Well, good morning and welcome to Great Commission Church. My name is Don McKenzie and I am part of the pastoral staff. Our pastor, Trevor Davis, is out of town and so I am your Labor Day treat. Now, Trevor started a series last week about telling, where God was telling people to arise and go in various situations. Well, today it's arise and go and speak to a difficult person. And that leads us to our opening question. Who is the most difficult person you know when it comes to talking to them about Jesus? Who is the most resistant? Who would absolutely shock you if you heard that they had become a totally committed follower of Jesus Christ? Well, about two years ago, I had a 32-year-old man look at me with a sudden unexpected anger and with great passion said to me, if you bring up spiritual things again, I will have nothing to do with you. And I thought, wow, okay, I didn't see that coming. And later in this message, I will tell you how I responded to one of my sons when he said that to me. So do you have anyone in your life that it is difficult or awkward to speak to about Jesus? Has someone come to mind? Are you thinking about that? Well, it does lead us to our first point in the message. And it is that some people seem impossible to reach. Now, my wife, Phyllis, mentioned that note takers sometimes can't write down the points quick enough before we replace them with something else. So I have put the four points of this message in your worship guide for you. And I hope that helps you note takers. All right, our prime example of a difficult person is in Acts chapter 9. And we're going to start with the first two verses. So let's read that. And it should be on your screen. Then Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked letters from him to the synagogues of Damascus, which was 135 miles north, so that if he found any who were of the way, and that's what they call Christians, they were of the way, whether men or women, he might bring them bound all the way back 135 miles away from their homes and family to Jerusalem where they would be put on trial. Saul was a very devout and zealous Jewish leader in Israel. He hated Jews who had decided to follow Jesus, who believed Jesus rose from the dead, and that he was now the king, their Lord, their God. And he believed with all of his heart that he was serving God by trying to exterminate Christians. So humanly speaking, Saul looked impossible to reach. So do you have a Saul in your life? Now, hopefully they're not as violent, but do they resist Jesus and not want to be with his church family? Could it be a prodigal son or daughter, a bitter ex-spouse, a hostile co-worker, an atheist friend, a family member hardened by pain or loss or confusion? Have you quietly, down in your soul, concluded they will never change? Well, in the next three verses, we're going to see Jesus starts changing someone that everybody thought would never change. And that leads us to our second point, which is Jesus knows who belongs to him. Jesus knows who belongs to him. [00:40:00 - 00:48:00] Acts 9 verses 3 through 5. Let's read that. As he journeyed, he came near Damascus, and suddenly a light shone around him from heaven. Then he fell to the ground, and he heard a voice saying to him, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? And he said, who are you, Lord? Then the Lord said, I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. It is hard for you to kick against the goads. See, Saul thought he was attacking Christians, and Jesus said, you're attacking me. And that statement is really stunning. A lot of the New Testament even develops this concept of the unity between Jesus and his people, so that to persecute the church is to persecute Jesus himself. See, he did not say, why are you persecuting my followers? He said, why are you persecuting me? So here is something we should never forget. Jesus cannot be separated from his people. If you ignore or leave his people, you have ignored and left Jesus. If you don't like your fellow church members, Jesus takes it personally and could ask you, why don't you like me? If you're not part of a local church family who loves and serves Jesus, you are not part of Jesus. Now, honestly, I don't know how Jesus could have made this any clearer. How you treat people is how you, how you treat his people is how you treat him. Yet our whole culture and even our natural tendencies just scream that we do not need a local church in order to be right with God. But Jesus said, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me when Saul was persecuting church members? So Jesus knows who belongs to him and he deeply identifies with us. He's in union with us somehow and he promises to never leave nor forsake us. So when Saul heard that voice, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? He became confused. Now see, Saul did not know Jesus and he had no idea who was speaking to him. But somehow he knew it was a God moment. And I bet you've had these moments where you thought, whoa, this is different. This is a God moment. He knew it was a God moment, a divine encounter. So he said, who are you, Lord? And then came the moment that changed Saul forever. Three little words. I am Jesus. I can't imagine the shock that went through his soul. Jesus, Jesus of Nazareth. He's alive. The resurrection is true. The Christians are right. I'm wrong. Instead of serving God, I have been fighting God. I am the enemy of God. And at that moment, everything he believed about God was now collapsing around him. And it all happened with just one sentence from the living Jesus. See, no one knew Saul belonged to Jesus. Saul had no idea. He was on his way to arrest Christians. And instead, Jesus arrested him and took him prisoner, but to his love and his mercy and his forgiveness and his grace. Saul met Jesus that day, and he was never the same afterwards, because you can't be the same if you meet the real living Jesus. You can meet a fake Jesus, and it can be exciting for a while, but you'll grow tired and bored with him, and you'll leave. What happens next in this passage is so unexpected, and it leads to our next point. Number three, Jesus often sends ordinary believers to difficult people. Jesus often sends ordinary believers to difficult people. So after Jesus speaks to Saul, he also struck him blind and told him to go into Damascus, and then he would be told what he must do. I mean, Jesus acts like he's in charge and can do whatever he wants. Oh, well, he is in charge, and he can do whatever he wants, and he does do whatever he wants, because he really is the risen Lord of glory with all authority and power. So Saul, now a blind man, is led into Damascus, where he stayed for three days without sight, being blind, and he didn't eat or drink. And then we come to verses 10 to 12, so let's read those. Now there was a certain disciple at Damascus named Ananias, and to him the Lord said in a vision, Ananias, and he said, here I am, Lord. So the Lord said to him, arise and go. See, there's our phrase, arise and go to the street called straight and inquire at the house of Judas for one called Saul of Tarsus, for behold, he is praying. We know nothing about Ananias, except he appears to just be an ordinary believer. And out of the blue, Jesus calls his name and tells him to arise and go and minister to the famous Christian terrorist, Saul of Tarsus. And after this episode, we don't hear another word about Ananias. Notice what Ananias says first when Jesus called his name. Now, I have to tell you that while I was studying this, I noticed that Jesus called Saul by his name twice, Saul, Saul. And then when he talks to Ananias, he calls him by his name, Ananias. And I had to go, well, Lord, have you ever called me by my name? And so I started thinking and I was wondering. And after the service, of course, a couple of people said, yeah, I think the Lord has called me by my name. And I'm thinking, well, he's never, I don't think he's ever called me by my name. And I thought, well, what if the one time he calls me by name, he says, Don. [00:48:00 - 00:56:00] It's time. Come on, I'm bringing you home. And I'd be going, hallelujah, you finally called me by my name. This has kind of gotten under my skin a little bit, but hey, I'm going to be okay. All right? Don't worry about me. But what did Ananias say when Jesus called his name? He said, here I am, Lord. Now, I don't know how Ananias knew this was Jesus, but he did. See, Saul, on the other hand, had no clue who Jesus was when he spoke to him. Ananias quickly says, here I am, Lord. Basically, what do you want me to do? I'm ready. What a great attitude. And then Jesus told him what he wanted to do, and it all went south at that point. Arise and go minister to Saul of Tarsus. And Jesus even gave him directions to where Saul was staying. You know the joke. I mean, Jesus gave a man directions, okay? Let's read Ananias' reaction to Jesus' command to arise and go to a violent terrorist who hated Christians. It's in verses 13 and 14, and let's read those. Then Ananias answered, Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much harm he has done to your saints in Jerusalem. And here he has authority from the chief priest to bind all who call on your name. Now, I have to tell you, once I realized what Ananias was doing, not only could I identify with it, I started laughing. In a nutshell, Ananias thought he needed to update the Lord on Saul as if the Lord somehow was unaware what Saul was up to. Lord, I have heard from many, and you can trust me on this because I have a lot of reliable sources. And I can tell you that this man Saul, a violent, dangerous man, he's coming here to arrest and hurt your people. Now, now that you know this, Lord, I'm sure that you can see it's a bad idea to send me to Saul. So I asked myself, what happened to happy and willing Ananias? Well, I think when he heard the news, a deep fear set into his soul, and it scared him so badly that he actually kind of went into a moment of shock. And I've heard that when people receive terrible or frightening news, it is normal for them to lose perspective. And they can say things that they would never say once the shock wears off. They might even know God is sovereign, but in that moment, they aren't thinking about what they know about God. They're thinking and reacting to what just hit them. So fear can make you focus on your immediate situation, and suddenly it becomes hard to believe that your loving heavenly Father is still working for your good and his glory in light of what you just heard or experienced. And the question why can start echoing around in your heart and mind. Sometimes you go, this just doesn't make any sense to me. We can wrestle with God, beg with him, cry, complain, because surely God doesn't understand. And if he does understand, well, then how can he be a good God and this happen? So we struggle. And I think this is what Ananias was experiencing. He was shocked and confused and afraid. Really, to me, I go, poor Ananias. He has now said something really, really stupid and insulting to Jesus, his Lord and his God. And my question is, how will Jesus respond? Well, Jesus replied, Ananias, my sweet moron, who do you think you're talking to? Why do I save such idiots? Just do what I told you and do it now or else. Can you ever imagine Jesus saying something like that? I could imagine me, but not Jesus. He's just not that way. So let's read what he actually did say. It's in verse 15. But the Lord said to him, go, for he is a chosen vessel of mine to bear my name before Gentiles, kings, and the children of Israel. There's so much here, but I just want to take a moment and see what we can learn about Jesus from just how he answered Ananias right after Ananias basically said, Jesus, you don't know what you're talking about. So the first thing I see is just how calm Jesus is in the face of this really crazy comment by Ananias. He just calmly yet firmly repeats his command, go. And then he gives some explanation to calm his fears. Ananias, I do have a plan. I have chosen Saul for myself. And he will become a part of you and he'll be my witness to all kinds of people. It's okay. I do actually know what I'm doing. Do you see the kindness, the gentleness, the communication, the amazing patience, the self-control? So it made me think, how do I react when someone insults me or acts like I'm stupid? Do I react like Jesus? Or do I get caught up in that moment? Kind of like Ananias did. Say something stupid. Or do I react like Jesus? Ah, to be more like Jesus, right? See, Ananias didn't know that Jesus often sends ordinary believers to difficult people that he has prepared in advance to hear good news about him. Now, isn't that the key here? Ananias didn't know Saul was now ready to hear the good news of Jesus. God saves difficult people and he always uses somebody like you or me to be the ones to influence them, just ordinary Christians who can invite them to church or ask them about their spiritual lives, tell them about Jesus. But how can we tell if a difficult person is ready? Well, in this case, Jesus directly told Ananias, but that, I think, is an exception. It doesn't normally happen like this. So how can we know [00:56:00 - 01:04:00] if a difficult person is ready or not. So we need to look for signs and ask people questions to explore whether God is preparing them or not so we're working with God on this matter. See, God knows who belongs to him and we don't. And so we need to figure out who is he preparing. Remember earlier I told you one of my sons threatened me that if I asked him about spiritual things he was going to remove himself from my life. Would you like to hear the question I asked him that got all the excitement going? Well, would you? All right. Thank you. I asked, has anything changed for you spiritually since the last time I asked? And wow, was I surprised with the quick and angry response of, why do you keep asking me that question? Well, it flashed through my mind that I knew it had been almost a year since I had last asked him that, but I guess it just hit his final nerve. And after he poured out his anger and threats, I could have just answered with my own anger and some really un-Jesus-like things, but amazingly God gave me some grace and here's what went through my mind. Suddenly I remembered when Jesus said, don't cast your pearls before swine. And I thought that I had just heard a little oink in my son's comments. And so I just said to him, okay, I hear you and I'll respect that and not say anything. He's a difficult man that I dearly love, but it was obvious to me it was not the Lord's moment. And I just needed to keep on waiting and I'm still doing that. See, Jesus is the Savior, I'm not. And Jesus is a great Savior, so putting my hope in him and waiting on his wisdom and power, well, I think it's the best thing to do. I don't know anything else to do. But learning some questions to use, to probe, to explore, to test and see if the Lord is at work, I think that's a good thing to learn. And I'm only going to list four questions here for you out of about the nine or 10 that I had that you might use to test and see if God may already be at work in someone. And I also put these in a little smaller print in the worship guide down at the bottom of the notes section. So now that allows me just to read these with no commentary. I said that in the first service, about halfway through I go, gosh, I think I've already made four commentary remarks. Okay, so I'm going to try to make no commentary, just read this, all right? You've already seen the first one. Has anything changed with you spiritually since we last spoke? Has anything changed in the way you think about God lately? Is there anything spiritual that you're wrestling with right now? I like this one. If I ask you today where you are spiritually, would your answer be different than it was six months ago? So what do you do with a difficult person? Well, you first have to find out if they are open or resistant right now. So test the waters. Ask some questions. Listen, you'll probably find out pretty quickly. And if they are difficult, hey, you still planted a seed. That's a good thing. So keep praying, keep waiting, and maybe after some time has passed, try again. If they do respond, then see if you can help them take a next step. Invite them to church. Offer to take them to lunch or dinner. Ask about their religious past. Hey, where are you spiritually? And don't overlook the power of your own story. Sharing a personal testimony of salvation is always a good thing. So when the opportunity comes, be ready to share what Jesus has done for you. What has he done in your life? Remember, Jesus is the Savior. He cares more than we do. And I think we see in this passage that we need to learn to follow his promptings rather than expecting him to follow just ours. And now that leads us to our last point. Number four, nobody is beyond the grace of God. So let's read Acts 9, 17 through 18. It says, And Ananias went his way, entered the house, and laying his hands on Saul, he said, Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you came, has sent me that you may receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit. Immediately there fell from his eyes something like scales, and he received his sight at once, and he arose, and he was baptized. What a moment. The church's greatest enemy becomes part of the family. Ananias walks into the room and calls him Brother Saul. The difficult man becomes a brother. The wolf becomes a shepherd and ends up writing 13 of the 27 books in the New Testament. If Jesus can save Saul of Tarsus and change his life, he can save and change anyone. I think that's what the Lord wants us to see in the salvation of Saul, who we all know as the Apostle Paul. Never give up. God uses ordinary Christians just like you and me to reach difficult people, and no one is beyond the grace of Jesus. All right, I want to review the first question I asked you when we got started. Who is the most difficult person you know when it comes to talking to them about Jesus? Is it possible the answer to that question might be the person sitting in your seat? Could it be you? Are you the most difficult person you know when it comes to wanting to sell out loving and following Jesus? Would it shock you or your friends or family if you became an utterly devoted lover and follower of Jesus? Well, if that is you, I want to urge you to stop fighting God. See, Jesus is good. It's safe to let go and trust him. He is the Son of God who died as a sacrifice for sinners like you and me, and if you commit your heart and soul to him, [01:04:00 - 01:12:00] as your Lord and God, he promises to forgive you and make you a new person on the inside. Maybe you can't even imagine loving and following Jesus with all your heart. So I'd like to get you to ask yourself this. Does that idea even appeal to me at all? Is your soul starting to nag you a little bit that you need to get right with God? And may I say Jesus is alive. So ask him to change your heart so you can trust and love him. And if you feel confused or just unsure about all of this, but you sense that God may be dealing with you, there are options that you have here today. You could come receive prayer after we dismiss the service, or you could mark the box that's on your welcome card that says, I'm ready to trust Jesus or rediscover my faith. Can I tell you what that really just simply means? It means I'm willing to talk about it now. That's all it means. You mark that box, you're not making some big declaration, except, you know what, I'm willing to talk about it, and we will get with you and we'll talk about it. No pressure. And if you already believe in Jesus, but you're not part of a local church family, then take the next step. Learn from Jesus that you cannot separate Jesus and his people. And if you are separated from his people, you're separated from Jesus. And if you're hearing that and go, oh, I need to correct that, what do I do? You need to join a Jesus-loving local church, whether it's ours or another one, but you need to be with his people because Jesus loves his people, and he draws true believers to his people. You can't touch the people of God without touching Jesus. We've already learned that earlier. So whether it's trusting Jesus, asking for prayer, or becoming part of his church family, don't be the difficult person. Take a meaningful step toward the Lord today. Let's pray.

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Join us this Sunday at Great Commission Church for a welcoming and uplifting worship experience. If you’ve been searching for a church near you, you’ll discover a warm, authentic church family ready to help you grow in faith.

We are a family-friendly, non-denominational Christian church in Olive Branch, serving individuals and families throughout DeSoto County and the greater Mid-South. People looking for Christian churches in Olive Branch often discover a vibrant community where faith comes alive and lives are transformed through the Gospel.

Whether you’re new to faith or have followed Christ for years, you’ll find welcoming Sunday services, practical Bible teaching, and a place to belong. We are more than a congregation — we are a church family united by a mission to follow Jesus and live out the Great Commission.

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