INTRODUCTION TO ACTS 9
Acts 9:1-5
I. The Spreading Flame Acts 9-28
II. The Drama of Conversion Acts 9:1-5
A. The Miracle of Human Birth
B. The Miracle of Spiritual Birth
1. The Importance of Paul in the Book of Acts
2. The Prominence of Paul’s Conversion in the Book of Acts
III. The Spectacle of Sovereign Grace Acts 9:1-4
A. The Way God Works
1. He Chooses an Individual
2. He Chooses an Unlikely Individual
3. The Quality of Redemption
a. The People Who are Not Like Us
b. The People Who Do Not Like Us
B. The Initiation of God
“What stands out from the narrative is the sovereign grace of God through Jesus Christ. Saul did not ‘decide for Christ.’ On the contrary, he was persecuting Christ. It was rather Christ who decided for him and intervened. The evidence for this is indisputable.” -John Stott
C. Salvation Taken into God’s Own Hands
“According to the plan of grace revealed in the Gospel, God has taken the work of salvation into His own hands. The great design originated in the mind of God. In the ages of eternity it arose out of His own self-moving goodness, without the councsel of any creature, without the intercession of any creature, and without respect to the merits of any creature. It was His own purpose, His own favorite choice, induced by nothing but a regard to His own glory and compassion for a ruined world. The work is all the Lord’s, undertaken for His own glory, undertaken from love, inexhaustible and invincible.And as the Lord liveth, it will be accomplished.” -Edward Griffin (1770-1837)
IV. Christ as Sovereign Sufferer Acts 9:5
A. The Sinner’s Capacity to Inflict Suffering Upon Christ
B. The Sinner’s Capacity to Inflict Suffering Upon Himself