Sunday Shortcut: Devotional Version of the Sermon
Read Acts 9:1-20: Today we as Christians are oftentimes blind to what the Lord is doing around us. We at times are like Saul; we are blind to what the Lord is doing and we don't fully understand him. We want to follow God but we don’t know that we are doing it incorrectly because we don't see him or know him. Instead of being spiritually blind we are instead to have Blind Faith.
Saul did not know what God was doing in and through Jesus. Saul was blind to the Gospel but then God revealed himself to him and then Saul without knowing hardly any of the details of what was to come ahead put his Blind Faith in God.
Believers often don't understand fully who God is and we are blind to his character and his instructions. However, if we can build up our faith in God by learning who he is and seeing him more clearly we can begin to have Blind Faith in God, trusting that he will lead and guide us in the right ways as we follow him.
There are a lot of different ways to hear from Jesus but today we’ll look at three. The easiest and the most accessible way to hear from Jesus is to #1 Study God's Word. Do not just simply read his words, but study the Bible.
In Isaiah 55:11b God says “[My word] will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.” Where God’s word goes it is effective. If you want to have your eyes opened, to be able to see God read his word, read the Bible. Read His Word and study it and let it go deep into your heart and mind.
You can do this however you want but every week in the bulletin there is a selection of Bible reading plans that aim to make it easy to read the Bible in a systematic way. There are four options and you can do 1, 2, 3 or all four of them or you use none of my suggestions and use your own bible reading plan but however you do it, dust off your bible and open it up and read it, study it and allow it to change you. Discuss it with others when you have questions and allow God to open your eyes to who he is as you hear from him by reading his word.
A second way to hear from Jesus is to #2 Spend Time in Worship. Worship is whenever you celebrate God’s presence and you honor him with your life. Everything that you do with your body that celebrates God and honors him is worship. When Ananias decided to go to Saul in spite of the risk of his own life he was acting worshipful as he served the Lord.
When you live your life as worship to the Lord it changes how you see him and how you hear him as you live your life focused on him rather than yourself. When you are thinking about the Lord and doing things for his glory and honor it is easy to hear from him as you are focusing on him and directing your thoughts towards him. However you choose to worship, the Lord is inviting you to worship him in spirit and in truth.
A third way to hear from Jesus is to do what Saul did after being blinded, #3 Fast and Pray. A fast is when you spend some amount of time not consuming something, generally food, replacing the time you spend preparing, eating and cleaning up your meals with extended times of prayer to God, which at times include both worship and bible reading. By fasting and spending that time in prayer you are giving your hunger and your thirst to the Lord and humbling yourself before him and asking for God to give you an answer to your prayer.
You can hear from the Lord Jesus in many ways, through reading His Word, worship, fasting and praying, or many other ways. Whichever ways you may use to hear from God, when you hear from the Lord your blindness to who he is and how he desires you to live will drop like scales from your eyes. God wants to help you to have blind faith instead of being spiritually blind. Be one who hears from the Lord by spending time reading the Bible, worshipping, and fasting and praying and develop blind faith in the Lord.
