<TITLE>04. Par 27-35</TITLE>L-27   Notice Paul, being a great master teacher, well trained, on his road down to Damascus, one day, to arrest the people that were in this new Way. Now, he was sincere. God does not judge you by your sincerity. I never seen any more sincere people than the heathens. Many of them even kill their own children, in vain, for--for sacrifice to an idol. It's not the sincerity. A man could take carbolic acid, sincerely, thinking he was taking something else. Sincerity doesn't save you. "There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof is the ways of death."
Paul was sincere when he gave witness, in his own authority, to stone Stephen. Later on in years, I like the apology of Paul, he said, "I'm not worthy to be called the disciple or to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the Church even unto death." With sincerity!

L-28   And on his road down, he struck an experience. The Holy Spirit come out in a big Pillar of Fire, and It blinded him. Now, we've went through that, that Pillar of Fire was Christ. And He's the same Pillar of Fire that led the children through the wilderness. Christ was God, and God was Christ. God was made flesh and dwelt in the body of the Lord Jesus. "God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself," showing what He was.

L-29 In the Bible back here, in the former verses we been reading, that, "He made Hisself lower than the Angels. Taken on the form, not of Angels, but taken on a form of flesh." Angels had not fallen, they need no redemption. Flesh had fell, human beings, and they needed redemption. So, in the old laws, a man, to be a--a redeemer, first he had to be kinfolks; the great Book of Ruth, we went through here, sometime ago. And how that God, being Spirit, was made kinfolks with us, by becoming one of us, in order to redeem us and give us Eternal Life. He had to become us, that we through grace might become as He.

L-30   And we find the Pillar of Fire led the children of Israel. And when It was made flesh here on earth, we hear Him talking one day, and He claimed that He was the Pillar of Fire. They said, "You say that you're greater than our father Abraham?"

L-31 He said, "Before Abraham was, I AM." Who was the I AM? The Pillar of Fire in the burning bush, a perpetual memorial through every generation; not only that generation, but this generation, the same Pillar of Fire. And we're thankful this morning that we even have the picture of It, that He has not changed. He's the Immortal, Eternal, Blessed One. He does the same things now that He did then, and how happy it makes us feel.

L-32   But before Paul would accept this experience... Knowing that the Angel of the Lord was the Pillar of Fire, which was Christ, the... Well, He was the Angel of the Covenant, which was Christ. Moses thought better, that, chose rather to suffer the afflictions with the people of Christ, and to be led by Christ, than all the treasures of Egypt. He followed Christ, which was in the form of a Pillar of Fire.

L-33 Then Christ said, "I came from God," when He was here on earth, "I go back to God." After His death, burial, resurrection, glorified body setting at the right hand of the Majesty, to make intercession; Paul saw Him as the Pillar of Fire, again: a Light that put his eyes out, almost; smote him blind.

L-34 Peter saw Him come into the jail as a Light, and open the doors before him as he went out. We find out that He was the Alpha and Omega, the First and the Last.

L-35 And here He is with us, today, doing the very same things that He did then, making Hisself visible back to us, showing it to the scientific world.


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