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Lights Camera Action                                                                                                                          Acts 26:9-18

Recap

• Paul is still being held under false accusation
• He is now before King Agrippa who will hear him (again)
• Pastor Crystal spoke about the hope Paul spoke about even in chains
• He gives an account of how he persecuted Christians and how as he Journeyed to Damascus, and how he met Jesus Christ
• This was the beginning of him receiving the assignment to carry the Gospel to the Jews and the Gentile

Gods Plans:

• Every kid has a dream and growing up in Kenya was no different.
  • I wanted to be successful, I wanted a castle like every some of you kid, didn’t even think about how much the electric bill would be …leave alone the maintenance cost
  •  I wanted to be a lot of things – some really good, like be responsible, have a wife and kids, own a business, own a farm and have lots of animals –
  • Some not so good like being a movie producer in Hollywood e.t.c
• Even today, there are things that I wanted to do – Most of those plans are about me and my desires, my comfort, my drive
• But God usually has a different plan
• I have come to a point in my life, where I have realized that the moment that I gave my life to Christ, my say – my plans, my desires are only secondary to what God’s will is for my family and I
• And that’s what’s Paul is saying:

Acts 26:9 (AMPC) – I myself indeed was [once] persuaded that it was my duty to do many things contrary to and in defiance of the name of Jesus of Nazareth.

• Translated – I had a plan for my life and that plan was a great plan, a plan that was against Jesus and his people
• But **Proverbs 16:9 – A man’s heart plans his way, But the Lord directs his steps.
• Paul, educated in the best school, had a great mentor, had high ranking career. He was devoted to his job, regardless of the moral implication, he was dedicated.
• In todays standard- Paul was successful
  • Paul was already obedient, hardworking – though in the wrong endeavors, the fact is that, he put his all in the things that he did
  • And when that moment came, all that was required was a redirection
  • It’s easier to redirect a moving train
  • Are you moving …? or you stagnant. Waiting to be moved
  • Moses – Came to the red see and God “Exodus 14 – And the Lord said to Moses, “Why do you cry to Me? Tell the children of Israel to go forward.
  • Same case with David, Anointed King as a teenager – Yet he didn’t just sit around and wait. He was a shepherd and a good on that would defend his dad’s flocks
• God is looking for a willing heart, a hard-working person whom He can use
• Proverbs 16:1 – The preparations^[a] of the heart belong to man, But the answer of the tongue is from the Lord.
• We humans make plans, but the LORD has the final word.
• Matthew 12:35-37 – A good man out of the good treasure [a]of his heart brings forth good things, and an evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth evil things. 36 But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment. 37 For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.”
• Even though God has the final answer, we are still accountable to the plans we make
• Our lives are being recorded – every moment and we will be accountable to for those decisions
• I got good news though, we have a God that loves us, who is willing to redirect us from our foolishness. From death.
• There comes a time in one’s life when you see the Light, and once you have,  you can’t be the same
• Paul was transformed. All his plans were tabled and found useless and at the moment, the past was just that, a picture of the Past.
• I love photography- I love to look at old pictures – Q missions’ headquarters was a bookstore
• Pictures capture a moment in time …and truly a picture is worth a thousand words. (I love to guess- what was going on in their lives at that time?)
• Pictures can motivate – To be better than we were before or during (want to gain some muscles)
• Pictures can’t lie – I used to have hair and now – I used to have hair
• But the real question is, who are you today?
•  In an age where we can take a picture, not like it…delete it and redo it 40 times…Are we truly capturing (acknowledging) who we really are?
• Most of us are caught up with taking so many “Perfect” selfies that we have no real evidence of who we used to be, and so there is truly no need to change because – We have lied to ourselves that this image we have crafted before taking a picture is truly who we are.
• Why the title – DW Griffith – Frustrated on set for running out of time, he started to bark orders Lights! to re-spot the lights on the actor, Camera! to roll the camera and Finally Action! To get things moving.
• I believe that when Saul encountered the light, that was his Lights Camera Action moment
• The light was the line that CAPTURED his past and KEPT it as a past and now he was required not to stay in the past but to had to take ACTION follow his transformation.
• You used to be a sinner, you had great plans that were driven by your old desires, then you heard the gospel -and you had a Lights Camera Action moment…You met Christ …Lets now look at your actions – Lights Camera Action.
• Speaking about Pictures, there are a few incredible video’s on YouTube of Photographer who recorded weekly pictures of their kids from 0-20yrs – The transformation is incredible. You can see the changes but what I love most is the secondary things – the background, tells you when they moved, the season, if they are organized or not
• If we have been transformed, what do people see in the background?
• If we took at picture of your life since you have had a lights Camera Action moment, what would we see in your relationship over the years, your attitude, how do you treat those that love you and how about those that don’t?
• Lights Camera Actions – What actions are your pictures and videos telling us?
• James 1:23-25 – For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; 24 for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. 25 But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.
• Paul Actions are: getting a moment to defend himself yet he chooses to preach the gospel
• Now that is how I would love my before and after pictures and videos to look like.

Old Pictures

• We ought to pull out our old pictures (Shoe boxes), not to became them but to remember what we were (Reflection)
• Paul remembers that he used to be like them. He did the same thing they are doing to him
• And I believe as he took that opportunity to share the gospel, he was hoping that that would be a Lights Camera Action moment for them.
• Acts 26:10-11 – This I also did in Jerusalem, and many of the saints I shut up in prison, having received authority from the chief priests; and when they were put to death, I cast my vote against them. 11 And I punished them often in every synagogue and compelled them to blaspheme; and being exceedingly enraged against them, I persecuted them even to foreign cities.
• As I share this word with you today, I want to let you know for a long time I had my moment as well…
  • I held on to Anger, I thought the world was against me
  • I held unforgiveness – I used to tell people that I was a rubber band
  • I did and wished for things that pleased my body and life regardless of the consequences
  • And then there was a lights Camera Action moment for me … God opened my eyes and I saw the picture of what I had become – and I didn’t like it …if anything like Paul I found myself doing contrary to what God had called me to be – A Christian- to be Christ like!
  • An opportunity had come – Acts 26:18 … to open their eyes, in order to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified[c] by faith in Me.’

Agrippa says to Paul “You may speak in your defense

And Paul responds: I am fortunate that you get to show you my pictures Sir, let me pull out my old shoe box and lay them out because these pictures have a story.

He goes ahead and shows him, this is the one when I was a little boy learning under Gamaliel – recognized as a Pharisee doctor of Jewish Law

Here was my first Christians that I persecuted, here is another when punished them and sent them to prison,

Here is the another one when I cast my votes for them to be killed – Praise God, there was no video those days, because those would be unbearable to see.

And here King Agrippa is the one that means the most to me. He pulls an album, not longer in a shoe box…but in an Album, displayed for all to see.

I was on my way to Damascus, and right there, a light from heaven, brighter than the sun shone down on me …and that King Agrippa this here was my “Lights Camera Action” moment

And since then, my actions have changed, my desires have changed, I now do everything for Christ!

Ephesian 4:24 – But you have not so learned Christ, 21 if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: 22 that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, 23 and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, 24 and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.

King Agrippa – Here is my prove of what that moment meant for me … A NEW LIFE, A NEW MAN…. Lights Camera Action!

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