Acts 24:22-27
Acts chapter 24, verses 22 through
27. Some of you are probably beginning
to think that the end of Acts is like watching court TV. It’s
the same thing over and over. But we do remember God’s calling
to the apostle Paul in the earlier chapter of Acts, the Lord Jesus,
when he met Saul on the road to Damascus. said, you will suffer
for my name and you will speak to Gentiles and their kings. And so in this series of court
appearances that began a couple of Sundays ago in our studies,
we see the progression of Paul speaking before Lysias, the Roman
proconsul or the head of the army garrison there in Jerusalem.
He then goes to Felix. And he’ll speak to Felix and
his wife, Drusilla. Then there’s Festus. And then
there’s Agrippa and Bernice. And on and on, Paul will travel,
sailing to Rome. He’ll speak to centurions. He’ll
speak to Roman authorities. And ultimately he will speak,
we believe, the gospel to Nero, the great and wicked emperor.
And so, court TV maybe, but the word of God indeed. Let us give
our attention to it now. Acts chapter 24, beginning at
verse 22, but Felix having a rather accurate knowledge of the way,
putting them off saying, when Lycius, the tribune comes down,
I will decide your case. Then he gave orders to the centurion
that he should be kept in custody, but have some liberty and that
none of his friends should be prevented from attending to his
needs. After some days, Felix came with
his wife, Drusilla, who was Jewish, and he sent for Paul and heard
him speak about faith in Christ Jesus. And as he reasoned about
righteousness and self-control and the coming judgment, Felix
was alarmed and said, go away for the present. When I get an
opportunity, I will summon you. At the same time, he hoped that
money would be given him by Paul, so he sent for him often and
conversed with him. When two years had elapsed, Felix
was succeeded by Portius Festus, and desiring to do the Jews a
favor, Felix left Paul in prison.” Amen, the word of the living
God. I think many of you know from your childhood reading of
the fables, the tortoise and the hare, Slow and steady wins
the race, the tortoise said, and he slowly and steadily made
his way along the race course. The hare would sprint and stop
and rest. He would sprint and stop and
get a Coke. He would sprint and stop and
see friends. The tortoise, slow and steady, wins the race. And I think we need to see Christian
ministry more like the tortoise than the hare. In our day, we
like excitement. We like movement. We like numbers.
We like big things, shiny things. And we like metrics. The joke
among pastors sometimes is, well, you’re more concerned about nickels
and noses. And that’s often actually hardly
ever God’s concern. He’s not concerned about nickels
and noses. He’s more concerned with faithfulness. And so if we were to put or place
the burden of American Christianity and the metrics it requires of
nickels and noses on the apostle Paul and say, how could you possibly
be successful? How could you possibly serve
the Lord from prison? Or what if? What if ministry
is slow? What if it doesn’t seem to be
producing much outward fruit? What if there’s not much to measure?
Would we indeed say we have failed? Would we indeed say Paul has
failed? In fact, if you think about the
school of Gamaliel, Would they send out their alumni magazine?
Would they put Paul’s stubby body beaten picture in and say,
he’s the best of the best. Come here and you’ll have a ministry
like him. I hardly doubt that would be
the case. But Jesus has said in the scriptures,
Jesus has said clearly to the apostle Paul that his metrics
are different. And Jesus’ intention for Paul
is that he would suffer and be God’s chosen instrument to go
to the Gentiles. He would suffer and be God’s
chosen instrument and preach to the kings, even to the emperor. And so we can say, because Jesus
says so, Paul’s ministry is a success. Paul’s ministry is slow and steady. And as Paul will say to Timothy
at the end of his life, I have fought the good fight. I have
finished the race. And I think what we see in our
passage is in the providence of God, Paul’s ministry is a
slow and steady, maybe not very exciting ministry, but indeed
it is a ministry of might and power. And we find ourselves
in this passage of scripture. Court TV, if you want to call
it that, we find Paul’s delay of justice. You maybe perhaps
have read Roman history and you know of the Pax Romana, the peace
of Rome. Rome was a vast empire. It began
sometime in about 700 and something BC, about the time we read in
Isaiah of his call to the ministry to preach to pre-exilic Israel. The Roman Empire had its beginnings,
and so by this time, it’s an 800-year-old empire. If you’ve
read your history, you know that it crashed and it burned and
really is a sign to us Americans who can’t get a hold of ourselves
and who are unwilling to go through what it takes to reclaim a nation
morally and fiscally and in other ways. We will likely crash and
burn like did Rome. But the Pax Romana at this point,
800 or so years into their history, was a rather serious undertaking.
They wanted their vast empire to enjoy peace and provision
under the emperor. And so we find Felix here. He’s a government worker. And you know what we think about
government work. Very often these folks, they work for their pay
and their pension. You don’t get much else out of them. You
understand also that Felix here, his neck is on the line. If he doesn’t uphold the Pax
Romana, if he does not uphold the peace of Rome within the
Judean countryside and the city of Jerusalem, if he doesn’t get
the uprising of the Jews, not only their uprising against Paul
under control, but their general uprising against Rome, it’s his
neck. And what we’ve seen tried before
Lysias the Tribune and what we’ve seen tried before Felix and it
will go before Festus and others is basically a matter of the
Jewish faith. It’s not a matter for Rome and
it’s not a state issue, but you read in this passage and we’ve
seen in past weeks, we’ll see in coming weeks. These Roman
authorities are trying to please everyone except God. They’re
trying to please the emperor. They’re trying to please their
overseers. They’re trying to please the Jewish population
over which they have a government. But they are using Paul, the
apostle, as a pawn in their little game. And we understand the opportunity
to give the Jews a favor. We see the opportunity that perhaps
Paul, which he’ll never do, may give Felix a bribe. But the Pax Romana is in play
here. The keeping of the government
job with a paycheck and a pension is important. And you can imagine
how Paul feels with this delay of justice. I imagine he feels
like Joseph, who was forgotten by the cupbearer. under Pharaoh. And he lingered in prison for
two more years. Now we know the rest of the story,
what those meant for evil, God meant for good. And he saved
Israel and others from a great famine. And we know the rest
of the story with Paul, what he will go and do in the rest
of the Roman empire. We need to remember that this
delay of justice is in God’s sovereignty. It’s under God’s
providence. and that Jesus is the jailer. Jesus is the one holding Paul
in custody. Jesus is in charge of Paul’s
circumstances. And it’s the hand of God that
is at work for his glory and our ultimate good. Maybe you’re
in a situation where things just seem on hold and you’re in the
custody of circumstances as it were. Take comfort here because
God is at work More than we know, more than we imagine, just when
we think nothing is happening, God is most at work and he will
soon shine brightly. Well, Paul will spend two years
in custody at Caesarea. He’ll spend two years of his
life under Roman imprisonment. And we might say, Lord, what
a waste of time. Lord, why didn’t you get Paul
out of prison? Why didn’t you orchestrate the
biggest jail break and, you know, give him one of those mustaches
and fake noses and glasses and let him go around the empire
where the Asian Jewish population didn’t know where he was and
he could go preach Jesus. He could be more effective. See,
that’s how we think. But God very often works in our difficult
circumstances. He puts us in hard places in
order that he may chisel off the rough edges. He may burn
off the dross and he may refine our silver and our gold. Never
underestimate quiet years. Never underestimate God giving
you a sleepless night. Maybe it’s a chance to pray.
Never underestimate God’s wisdom in giving you, or as he’s done
here, the apostle Paul, Time to study, time to pray, time
to write, time to meet with others and opportunities to present
Christ within the confines of a prison there at Caesarea. We understand that Felix gave
Paul lots of freedom. He let his friends come to him.
He let them care for him. Remember, Paul was sick. Paul
was losing his eyesight. He had Luke the physician with
him and his friends and family could come tend to him these
couple years. Here’s an added bonus. The scriptures
don’t tell us plainly, but we can put the pieces together,
the timing together. Luke, who was often with Paul
during this time, spent these two years, we believe, compiling
from Mark. and other sources, the account
of Jesus’ earthly ministry. And then he spent so much time
with Paul who had been on these missionary journeys already,
and he compiled Luke and Acts. Now we as a congregation have
spent roughly the last four years studying the content of Luke’s
gospel and now the continued work of Jesus through his apostles.
And that would not have happened if God had not hit pause on the
travels. if God had not hit pause on the
journeys. And so Luke most likely compiles
those two great books that we hold dearly in our scriptures. Now, Paul is going to go on to
Rome. We’re going to read about the shipwrecks and all the rest.
He’s going to go on to Rome. He’s going to spend a couple
of years there in prison. And from Roman imprisonment, he’s
going to write what we call the prison officials, Galatians and
Ephesians and Colossians and Philemon. He’s going to continue
to make good use. I read a couple years ago of
a fellow who needed to write a couple more chapters in a book
that he was going to complete. And he was having a hard time
finding the time and the place and the energy to do it. He tells
the story of buying a round trip plane ticket to Beijing or somewhere
across around the world and he gets on that plane with his laptop
and 12 hour flight there, 12 hour flight back, whatever it
is. He finished those chapters. And
sometimes don’t we need to hem ourselves in. We need to be confined. And so perhaps a sickness, perhaps
time in your bed, perhaps a sleepless night, perhaps some sort of set
of circumstances God may be using to open your eyes and to see
what he is doing and how you fit in. I think of Bunyan in
the Bedford jail. From that jail, he wrote Pilgrim’s
Progress, a book we hold dearly, most often next to our copies
of God’s Word. We serve Christ. Christ is the
jailer. Christ is the God of providence.
Christ is the one who tailor makes our circumstances. And
so Paul’s two years of custody serve the mission of Jesus for
Paul to preach to the Gentiles and to their kings. And we know
he speaks to Lysias, the tribune. He speaks to Felix and Drusilla.
He speaks to Festus and Agrippa and Bernice and Jailers and sailors
and centurions and magistrates and perhaps even comes face to
face with the great Nero. And so the two years of custody,
the delayed justice, what others have meant for evil or what others
are using Paul as a political pawn for God is intending for
the good of others and his everlasting glory. Now, during this delayed
justice and during these couple years of custody, Paul has conversations
about Christianity or the way with Felix and with his wife,
Drusilla. For some reason, they fancy Paul.
Maybe he’s their little prisoner. He’s their voice of reason. He’s
their little philosopher. And so maybe for, well, entertainment,
because, you know, they don’t have Netflix yet. Maybe the band
and the orchestra are off for the summer and the royal palace
is a little boring. So perhaps that’s why they bring
Paul in from time to time. It’s a diversion. Perhaps they
want to bring him into their presence to remind him of his
predicament. Justice has not yet been served in his life.
And perhaps, Paul, you’ll come to your senses and pay us a little
bribe. Maybe they want to have their consciences eased. They’re living in great sin,
unmarried and adulterous. And perhaps they want Paul to
speak words of comfort to them, to be a priest who justifies
their sinful behavior. Perhaps they want to be religious
in some way. Our passage tells us that they
are both knowledgeable in the way. She, because she’s of the
Jewish background and he, because they, well, they’re married and
she’s probably told him some of these things. And they have
knowledge of the way, but not saving faith in the way, truth,
and in the life. He’s going to converse with Paul,
this Felix. He’s gonna converse with him
over and over, but he will not be converted to faith in Jesus
Christ. He is neither convinced of his
need of Jesus or converted to salvation through faith. And
so slow and steady wins the race. Paul, the great orator, Paul,
the great reasoner, Paul, the great man of logic and knowledge,
can say it over and over till he’s blue in the faith. But the
Holy Spirit does not come to work in the life of Felix. Well, we come to I think what
is the husk of this passage? It’s not the delay of justice
that’s that important. It’s not the two years in custody
that’s the center of attention here. It’s not even the conversations
that Paul has with Felix on Christianity that are the best part of this
passage. I think the center of this passage
is how seriously Paul takes the gospel of Jesus Christ, how seriously
Paul takes the eternal condition of Felix, the eternal condition
of Drusilla. Their lives are a mess. Our passage tells us that Drusilla
was a Jew and it’s implied that perhaps She informed her husband
of the Christian way, as it was known during that time. And really,
if I was under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, I would have
haggled with the Holy Spirit and said, you know, where it
says in verse 24, after some days, Felix came with his wife,
Drusilla, who was Jewish. I would have added in there,
and she was 19. Because that tells us a lot about
Felix. Felix was an older man, perhaps close to 60 years old.
He was on his third wife and she’s only 19 and this is her
second husband. That tells you a lot, doesn’t
it? And there’s a story behind the story. He lured her away
from her husband. She left her first husband to
live with him. They’re not even married. And
so you can imagine what Paul knows because he hears it sitting
in jail. And all that to say, Felix and
Drusilla have a real mess of their lives. And you know, I
hate to poke fun at American Christianity, but it’s too easy
sometimes. Paul is not going to stand before
Drusilla and stand before Felix and say, what’s evangelism these
days? You’ve got three check boxes,
right? God has checked yes, he wants to love you. The devil’s
checked no, he wants you to go to hell. And now there’s the
third check box. It’s up to you to decide, right? That’s American evangelism the
last 150, 200 years. Y’all have been hearing of that
in the Sunday school class over the last many months. That’s
not the way it works, is it? We go to a person and we look
at their lost condition. We tell them in great detail
their lost condition. In fact, several people in recent
church history, I think Francis Schaeffer would have been one
of them, said, if I have an hour with a non-Christian, I’m gonna
spend 59 minutes telling them how sinful they are. And I’m
going to spend the last minute telling them about Jesus. Well,
that’s flipped over on its head these days, isn’t it? We’ve begun
to tell people the gospel is just fire insurance. The gospel
is just a get out of hell free card. And I think we see a great
example in the life and in the ministry of the apostle Paul.
He knows that Drusilla and Felix don’t just need to make a decision.
They don’t need to just pray a prayer. They don’t just need
to fill out a card and tuck it in their Bible. So hope their
kids will find it upon their death and say, oh, good, mom
and dad are in heaven because they signed the prayer card,
right? Forgive me for poking at American Christianity, but
doesn’t this passage lend itself to saying there’s so much more
when we present the gospel? In fact, There are three key
things that Paul speaks of. He speaks of righteousness, he
speaks of self-control, and he speaks of the judgment that is
to come, the judgment of both the righteous and the unrighteous. And in Acts chapter 24, this
is Paul’s gospel presentation. You could read the rest of the
Bible and you might emphasize other things. You might emphasize
something other than self-control. It’s part of the fruit of the
spirit, isn’t it? But here in Acts 24, here in
Paul’s tailor-made presentation to Felix and Drusilla, he says
to them of righteousness and of self-control and of judgment,
much about the Christian faith. I read somewhere in recent years
a wonderful little statement. I wish I could go back and find
where it was and who said it. But the statement goes like this,
Christianity is not a condiment. Now, you know, you go out to
supper and, well, it needs a little salt. It needs a little pepper.
It needs a little ketchup. And the idea behind this quote,
this saying that Christianity is not a condiment, you don’t
take your crummy, sinful life and put a little Jesus on it,
right? That’s what we hear very often.
Uh, take your crummy unrighteous life, squirt a little Jesus on
it. Uh, maybe catch up for the blood of Jesus, something like
that. And Oh, what a, what a wonderful life you have. No, Jesus comes
in and he makes you new. Jesus comes in and by his word
and spirit and through a lifetime of growth and grace, he makes
you whole. And he says to people like Drusilla
and to people like Felix, you need faith in Jesus. You need
faith in his blood and his sacrifice and his atonement. You need repentance. You need to turn from your life
of sinfulness, apparently an unrighteous life, apparently
a life that lacked. self-control, and you need to
walk in newness of life according to the scriptures. That’s the
message Paul gave them at least this one time we’re reading of.
And perhaps he said it over and over in their conversations.
Have you ever thought about who you’re speaking to about Jesus?
And have you ever thought about what’s going on in their life?
And have you ever thought about biblical truth that could apply
directly to them? And you tailor, make a gospel
presentation. That’s what Paul here has done.
He sang to them about righteousness. God is righteous. In him, there
is no blemish. There is no sin. There is no
whiff of evil. God is holy. God is righteous. And I’m sure he said, and you,
Felix, And you, Drusilla, you are unrighteous. You are full
of sin. You are full of wickedness. You
are full of unrighteousness. And Jesus has come. Nazarene,
I’m accused of following this sect, I’m accused of beginning
this. Jesus is righteousness. He came and he lived and he obeyed
and he suffered and he died and he offers salvation through faith
in him. And if you come to him by faith,
you receive that righteousness. God sees you as if you’ve never
sinned. As if you’ve never committed
adultery, as if you’ve never stolen a young wife from a young
husband, as if you’ve never killed anyone, as if you’ve never done
anything wicked under the crown of Rome. And don’t you imagine
Paul got very specific here. He, he said, you can come to
faith in Jesus and that is all wiped away. And then he speaks
of self-control and can’t you imagine that? Felix struggled
with the typical three S’s. A good Baptist preacher friend
of mine says, every man struggles with sex and silver and sloth. He suffers from laziness, he
suffers from the want of money, and he struggles with sex. And that’s exactly where Felix
is. And he’s dragged Drusilla into
this. She’s obviously power hungry. She’s obviously, I mean, they’re
Bonnie and Clyde, right? They are joined at the hip in
their life of crime and sin. And Paul speaks to this lack
of self-control, this lack of righteousness. And then he lands
it. There’s a judgment coming. God
is gonna raise the just and he’s gonna raise the unjust and he
will open the books And Felix, just as you’re judging me over
this Jewish affair, just as you’re judging me over these Roman affairs,
God, the righteous judge of the earth, will judge you. So deal with it. Deal with it
now. Come to faith in Jesus Christ. Believe in him and him alone
for your salvation. Can’t you imagine the boldness
of Paul, the pleading of Paul, The passion of Paul, this old,
battered, near blind man, speaking, making the most of every opportunity
to preach Jesus. Earlier in the pastoral prayer
when I said, Lord, help us to live a righteous life, help others
to see it. And when they ask us who we are
and where we’ve come from, we can tell them about Jesus. Would
you be this passionate? Would you be this pointed? Would
you be this direct with another person knowing their eternal
state? is in the balance, knowing they’re
standing before the righteous God. And so Paul speaks the gospel
in line with the righteous demands of God. He gives the good news
of salvation through faith in Jesus received by faith that
can be yours by turning to Jesus. He risked his neck. This man
judges Paul and he could have said away with him off with his
head. I’m tired of it. Two years. He never gave me a
bribe. Can’t make the Jews happy if I keep them alive. Let’s just
be done with this man. No, Paul is God’s chosen instrument. He’s the chosen instrument to
Gentiles and their kings and whatever cost, whatever it takes,
whatever words, whatever touchy subjects. You know, I’ve got
preacher friends, what you preaching on? I’m preaching through this
book of the Bible. What are you preaching on? Well, I’m preaching
on some topics. And usually when you preach on topics, you preach
on the things that are easy. Usually you preach on the things
that are fun. Usually you preach on the things that aren’t gonna
get anybody upset. But what do you do when you’re
preaching through the gospels and divorce pops up or adultery pops up or
righteousness versus, it’s just there, right? Remember John the
Baptist? He lost his head because he preached.
to a very similar situation. Don’t you think Paul knows with
every word that exits his mouth, this could be it. But he also
knows in the back of his mind, and he knows in his heart because
it’s true, and Jesus’ word is trustworthy, you will be able
to go to Rome and testify. And so this justice delay, this
two years of custody, these conversations, even on touchy subjects, apparently
strike a nerve with Felix and with his wife. And
our passage says, Felix was alarmed. Now you can pass over those words
and say, Paul got him. He was pricked in the heart.
He was touched in his conscience. He probably didn’t sleep for
a day or two, at least until the conviction wore off. This
was a greedy man. This was a man full of lust and
he was corrupt. He had no self-control and his
self-control was lacking in every department. He would put people
to death. He was ruthless. He was a womanizer
and all the rest. And earth’s judge of Paul now
bumps into the righteous judge of the earth, Almighty God. This
man was afraid of two kings. He was afraid of Nero and he
was afraid of King Jesus. Nero, if he didn’t protect the
Pax Romana and King Jesus, if all that Paul said was accurate
and correct. And so now this unrighteous man
is looking at himself in the mirror and he is alarmed. but
he’s not convinced. He’s alarmed, but he’s not converted.
And he says to Paul, go away for now. I’ll hear you later. And you know, that’s a very dangerous
place to be, isn’t it? Especially sitting in church
when we’re sitting under the sound of God’s word. And maybe
perhaps God’s gospel is calling you away from sin, away from
a lack of self-control, away from a life of unrighteousness.
And you’re like Felix saying, not now, go away preacher. Is
it 12 o’clock yet? Is it time for lunch yet? Stop
preacher, I’ve heard enough, I’ve had enough. Perhaps you’re
alarmed, but you’ll forget or it’ll wear off the conviction
in a little while. I think of St. Augustine who
writes in his confessions of his conversion to faith in Jesus.
He said, I held before me the pearl of great price, but I hesitated. And then he makes a prayer at
some point on his way to conversion. He says, Lord, Lord saved me,
but not yet. He was in love with his mistresses.
He was in love with his evil life. And he knew that to come
to faith in Jesus would be to come to grips or actually to
lose his grips on his idols and his unrighteous living. And so
sometimes my brothers and sisters, God presses us to break with
sin. You understand, don’t you, the
reality of what Felix would have to do. He would have to come
to faith in Jesus and bow to another. He would have to put
away his wife and restore her relationship to her rightful
husband. He would have to stop all his ruthless ways and quit
protecting his pay and his pension. And he would have to begin to
live a righteous life. And he puts the pros and the
cons in the scales. And the cons and the pros begin
to tip and teeter and totter. And he says, no, thank you. But I remind you of the story
of Noah building the ark for 100 years. He preached righteousness. He preached of coming judgment
and he preached of salvation through this big wooden boat
he and his boys were building. And the people continually rejected
it. The people continually made sport
of him. They completely thought he was mad. And then there comes
a time when the rain begins, Noah and his family and the animals
go in the ark. And the passage is just very
clearly and crisply says, and God shut the door. And then you fast forward to
Isaiah’s words. Seek the Lord while he may be
found. Call on him while he may be near. And that’s where we are today,
brothers and sisters. Perhaps Christ is pressing you
to come to faith in him for the first time, repenting and turning
from your sins and entering a life of righteousness through faith.
Or perhaps you are a believer and you’ve just been being religious. You’ve just been checking the
boxes. And perhaps you’re holding on dearly to some sin in your
life. God puts you before you today,
his cross. God puts you before you today,
his call. And I hope and pray that Christ
and his gospel message is a fragrance that you see his offer of forgiveness
and that you have no hope facing him in judgment except through
faith and his son, the Lord Jesus. May that be so. Let’s do pray
together. Our Lord, we. We pray that we would know right
now that time is of the essence. If our consciences are tender
and our hearts are stirred and if perhaps we don’t know Jesus
or perhaps we know him, but we’ve not been walking with him, that
we would use this wake up, this warning, these words, uh, that
we would heed them, that we would think of the words of Psalm 95
that are echoed in Hebrews today. If you hear God’s voice, that
we may not harden our hearts. but that our hearts may be tender
to love Jesus, to know Jesus, to walk in him. Lord, hear us
and help us and make your word run its errand and do its work,
we pray with all our hearts. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.