THE BOOK OF ACTS
Lesson 54, Chapter 26
We’ll begin at verse 9 of Acts chapter 26 today. So open your Bibles there.
At the picturesque seaside port city of Caesarea Maritima, the provincial capital for the local
region including Judea, Sha’ul is standing before Governor Festus, King Agrippa and Queen
Bernice and an assortment of other unnamed dignitaries. The purpose of this gathering is not
as Paul’s judicial trial since that has already occurred; and the results of the trial were
ambiguous to say the least. In fact it is precisely the vagueness of the testimony that was given
by Paul’s accusers and then Paul’s rebuttal to it that has put Festus in a similar befuddled
position as it did for Festus’s predecessor, Felix. Both Felix and Festus could make little sense
of the accusations against Paul, concluding that essentially none of it had anything to do with
Roman law but rather the dispute had to do with some arcane nuances of Jewish religious
laws. For reasons that aren’t given, the former governor, Felix, apparently didn’t want to rile
the High Priest and the Jewish leadership by the outright acquittal of Paul, so Felix’s solution
was simply to do nothing and let the un-convicted Paul languish in prison until the situation
somehow worked itself out.
The new governor, Festus, was caught in a similar set of Chinese fingers as Felix; he needed
to have good relations with the Jewish leadership (since it was Felix’s inability to maintain
peace and quiet in Jerusalem that got him fired from his job), yet as an able administrator and
judge Festus was not disposed to convict an obviously innocent man purely for the sake of
local politics (especially when that man was a Roman citizen). However Festus had a peculiar
problem that Felix didn’t; as Paul was explaining himself to Festus he declared his rights as a
Roman citizen to appeal his case directly to the Emperor (who at this time was the notoriously
fickle Nero). Festus had little choice but to grant Paul his wish, but at the same time the
Emperor would expect to have a well articulated issue of Roman law presented to him in order
to make the judgment. In this case Festus had already determined that Paul broke no Roman
laws, and so he had no idea what he should write and send to Nero as the issues of this case
that Nero was being asked to settle. However by good fortune the Jewish King Agrippa and his
sister Bernice had arrived in Caesarea for a visit, so Festus thought that perhaps they could
better understand the accusations against Paul and help Festus formulate a proper letter of
charges to be sent along with Paul to Rome.
Let’s re-read part of Acts 26 to begin.
RE-READ ACTS CHAPTER 26:9 – end
Some Bible commentators aren’t satisfied with Paul’s approach in his speech because they
aren’t sure that what Sha’ul is saying is logical. So for them there is doubt as to whether this
account is entirely accurate. While acknowledging their concerns, it seems to me that Paul is
evidently saying that he completely understands his adversaries’ mindset as regards their
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distrust, even hatred, of Yeshua and of the Jewish sect he spawned, The Way, because Paul
himself had once harbored these same views. When witnessing to un-Believers about the
Lord, or even when explaining to long-time Believers about why they should take the entire
Bible seriously (including the Torah) and that manmade Church doctrines need to be re-
examined and some taken with a healthy dose of salt, it is usual for me to explain that not that
long ago I was in their shoes, with the same worldview that the Christian majority holds. What
we read here in Acts 26 is Paul’s way of saying that he doesn’t condemn his opponents for
their current way of thinking because he understands that they are as ignorant of the truth as
he used to be. Yet at the same time Paul communicates that (excuses aside) a new age has
dawned, the Kingdom of Heaven has broken through, and it is time to set aside old prejudices
and thought patterns and be willing to accept God’s sovereign will; and that begins with
accepting His Son, Yeshua, as Lord and Savior.
He goes on to say that he was not only in agreement in principle with the High Priest and the
Sanhedrin concerning Yeshua and The Way, but that he was an active part of the group who
sought to arrest and persecute Christ’s followers. He confesses that he voted with the majority
to put Stephen to death for no other reason than he was a Believer. Further, on behalf of the
Sanhedrin Paul traveled from synagogue to synagogue ferreting out any possible Jesus
sympathizers and then trying to get them to blaspheme. In our previous lesson we discussed
the notion that is nearly universal among New Testament commentators that the blasphemy
that Paul had in mind was to get these Messianic Jews to renounce Yeshua. But that is illogical
because from the viewpoint that Paul held at the time, it was believing in Yeshua that was
heretical; not the act of renouncing Him. If Paul could get a Jewish Believer to renounce Christ
and return to mainstream Judaism, it was seen as a happy ending for everyone and was
certainly not blasphemy. So it is clear to me that Paul was trying to get the Believers to say
things against Jewish Law, halakhah, which would then constitute a case of blasphemy and
thus could be taken before the Sanhedrin; a charge, which proved, exacted the death penalty
from the blasphemer.
Now that Paul has established his life history including where he was born, his religious and
political affiliations, and that he was against the very sect of Judaism that he is now part of, he
explains what brought on his radical change of heart. Beginning in verse 12 he tells his story of
meeting the risen Yeshua, who speaks to Paul from Heaven, as Paul is traveling towards
Damascus, Syria to arrest some Believers who have been reported to have fled to a
synagogue there.
As all who have taught for any length of time will tell you, it is sometimes necessary to repeat
some of the more important information so that students have a better chance to digest it. So I
want to say again something that I have said to you in previous lessons: even though most
Bible commentators and Pastors will refer to Paul’s meeting with Christ on the Road to
Damascus as his “conversion experience”, it was anything but that. Paul did not “convert”;
Paul merely learned in rather dramatic fashion that the Messiah that he (and all other Jews)
were waiting for had come, and His name was Yeshua of Nazareth. For a Jew to convert
means that he or she becomes a gentile (or in the religious sense of the New Testament, a
gentile Christian). And in fact it is clearly the aim of many Christian denominations to establish
Paul as leaving his Jewish heritage and religion behind and adopting a gentile one. This
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doctrine of conversion is widespread in spite of Paul’s claims to the contrary in the Bible
because as the early Church Father Chrysostom and others before and after him claimed, Paul
maintained his outward Jewish appearance and customs as an elaborate, but well meaning,
deception so that he might have a better chance of gaining an audience with Jews for the
purpose of telling them the Gospel.
This is the third time we’ve encountered the same story of Paul’s experience with Yeshua
(first in chapter 9 and then again in chapter 22) so we won’t go over every detail as Paul
recounts that experience for his distinguished audience. I will mention however that there are
minor differences in small details among these 3 tellings, mainly involving how the bright light
shown, who fell down and who got back up, and who saw or heard what, among those
travelling with Sha’ul. What is key is that the event actually happened, and that it was
inherently supernatural; this is the point that Paul wants to come across to the dignitaries
sitting in front of him and to all who might ever hear this story.
Since the era of the Enlightenment that began in Europe in the early 1700’s A.D. the trend of
Christianity has been to search for a rational explanation for what the ancient Bible clearly
wants us to see as irrational to the human mind. And especially in the later 20
th
and now the
21
st
centuries among many Christians and Jews, an acceptable explanation of events such as
the plagues that bedeviled Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea waters, and Paul’s experience on
the road to Damascus must be presented as something that can happen in the natural realm
since the supernatural is deemed but primitive and unintelligent myth. To that end I found
some words from a one-man play written by Phillip Goble, called The Rabbi from Tarsus, in
which Paul is depicted as being interviewed by his friend and sometimes travelling companion
Luke, giving him information for the gospel Luke wishes to write.
I want to quote this to you because not only is it delightful to hear but because it truly exposes
the folly of any Christian wanting to have their cake and to eat it, too, so to speak. That is, for
anyone to profess faith as a Believer in Jesus, but then to demand that when reading the Bible
we run across things that can only be described as “miracles” we cannot accept them as real
unless a basis in science can be found to explain them, is itself an irrational if not downright
silly stance. And I truly believe that anyone who takes this approach may attach a Christian
label to themselves, but it is in fact a dangerous self-deception that they think allows a person
to have one foot in the Kingdom of Heaven and the other comfortably in the world. Listen to
this because I chuckled over it long after I first read it, and yet it is profound enough that it
added one more solid brick to my personal foundation of faith. Perhaps it will to yours as well.
This is Paul speaking to Luke about his experience on the road to Damascus: “Now let me
pause to clear up one thing, Luke….for the benefit of the scoffers you MUST refute. What
exactly made me switch….NOT religions but vocations, from that of a persecutor to that
of an advocate and an apostle? What was the problem, Doctor? Are the scoffers right?
Was it really just a case of sunstroke? Nervous collapse? Hallucination? Guilt
catharsis? ‘What is truth for you, Paul, is not truth for me’, they say. ‘There are natural
explanations for everything’.”
“Yes, yes, Doctor, here is the natural explanation. One day, on the road to Damascus,
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while I tried to enforce the Law of Moses, piously serving my God with all my heart,
I…the arrestor….was arrested by a naïve superstition. Quite naturally, a meteor just
happened to blaze across the sky. At the very same time, it just happened to thunder, so
that the other rabbis quite naturally did see and hear something. At the very same
time…clumsy me….I just happened to fall off my horse. And at the very same time, I just
happened to hallucinate with a nightmare vision, complete with face, fire and voice, that
just happened to be my ENEMY, who just happened to want me to go to work for HIM!!
And this (work was to be) among people who just happened to be my enemies, the
Gentiles. And at the very same time I just happened to have tissues form over both my
eyes with a purely accidental case of coincidental cataracts.”
“Yes, Doctor, there are natural explanations for everything, if one has enough bad blind
faith to go his own way. Many like Nero are lords of their own lives who want to go their
own way, even if it may lead to Hell. But, Luke, I had to trust God, and like any other
disciple take a step of faith into the mikveh waters and then into the Damascus
synagogue.”
Back in Acts 26; Paul continues in his story of his experience with Christ with the words of
verse 14 when he says that the voice from Heaven not only identified himself as Yeshua, but
also spoke to Paul in Hebrew! I find it most fortunate that Luke would include this seemingly
minor bit of information, because Yeshua could have spoken to Paul in his native Greek
tongue, or even in Aramaic in which Paul was conversant. But since Luke says that Messiah
spoke to Paul in Hebrew, would he have said: “Hey Paul, it’s me Jesus?” Or would he have
said “Hey Sha’ul it’s me Yeshua?” I say that tongue in cheek because whether you realize it
or not, the names Paul and Jesus are strictly English-language words (a language that didn’t
come about until 13 centuries after the New Testament was created). So for those who still
have trouble with using the Hebrew names of Jewish Bible characters, and especially for Our
Savior, please note that Christ clearly would have spoken of himself as Yeshua and called
Paul Sha’ul since Luke specifically says that the conversation between Paul and Christ was in
Hebrew.
Then in verse 18, in a sentence that was sure to raise the eyebrows of his aristocratic
audience, Paul says that Yeshua was sending him to open peoples’ eyes in order that they
might turn from darkness to light. And that the people he was being sent to were both Jews
and Gentiles. And that those people, Jews and Gentiles, who put their trust in the very same
person who had interrupted Paul’s journey of persecution would receive forgiveness of sins
and become a member in the community of those whom God set apart for holiness. So now
Paul has crossed a line; it is one thing to more or less instruct Agrippa and Bernice who,
because of their Jewishness, understood that Paul was speaking as a Rabbi from a Jewish
cultural and religious standpoint. But when Paul said that this trust in Yeshua was also
necessary for Gentiles to have their sins forgiven, this was a direct assault on Festus and his
gods.
But understanding that essentially Agrippa was in attendance because of his Jewishness, Paul
addresses him by name and says that he did not disobey this vision from Heaven. So he went
on to Damascus, then back to Jerusalem, and then journeyed throughout the province of
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Judea proclaiming the Good News about forgiveness of sins wherever he went. But even more
that people’s lives need to reflect that they had turned from their sins and repented.
Repentance is always presented, Old and New Testaments, as the prerequisite to forgiveness
of sins whether that sin was atoned for by the blood of animals on the Temple Altar, or by faith
in the blood that Yeshua spilled at Calvary. Let me repeat that: the writers of the Holy
Scriptures know nothing of a kind of forgiveness that occurs without first sincerely repenting
and turning. I think this is perhaps the single reality that worries me the most for all who
profess Christ. I worry that the weak doctrines taught today (and for a long time, really)
incorrectly tell seekers of God that one can achieve forgiveness of sins by merely professing
Christ, and maybe by attending Church or synagogue from time to time, but they can also go
right on living as before with only lip service paid to actual repentance.
Confessing that one has sinned or is sinning or is contemplating committing a sin, is not
repentance (although confession is a good and needed first step). Notice how John the Baptist
preached one thing only, and baptized for one thing only: repentance. The Baptist did NOT
baptize for forgiveness of sins; but only for repentance to PREPARE for forgiveness of sins.
This naturally followed the Law of Moses in its principles. Before presenting one’s sacrifice of
atonement at the Temple Altar, FIRST that person had to have repented and gained a contrite
heart. If they didn’t, their sacrifice had no effect. It is the same for Believers today. Too often I
meet people who truly believe that praying the sinner’s prayer is the beginning and end of their
obligation to God. How they live their lives, what they fill their minds with, and their personal
behavior aren’t seen as a reflection of their faith (or perhaps lack thereof), but rather as
entirely separate issues.
James (actually Jacob), Yeshua’s brother and the supreme leader of The Way until his murder
by the High Priest in 62 A.D., had strong words for those in his time who thought faith and
behavior were not connected. And these strong words are there as a warning for us as well.
James 1:22-25 CJB
22
Don't deceive yourselves by only hearing what the Word says, but do it!
23
For whoever hears the Word but doesn't do what it says is like someone who looks at
his face in a mirror,
24
who looks at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he
looks like.
25
But if a person looks closely into the perfect Torah, which gives freedom, and
continues, becoming not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work it requires, then he
will be blessed in what he does.
And lest anyone think that Paul has a different viewpoint on this subject, listen to this:
Ephesians 2:8-10 CJB
8
For you have been delivered by grace through trusting, and even this is not your
accomplishment but God's gift.
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9
You were not delivered by your own actions; therefore no one should boast.
10
For we are of God's making, created in union with the Messiah Yeshua for a life of
good actions already prepared by God for us to do.
It has always been a struggle in the Christian faith to balance trusting (faith) with works. And it
seems that we always get either too faith-heavy (meaning we see works as perhaps counter-
productive or as even offensive to our faith) or too works-heavy (meaning that we focus so
much on good works that we either get very proud or we lose sight of our first love, Yeshua).
So while Paul is always consistent in insisting that salvation is an act of grace that is not
achieved by our good works, at the same time he counters that if we have truly received the
divine grace brought about by our trust in Yeshua, then it ought to manifest itself as good fruit
in our lives. If the good fruit (synonymous with good works) is not there, this can be an
indication of a serious problem. And this is because we weren’t given salvation simply for its
own sake; but rather salvation is the necessary spiritual condition to ready us for doing the
“good actions already prepared by God for us to do”.
Finally in verse 20, Paul states the reasons as he sees it for his being harassed and arrested:
1) he took this message of Good News to Gentiles, and 2) he went to Jewish synagogues and
proclaimed the same. So the issue is that the Jewish religious leadership were livid that Paul
took a message of salvation (that they didn’t believe in), which was manifest in Yeshua of
Nazareth (who they also didn’t believe in), to gentiles who they saw as occupiers. Once again:
we find that the issue is actually political and cultural, not religious. I also want to alert you to
something we discussed last week: it is that in verse 21 where the CJB says “It was because
of those things that Jews seized me…..”, almost all English translation will say that it was “the
Jews” (adding the article “the” before the word Jews). The article is simply not there in the
Greek. And by adding “the” to make it “the Jews seized me” it becomes an indictment of
Jews in general. By leaving out the article “the” (as in the oldest Greek documents we have),
then it means that only certain Jews seized Paul. These seemingly minor nuances (or perhaps
better, discrepancies) that appear all throughout most standard English Bible translations are
additive in their effect. Suddenly instead of Paul or Yeshua being accused or persecuted by a
certain group of Jews, we find the entire Jewish race being implicated, which was never the
intent of the Scripture passage.
Paul says he has been able to withstand the plots and attacks against him because he had
God’s help. So in the conclusion of his speech he says that he has said nothing except what
the prophets and Moses said would happen. In other words, he is claiming that he has not
created some new doctrine nor has he said anything against normative Judaism. So is he
talking about Jewish Law, here? No. Just as we discussed in earlier lessons about how to
know when Paul uses the term “law” whether he means Jewish Law (Halakhah) or the Law of
Moses (the Torah ), here we see that when he says “the prophets and Moses” it is exactly
synonymous with the term “the prophets and the Law”. Saying someone follows Moses is just
shorthand for saying they follow the Law of Moses. So by using the terms Moses and Prophets
together, we can know for certain that Paul is speaking of Holy Scripture and not traditions and
customs. Sha’ul is saying that he is being persecuted for simply believing and quoting the
Holy Scriptures. And we find that Paul said nothing about Yeshua that Yeshua didn’t also say
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about Himself. In the Gospel of Luke we find this:
Luke 24:25-27 CJB
25
He said to them, "Foolish people! So unwilling to put your trust in everything the
prophets spoke!
26
Didn't the Messiah have to die like this before entering his glory?"
27
Then, starting with Moshe and all the prophets, he explained to them the things that
can be found throughout the Tanakh concerning himself.
Paul also says that the Scriptures explain that Messiah would die, and rise from the dead, and
would proclaim light to Jews and gentiles. This first of all put him at odds with the High Priest
and the Sadducees because they didn’t believe in resurrection even though the Scriptures
clearly speak of it. But that doesn’t matter; in most of Judaism and Christianity traditions and
customs often trump the Bible. If the religious leadership in Paul’s day actually believed God’s
Word, they would see that Paul exactly fit the profile of the prophesied servant of Isaiah 49
who would announce light to both Jews and Gentiles. Paul is being persecuted for doing the
very thing God says must happen.
Isaiah 49:5-6 CJB
5
So now ADONAI says- he formed me in the womb to be his servant, to bring Ya'akov
back to him, to have Isra'el gathered to him, so that I will be honored in the sight of
ADONAI, my God having become my strength-
6
he has said, "It is not enough that you are merely my servant to raise up the tribes of
Ya'akov and restore the offspring of Isra'el. I will also make you a light to the nations, so
my salvation can spread to the ends of the earth."
So here the venerated Isaiah says that the day will come when light will come to the nations
(gentiles). What does that mean, to be a “light” to the nations? The word for light in Isaiah is
the same as we find it early in Genesis regarding creation: owr. Owr is better translated as
enlightenment than light. Owr is a spiritual term that speaks of God’s enlightenment; it speaks
of good and of truth. It does not mean light that comes from light emitting objects such as the
sun or from stars or from a light bulb. So clearly the meaning here in Isaiah is that God’s
enlightenment, God’s truth, will be taken by this honored servant to the gentiles. Paul is doing
exactly that.
But now in verse 24 Festus simply loses it; he can’t fathom what Paul has been saying
(interestingly Paul wasn’t even addressing Festus). To Festus (a man who doesn’t know God)
the divine truth that Paul has been speaking sounds like foolish nonsense; the ramblings of a
madman. Of course! One must be “of God” to understand the things of God. Festus was
anything but.
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1Corinthians 2:14 CJB
14
Now the natural man does not receive the things from the
Spirit of God- to him they are nonsense! Moreover, he is unable to grasp them, because
they are evaluated through the Spirit.
Many years ago my wife and I were visiting her elderly father. A college educated man who
was a retired school teacher, he found the Bible impossible to comprehend. One day we were
sitting together in his living room talking about something in the Bible when he just burst out in
frustration that he has tried and tried to read the Bible but it was just words that formed no
meaning for him. He said he saw that there were sentences and paragraphs and that the
words were actual words; but they made no sense to his mind. He was not a Believer.
A few years later, and only months before he passed away, he made his peace with God. He
entered a local church that had been very kind to him, walked forward and went to his knees
and sincerely prayed for forgiveness. He received Christ. We saw him a few weeks later
reading his Bible and he said all of a sudden the words have meaning and bring him great
comfort; and he couldn’t understand why until then those Bible passages were just a jumble of
nouns, adjectives and verbs.
Festus was an educated and intelligent man who worshipped the pagan Roman gods. He had
no relationship with the true God and (he admittedly) knew little about Jews or the Jewish
religion. So Paul’s words were just so much noise and clatter to him. Essentially, Paul’s
speech and the beautiful life-giving truths that were embedded within it were far beyond
Festus’s spiritual capacity to grasp. And this is something we must understand when we
speak to non-Believers about the Lord. Unless the Lord has already done a work in them,
everything we might say seems like foolishness because non-Believers have no spiritual
capacity to understand them.
Paul responds with great courage to Festus that what he is saying is not crazy-talk, but rather
is truth and sanity. And that King Agrippa surely understands these matters (being Jewish), so
that’s why Paul was addressing himself to Agrippa and not to Festus. So then Paul confronts
Agrippa and asks him the $64,000 question: “So king, do you believe the prophets?” Agrippa
is incredulous! He’s also no doubt somewhat embarrassed so he fires back that he now
realizes that all along Paul has been trying to persuade him to become a Believer! Paul minces
no words and acknowledges that indeed he’d like for Agrippa to become a Believer and in fact
he wants everyone to become a Believer.
That last thought was a real conversation stopper. Agrippa and Bernice had heard enough and
quickly made their exit. But even though in Festus’s opinion Paul was perhaps not in his right
mind, and despite Paul’s aggressive evangelism, he had certainly not done anything that
deserved death or prison. So essentially Agrippa and Bernice proved to be of no help to poor
Festus; he still had no idea what to tell Nero about Paul’s case.
The chapter closes with Agrippa dumbfounded that Paul had appealed to the Emperor
because since he has essentially been found not guilty he could have walked away a free man
right then. But because Paul appealed he would have to remain in custody many more months,
maybe even a year or more, until he could be transported to Rome and until Nero could hear
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his case. What Agrippa doesn’t know is that God had planned it this way, and Paul was aware
of it and happy as could be that he was about to get a free ticket to Rome so that he could
share the Good News with the Romans and hopefully even with Nero himself (all as God told
him would happen, several years earlier).
What to the average person might seem like a terrible outcome for Paul (STILL remaining
incarcerated for now well over 2 years), was for Paul a victory. What a lesson for us; even the
unpleasant things that happen in life that seem to be anywhere from inconvenient to painful or
even catastrophic as perceived by our fleshly eyes may well be God’s plan and purpose for us
if we’re willing to take it up. Paul wasn’t being punished or ignored by God; he was being
used in one of the mightiest ways we’ll find in all of Holy Scripture. But it wasn’t glamorous,
comfortable or convenient.
Luke 9:23 CJB
23
Then to everyone he (Christ) said, "If anyone wants to come after me,
let him say 'No' to himself, take up his execution-stake daily and keep following me.
Paul exemplified Yeshua’s statement. So the question we each face (if we have the courage
to be honest with ourselves) is how far away from our comfort zones are we willing to go
should the Lord call us? What is the limit to our self-sacrifice and personal discomfort that we
are willing to experience to do the Lord’s will? Paul had no limit.
Next time we’ll take up Paul’s perilous voyage to Rome, and hear one of the most amazing
and dramatic sea stories ever recorded in ancient history.
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