1 Agrippa said to Paul, "You have permission to speak for yourself." Then Paul stretched out his hand and made his defence:

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1 1 Acts 26:1, Agrippa said to Paul, "You have permission to speak for yourself." Then Paul stretched out his hand and made his defence: 9 "I myself was convinced that I ought to do many things in opposing the name of Jesus of Nazareth. 10 And I did so in Jerusalem; I not only shut up many of the saints in prison, by authority from the chief priests, but when they were put to death I cast my vote against them. 11 And I punished them often in all the synagogues and tried to make them blaspheme; and in raging fury against them, I persecuted them even to foreign cities. 12 "Thus I journeyed to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests. 13 At midday, O king, I saw on the way a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, shining round me and those who journeyed with me. 14 And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, 'Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? It hurts you to kick against the goads.' 15 And I said, 'Who are you, Lord?' And the Lord said, 'I am Jesus whom you are persecuting. 16 But rise and stand upon your feet; for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to appoint you to serve and bear witness to the things in which you have seen me and to those in which I will appear to you, 17delivering you from the people and from the Gentiles to whom I send you 18 to open their eyes, that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.' 19 "Wherefore, O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision, 20 but declared first to those at Damascus, then at Jerusalem and throughout all the country of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God and perform deeds worthy of their repentance. 21 For this reason the Jews seized me in the temple and tried to kill me. 22 To this day I have had the help that comes from God, and so I stand here testifying both to small and great, saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses said would come to pass: 23 that the Christ must suffer, and that, by being the first to rise from the dead, he would proclaim light both to the people and to the Gentiles." 24 And as he thus made his defence, Festus said with a loud voice, "Paul, you are mad; your great learning is turning you mad." 25 But Paul said, I am not mad, most excellent Festus, but I am speaking the sober truth.

2 2 I find it easy to sympathise with poor old Festus. He s a Roman official, and he s just arrived to start his new job as procurator and he walks straight into hearing a case that makes absolutely no sense. It s a case against a Roman citizen, so it s got to be done right. This citizen had a life of status, and wealth, and respectability, and influence. You might say he d done well for himself. And then he threw it all away. WHY??? Well, as he stands in court, pleading his case, he says that he saw a light, and that he heard a voice, and that he had a meeting with another bloke that Festus knows is actually DEAD because everyone knows that he was executed as a criminal! Anyway, he says he met with this dead bloke, and that this dead bloke told him to completely give up his old life, and to start telling everyone about him. AND HE DID IT! If you were hearing the case, what would you think? No wonder Festus, hearing all this hearing this respectable Roman citizen claiming all this weird stuff and knowing that he used to be normal shouts out at the end of Paul s testimony: Paul you are out of your mind! And no wonder that he didn t pay much attention to Paul s reply, I am not mad, most excellent Festus, but I am speaking the sober truth. In this reading from Acts tonight, we hear one of the many times when Paul gives an account of the moment when he became a Christian, the moment when his whole life changed. In this reading, we are close to the end of Paul s ministry. From this hearing, Paul will be sent to Rome for trial, and as church tradition tells us, shortly after the end of the book of Acts, he will be beheaded, because of his discipleship to Jesus. In between the time when he became a Christian and this time when he s telling about it in court, he has visited most of the civilised world, and everywhere he s gone he s turned the world upside down. Everywhere Paul s gone, as Festus sees it, many others have caught this same infectious insanity. It s becoming an epidemic! To Festus, and to others listening, Paul might as well be an alien from another planet. And yet, this sense of alienation this sense of just not living on the same planet as normal, civilised people of the world, is exactly what Jesus foretold would be the experience of His disciples. And that was exactly what Jesus Himself experienced. For example: The Pharisees were easily the strictest group among religious Jews. Their record of church attendance was faultless! They not only taught obedience to

3 3 the Torah, the Law of Moses, the first 5 books of our OT there were a whole load of other rules and regulations written by the early rabbis, in a collection of writings that Jews call the Mishna and Pharisees were expected to obey all those too! Their whole lives were regulated by rules and regulations. If church attendance and doing the right rituals and saying the right words and obeying the right rules could get a guy to heaven, then definitely these guys were going to be right at the top of the list! But Jesus had nothing in common with them. To these respectable religious Pharisees, Jesus said, You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world. (John 8:23) And Jesus said to His disciples, For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. (Matt 5:20) Because, as you know, the Pharisees teaching was all about outward observance, and Jesus taught again and again that it s the inner person that needs to change and that the only way that s possible is if Jesus, who is God Himself, comes to live in that person, changing him or her from the inside. Jesus never expected or intended His disciples to be comfortable with this world or to fit in. any more than He did. At the end of Jesus earthly ministry which means at the beginning of Jesus ministry to the world through His disciples He told them that the Holy Spirit who would inspire them would make them strangers to the world: And I will pray the Father, and he will give you another Counsellor, to be with you for ever, 17 even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him; you know him, for he dwells with you, and will be in you. (John 14: 16-17) 18 "If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. (John 15:18) (Jesus praying for His disciples) I have given them your word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. (John 17:14) This wasn t just for those few disciples who heard Him praying then Jesus continued: I do not pray for these only, but also for all those who will believe in me through their word (John 17:20) And Paul lived just that life of discipleship, delighting in being different from those in the world around him, and teaching the disciples he made to be like him. As he wrote to the Church at Rome:

4 4 Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind (Romans 12:2a) but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, 24but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.25 For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. (1 Cor 1:23-25) So what about us Christians today? We Christians claim to have had a personal experience, or a personal meeting with Jesus. Some of us say, On that day, I gave my life to Jesus, I accepted Him as my Lord. Others say, I m not sure when it happened exactly, but I remember the day when I realised I had given my life to Him. We Christians claim that meeting was the start of a new life that we have been born again. Jesus said, (John 3:3 NIV) I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again. We Christians claim that we continue to have regular or constant personal contact with Jesus, and through Him with the creator of the universe more than that, we claim that He is our personal Lord, or Master, that we are directed or guided by Him. No wonder some think we re mad. How about you? Do you fit in comfortably out there in the world? Are you indistinguishable from all those people around you who live in the world, and do not know Jesus as Lord? Or are you one who doesn t quite fit? Are you the one who doesn t laugh at the risqué or the blasphemous joke at work? Are you the one who doesn t fiddle expenses, or take home little things from work that no one will miss? Are you the one who doesn t join in the gossip behind a person s back? And are you known as a disciple? That s as it should be, that s how Jesus, the one you call Lord, always in tended you to be. We Disciples of Christ, or Christians are called to be distinctive, in many ways. The world tells us to love things, and to use people. Our supernatural Lord teaches and empowers us to love people, and to use things. The world teaches that we should strive after power and status Our Master and Saviour teaches us He who would be great among you must be your servant.

5 5 The world teaches that an adult should be independent and self-reliant Jesus teaches and empowers us to be more and more dependent and reliant on Him. To use an example that Dave Wills used in a sermon many years ago, the world applauds and praises those who say, in the words of Frank Sinatra I ve travelled each and every byway, and more, much more than this, I did it my way Our Lord teaches us that we need to be ready to deny ourselves, and our own human ambitions for our lives, follow His supernatural guidance and direction, and go God s way, follow God s individual plan for each of our lives. Funny thing is, when we do, we discover real personal fulfilment and purpose because that plan is what He made us for in the first place So there at the hearing is Paul. He s not afraid to be distinctive, he s not afraid to be different, and he s not afraid to be very visible to those around him. We must not lose our distinctiveness as Christians. Jesus said to His disciples, You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot (Matt 5:13) And we know that in first century salt was a preservative salt was what stopped meat or fish going rotten. And who today would deny that the world is in real danger of rottenness and corruption today? Then Jesus said, "You are the light of the world Nor do men light a lamp and put it under a bushel, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. (Matt 14a, 15) Where salt is passive it just sits there doing its job light is active light actively goes out and reaches all around it. So what is all this to us? I believe that there are many questions that God would have us each take away this evening. Among them: 1. Am I indistinguishable from all those around me Or am I distinctive and different as a Disciple of Jesus Christ? 2. Am I hiding under a bushel the light that Jesus intended to bless the world, or am I like a lamp on a stand letting the light of Jesus shine before others? 3. When Jesus prayed for His disciples, including us, He said, they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Can I say, as

6 6 Jesus intended, I am not of the world, even as Jesus is not of the world?

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