Acts 26.17b-20
‘I am sending you to them to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’ So then, King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the vision from heaven. First to those in Damascus, then to those in Jerusalem and in all Judea, and then to the Gentiles, I preached that they should repent and turn to God and demonstrate their repentance by their deeds.
An interesting thing which is said in this account and not in the others is that the Lord was sending Paul to ‘open their eyes’ – the irony of this was surely not lost on Paul when, at that point, he himself was still blind! And there is another curious phrase in this verse, when Paul tells Agrippa he ‘was not disobedient’. Why didn’t he simply say ‘I was obedient’? Could it be that when God asks us to do something difficult, something which is likely to arouse opposition, our natural instinct is to say ‘Why me, Lord?’ – ‘I’m no good at this sort of thing’ – ‘I’m not a speaker’ – ‘Please send somebody else.’ Disobedience comes more naturally than obedience, especially when we are faced with something challenging. But there are things God wants you to do and wants me to do, and despite our natural reluctance he will give us what we need for those tasks.
Is there something God is asking you to do which you are reluctant to respond to? Pray for the courage to say yes.
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