Thursday, August 24, 2023

Today’s Scripture Reading
Acts 24:1–23

Five days later the high priest Ananias came down with some elders and an attorney, a certain Tertullus, and they reported their case against Paul to the governor. When Paul had been summoned, Tertullus began to accuse him, saying: “Your Excellency, because of you we have long enjoyed peace, and reforms have been made for this people because of your foresight. We welcome this in every way and everywhere with utmost gratitude. But, to detain you no further, I beg you to hear us briefly with your customary graciousness. We have, in fact, found this man a pestilent fellow, an agitator among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes. He even tried to profane the temple, and so we seized him. By examining him yourself you will be able to learn from him concerning everything of which we accuse him.” The Jews also joined in the charge by asserting that all this was true.

When the governor motioned to him to speak, Paul replied: “I cheerfully make my defense, knowing that for many years you have been a judge over this nation. As you can find out, it is not more than twelve days since I went up to worship in Jerusalem. They did not find me disputing with anyone in the temple or stirring up a crowd either in the synagogues or throughout the city. Neither can they prove to you the charge that they now bring against me. But this I admit to you, that according to the Way, which they call a sect, I worship the God of our ancestors, believing everything laid down according to the law or written in the prophets. I have a hope in God — a hope that they themselves also accept — that there will be a resurrection of both the righteous and the unrighteous. Therefore I do my best always to have a clear conscience toward God and all people. Now after some years I came to bring alms to my nation and to offer sacrifices. While I was doing this, they found me in the temple, completing the rite of purification, without any crowd or disturbance. But there were some Jews from Asia — they ought to be here before you to make an accusation, if they have anything against me. Or let these men here tell what crime they had found when I stood before the council, unless it was this one sentence that I called out while standing before them, ‘It is about the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial before you today.’”

But Felix, who was rather well informed about the Way, adjourned the hearing with the comment, “When Lysias the tribune comes down, I will decide your case.” Then he ordered the centurion to keep him in custody, but to let him have some liberty and not to prevent any of his friends from taking care of his needs. (NRSV)

Reflection
Some background: Paul got arrested in the Jerusalem temple, and he thinks the charge against him is based on his teaching the resurrection of the dead. He’s defended himself before a crowd outside a barracks, escaped a flogging by insisting on his Roman citizenship, stood up before the council of chief priests, and escaped an assassination plot. Hence the tribune, Claudius Lysias, sent him to Felix the governor with a letter. Now Paul’s defending himself again.

And this isn’t the end. Paul will spend two more years in Felix’s custody after his defense, with Felix unable to find a charge against him but hopeful that Paul will offer a bribe. Then Felix passes Paul on to his successor, Festus, as a favor, and Paul finally appeals to the emperor. This produces more meetings, involving a king named Agrippa and his wife before Paul is finally sent to Rome. The book of Acts will end with Paul in Rome for two years, never reporting on a trial before the emperor.

This background is needed because faith is lived out in the concrete reality of background like this. The legacy of Paul’s New Testament letter and the teaching it contains for the church was not worked out in a private study but in a prison cell, under house arrest, bound, required to make a defense of faith time after time after time. It matters a great deal who is in power at the time and what the cultural, political, and social circumstances are. Those forces shape faith, and the witness of Paul is also that faith shapes those forces.

What governments and courts are doing is pertinent to people of faith, and we are called to be pertinent to courts and governments. Let that calling inspire us as we testify with words and deeds to our common hope in the power of life over the forces of death.

Prayer
Gracious God, embolden us to tell your story to a world that needs to hear it. Over and over again, among family and friends, strangers, leaders, and anyone else, may our story be love, grace, justice, peace. For your glory. Amen.

Written by Rocky Supinger, Associate Pastor for Youth Ministry and Worship

Reflection and Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church

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