What Do You Want Me To Do?

In Acts 9, we find the story of Saul on the Damascus Road. Saul was not looking to have a religious "experience". In fact, he was on his was to stop those who were following Christ and hopefully wipe out Christianity. Like every sinner, he is going along thinking he has life by the tail. He is in charge of his life. Then all of the sudden he encounters the LIGHT from heaven. God uses this light to get Saul's attention, and get his attention it does!

It would have been scary enough to SEE a light that bright at noon time (According to Acts 22:6), but he also HEARD the light speaking! See, he not only encountered the LIGHT from heaven, he also met the LORD of heaven!

It is interesting to note that when he really encountered the LORD, it stopped him in his tracks! Verse 4 says, "he fell to the earth." I believe the Bible teaches that if a sinner truly encounters the LORD, they will stop doing what they are doing! It bothers me to see people who claim to have gotten saved yet their life has not changed one bit. My Bible tells me in 2 Cor. 5:17, "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." For some, their lifestyle never changed because the "old things" never "passed away."

But here is where I believe Saul evidenced a true conversion experience; I believe it is found in verse 6 when he said, "Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?" Many people today are too busy TELLING God what THEY want to do and what they want HIM to do for THEM. Instead we need to be saying, "Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?"

One of the greatest evidences a person has truly been born again is they will want to live for God. Jesus said in John 14:15, "If ye love me, keep my commandments." 

See, the real issue with many today is simply this: they have a heart problem. It is easy to come to church, lift your hands during the worship songs, sway back and forth and shed a tear while you sing about loving God. What I want to know is, ARE YOU KEEPING HIS COMMANDMENTS? That is where the REAL evidence is at!

Many people want Jesus as their SAVIOR--they do not want to go the hell. But they do not want Him as their LORD. To have Him as their LORD means he controls every aspect of their life.

They have ACCEPTED Him as SAVIOR,, but have never ACKNOWLEDGED Him as their LORD. That is why they live like they do. They might be a believer, but they are living like an unbeliever.

Start asking God, today, "What do you want me to do?"

Talking To A Sheep

You can tell a lot about a person spiritually by how they respond to rebuke.  In Matthew 7, Jesus speaks of two types of people.


1. The Hypocritical Believer
The favorite Bible verse of some people is Matthew 7:1, “Judge not, that ye be not judged.”  They believe Jesus is saying that we are never to judge anyone for anything. But that cannot be right because later in verse 5 Jesus said, “Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye.”


Jesus was warning against hypocritical judgement.  He said, “Take care of the sin in your life before you try to help someone with the sin in their life."   Then He mentions the second type of person.


2. The Hardened Unbeliever
Matthew 7:6 “Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.”  


Two types of animals are mentioned in this verse—dogs and swine.  We know this is referring to an unbeliever, because 1) Back in verses 3-5 he is referring to a “brother.”  2) Dogs and swine always represent unclean animals.  God’s children are sheep, not dogs and swine.


Jesus said that a believer will respond correctly to loving rebuke, but not a hardened unbeliever.  They will no more appreciate loving rebuke than swine appreciate pearls.  It does no good to rebuke a hardened scorner.  Throw a pearl to a swine and he will resent it as much as if you had thrown a stone at him.


True believers will have a tender heart when they are rebuked.  When Nathan confronted king David about his sin, David didn’t get mad at Nathan.  He said, “I have sinned.”  On the other hand, there have been some who I had to rebuke who, even though they ‘professed’ to be a Christian, they responded to rebuke just like a hardened unbeliever would.


So, pastor, the next time you are faced with a professing Christian who will not respond biblically to your loving rebuke, take heart.  You are probably not talking to a sheep.