by sixth graders with insight...
It happens a couple of times each school year... one of my sixth graders in Bible class... in the Wednesday after school ministry at church... says something that blows me away...
Today's story... Saul's conversion experience on the road to Damascus... Acts 9:1-31...
The exercise... Do a before and after chart about Paul...
Saul before he met Jesus... Saul after he met Jesus...
Listing the before attributes... one says... He had scales on his eyes...
Of course... I immediately begin to argue... No... that was af...
But then I saw... No... You're right...!
The scales couldn't have fallen off after he met Jesus unless they were there before he met Jesus...
The lesson busted into my heart...
An encounter with Jesus... reveals our spiritual reality... and it becomes flesh...
Saul was spiritually blind... but he didn't know it... UNTIL... he met Jesus... then his spiritual blindness manifested itself as physical blindness...
The blindness remained for three days...
Three days Saul wrestled with his spiritual reality until... Jesus sent Ananias to lay hands on him... and he was filled with the Holy Spirit...
So Ananias departed and entered the house.
And laying his hands on him he said,
"Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you
on the road by which you came has sent me
so that you may regain your sight and be filled
with the Holy Spirit."
And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes,
and he regained his sight.
Acts 9:17-18 ESV
Saul could physically see what caused his spiritual blindness...
it fell on the floor right before him...
he was blind... but now he sees...
An encounter with Jesus... reveals our spiritual reality... and makes it flesh...
And I wonder... how many of us struggle with spiritual realities we won't come to grips with... after an encounter with Christ...? How many of us sit in the dark...? Struggling... rather than surrendering...?
How many of us are actually experiencing...? walking in...? the life changing wonders of living out the spiritual reality of life after an encounter with Him...?
All I know... is that I'm blown away by this insight from a sixth grader... and the way this has changed my view... of what it means... to encounter Him...
Humbled... by encountering Him... in a sixth grader...
by seeing spiritual reality... manifest itself in the flesh...
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