This morning, as I was reading and praying, I was thinking about how hard it is to change.

We all have things in our lives we’d like to change.  We all have things in our lives we’d like to do different.

But, if you’re like me, you find that change is hard. We fall into routines, we do things the way that we’ve always done them, we pick up bad habits that are hard to drop.

And we can think, well, this is just the way that it is.  I won’t be able to change.  It is as it is, and this is just the way that it’s going to be.

I was thinking about change this morning, and I read this passage in Acts 9:

19b For several days he was with the disciples in Damascus, 20 and immediately he began to proclaim Jesus in the synagogues, saying, “He is the Son of God.” 21 All who heard him were amazed and said, “Is not this the man who made havoc in Jerusalem among those who invoked this name? And has he not come here for the purpose of bringing them bound before the chief priests?”

The people ask of Paul, “Is this not the man that. . . ?”

Paul had changed.  But, if we remember the story of Paul, it wasn’t that he had enough will power to change. It wasn’t that he wanted it badly enough to change.  It wasn’t his desire to be changed that changed him.

It was God.

He had an encounter with God, and God changed him.  He was knocked off his donkey and the Lord changed him.

It was God that did it.  Not Paul.

Perhaps we are frustrated today because we are trying to do it ourselves and finding that we can’t.  Perhaps we finding that we don’t have enough will power. Perhaps we fall back into the old habits and feel guilty.  And feel like we can’t do.

And really, guess what?

We can’t do it.

Alone.  We can’t change ourselves by ourselves.

But God can.

What do you want to change today?  Give it to God. And give it again, and again, and again, and again.  Give it to Him each second, each minute, each hour.

Give it over and over again.

You will take it back.  I do, we all do.  Give it back.

God changed Paul to the point where folks couldn’t believe it was him.

He is still God. And He can still do it.

What do you want to change today?  Give it to Him.  Again and again.  And, He will change us.  For our good and for His glory.

Give it to Him.