PAUL’S CONVERSION and OUR OWN
Acts 9:15-25
I. Patterns which are Unusual and Distinct
A. A Spectacular Public Conversion (Acts 9:3-8)
1. The Burning Bush (Exodus 3:2ff)
2. The Damascus Road (Acts 9:3-8)
3. “Most conversions are a gradual realization
of what God has already done.”
--Donald Grey Barnhouse (1895-1960)
B. Immediate and Prominent Ministry Engagement
(Acts 9:20-22; Galatians 1:15-18)
II. Patterns which are Common and Shared
A. A Realization of Spiritual Blindness (Acts 9:8-9)
1. The Contradictory Arguments of Naturalism
a. We should not believe anything which cannot be perceived by the senses.
b. The argument from the “Pale Blue Dot”
“The earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.”
--Carl Sagan (1934-1996)
-- Man cannot be so significant that he can perceive everything while at the same time so insignificant that he is no more than a speck of dust riding upon a slightly larger speck of dust in the cosmos.
2. The Christian understands that he cannot see on his own.
He must be shown. (John 1:50)
3. The Experience of Fanny Crosby (1820-1915)
B. A Family Connection with Other Christians (Acts 9:17)
C. Baptism (Acts 9:18)
D. Public Confession of Faith in Jesus (Acts 9:20)
E. Growth (Acts 9:22)
F. The Experience of Contradiction (Acts 9:23-24)