Can an enemy be turned into a friend?

Acts 9:1-6Meanwhile, Saul was uttering threats with every breath and was eager to kill the Lord’s followers. So he went to the high priest. He requested letters addressed to the synagogues in Damascus, asking for their cooperation in the arrest of any followers of the Way he found there. He wanted to bring them—both men and women—back to Jerusalem in chains. As he was approaching Damascus on this mission, a light from heaven suddenly shone down around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul! Saul! Why are you persecuting me?” “Who are you, lord?” Saul asked. And the voice replied, “I am Jesus, the one you are persecuting! Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”

Acts 26:9-11“I used to believe that I ought to do everything I could to oppose the very name of Jesus the Nazarene. Indeed, I did just that in Jerusalem. Authorized by the leading priests, I caused many believers there to be sent to prison. And I cast my vote against them when they were condemned to death. Many times I had them punished in the synagogues to get them to curse Jesus. I was so violently opposed to them that I even chased them down in foreign cities.

Galatians 1:23All they knew was that people were saying, “The one who used to persecute us is now preaching the very faith he tried to destroy!”

Paul (previously known as Saul), the man who wrote half the New Testament, was once a violent enemy of the church, but God changed his heart. Often, enemies of God become believers in God! When that happens and who it happens to are often impossible to predict, but in almost every church around the world are believers who once actively opposed God, God’s people, and God’s way of living. Just like Paul, God changed their hearts.

1 Peter 2:12Be careful to live properly among your unbelieving neighbors. Then even if they accuse you of doing wrong, they will see your honorable behavior, and they will give honor to God when he judges the world.

Few events are more wonderful than an enemy becoming a friend. With love, forgiveness, prayer, and kind words, God can use us to turn some of our enemies into our friends.