Eph.1:1 – Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, to the saints which are in Ephesus, and to the faithful in Christ Jesus:
Paul’s entire life is a testimony of the grace of God. If anyone was disqualified as a representative of Jesus Christ it would be Paul. Paul was an enemy of the gospel doing everything within his power to destroy Christianity. In Acts 9 it describes Paul as “breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord”. This terminology is a language of violence that Paul was living in; he was breathing in and breathing out hatred toward Christ. That is where the grace of God broke in. In the midst of Paul’s hatred love broke through on the Damascus Road. In a moment grace had stopped Paul in his tracks and transformed him from a hater of Jesus to a lover of the Lord. There is no explanation for this but the sovereign grace of God interrupted Paul’s life. This Pharisee was changed into an apostle to the Gentiles, that is something that we be considered not even possible. Here is how the Reformed Expository Commentary described this.
“Because Paul’s apostleship is the will of God, he can defend his right to speak. There was a time when Paul breathed out threats against those who confessed Jesus as Lord. He held the cloaks of those who stoned Stephen. We could rightly question, “What right did he have to speak for God?” None at all, based on his record. But Paul is not an apostle because of his record. He is an apostle because of Christ’s redemption. Jesus had corrected him, claimed him, and commissioned him. Paul could well confess that he was the greatest of sinners, yet he could still speak for God, because it was God’s will for him to do so. What a message of comfort that is for us, too. When others who know about our past life question what right we have to speak for God—when they know the faults and failings in our personal history, we can say like the apostle Paul, “Were my speaking based on my doing, then I would have no right to speak. But God corrected me, claimed me, and commissioned me to speak of himself. Because God wants me to speak, I have a right to speak.”
So what about you? What is your story of a life interrupted by grace? Our story, our testimony, is what convinced the world of the power of the gospel. Your encounter with grace gives you a calling to tell others of what Christ has done for you.
