Today Acts 26 Saul Saul become Paul

Scripture selections are taken from the Rock Church Daily Bread Reading schedule for each month. “Lena’s Journalin’” are Lena’s comments on the specific passages from her Daily Journal.

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Acts 26:1-32
1Then Agrippa said to Paul, "You may speak in your defense." So Paul, with a gesture of his hand, started his defense: 2"I am fortunate, King Agrippa, that you are the one hearing my defense against all these accusations made by the Jewish leaders, 3for I know you are an expert on Jewish customs and controversies. Now please listen to me patiently!
4"As the Jewish leaders are well aware, I was given a thorough Jewish training from my earliest childhood among my own people and in Jerusalem. 5If they would admit it, they know that I have been a member of the Pharisees, the strictest sect of our religion.
6Now I am on trial because I am looking forward to the fulfillment of God's promise made to our ancestors. 7In fact, that is why the twelve tribes of Israel worship God night and day, and they share the same hope I have.
Yet, O king, they say it is wrong for me to have this hope! 8Why does it seem incredible to any of you that God can raise the dead?
9"I used to believe that I ought to do everything I could to oppose the followers of Jesus of Nazareth. F124 10Authorized by the leading priests, I caused many of the believers in Jerusalem to be sent to prison. And I cast my vote against them when they were condemned to death. 11Many times I had them whipped in the synagogues to try to get them to curse Christ. I was so violently opposed to them that I even hounded them in distant cities of foreign lands.
12"One day I was on such a mission to Damascus, armed with the authority and commission of the leading priests. 13About noon, Your Majesty, a light from heaven brighter than the sun shone down on me and my companions. 14We all fell down, and I heard a voice saying to me in Aramaic, F125 'Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is hard for you to fight against my will. F126 '
15"'Who are you, sir?' I asked. "And the Lord replied, 'I am Jesus, the one you are persecuting. 16Now stand up! For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my servant and my witness. You are to tell the world about this experience and about other times I will appear to you. 17And I will protect you from both your own people and the Gentiles. Yes, I am going to send you to the Gentiles, 18to open their eyes so they may turn from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God. Then they will receive forgiveness for their sins and be given a place among God's people, who are set apart by faith in me.'
19"And so, O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to that vision from heaven. 20I preached first to those in Damascus, then in Jerusalem and throughout all Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that all must turn from their sins and turn to God—and prove they have changed by the good things they do. 21Some Jews arrested me in the Temple for preaching this, and they tried to kill me. 22But God protected me so that I am still alive today to tell these facts to everyone, from the least to the greatest. I teach nothing except what the prophets and Moses said would happen—23that the Messiah would suffer and be the first to rise from the dead as a light to Jews and Gentiles alike."
24Suddenly, Festus shouted, "Paul, you are insane. Too much study has made you crazy!"
25But Paul replied, "I am not insane, Most Excellent Festus. I am speaking the sober truth. 26And King Agrippa knows about these things. I speak frankly, for I am sure these events are all familiar to him, for they were not done in a corner! 27King Agrippa, do you believe the prophets? I know you do—"
28Agrippa interrupted him. "Do you think you can make me a Christian so quickly?" F127
29Paul replied, "Whether quickly or not, I pray to God that both you and everyone here in this audience might become the same as I am, except for these chains."
30Then the king, the governor, Bernice, and all the others stood and left. 31As they talked it over they agreed, "This man hasn't done anything worthy of death or imprisonment." 32And Agrippa said to Festus, "He could be set free if he hadn't appealed to Caesar!"
FOOTNOTES:F124: Greek oppose the name of Jesus the Nazarene. F125: Or Hebrew. F126: Greek It is hard for you to kick against the oxgoads. F127: Or "A little more, and your arguments would make me a Christian."
Copyright Statement: Holy Bible, The New Living TranslationCopyright © 1996 by Tyndale Charitable Trust. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers. All rights reserved.

~ Lena’s Journalin’
Paul is showing how he’d justified his incorrect actions, based on thoughts he’d entertained based upon the opinions of his peer group. He was adamantly upholding an untruth, He was violently enforcing what was against God; thinking it was of God.
That is what a religious spirit is about. Upholding my perceived truth, rather than the truth of God’s word. The truth of God’s word can only be known by the spirit of God. It has to be inspired by God, God breathed, so that Zoe life comes into it, or else it is words on pages to follow to the “T” even to the destruction of others.
That last phrase is key. Would God’s word, in spirit, be destroying another? No, the spirit of God Him self is expressed through His word, and God is love, light, life. So Saul goes out to destroy those who are called Christ. He’s destroying them because they aren’t doing it his way, the way he believes it should be done in accordance with the black words on white papyrus. The part he enforces is, you must keep the law, if you don’t keep the law, you need to die.
Jesus had taught that the keeping of the law in Him, covered by His sacrifice, is fulfilled by loving God and loving people. You are dead already, because no man can keep the law to the “T”, not even Saul and his religious partners and they too should be destroyed if keeping the law were the gage of the judgment in execution. Saul had a big log in his eye and was very concerned to get the splinters out of the eyes of others. He took those ideas by force, his incorrect actions were bringing death to him unknowingly. He was living in the darkness of religious deception, which tells us we can make our own way, we can live however we see to live, we can do what we believe is right in our own eyes, even religiously.
What the Lord wanted Him to take by force, and not by physical force, was people’s hearts. The spirit of the Lord wanted to move in by love and capture people’s hearts, arrest them by his overwhelming overcoming love to the point of surrender, not of physical taking, but of physical giving.
That one would bow a knee, bend a waist, and bow a head willingly, without physical force, would show heart change.
Saul had to be taken off of his high horse to be able to see this. God used a physical manifestation, a physical fall to wake him up, shake him up, and show him the light. This physical fall would keep him from falling eternally.
So I say to you today, from the Lord: “Saul, Saul (meaning, “My desired, I’m enquiring of you”) why do you fight against what I AM doing? Is it hard for you to fight against My will?”
And is your reply- “Who are You , Lord?”
Do you know Him, really know Him, in the spirit, rather than by the letter of law? Do you know His heart, His inmost desire, His character? Do you know what He would have you stand for? Or do you stand alone, set in your own opinions? Steadfast in your own convictions? Immoveable in your own right?
These are all good questions every Christian should periodically be asking themselves. It is always good to ask pinpointing serious questions to ourselves, and come and stand before the truthful light presence of God. We are not living for ourselves in Christ, we live for Him. It is best to face ourselves and who, what and why we are living.
Saul was alive, fully manifested in himself. In his self life, he was justified, enforcing who he was, yet not at all knowing truly who he was to be, until he found himself in Christ alone.
This is how it is for each of us. We may be born with a great personality, have learned skills that set us apart from others around us, we may be good looking, popular, or even mean and ugly, but influential or wealthy, but we cannot and will not find ourselves outside of Christ, ever.
When we are found in Christ, arrested by His spirit, we will all find the same, ONE purpose for life, as outlined here. This scripture was not only speaking of Saul, it speaks of us. All of us are His desire, we are the way His desires are fulfilled. God is enquiring of each one of us, to se if we are for or against Him.
For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my servant and my witness.
You are to tell the world about this experience and about other times I will appear to you.
And I will protect you from both your own people and the Gentiles.
Yes, I am going to send you to the Gentiles,
to open their eyes so they may turn from darkness to light,
and from the power of Satan to God.
Then they will receive forgiveness for their sins
and be given a place among God's people,
who are set apart by faith in me.'

Gentile actually means, “Multitude”!
I will protect you from the multitudes
I am going to send you to the multitudes
To open their (the multitudes’) eyes so they can turn from darkness to light
(So the multitudes can turn) From the power of satan to God
So they, (the multitudes) can receive forgiveness for their sins
And they (the multitudes) can be given places among God’s people and
(The multitudes) can be set apart by their (own) faith in Me.
THIS IS why we are saved. THI IS why we come to know the Lord.
So, if you have not received Him yet, in a personal way, not a religious action, all must turn from their sins and turn to God—and prove they have changed by the good things they do.
A “saved “ person who “knows” the Lord will have evidence of a changed life, no longer lived for self, but lived for Christ.
Saul was changed to Paul. Saul was the desire, the Lord enquires of each of us to see if we will receive Him and be changed into His image and likeness. Paul is the bowed to the will of God new man, who came down off of the high horse of prideful ambition, and lives unto God. He must increase and I must decrease.
Ever hear people pray for increase? This is what is meant by God concerning that prayer. More of the Lord manifest, less of your old Saul man, given over as a living example to the multitudes.

Daily Repetitive Verses:

Isaiah 58:12 You'll use the old rubble of past lives to build anew, rebuild the foundations from out of your past. You'll be known as those who can fix anything, restore old ruins, rebuild and renovate, make the community livable again. THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language