What does an “encounter with the Lord” look like?
Calls you by name
Confronts you about sin in your life and the need to repent
Convicts you about actions you need to take
Speaks over you who you are in Him
Reveals truth to you that you have not “seen” yet
Directs you to do something specific
Overwhelms you with peace/courage at a time when only He could
Transforms you into a new creation by His grace through faith
Acts 9:1-19
Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest 2 and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem. 3 As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. 4 He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”
5 “Who are you, Lord?” Saul asked.
“I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” he replied. 6 “Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”
7 The men traveling with Saul stood there speechless; they heard the sound but did not see anyone. 8 Saul got up from the ground, but when he opened his eyes he could see nothing. So they led him by the hand into Damascus. 9 For three days he was blind, and did not eat or drink anything.
10 In Damascus there was a disciple named Ananias. The Lord called to him in a vision, “Ananias!”
“Yes, Lord,” he answered.
11 The Lord told him, “Go to the house of Judas on Straight Street and ask for a man from Tarsus named Saul, for he is praying. 12 In a vision he has seen a man named Ananias come and place his hands on him to restore his sight.”
13 “Lord,” Ananias answered, “I have heard many reports about this man and all the harm he has done to your holy people in Jerusalem. 14 And he has come here with authority from the chief priests to arrest all who call on your name.”
15 But the Lord said to Ananias, “Go! This man is my chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and to the people of Israel. 16 I will show him how much he must suffer for my name.”
17 Then Ananias went to the house and entered it. Placing his hands on Saul, he said, “Brother Saul, the Lord—Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you were coming here—has sent me so that you may see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” 18 Immediately, something like scales fell from Saul’s eyes, and he could see again. He got up and was baptized, 19 and after taking some food, he regained his strength.
Knowing Christ vs. Knowing about Christ
Knowing About Christ
Matthew 15:8-9 (Isaiah 29:13)
“‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules.’”
Knowing Christ
Philippians 3:7-11
But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8 What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith. 10 I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.
When Paul speaks of “knowing Christ Jesus my Lord,” then, he means that he has acknowledged God’s great act of deliverance in Christ and submitted to Christ’s lordship.
To know Jesus is not the same as knowing about His historical life; it is not the same as knowing correct doctrines regarding Jesus; it is not the same as knowing His moral example, and it is not the same as knowing His great work on our behalf.
To know Him means to grow in practical day-by-day relationship with Him in such an intimate way that we would become more Christlike.
Oswald Chambers
What Saul experienced on the road to Damascus had no logical explanation, and neither did the choice he made afterward: to live in total obedience to Jesus Christ.
When Jesus Christ appears to me, I’m in danger if I say, “I won’t.” Jesus will never insist on my obedience, but if I refuse to obey, I’ve begun to sign the death warrant of the Son of God in my soul. When I stand face-to-face with Jesus Christ and say, “I won’t,” I’m backing away from the re-creating power of his redemption. If I come to the light, it’s a matter of indifference to God’s grace how abominable I am. But if I refuse the light, woe to me. “Everyone who does evil hates the light. . . . But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light” (John 3:20–21).
Mission of YOUR Life – What is the point?
Knowing and serving Christ Jesus and pointing people to Him
R.C. Sproul once wrote,
“Resisting the lordship of Christ is not only sinful, but it is stupid, because God has raised Him from the grave, placed him at His right hand, and given Him all authority in heaven and on earth and has called every person to bow the knee before Him. To resist Him is foolish.”
“In 1 Timothy 1:16, Paul says, “And yet for this reason I found mercy, in order that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience, as an example for those who would believe in Him for eternal life.”
Paul’s conversion is an example for us all.
It is an example of the fact that none are too far gone for God’s mighty power to save.
It is an example of what God can do when He takes hold of a life.
It is an example to encourage us to pray for and share with every sinner, no matter how wicked.
It is an example for us to commit ourselves afresh to whatever purpose God has given us to do for His kingdom.
As Paul later wrote in 2 Cor 5:14-15, “For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; and He died for all, that they who live should no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf”.
Dennis Rainey
“Christ has staked a claim on our life. Be glad of it. He is incomparable! It is your calling, and honor, to serve Him. There is no other way to live a life that matters.
Acts 20:24
I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace.
Galatians 2:20
I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
Oswald Chambers
Have you ever had a crisis in which you deliberately, emphatically, and recklessly abandoned everything to God? It is a crisis of will. You may come to the crisis many times in your outward experience, giving up worldly things and behaviors. But giving up external things amounts to nothing. The real crisis of abandonment happens within. Giving up external things may be a sign of being in total bondage, not to God but to your own idea of holiness.
Have you deliberately committed your will to Jesus Christ? It is, truly, an act of will, not of emotion.