A Far More Abundant Kind of God
I often hearing people saying, “I wish I had a powerful conversion story.” I resonate with their desire. Having been raised in a solid Christian family, my understanding of Jesus and the Gospel was like slowly growing light, appearing more glorious as the years went on. At home and at church, I grew up hearing the conversion story of Saul the Jewish Pharisee and persecutor (Acts 9). In his spiritually darkest moment, he was struck with the light of God’s glory. He went from not knowing the Lord at all to preaching the Gospel to Jews, his own people who hated Jesus! All of it happens in one chapter, Acts 9.
For a long time, I also wished I had a powerful conversion story.
That same Saul – later Paul the Apostle – prays for the church in Ephesus to “be strengthened,” that “Christ may dwell in [their] hearts,” that they may be “rooted and grounded in love,” that they may “know the love of Christ,” and that they “be filled with all the fullness of God” (Eph 3:14-19). All of these requests point to His main prayer for the Ephesian Church: a powerful conversion. Conversion cannot be achieved by a believer’s personal work, but God’s own work. So, your testimony, alongside the Apostle Paul’s, is a testimony to the kind of God that you serve and worship. It is a testimony to the sovereignty of God.
God’s sovereignty is appropriately defined in Paul Tripp’s book Do You Believe? He writes, “God determined all that will happen and rules the means by which everything will happen.” Consider how Saul’s conversion exemplifies this definition. Despite His personal will to do as he planned, the Lord’s will prevailed, determining that Saul stop in his tracks and come to Jesus. God’s sovereignty determined Saul’s powerful conversion and Saul was overwhelmed in view of God’s mercy and grace.
Furthermore, Saul was incapable of predicting God. God’s powerful sovereignty implies mystery, another aspect we are typically uncomfortable with. Paul points to this mystery in Ephesians as he writes, “Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think” (3:20). Paul knows a sovereign God can do all that he prays for the Ephesian church, and far more than He can imagine! Could Saul the Pharisee, lost in darkness, have ever known he would one day be Paul the Apostle, clothed in the light of Christ’s righteousness, proclaiming the wonders of the Gospel? It was more than he could “ask or think.”
Our sovereign God’s work can seem mysterious to us, but He is always faithful. If you are a Christian, your conversion story is not dissimilar from Paul’s, for you serve the same faithful and sovereign God. Notice how God continued to work far more in Paul’s life. In Acts 4, when believers are experiencing persecution, they pray that God may “allow them to speak [His] word with all boldness”. Only five chapters later, God answers that prayer more than they could imagine. Saul, their persecutor, became a bold Gospel proclaimer. God did far more abundantly than the apostles ever imagined - according to His mysterious plan - through His powerful answer to prayer.
For a long time, I wished I had a powerful conversion story. Covenant children often do. But I now see that the God who did far more abundantly in Paul’s life has done and will do so for me. He changed my sinful heart at a young age, later calling me to serve Him at a beautiful church in Rock Hill. Just as He worked in my life, He works in all our lives. His sovereign plan is a mystery, but we can trust that our God is faithful to change hearts. Furthermore, He works in ways we never could imagine.
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