerusalem of those who called upon this name? And has he not come here for this purpose, to bring them bound before the chief priests?” 22 But Saul increased all the more in strength, and confounded the Jews who lived in Damascus by proving that Jesus was the Christ.

The first thing that Saul did after his eyes were enlightened was to confound expectations by proclaiming Christ rather than jailing Christians as he had set out to do. He sounded different and he acted differently.

What did we expect when we first believed? In many ways the first expectations that had to be confounded were our own expectations.

A brother in the Lord came to me after my conversion and said, “I have prayed and prayed that the Lord should remove this sin from me and He has not. What am I to do?” My answer came to him from a place that was not in my mind since I was a new creation myself.

“Your body is His temple. Do not tell Him how to clean His house.”

My friend had an expectation that was not realized and that led to doubt and fear. He began doubting his own conversion. Unrealized expectations lead to disappointment. Placing our faith in Christ begins with the blissful ignorance of faith. Don’t expect how we will change. In that way we will not be disappointed.

So how does the Lord clean His house?

John 14:12 English Standard Version (ESV) “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father.”

Jesus healed the sick, calmed the seas, walked on water and raised the dead. What could we possibly do that was greater than that?

A hint of what that would be is contained in the message itself.

He left them and went to be with the Father.

What is the one thing that Jesus could not do while He walked the earth that we can do?

He couldn’t show His abiding presence in mortal man as long as He was with them.

This is true and the tricky part in that is how Jesus reveals Himself in us so that others might know Him.

We cannot just declare His abiding presence and make others see Him. It is not as easy as asking Jesus to come out to play.

It becomes even more difficult if we continue to act in the same manner we did before we came to Christ. People who knew us before being saved will not see any difference in us if we are not changed. We have to become this new creation in Christ.

That is not something we do as much as it is done to us.

When I first became this new creation my family saw some really drastic changes. It was awkward for them because they thought I had lost my mind. In fact I did. My mind was not my own any more. I had given myself over to Christ.

Not everyone who becomes a Christian undergoes radical transformations. Some of us were decent people and the change did not look all that different. Some of us with exceedingly sinful lives found we could no longer live that life. Getting to be this new creation is awkward for us because we do not know at first what it means to be renewed in the spirit.

It took a year before my family realized who I was in Christ. It has taken me long to discover all I am in Christ because I am still being changed. Being a Christian is not a revolution, it is an evolution. We change bit by bit, from grace to grace, new mercies every morning.

We are not in control of the order of change. What changes and when isn’t up to us.