Daily Devotional for Thursday, May 11

Paul Speaks of His Conversion

“And when we were all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice speaking unto me, and saying in the Hebrew tongue, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? it is
hard for thee to kick against the pricks,” Acts 26:14.

In sports, we hear a lot about “sticking to the basics.” If a reporter asks a coach about his plans for the future, more times than not, the words, “stick to the basics,” will appear in his answer. Why is that? Well, it is because the basics work. Fancy is cool, showy may occasionally win games, but over the long term, executing the basics works best. Another saying is that the simplest plan is usually the best plan. Sayings work because they usually contain truth, and it is true that keeping things both simple and basic yields positive results over the long term.
Have you noticed that Paul always did the same thing? I have never counted, but Paul did one thing over and over, and that was that Paul shared his personal testimony of salvation when the opportunity presented itself. Paul was facing charges by the Roman government but made no effort to defend himself. In Paul’s mind, that would have seemed a big waste of valuable time. Rather than protect himself, Paul shared the gospel message. Paul stuck to the basics by sticking to his story. As always, Paul shared only what he knew. Paul offered no deep theology to Agrippa but offered the basics.
We live in an era when many fancy themselves to be vastly intellectual so many feel they are way too smart for God. Many seem to think they have powerful intellectual arguments to make against your faith. What are you to do? Stick to the basics, because that is what you can do. You can chase intellectual arguments around with a person all day and they can always find a way to refute those. On the other hand, they can never disprove your personal testimony.

THOUGHT: If you share what happened to you personally, who can ever dispute it?

Wally Fry