My kids were visiting recently and somehow got into a competition to see who could recite the entire theme song to the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. They were both very good at it. We talked about watching that show together when they were kids and how we all loved this “fish out of water” story. The Fresh Prince was a street-wise kid from West Philadelphia who got sent by his mother to live with his aunt and uncle in upscale Bel-Air when trouble broke out in his neighborhood. The beginning of the song sets up the storyline:
Now this is a story all about how
My life got flipped turned upside down
And I’d like to take a minute, just sit right there
I’ll tell you how I became the prince of a town called Bel-Air.
The show dealt with cultural and contemporary issues of acceptance, tolerance, respect, teenage life, and family bonding. I think many of us love a great story that involves someone’s life being turned upside down for the good. I bet many of you have a good story about your conversion and your personal “Before Christ/After Christ” life.
But none of us can beat Paul’s “flipped turned upside down” conversion story. Born Saul of Tarsus, he was a Christian-persecuting Pharisee who lived a life of hatred and violence. Read what happened to him on the way to Damascus:
Acts 9 (The Message)
9 1-2 All this time Saul was breathing down the necks of the Master’s disciples, out for the kill. He went to the Chief Priest and got arrest warrants to take to the meeting places in Damascus so that if he found anyone there belonging to the Way, whether men or women, he could arrest them and bring them to Jerusalem.
3-4 He set off. When he got to the outskirts of Damascus, he was suddenly dazed by a blinding flash of light. As he fell to the ground, he heard a voice: “Saul, Saul, why are you out to get me?”
5-6 He said, “Who are you, Master?”
“I am Jesus, the One you’re hunting down. I want you to get up and enter the city. In the city you’ll be told what to do next.”
7-9 His companions stood there dumbstruck—they could hear the sound, but couldn’t see anyone—while Saul, picking himself up off the ground, found himself stone-blind. They had to take him by the hand and lead him into Damascus. He continued blind for three days. He ate nothing, drank nothing.
10 There was a disciple in Damascus by the name of Ananias. The Master spoke to him in a vision: “Ananias.”
“Yes, Master?” he answered.
11-12 “Get up and go over to Straight Avenue. Ask at the house of Judas for a man from Tarsus. His name is Saul. He’s there praying. He has just had a dream in which he saw a man named Ananias enter the house and lay hands on him so he could see again.”
13-14 Ananias protested, “Master, you can’t be serious. Everybody’s talking about this man and the terrible things he’s been doing, his reign of terror against your people in Jerusalem! And now he’s shown up here with papers from the Chief Priest that give him license to do the same to us.”
15-16 But the Master said, “Don’t argue. Go! I have picked him as my personal representative to non-Jews and kings and Jews. And now I’m about to show him what he’s in for—the hard suffering that goes with this job.”
17-19 So Ananias went and found the house, placed his hands on blind Saul, and said, “Brother Saul, the Master sent me, the same Jesus you saw on your way here. He sent me so you could see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” No sooner were the words out of his mouth than something like scales fell from Saul’s eyes—he could see again! He got to his feet, was baptized, and sat down with them to a hearty meal.
19-21 Saul spent a few days getting acquainted with the Damascus disciples, but then went right to work, wasting no time, preaching in the meeting places that this Jesus was the Son of God.
Saul got flipped upside down and became Paul, the greatest evangelist and church planter that ever lived. He authored the Pauline letters that make up a good portion of the New Testament and his words are quoted all over the world in all kinds of contexts. I bet of the hundreds of weddings I have performed, 1 Corinthians 13 was read at 95% of them.
How about you? Are you needing a flipped upside down moment with God? Is there some aspect of your life that needs to be drastically changed for the better? Take it from the Fresh Prince of Damascus: “8 You are saved by God’s grace because of your faith. This salvation is God’s gift. It’s not something you possessed. 9 It’s not something you did that you can be proud of. 10 Instead, we are God’s accomplishment, created in Christ Jesus to do good things. God planned for these good things to be the way that we live our lives” (Ephesians 2:8-10).
You are God’s accomplishment, created to do good things! Sometimes that requires a little flipping.
At Water’s Edge 