May 4, 2025 Third Sunday of Easter
Readings: John 21:1-19, Acts 9:1-20
“Redeeming Failures”
What’s your thought, can people really change? We’ve all heard the statement that a leopard cannot change his spots. You know, once a liar, always a liar! Right? Have you ever made the proclamation that person is unredeemable? So, can people really change? I’m sure you’ve harbored the thought that there’s no way you can forgive someone for what they did. We do believe that we can break some of our bad habits. Besides that’s what we went through Lenten for, change some of our sinful nature. Change is not easy. I do mean definitive changes that alter our personality. That is very difficult to master and to be effective. Yet, if and when we succeed in doing so, it is so easy to fall back into those bad habits. Trust me, I know because I have done it and still do it. We profess that when we believe in Christ Jesus and He is the savior of our souls, by His blood we are changed, we are washed white as snow. God can change a life, any human life. No where else in Scriptures is there a greater example of how a human can be changed by the power of God than today’s reading in Acts.
The early Church’s number one enemy, and nemesis Saul is changed by Christ. The mere mention of Saul wrought fear and terror among the followers of Jesus and the Apostles. According to Scripture Saul is responsible for the death of Stephen by stoning. Saul visits the Sanhedrin to go after these people of The Way. He has such distain for them that he is willing to go to other cities to root them out and bring them to the justice they deserve under Jewish Law. The Sanhedrin gives Saul that authority. Yet we all know that on the road to Damascus, Saul has an encounter with the resurrected Jesus the Christ. Could that be enough to change this man so consumed with rage and hatred for these people, the followers of Jesus? With his current resume there seems to be no redeeming qualities in Saul and for God to have plans for him in the new church is setting it up for failure. Today we know that is true, that encounter with Jesus was enough to change Saul. Paul became such an Apostle that he and Peter are the two top leaders in The Way Church. God had a plan for Paul.
Now put yourself in Ananias’ sandals. God comes to you and tells you the plans He has for Saul. From the stories you have heard about this man, there is no way you are not going to be skeptical and maybe even question God as having sound mind on this plan of His. There is no way this is going to work. Verses 13-14 give us an idea how that conversation went. “Lord, I have heard many reports about this man. People say he has done horrible things to your holy people in Jerusalem. He’s here with authority from the chief priests to arrest everyone who calls Your name.” God does not deny the things Saul has done. But He has great plans for Paul that Paul does not even know about yet. I can just hear Ananias, wait a minute God. You know what he has done, and you still want to use him in the spreading of the Church. Are You nuts? He’s an utter failure, there are no redeeming qualities in him, he is not worth the time of day. It wasn’t just redemption God had in mind. From the most outstanding failure in human life, comes the most outstanding, literally the most blinding miraculous success story in the Bible. All of it at God’s initiating. Yes, that is what I said, God initiated the encounter with Jesus, the loss of sight to Saul, the radical change in Paul’s thought process, and how he got Paul into Damascus and out. God initiated the encounter with Ananias and his meeting with Paul. He also helps with Paul’s escape from Damascus when some of the followers want to seek revenge on Saul. But God had a much better plan for Paul and the world. Saul’s future lied with taking the Gospel to the Gentiles, the kings, and the people of Israel and change them. But first God change and transformed Saul. Saul did not do it himself, God changed him. It is hard to make changes in ourselves by ourselves. But with the help of God change is possible and very likely. Our God of Easter changed Jesus’ human body from dead and buried, brought him forth from the grave changing him from dead to life. If God can change that, then he can change anyone. He can change a man hellbent on terrorizing and killing Christians, to someone that can change while bringing the Gospel to millions of people over two millennia. If God can change Saul into Paul, God can change any failure into something redeemable. Think about it for a second. If God had not initiated the redeeming power of the risen Christ on Saul, who was a complete failure in the eyes of the first Christians, then you and I might not be here. I will say that Saul had to accept the redemption into Paul, so there is some involvement on our part in this redemption story. We must be willing to accept the change, and work on keeping that change God has initiated in us for us.
Another story I read; John Newton was involved in slave trading. He met a Christian in one of his travels across the sea. He was changed so much he fought against slavery in England, became clergy and wrote the words to “Amazing Grace”. Some would call that a redeeming of failure.
I have met and talked with people who state that they are not worthy of the redeeming love of God. They are such failures according to Biblical human standards. Yet God still wants to redeem them. We were such a failure in our sinfulness, but Jesus died on that cross so that we too could experience redemption. My question to you is what are you doing with that redemption you were given? Are you allowing that redeeming love of God to just sit there while you slip back into a failing posture? Or! Are you taking that failed life and turning it into a success story in the Holy Name of Jesus? It is true that we do not like to admit, much less advertising our failures. Thomas Edison was asked after he failed to produce the lightbulb after one thousand times. His response was, I have learned one thousand ways not to make a lightbulb. The one thousand and first time, he was successful. Johannes Haushofer taught at Princeton and published a book on all his failures. In closing he said “However, because of God’s grace, our failures don’t have the final word”. God believes in you that He wants you to rise up and above all the failures in your life. He wants you to be successful in the ministry of Christ. No matter what you have done, you are redeemed! Now show the world you are not a failure anymore. Remember that in Communion as you join Jesus at His table.
