Acts 9:10-20 - Being Used by God: Don’t Let it Slip Thru Your Fingers
I spent some time this week looking on the computer at actual excuses people use, or have used, or might someday use, to miss church. Here are a few: I missed church because the little guy had a cold. The whole family had to stay home to blow his nose! - I missed church last Sunday because there was a sermon in the radio - I had to miss Church because the kids wanted to sleep in - I couldn’t go to church today because I had a flat on the car and didn’t think we could all fit in the truck - I just had this feeling I shouldn’t be there - Church gives me gas! - I’ve worked all week so I’m too tired to go! - There are too many hypocrites in church - There are too many sinners in church - I’m too young - I’ll go when I’m too old to have any more fun - It’s boring - I’m not good enough - I’m still a sinner - I’ll go to church after I stop smoking, drinking, cussin’, etc. - I work six days a week. The seventh day belongs to me - The Sabbath day is Saturday, not Sunday - I don’t get up in time on Sunday morning - Why should I give my money to some church? - I don’t want to be around a bunch of bible thumpers - I don’t like the songs we have to sing - It’s too cold in there, why don’t they turn up the heat - It’s too hot, why don’t they get air conditioning - The air conditioner is too loud - I worship God at home when I’m alone - My wife doesn’t go, so why should I? - My husband doesn’t go, so why should I? - My family never went to church when I was a kid - Jesus wasn’t a blue eyed white man - I can’t find a baby sitter on Sunday - The songs are too old - Nobody notices when I’m gone anyway - I don’t go to church on Sunday because getting the kids dressed in their Sunday Best first thing in the morning makes me cuss - I don’t go to church cause I have a feeling that God doesn’t like agnostics - Veni, Vidi, Non-Velcro (I came, I Saw, I didn’t stick around.) - The devil made me do it! - I didn’t miss church. In fact I had quite a good time without coming to church - I didn’t go to church because I had a dream. God was in it and he said not to go! - I didn’t miss church; I found a new Church. It’s a wonderful Church: no singing, no sit-stand-kneel, it’s very peaceful. Every Sunday you can faithfully find me at Bedroom Baptist with Pastor Pillow.
People can find excuses to justify whatever it is they want to do. They can blame it on their feelings, their health, their job. Even in the church. It’s amazing what we try to get away with and give God the blame or credit for it.
Today we will meet a man who is an unsung hero in the New Testament, because in the end he ignored all excuses and obeyed God anyway. His name is Ananias, Acts 9:10-20.
This Ananias is not to be confused with the Ananias of Acts 5, who, along with his wife Sapphira, lied to the apostles and to God about how much money they were giving to help others. That one died at the hands of God. This Ananias is only found in Acts 9, but he plays an important part in the history of the church. God used this man to help bring Saul the persecutor into the church. Saul had just met Jesus, but knowing the Lord isn’t enough. God wants people in the church as well. It’s not that the church will save anyone, but the church is God’s tool to save the world. Apparently God thought that Christians are more useful with the church than without the church.
You know, we all struggle with the question: am I useful? Does this matter? Am I important? Is the world a better place with me? Yet so many just stop with those questions, and never do anything about the answers. Even among church folk: we will notice problems, but expect someone else to be the solution. Meanwhile, the incredible privilege to be used by God to help other people find Jesus slips through our fingers.
I remember one summer when I was on a ministry team down south counseling at camps. There were four of us on our team – 3 others and myself. The other 3 were all from Nova Scotia, the names of the other 3 all started with J, and I was the only one who was old enough to drive the rental van. We were a fun team. Anyway, I remember one night in a large North Carolina building. Chapel had just gotten over, and we were roaming around the room looking for people to help. Jeremiah and I both saw the same kid, and thought he needed help. I let Jeremiah go help. And Jeremiah had the wonderful honor of leading that kid to Jesus. I let it slip through my fingers, because I didn’t just get up and go do it myself.
Folks, there are people all around us who need the Lord. I think that God even wants to use a certain person at a certain time to reach another certain person. A professor at Bethany called them “divine appointments”. It’s that moment that if you know you were born for. It’s that moment that if Jesus comes tomorrow, you could say, “It’s OK. I know you’ll say well done, because I just did well.”
Ananias did not let that divine moment slip through his fingers. He was there, and God used him to change the world. So who was Ananias? And what did he do to be used by God? Three things about Ananias’ character that will help us be used by God, too:
1) Ananias was listening to God’s voice (v10-12). This man was in prayer. Now, most of the time we spend in prayer is talking. Telling God all about our days, our problems, our concerns, our fears, our family and so on. Now, there’s nothing wrong with that. Voicing it sometimes helps us put it into perspective. But you know, God already knows all about it. Think about it: we have the privilege of spending time with the Almighty and All-Knowing God of the universe, and we spend so much of it telling Him what He already knows.
Yes, it’s easier to talk than to listen. Just ask any kindergarten group. But you don’t learn anything when you’re talking. You only learn when you’re listening. Ananias knew how to recognize God’s voice, to the point that when God spoke, Ananias was able to say, “Yes, Lord.” He knew God’s voice so well that He knew when the Almighty spoke to him.
Folks, it takes time to learn to recognize God’s voice. It takes practice. It doesn’t come in one sitting. It comes as a process. Waiting, being silent. Taking time to hear if the Lord wants to let you in on something you don’t already know. Perhaps you know the story of Elijah. He was the prophet of the OT who had just won a major victory over the forces of evil. Except that when he did, the evil queen Jezebel put out a bounty on his head: You will die, mark my words. So Elijah ran and ran and ran. Actually, more like, he walked and moped and dragged his feet. He sat under a tree and wished for death to find him. Then God showed up. God said, I’m going to speak to you. Listen for it. A huge windstorm came, and God’s voice was not in it. Then an earthquake ripped the land apart, and God’s voice wasn’t in that either. Finally, a great fire swept across the land, but God’s voice wasn’t in that either. At last, Elijah just heard a still small voice, and He knew that God was still with him.
It’s awful hard to hear God’s voice in the hardships of life or in the hustle and bustle of our busy world. But God wants to teach you to hear His voice in the quiet places that you need to forge out of your time. When you learn to hear His voice, then you’ll hear it next time you get into a windstorm or an earthquake, because you’ll know what it sounds like. You won’t find time, as if it’s waiting to be found. You have to make time; you have to take time. But when you do, and the Lord whispers just small things in your mind, then you’ll recognize His voice when the wind and the waves surround you.
2) Ananias was loyal to God’s directions (v13-16). Even though Ananias had his concerns and doubts about following the Lord’s directions, he still did it. Folks, there’s one thing to hear God’s voice, but there’s another thing to obey it. God’s voice often comes as, “This is wrong. Stop now.” But stopping is another thing altogether.
But for Ananias, he obeyed God, despite fears and questions about the mission. What about you? If God told you to do something hard, would you a) figure it wasn’t of God? b) delay doing it? c) come up with excuses why you can’t or shouldn’t? or d) just do it? How you answer that quiz reveals if you put your trust in God or in yourself and your own abilities (or lack of them).
3) Ananias was loving to God’s people (v17-19). Once Ananias decided to go, he went well. He even called Saul his “brother”, a term used in affection for others. He heard God’s voice, he was obedient to it, and thus he showed love to someone who wanted to kill him or throw him in jail. That’s a powerful testimony of how God really had a hold of Ananias’ heart.
Could it be that God might want to speak to you about helping other people get connected to this church? We’ve had a lot of new people over the last few months. Do you know their names? Do you know their kids’ names? Have you made an effort to show them that this really are a loving church? After service do you greet the newer folks? Do they know your names? If a guest were to base his or her whole visit on how well you treated them, would they come back, or would they think we were all snobby?
Learning to hear God’s voice is not just for our own benefit. God speaks to us so that we can be part of His plans to reconnect the lost people of the world to Him. It’s not so we can sit on shelves and be trophies; it’s so we can be used to help others find Him. And you know, as far as Ananias’ qualities go, not one of them is based on ability. Every one of is based on availability. We don’t know what Ananias could or could not do well. But we do know that He was available for God’s purposes, no excuses.
Reader’s Digest carried this story in 1996: A friend often told me about the problems he had getting his son to clean his room. The son would always agree to tidy up, but then wouldn’t follow through. After high school the young man joined the Marine Corps. When he came home for leave after basic training, his father asked him what he had learned in the service. “Dad,” he said. “I learned what ‘now’ means.”
God’s greatest privileges and blessings go to those who learn the same thing. Hearing Him, obeying Him, loving others. No excuses.
