the WWE - God style

I stopped counting the times I've asked God to send down neon lights instructing me on what I'm supposed to do with my life. I want him to send me an e-mail, writing on the wall, message on my answering maching, sky writing, anything! Just tell me what you want!

Sometimes he seems so far away. I know he has plans for my life, I just wish he could be more upfront about it all.

But then I read a story like Paul's conversion experience and I think - maybe I'll stick to the gradual revealing of God's plan for me.

I don't know what I would do if I experienced God in a flash of light like that - a flash so bright, it blinded me for days. What amazes me about this story is how Paul never argued with God. I mean, here was a guy who was so zealous in his pursuit of destroying Christianity that he even traveled across the country to arrest people. And yet, when God drops from heaven to give him the 'People's Elbow', Paul gets it. Body slammed by God. So hard he fell off his horse!

Pinned to the ground in the 'Wall of Jericho', God asks him, 'Why are you persecuting me?' Paul obviously wants to know who's giving him the smack down so instead of answering, he asks, 'Who are you, Lord?' (I guess he figures if he submits the pain would end sooner!) The answer? 'Jesus of Nazareth, whom you are persecuting.'

I wonder what went through Paul's mind when he heard that. He was a hardcore, devout Jew. The reason he persecuted Christians was because they claimed that the Jews had it all wrong - they could stop waiting, the Messiah had come! But Jesus was not the kind of Messiah Paul had been waiting for. What kind of Saviour gets arrested and executed? What kind of Saviour refuses to rise up against the cruel Roman government to free his people? What kind of Saviour disses the Jewish Pharisees? What kind of Saviour..? I think Paul was wicked angry.

It's that anger that makes me marvel at what Paul said next. He didn't say, 'Get off me, you crazy...light!' or 'Jesus of Nazareth is dead!' or anything like that. No, he said, 'What am I do to, Lord?'

Now that's a change of heart. That's the most dramatic thing to me about this story - it's not the light or even God speaking to Paul, it's his answer! 'What am I to do?' God backflips on him out of heaven and somehow, knocks the anger right out of him.

God tells Paul to get up, go to Damascus and wait. He'll find out what's in store for him there. Paul stays blind for a long time, even after hearing what God had in store for him. It was almost as though he needed the darkness for everything to sink in.

Have you ever been body-slammed by God? I know I have, at least once. Only, it felt more like a chair match where I got smacked over the head. It wasn't a 'conversion' experience like Paul's, but it was definitely a time where God gave me some serious direction for my life.

So what do you think? Still want God to send down the neon lights? Or are you okay with his still, small voice?