Acts 25

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Well, this is where we're supposed to meet every day and we get together and we grow in our love for the Lord. And we'll get from the book of Acts all the way to the book of Philemon. I'm so glad to be back with you this morning. We're at Acts chapter 25. Let's go ahead and have some coffee. We'll pray and we'll get into the Lord's Word. Let's pray.
Oh, Father, we thank you so much for this day. We thank you for your word. We thank you for your wonderful care for us. Lord, we pray that you would please be with us as we read your word this morning. May we understand it and may it apply to our lives in Jesus name. Amen. All right, so we're going to read all of chapter 25 today. So this is Paul in front of Festus. He's a new governor who's come from Rome, and he is the one who now Paul is giving his account to. So here we go.
Now Infestus had come to the province, after three days he went up from Caesarea to Jerusalem. Then the high priests and the chief men of the Jews informed him against Paul. They petitioned him, asking a favor against him, that he would summon him to Jerusalem, while they lay in ambush along the road to kill him. But Festus answered that Paul should be kept at Caesarea and that he himself was going there shortly. Therefore, he said, let those who have authority among you go down with me and accuse this man to see if there is any fault in him. And when he had remained among them more than ten days, he went down to Caesarea. And the next day, sitting on the judgment seat, he commanded Paul to be brought.
When he had come, the Jews who had come down from Jerusalem stood about and laid many serious complaints against Paul, which they could not prove. while he answered for himself, neither against the law of the Jews, nor against the temple, nor against Caesar have I done anything or offended in anything at all. Bethesda's wanting to do the Jews a favor asked Paul and said, Are you willing to go up to Jerusalem and there be judged before me concerning these things? So Paul said, I stand at Caesar's judgment seat where I ought to be judged.
To the Jews I have done no wrong, as you very well know. For if I am an offender, or have committed anything deserving death, I do not object to dying. But if there is nothing in these things which these men accuse me, no one can deliver me to them. I appeal to Caesar. Then Festus, when he had conferred with the council, answered and said, to Caesar, you have appealed to Caesar, to Caesar you shall go.
Well, let's go ahead and stop there for a moment and ask what is going on here. So we have a new governor. His name is Festus. Felix was the one before and now we have Festus. He comes and he ends up in Jerusalem and he's talking to the high priests and the elders there and they say, hey, there's this dude you got in prison. We'd like to try him.
And Festus is able to tell something's up and he says, I don't deliver people unto judgment until they've given account for themselves. You guys can come down to Caesarea Maritima with me and there you can bring your accusations against him. So he's in Jerusalem for something around 10 days. They head down to Caesarea and the next day he does exactly what he says. He sits on the bima, he sits on the judgment seat. there as the tribunal he allows them to bring their charges against Paul and Paul says hey look man.
I'm not guilty of any of this stuff neither against and notice the progression of things here in Roman law neither against the law of the Jews which The the Romans don't care that much about their history with the Jewish people show that nor against the temple now Romans do care about the temples. Nor against Caesar, meaning nor against the empire itself. He's going more and more to the heart of this. Nor against Caesar have I offended in doing anything wrong at all.
Now, Festus hears this and he realizes, okay, hold on, we've got something different on our hands here. And so he wants to do the Jewish people a favor. He's their new governor. And so he says, well, you go up to Jerusalem and be tried with me there. You'll be before me. Now, whether that means he gets tried by the Sanhedrin and Festus is just going to rubber stamp it, I don't know. But it's clear that Paul understands that something is wrong here. There's some type of judicial misgivings here, and he knows that there are things going on behind the scenes.
Remember, Paul was sent to Caesarea because the Jews had plotted to kill him in Jerusalem. People had taken vows of fasting that they would not eat or drink anything until Paul was killed. And now it's two years later, obviously they've had to have broken that vow and they've had to eat, but that doesn't mean the animosity is not there. It's very suspect that now they're asking for him to be tried in the very place that they tried to kill him before.
And so Paul says, look, I ought to be judged here. I'm already in front of Caesar's judgment seat. You're already the Roman governor. And he knows that he's not going to get he's not going to to get right judgment. It seems like the cards are stacked against him. And he's not unwilling.
Notice in verse 11, for if I am an offender or have committed anything deserving death, I do not object to dying. But if there is anything in these things which these men accuse me, no one can deliver me to them." He says, if I broke the law and I deserve death, I'll go die. The whole point of the Roman system was it was an empire ruled by law. And he's saying, I'm willing to face judgment. I'm willing to face justice. You can't send me to them because they're just going to kill me. But I'm not guilty of why they're trying to kill me. So what does he do?
He says, I appeal to Caesar. Now, he's not appealing a judgment that's already been made. That's how we think of the word appeal today. But he's appealing to be judged by Caesar. And so Paul is using, I think the Latin word I've written down here, the Latin word is provocatio. There's different types of appeals and this is a provocatio. This is him saying, I want to go and be judged by the emperor himself.
This time, this was perfectly lawful around the second century. This would become harder and harder and harder to do. But at this time, you know, if you wanted to go be judged by the king, go be judged by the emperor, go be judged by Caesar himself. You can. So Festus talks with this council and they say, all right, you have appealed to Caesar, to Caesar you shall go. But that doesn't mean it's wrapped up right away. Let's go ahead and read the second half of what happens here. Festus gets an interesting guest. And after some days, King Agrippa and Bernice, that's his sister, came to Caesarea to greet Festus.
When they had been there many days, Festus laid Paul's case before the king, saying, There is a certain man left a prisoner by Felix, about whom the chief priests and the elders of the Jews informed me when I was in Jerusalem, asking for a judgment against him.
To them, I answered, it is not the custom of the Romans to deliver any man to destruction before the accused meets the accusers face to face, and has opportunity to answer for himself concerning the charge against him. Therefore, when they had come together, without any delay, the next day, I sat on the judgment seat and commanded the man to be brought in. When the accuser stood up, they brought no accusation against him of such things that I had supposed, but I had some questions against him about their own religion and about a certain Jesus who had died, but Paul affirmed to be alive. And because I was uncertain of such questions, I asked whether he was willing to go to Jerusalem and there be judged concerning these matters. But when Paul appealed to be reserved for the decision of Augustus, I commanded him to be kept till I could send him to Caesar.
Then Agrippa said to Festus, I would also like to hear the man myself. Tomorrow, he said, you shall hear him. So the next day when Agrippa and Bernice had come with great pomp and had entered the auditorium with the commanders and the prominent men of the city, at Festus' command, Paul was brought in. And Festus said, King Agrippa, and all the men who are here present with us.
You see this man about whom the whole assembly of the Jews petitioned me, both at Jerusalem and here, crying out. He was not fit to live any longer. But when I found that he had committed nothing deserving of death, and that he himself had appealed to Augustus, I decided to send him. I have nothing certain to write to my Lord concerning him. Therefore, I have brought him out here to you and especially before you, King Agrippa, so that after the examination has taken place, I may have something to write. For it seems to me unreasonable to send a prisoner and not to specify the charges against him. All right. And that's where we'll leave the reading for now. We'll pick up more tomorrow for the reading. But we need to kind of dig into this.
Who in the world is Agrippa? King Agrippa is the great-grandson of Herod the Great. So King Agrippa and then you have he breaks it up amongst his children and then you have eventually Agrippa the second or the first and then you have Agrippa the second. That's who we're talking about here King Agrippa Herod or Herod Agrippa the second. Now this is an interesting one.
Josephus tells us like Herod Agrippa actually grew up not in Jerusalem, not in Galilee, nothing like that. He grew up in Rome. He actually grew up in the courts of Claudius the Emperor himself. And so it's there that he's grown up. He's fully aware of the whole Roman legal system. He's fully aware of the court. And so he's given to be the king in a whole bunch of areas just north of Jerusalem. But in especially a territory of Galilee where Jesus himself is from. And so of course this is a official guy that Festus would want to meet, you know, have Agrippa come. And hey, I got this question about this dude who's in prison who's appealed to Caesar.
Is there a king Agrippa comes? Now Agrippa has also more than just being, you know, something like the king of the Jews, but he's also the official Roman curator of the temple. When the high priest on the Day of Atonement on Yom Kippur needed to get his priestly garments, he had to go to King Herod Agrippa II, and the king would give the high priest the garments. And it was King Herod Agrippa who was also in charge of the temple treasury. And so this is one of these things when Agrippa comes, Festus realizes this is the man who's in charge of the temple.
And what was one of the chief reasons why they tried to kill Paul at first? Because they said he defiled the temple by bringing a Gentile into the temple. beyond the wall of the Sorok, beyond the barrier marker, you know, where it was just supposed to be the court of the women or the court of the Jews, not the court of the Gentiles. So brought even closer towards the temple.
They had charged him with defiling that and so he brings the rightful authority to judge. And so Agrippus, you know, well first Fiesta says, I can't find anything wrong in this guy. And so bring him in. Yeah, I want to hear this guy too. So the next day, they come as full of pomp and circumstances turned into this whole state affair, you know, all the regalia, all the, all the important people there. And they, they walk in and Festus gives his speech, kind of the history of the Jews wanting to kill him, but he doesn't have any reason. He pronounces, I don't see any reason for this man to die.
And then he goes even further than that and he says, I got to send him to Rome. He's appealed to Augustus. He's appealed to Caesar. By the way, Augustus is just a title for like a revered one, or it had more, uh, theatrific type understanding behind it as well. But the point is he's, he's appealed to Caesar, but he doesn't want to look incompetent before the emperor.
He's got to tell him why he's sending him. If he has no reason why he should die, then Paul should be released. But if he isn't released, then why is he going to Caesar? There's nothing wrong with him. And so he's really caught in this conundrum. If he's going to continue and not release him, he's got to have a reason. Or else Caesar's going to wonder, why in the world did I put this guy in charge? He can't even figure out this little matter of this Jewish guy who says that a dude's alive. Who cares?
And so that's where we're at today. For it seems unreasonable to send a prisoner and to not specify charges against him. Well, we've covered a whole lot of ground. Let's go ahead and wrap this up. What is the best verse to summarize this? Well, in my Bible, I have verse 19. I have a whole bunch underlined.
I'm gonna just say I in this whole chapter I'm going to say verse 8 neither against the law of the Jews nor against the temple nor against Caesar have I offended or done anything at all and also verse 19 But had some questions against him about their own religion and about a certain Jesus who had died whom Paul affirmed to be alive and Notice the heart of what Festus knows is that it's something concerning their own religion and that Jesus is still alive. I don't think what we have here in the book of Acts is meant to be everything that Paul had said to Festus, but he had enough to tell him about the gospel of Jesus Christ. Festus knew enough now. I don't think he quite gets all of it. I don't think he's a Christian But Paul has now boldly proclaimed to a second Roman governor first to Felix now to Festus and He's told him that Jesus is alive That his Lord his master Is alive We're coming to a day, well many of you will go to a service today that is traditionally called Good Friday.
This is the day that many people will celebrate Jesus going to the cross and dying. And on the Lord's Day on Sunday, why do we even gather on the first day of the week? Because we believe that Jesus Christ rose from the dead on that day. On the first day of the week, Jesus did not stay in that tomb, but death was conquered once and for all.
That Jesus is the firstborn of the resurrection. That Jesus rose from the dead for your justification and for mine. If Jesus is alive, then His righteousness is true. If Jesus is alive, and if you are in Jesus, you have been declared righteous. And if Jesus is alive, then the promises of Him coming again are true. And if the promises of Him coming again are true, then you and I will also rise again from the dead and we will live with God forever.
I hope this is your hope. I pray that you confess with your mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord and believe in your heart that God rose him from the dead. I pray that you are truly saved. Let's pray. Father, we thank you that you have given us this testimony of the true word, a true historical count. We thank you for Paul's witness to your gospel. We thank you so much for the resurrection of Jesus Christ and the life that you have given us in him. Lord, we pray that you would fill us with hope. In Jesus' name, amen. May the Lord bless you today. May you rest in the finished work of Jesus Christ. And I'll see you tomorrow. Bye.
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