Acts 25:23-27<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0<\/i>The next day Agrippa and Bernice\u00a0came with great pomp and entered the audience room with the high-ranking military officers and the prominent men of the city. At the command of Festus, Paul was brought in.\u00a024\u00a0Festus said: \u201cKing Agrippa, and all who are present with us, you see this man! The whole Jewish community\u00a0has petitioned me about him in Jerusalem and here in Caesarea, shouting that he ought not to live any longer.\u00a025\u00a0I found he had done nothing deserving of death,\u00a0but because he made his appeal to the Emperor\u00a0I decided to send him to Rome.\u00a026\u00a0But I have nothing definite to write to His Majesty about him. Therefore I have brought him before all of you, and especially before you, King Agrippa, so that as a result of this investigation I may have something to write.\u00a027\u00a0For I think it is unreasonable to send a prisoner on to Rome without specifying the charges against him.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n
\u201c<\/span>The next day Agrippa and Bernice\u00a0came with great pomp and entered the audience room with the high-ranking military officers and the prominent men of the city. At the command of Festus, Paul was brought in.<\/i>\u201d\u00a0\u00a0King Agrippa II and Bernice entered with full pageantry.\u00a0\u00a0They were dressed to the hilt and led a progression of officials who were also dressed to the hilt.\u00a0\u00a0This \u201chearing\u201d of Paul, attended by non-Jews other than King Agrippa II and Bernice, were coming to a prestigious event.\u00a0\u00a0It was held in an amphitheater overlooking the Mediterranean Sea and the venue was filled.\u00a0\u00a0It was, to them, a place to be seen by those that mattered.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0In this atmosphere of pomp and circumstance, and to the satisfaction of the curiosity of the attendees,\u00a0\u00a0Paul was led in.\u00a0\u00a0He was in chains and wearing humble garb.\u00a0\u00a0Paul was accounted to have been a short man with little hair, a long hooked nose, bowed legs and runny eyes.\u00a0\u00a0Certainly not inspiring any high regard from his viewers.\u00a0\u00a0Yet Paul knew that he was not before these government officials due to the brilliance of who he was, physically or otherwise, but because of the exceeding excellence of his Savior and Lord Jesus Christ.\u00a0\u00a0Paul was not puffed up by speaking to these people, but rather the audience that he sought to please was but One, the Lord Jesus Christ.\u00a0\u00a0The people came in together, to be seen and acknowledged.\u00a0\u00a0Paul came in with the unseen Jesus.\u00a0\u00a0There are countless examples of God being with one is more than the millions, or giants, who oppose.\u00a0\u00a0Praise God!<\/p>\n \u201cFestus said: \u201cKing Agrippa, and all who are present with us, you see this man! The whole Jewish community\u00a0has petitioned me about him in Jerusalem and here in Caesarea, shouting that he ought not to live any longer.\u00a025\u00a0I found he had done nothing deserving of death,\u00a0but because he made his appeal to the Emperor\u00a0I decided to send him to Rome.<\/i>\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Festus states that the \u201cwhole Jewish community<\/i>\u201d had petitioned him concerning Paul.\u00a0\u00a0We should understand that the Sanhedrin represented the Jews.\u00a0\u00a0Not unlike a modern leader of a country represents the country to leaders of other countries.\u00a0\u00a0So the Sanhedrin, as the leaders of Judaism, spoke for the entire Jewish community, though certainly we know that not all agreed with them.<\/p>\n We have discussed when previously reviewing the scriptures preceding these, that the Jewish leaders proved Paul guilty of no crimes against Rome (most important) and in fact had only brought charges of different beliefs regarding the resurrection of the dead, specifically (and vitally), concerning the resurrection of Jesus.\u00a0\u00a0Festus here, again, states that Paul had done nothing worthy of Roman punishment and certainly not of death.<\/p>\n \u201cBut I have nothing definite to write to His Majesty about him. Therefore I have brought him before all of you, and especially before you, King Agrippa, so that as a result of this investigation I may have something to write.\u00a027\u00a0For I think it is unreasonable to send a prisoner on to Rome without specifying the charges against him.<\/i>\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Festus lets the dignitaries in attendance know that since he has no charges against Paul to present to Caesar, perhaps they could help him with that?\u00a0\u00a0We have discussed that King Agrippa 2 had a greatly diminished rule than his father, but that does not mean that he did not have great influence.\u00a0\u00a0In fact, it is said that King Agrippa had greater influence than Governor Festus.\u00a0\u00a0A letter of support from him would go a long way.<\/p>\n Imagine a man with cuffed hands and ankles brought into a modern court to be convicted of a crime by the judge.\u00a0\u00a0Now imagine that when the judge asked the prosecutor for the charges, the prosecutor reported that he had no evidence of the man having broken any law.\u00a0\u00a0The man had been jailed and cuffed because city officials wanted him to be ordered to death because he had different opinions than they.\u00a0\u00a0Why, the prosecutor would be thought a fool by the judge.\u00a0\u00a0The judge would chastise the prosecutor for wasting the time of the court and may likely recommend punishment for the actions of the prosecutor.\u00a0\u00a0If Festus had sent Paul to Caesar without good reason, Caesar could have become enraged.\u00a0\u00a0Doing that would have been especially dangerous to Festus as the Caesar was the unpredictable and evil Nero.\u00a0\u00a0Certainly Nero would have asked \u201cIf you had no charges to bring, instead of troubling me, why didn\u2019t you just set him free?\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Exactly.\u00a0\u00a0This problem of Festus was not one created by the Jewish leaders but rather the cause of his problems was his own weakness.\u00a0\u00a0He feared the unrest the Jews may have created if they didn\u2019t get their way so he wavered from doing the right thing and just letting Paul go.\u00a0\u00a0Of course, God knew how Claudius Lysias, and Governor Felix and how Governor Festus would respond.\u00a0\u00a0He used how He knew they would react to give Paul the opportunity to share the Gospel in Caesarea and in Rome.\u00a0\u00a0We know that the Roman government did not really control the fate of Paul, it was God who was in control.\u00a0\u00a0God was in control for Paul and He is for us.\u00a0\u00a0Praise God!<\/p>\n It is recorded that around 100 AD Pliny the Younger (A lawyer and magistrate of Rome wrote of hundreds of notable letters of which 247 survive and are considered historically significant) wrote to Caesar Trajan about His process of identifying and killing Christians.\u00a0\u00a0He reported that he found Christians to be \u201ccontumacious and inflexible\u201d in holding to their truth.\u00a0\u00a0He said that if they would renounce Jesus as God, then they could be set free but if they did not, they would be killed. (Let\u2019s remember that meant being horribly tortured before death.)\u00a0\u00a0Pliny the Younger reported that there were many who renounced their faith in Jesus in order to avoid suffering and death.\u00a0\u00a0He spoke comparatively of those he thought as real Christians who were completely committed to the faith, in this way \u201cwhereas there is no forcing, it is said, those who are really Christians\u2026\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Even this slaughterer of Christians could recognize true Christians from those who played at it.\u00a0\u00a0Those who were true Christians would not renounce their faith for any reason.\u00a0\u00a0Not to save themselves, or their families, from any torture of death.\u00a0\u00a0Yes, they held stubbornly to their faith and trusted the Lord even onto the afterlife.<\/p>\n Family and friends, we are called to have the same faith as these early believers.\u00a0\u00a0Hebrews 11<\/b>\u00a0reveals the faith that we are called to.\u00a0\u00a0The faith that we are called to considers Christ most dear, and that with no rival, and cannot be dissuaded for any reason, for any person, or for anything.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Yes, there are many victories in the Christian life, yet\u00a0Vs 34-38<\/b>\u00a0also states of the true believers of the past, and to what we are likewise called to, \u201cThere were others who were tortured, refusing to be released so that they might gain an even better resurrection.\u00a036\u00a0Some faced jeers and flogging,\u00a0and even chains and imprisonment.\u00a037\u00a0They were put to death by stoning;\u00a0they were sawed in two; they were killed by the sword.\u00a0They went about in sheepskins and goatskins,\u00a0destitute, persecuted and mistreated\u2014\u00a038\u00a0the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, living in caves\u00a0and in holes in the ground.<\/i>\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Family and Friends, there is no valid reason to give up what we eternally have for what we temporarily have.\u00a0\u00a0The martyred missionary Jim Elliot (1927-1956) famously said \u201cHe is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Let us, as our brothers and sisters before us did, hold the riches of our inheritance in Christ as the treasure we hold more dear than anything, and anyone in this world.\u00a0\u00a0After all, Jesus gave all for us so that we could have all that is eternal and lasting and wonderful.\u00a0\u00a0Praise Jesus!\u00a0\u00a0Praise God!\u00a0\u00a0Hallelujah!<\/p>\n P<\/b><\/span>salm 150:6<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.\u00a0 Praise the Lord!<\/p>\n Micah 7:7<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0But as for me, I watch\u00a0in hope\u00a0for the\u00a0Lord, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear\u00a0me.<\/p>\n Micah 6:8<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0He has shown You, O man, what\u00a0is\u00a0good; and what does the\u00a0Lord\u00a0require of You but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with Your God<\/p>\n Numbers 6:24-26<\/b>\u00a0\u201cThe\u00a0Lord\u00a0bless you and keep you; 25\u00a0the\u00a0Lord\u00a0make His face shine on you and be gracious to you; 26\u00a0the\u00a0Lord\u00a0turn His face\u00a0toward you and give you peace.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Acts 25:23-27\u00a0–\u00a0The next day Agrippa and Bernice\u00a0came with great pomp and entered the audience room with the high-ranking military officers and the prominent men of the city. At the command of Festus, Paul was brought in.\u00a024\u00a0Festus said: \u201cKing Agrippa, and all who are present with us, you see this man! The whole Jewish community\u00a0has petitioned…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192],"tags":[82,104,94,1874,17],"class_list":["post-2121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-devotion","tag-acts","tag-hebrews","tag-micah","tag-numbers","tag-psalm"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2121"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2121\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2122,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2121\/revisions\/2122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}