“So I always take pains to have a clear conscience toward both God and man” (Acts 24:16).

A number of years ago, an ad appeared on television, the purpose of which was to promote higher education. There was a line in the ad that got right to the point. At a strategic moment the voice said, “A mind is a terrible thing to waste.” The point being made was that access to higher education should be available for all who choose to pursue it.

Well, the passage cited above makes us aware of something else that’s a terrible thing to waste, a clear conscience. Let me explain. The conscience is God’s gift to his children. He placed it there to serve as an inner voice, a mechanism whereby the Holy Spirit speaks to us at the deepest level. Although there may be times we wish it were not so vocal, we should never despise or demean its importance. That’s where the words cited above speak to each of us.

You see, in his speech before King Agrippa, Saul sought to demonstrate his integrity, as well as the truthfulness of his relationship with Christ, by telling the king that his conscience was clear. I wonder how many of us can attest to a clear conscience as did Saul.

But there is more. Not only did Saul speak of his clear conscience before God and man, he also said that he takes “pains” to keep it clear. That speaks to me simply because I can’t always say the same thing about myself. My guess is that if we are to be honest, there are times each of us cannot claim to take pains to maintain a clear conscience. That observation raises the question; “How do we keep a clear conscience?”

There are two things that come to mind in that regard. First, taking pains to keep a clear conscience begins with the pursuit of personal holiness. Every part of our lives should be oriented toward doing what Paul told Timothy; “Set an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith and in purity.” In that light, can you see that a mandatory component of a clear conscience is the pursuit of personal holiness?

The second component of a clear conscience is a readiness to admit our sin and seek forgiveness as soon as our conscience makes us aware of it. If we fail to do that, we increase the risk of deadening our conscience. That’s bad! Thus, when our inner voice alerts us to the presence of sin, we should confess it immediately and ask God to enable us to flee from it.

Life is indeed sweeter when the conscience is clear. We are better able to enjoy our relationship with God and with others when we possess and take pains to maintain a clear conscience. Let your conscience speak to you at this very moment. Is your conscience clear and are you taking pains to keep it so? I trust you are.

“Now when forty years had passed, an angel appeared to him in the wilderness… there came the voice of the Lord, ‘I am the God of your fathers… and now come, I will send you to Egypt.’”

Forty years is a long time to wait for one’s marching orders, would you agree? As you know, Moses had been working for his father-in-law for forty years, ever since he fled from Egypt. We have no idea the degree to which he understood that his time away from Egypt was for a larger purpose. All we know is that forty years is a long time. Would you wait forty years? We tend to get agitated if we have to wait forty minutes, let alone forty years.

Yet in God’s way of working, waiting is an essential and unavoidable part of preparing one’s heart for God’s ultimate purposes for us. Waiting is hard, frustrating, discouraging, deflating and perplexing, while at the same time unavoidable. As Christians, our posture must be to embrace God’s hand during the “silent” periods of our lives, no matter how long they last. I came across a poem this week that was a blessing to me as it relates to waiting. It springs from the pen of J. Danson Smith. I think you will be blessed as well.

“Waiting! Yes patiently waiting!
Till next steps made plain will be;
To hear with the inner hearing
The voice that will call for me.

Waiting! Yes, hopefully waiting!
With hope that need not grow dim;
The Master is pledged to guide me,
And my eyes are unto him.

Waiting! Expectantly waiting!
Perhaps it may be today;
The Master will quickly open
The gate to my future way.

Waiting! Yes waiting! Still waiting!
I know, though I’ve waited long;
That while he upholds his purpose,
His waiting cannot be wrong.

Waiting! Yes waiting! Still waiting!
The Master will not be late;
Since he knows that I am waiting
For him to unlatch the gate.”

Some of us this morning are waiting, and we don’t particularly like it. Would you allow these words to bless your heart as they have done mine?

“Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to your saints in Jerusalem” (Acts 9:13).

Question: Who but God has the ability to bring salvation to those who we consider least likely? Answer: No one.

In that light, I think you would agree that if the Bible shows us anything, it’s that God saves those who, at least to our eyes, appear least likely to turn to Christ for salvation. Think of Augustine, Martin Luther, John Newton, C. S. Lewis, Leo Tolstoy, Charles Colson and Josh McDowell, just to name a few. These are men who were vehemently opposed to God at one point in their lives.

Frankly, that same thing may apply to some of you. Perhaps you can reflect on a time in your life when a relationship with God was the furthest thing from your mind. I know that applies to the Apostle Paul, who came to faith in Christ after encountering him on the road to Damascus. In the words of Ananias, who spoke what is cited above, “I have heard…how much evil he has done to your saints.”

I wish I had time to tell you the stories of how the men named above came to faith in Christ. I encourage you to read their stories for yourself. Although you will learn a lot about them, the biggest lesson is about God. What you will conclude in reading their stories is that God takes the initiative in saving those who appear least likely to come to faith in Christ.

In that light, what we learn is that God is sovereign over everything, including those to whom he brings saving faith. Let me say that in a different way. The men named above did not find God. Rather, God found them. That’s certainly what we can surmise from the story of Paul’s salvation in Acts chapter nine.

Listen to a sample of the things Paul said about himself as a means of demonstrating the grace of God in saving him, in spite of his hatred of Christianity. In various places he wrote: “I persecuted this Way to the death; if anyone has confidence in the flesh, I far more; as to the law a Pharisee, as to zeal a persecutor of the church; even though I was formerly a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor, I was shown mercy.” The only way to interpret those words is that Paul understood that it was not he who found God, but rather God who found him. It’s with that understanding that Paul wrote, “But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ…by grace you have been saved through faith, and that is not your own doing; it is the gift of God.”

We must never lose sight of the fact that salvation is God’s gift to us. Even the faith that saved us is God’s gift. That thought alone should humble us to a significant degree. Friends, can you echo the words of Paul? “To me, the very least of all the saints, this grace was given.”

“So there was much joy in that city” (Acts 8:8).

Joy is an elusive commodity in our day, would you agree? Joy is something we all desire, yet often have a difficult time achieving. I wonder if the reason why we lack joy is because we don’t understand what true joy is, let alone look for it in the wrong places. It’s in that context that the words of Luke in Acts 8:8 caught my attention. Not only was there joy in the city he referred to, he said that there was much joy. I like that.

Now in reading about the “much joy” Luke referred to, a reasonable question relates to its source. In other words, what produced and sustained the joy Luke made mention of? Well, in order to answer that question, we must examine the preceding verses. So let’s do so for a moment.

A careful review of verses 5-8 suggests three reasons for their joy. In verse five we read that “Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ.” So reason number one for their joy was that they heard the message preached by Philip, salvation in Christ.

But there is more. Not only did they hear his message with their ears, the text tells us that they “paid attention to what was being said.” The phrase “paid attention” means that they brought his message near to their hearts. They devoted their thoughts to it. That signifies to me that what they heard with their ears made a difference to their hearts. Proclamation makes a difference when it penetrates the heart, which is what took place for them.

Finally, as was common throughout the book of Acts, effective proclamation was accompanied by external signs. In other words, they saw the power of God at work in the form of healing and other signs.

Now put those things together. Hearing Christ proclaimed, responding in faith and witnessing the power of God at work resulted in “much joy” in that city. How does that apply to you and me? Well, can you see that what brought them much joy works in the same manner in our day? What that says to me is that much joy is found in a right relationship with God that comes only through bringing the message of Christ near to our hearts as we respond in faith to His offer of salvation. As we do so, we will see the power of God at work as lives are transformed from spiritual death to spiritual life and vigor, which if you think about it is far more amazing than a paralyzed man walking again.

Are you looking for much joy? They found it in hearing and responding to the message of salvation in Christ. That’s the only place to find joy, “much joy” to be exact!