March 11, 2025
#262 - Nobody is Beyond God's Reach - Acts 9.1-9
Today on Al Pastor, Pastor Brian walks through Acts 9:1–9 and the stunning story of Saul's radical conversion. Discover how God's grace confronts even the hardest heart, how Jesus identifies personally with His people, and why resisting God's call only leads to more pain. If God could save Saul, He can reach anyone. Join us for this life-changing moment in Scripture!
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You're listening to Al Pastor, the show that helps you love God, love your neighbor and eat more
tacos.
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I'm your host, Pastor Brian.
Welcome to the show.
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Hey friends, I want to thank you for tuning into today's episode.
We're going to be covering Acts Chapter 9, verses one through 9, an incredible story of conversion
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and the power of the gospel.
Nobody is out of reach of God's grace.
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Now let me ask you, have you ever been convinced that you were right about something?
Maybe to find out that you were wrong?
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I know, I've been there several times.
Maybe you've even argued passionately, standing your ground, only to later realize that the truth
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had been staring you right in the face all along.
This is exactly where we find ourselves in the text today with Saul of Tarsus.
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This is a man who was breathing in threats of murder, who lived and thrived in him in an atmosphere
that he had created a persecution.
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That is, until the risen king of Kings met him on the road to Damascus.
Now, this is one of the most significant turning points in Scripture.
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Luke records this in three separate sections in Acts.
The point is, he's emphasizing just how pivotal, just how monumental this moment is not only for
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Saul, but also for the entire trajectory of the the early church.
And so I want us to walk through Acts Chapter 9, the 1st 9 verses, not overly fast, but we're going
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to take our time.
We're going to do it together.
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We're going to see what happens when God gets a hold of a man that is running full speed in the
wrong direction.
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All right, let's begin by reading the first couple of verses out of Acts Charter 9.
The Bible says then Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went
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to the high priest and asked for letters from him to the synagogues of Damascus, so that if he found
any who were of the way, whether men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.
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Now I want to start off because the Bible says that Saul was still breathing threats and murder.
Now this isn't just a figure of speech.
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The the original Greek language behind this suggests that the the threats and murder were the very
air that he breathed it it it fueled him.
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In other words, it drove him.
He was relentlessly obsessed in his pursuit of Christians.
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And even though most of the believers had scattered from Jerusalem, we looked at that in the
previous chapter.
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They were scattered, and the indication is that God himself was planting them in these places.
But Saul wasn't content to let them go.
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He wanted them silenced permanently.
Now we've got to ask the question, why Damascus?
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And if we study this out a little bit, this city is about 140 miles northeast of Jerusalem.
Now, it had a significant Jewish population.
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It was a a hub of commerce and culture, and evidently it had become a growing Center for followers
of Jesus.
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Now pay attention to this because the Bible describes them as being of the way.
Now this term, the way is so rich and so deep in meaning, Jesus himself declared in John 14, six.
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And hopefully you can help me out on this, he said.
I am the way, the truth and the life.
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No one comes to the Father except through me.
And so the early believers were not just subscribing to a set of teachings.
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They weren't just identifying with some new sect of religion.
They weren't just putting on the jersey.
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No, they were walking a path, a path that led to life.
And Saul, he was determined to shut that path down.
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But I want you to notice something that's amazing here.
Aul wasn't just hunting Christian men.
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He specifically targets women as well.
I'm trying to remember when and where and how I mentioned this.
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I can't remember if it was that Bible study or behind the pulpit or even on a podcast, so if you've
heard this already, just bear with me for a second.
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In the previous chapter, we saw that Saul was hunting down both men and women and imprisoning them.
This is highly significant because it was very unusual both in Israel, in in Judaism, and even in
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the 1st century Roman world to arrest women.
Now, that doesn't mean that it never happened.
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It was just a very rare act.
So what's the point in this?
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This is telling us something about the early church.
Now, first of all, understand that women did not hold also a prominent role in Judaism.
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What does that mean?
It means that they were not esteemed very highly in any kind of Worshipful acts of service.
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It was the men, it was the priests, It was those who did everything that had to do with the
sacrifice, everything that had to do with the ceremonies, everything that had to do with the
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speaking.
Women were relegated to their own special court.
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They couldn't even worship together with men.
So what does this tell us?
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That Paul is hunting down women as well.
That women were #1 active.
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They had been vocal, and they were influential.
And so this is amazing because the gospel is already breaking down barriers, making no distinction
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between male and female in Jesus Christ.
That's what the book of Galatians.
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Paul later writes this in Galatians chapter 3 verse 28.
And so hold with me for a second.
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We, we have been learning, we have been reading the democratization of salvation is not just for the
Jew, it's to the Jew first, but it's also for the Greek as well.
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It is to Jerusalem, to Judea, to Samaria, to the ends of the earth.
It is it is the promise that was made to Abraham that through you and through this promised seed, I
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will bless all the families of the earth.
And so we've been looking at those ethnic barriers that have been broken down.
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And so now we see in seed form some evidence here of gender as well.
There is no distinction between male and female.
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And so the women were just as much of A threat in the eyes of Saul as were the men.
Why?
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Because they were participating in the community, in the worship of the Way.
And so Saul secures his letters from a high priest.
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Now most likely, depending on the timing and depending on what scholar, and most likely this would
have been Caiaphas at the time.
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But that's not necessarily the point.
The point is that these letters gave him an authorization to arrest Christians and to drag them back
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to Jerusalem for trial.
Now in his mind, he's doing God's work, but you and I know the end of the story reality.
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He's fighting against God himself.
Let's read on in verses starting verse 3 of Chapter 9.
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It says as he journeyed, he came near Damascus, and suddenly a light shone around him from heaven.
And then he fell to the ground and he heard a voice saying to him, Saul, Saul, why are you
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persecuting me?
Now, Saul, nearing the end of this long journey, remember, it's 140 miles.
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He is suddenly surrounded, engulfed in in light brighter than the noonday sun, as he later recounts
in Acts chapter 26.
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Now this wasn't just any light.
It was the glory of God, the same glory of the Lord that filled the temple in the Old Testament, the
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same glory that was present during the transfiguration on the that day when Peter and James and John
stood on that mountain.
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And then Saul hears the voice.
Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me now?
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Jesus calls his name twice just like God did with Abraham, just like he did with Jacob and Moses.
In other words, this wasn't a casual question that Jesus is asking.
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This is a divine confrontation.
Now Saul, who later we know became a he excelled in in Pharisee ISM.
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He's a Pharisee of the Pharisees, well trained in the scriptures.
He would have instantly recognized that this twice call of his name was the voice from heaven.
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But the question actually confuses him.
He says, hold on for a second, persecuting you.
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Saul in his mind wasn't persecuting God.
He was hunting down Christians.
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And yet here's Jesus identifying Himself so intimately with His people that to persecute them is to
persecute him.
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Now let's stop and appreciate that for a moment.
You know, the church isn't just a gathering.
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It's not just this casual thing that we do on Sunday morning.
This is the way the most people view it.
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But this is the body of Christ.
This is talked about in the 1st chapter as Paul would expound upon it in Ephesians chapter 1.
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And here's the thing, when 1 believer suffers, Jesus feels it.
When one person is attacked, he takes it personally.
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And so Saul wasn't fighting against a movement, he is fighting against the resurrected king.
And then comes this famous phrase he says, is it hard for you to kick against the goads?
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And I don't want to take for granted that we all understand this particular term.
In fact, this morning I was kind of teasing a little bit with Marcia's and, and, and I said, Hey,
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when are you?
When are you going to make me breakfast, Right.
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And she's like, I don't know, I might wait till 10 or 11.
Sometimes I eat really late.
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I, I try not to eat early in the morning.
I want to postpone my meals as long as as long as possible.
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And so I said, why don't you go in there and make me some breakfast?
Why are you trying to kick against the goads?
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And she's like, what do you mean?
What does that mean?
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Well, let me tell you what it means.
It is an agricultural metaphor.
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And this is definitely worth explaining.
So hang with me for a moment.
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In ancient times, farmers would use this long pointed stick.
It was called a goad, and this would help prod their oxen forward.
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Now if an ox resisted, and if he kicked against the goat, it would only drive that sharp point
deeper into his flesh.
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Now the more that the ox fought, the more it would hurt himself.
And so what's going on here?
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Jesus is telling Saul, you've been resisting me, but you're only hurting yourself.
Isn't that true with the call of God, when in our lives, when he is calling centers sinners to
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repentance and they resist and they resist, they're only hurting themselves, aren't they?
And So what were the goats?
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I guess we could say in Saul's life.
Maybe it was the words of Steven.
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Maybe it was the the courage of the Christians he had been arresting and murdering.
Maybe it was the power of their testimonies not backing down.
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It was the truth of the gospel. 9 At the edges of his conscience he had been kicking, fighting
against conviction, and now he is face to face with the risen king.
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Now let's move on to verse number six.
I want to, I want us to look.
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And what happens here?
It says so.
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He trembling and astonished.
I love that.
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He said, Lord, what do you want me to do?
And then the Lord said to him, Arise and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.
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I love that.
Now let's take note.
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Trembling.
And he was astonished.
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This is the same man who just moments ago was marching confidently towards Damascus.
He's ready to arrest believers.
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And now he's on his knees, he's blind, he's helpless.
And he's saying, Lord, what do you want me to do?
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And Jesus tells him to go into the city and to wait.
There's no mission yet.
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There's no immediate commissioning.
He says just wait and notice the time frame for three days.
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Saul is sitting blinded, in other words in total darkness.
Now could there be a correlation there?
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Could that be 3 days that Jesus was in the tomb?
Could it be 3 days until until Saul can experience the resurrecting power of the of the risen king?
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Yes, most likely.
And so as he's sitting there, he is fasting and he is praying and he is reflecting the the one who
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had been hunting down Christians has now become the haunted one by Jesus Christ.
The the one who had been persecuting Christians is now the one who has been pursued.
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God has broken him down.
But get this, it's not to destroy him.
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This was the beginning of something new.
Now I want to wrap up today by giving us just a few points of some takeaways that you and I can have
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for today.
And, and what this passage of Scripture teaches us teaches I'm tongue tied teaches us.
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Wow, hey, that's all right.
I think we all get tongue tied every once in a while.
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But here's the first thing that that this passage teaches US #1 nobody, OK, nobody is beyond the
reach of God's grace.
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I mean, think about this.
If Saul, the greatest enemy of the church, if that guy can be transformed, so can anyone.
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There is power in the gospel of Jesus Christ.
It is the power of God unto salvation.
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Romans 116.
You should jot that down.
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You should look it up.
The gospel is powerful.
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Nobody's beyond the reach of God's grace.
Here's #2 Jesus identifies personally with His people.
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I, I, I want to emphasize and highlight.
I hope you'll do this in your Bible.
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He doesn't say why are you persecuting them, but He says, why are you persecuting me?
Jesus walks with his people in their suffering.
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I hope that'll be an encouragement to you today.
If you're going through something, if you feel like you're suffering, if somebody has done you
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wrong, if you're if you're in a physical element or you've been afflicted it, Jesus identifies with
you.
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Here's the third thing, Resistance to God's call is futile.
Now, I don't know if this is going to land with everybody and certainly not a younger audience, but
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I really like Star Trek.
OK, not the new stuff, but I like the old stuff and not, not the original.
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I like Star Trek The Next Generation.
And there was an arch nemesis of the Federation known as the Borg.
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And they had a, a theme.
The Borg was a part machine, part human, and they were trying to take over the universe.
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And when they would approach, they would just say, hey, give up.
Resist is futile.
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That was the line, right?
And this is really the line that should be for God's call when he calls for us to be saved.
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Resistance is futile.
Saul kicked against the goads, but all it did was bring him pain.
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And so God's Word, God's truth, will always prevail.
And maybe today you've been resisting some goads of conviction.
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Maybe God has been trying to bring some some correction, some conviction back into your life.
Maybe he's been prodding your heart and you've been fighting against it.
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The lesson that we learned today is absolutely clear.
Surrender.
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Surrender your life and repent and bend the knee to King Jesus.
When you surrender, it is far better than resisting the convicting power of the Holy Spirit.
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Hey, I want to thank you so much for tuning in with me today.
On the next episode, we're going to take a look at what happens when a blind man is blinded by the
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light and he finally is able to see.
Thanks again.
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We'll see you on the next episode.
Thank you for listening to Al Pastor with Bryan Overturf.
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Until then, we'll see you later.