If one views directions on a cell phone or tablet, sometimes a voice says “at the next stop sign or light make a U turn.” Somehow, the driver of the vehicle, though being on the right road, was headed in the wrong direction. Sometimes not only is the direction wrong, but the individual is on the wrong road.

Such was the case of a highly religious Jew by the name of Saul. Fervent in his devotion to Judaism, he purposed to imprison and even put to death those who were professing to be of “the Way.” Saul was on the wrong road going in the wrong direction. Relationship with God could not be found in religious fervor. 

In God’s divine plan, Saul would hear from Stephen, perhaps whom he arrested, the gospel message that Christ died on the Cross to provide salvation for every individual. Forcefully Stephen proclaimed … “You stiff-necked people, with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are just like your fathers: You always resist the Holy Spirit! Was there ever a prophet your fathers did not persecute? They even killed those who predicted the coming of the Righteous One. And now you have betrayed and murdered him—you who have received the law that was put into effect through angels but have not obeyed it.” When they heard this, they were furious and gnashed their teeth at him. But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. “Look,” he said, “I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.” At this they covered their ears and, yelling at the top of their voices, they all rushed at him, dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul” (Acts 7:51-58 NIV). 

It was not until Saul was on the road to Damascus that he would have an encounter with Jesus Christ. His life would be turned around from being a persecutor of Christians to the most vocal spokesman of “the way.” Saul, to become the Apostle Paul, was now on the right road and going in the right direction. His spiritual walk would experience successes and failures. He admitted that … “We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do — this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it” (Rom 7:14-20 NIV). 

Sin in his life would take him in the wrong direction, though on the right road [saved]. However, by admitting his sin to God, a U turn would restore fellowship and put him in the right direction. The Apostle Paul had to apply to his own life the truth expressed by a fellow apostle … “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9 NIV). 

Today, some Christians are going in the wrong direction. Though eternally saved, their spiritual lives are in reverse. Peter expressed God’s remedy … “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18 NIV). 

 

Harry Martinez, a resident of Albany, is a retired minister who served a nondenominational congregation in Florida. His weekly column appears in several South Georgia newspapers.