A Divine Encounter: Paul's Appeal to Agrippa

Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church Podcast,

where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.

My name is Pastor Josh, and I want to thank you for listening to

this podcast.

I hope that this podcast can be a blessing to you and strengthen

you in the word of God.

Now, come along.

Let's look into the Bible and see what God has for us here today.

We're going to get into the scriptures here this evening.

If you have your Bibles, turn there with me to Acts 26.

And it's been a couple weeks since we've been here because last

week was Father's Day and we didn't have an evening service.

But if you can remember, let's.

Let me.

Let me quiz you guys on this.

Okay?

Where we left Paul off, was he in what we would call a circumstantial

good place or a bad place?

Bad place.

Okay, He's.

He's in prison.

He's been held for over now two years for essentially doing nothing

wrong.

And he was promised a fair trial.

They didn't give him one.

And so basically, there was this guy that basically said this.

He said, you know what?

I.

I can't make a decision, so I'm just going to leave you there

in jail.

That was Felix.

And we saw a guy named Festus.

Festus is like, I don't know what to do with this guy named Paul.

I've tried to deal with his own people, and he's not really.

They're not really cooperating with me.

And so he gives it over to a guy named Agrippa.

Now, in the meantime, Paul has appealed to talk to Caesar.

Now, why is that important?

Because Paul is a Roman citizen, and he had the opportunity

to appeal his case to the highest court in the land, and that

would be Caesar.

And so Paul in this process says, I want to talk to Caesar.

And so they said, if that's what you want, that's what you'll

get.

But here in chapter 26, we see Agrippa come before Paul.

And Paul is going to, essentially.

Well, Agrippa's plan is for Paul to tell him why he's innocent.

But Paul takes this as an opportunity to give the gospel.

But I want to go back a little bit here, because if we were to be

watching this as a movie, we would say, while Paul has made a

lot of bad decisions to get to where he is, he should have been

smarter.

He should have avoided this.

Well, believe it or not, back In Acts chapter 21, Paul had an opportunity

Acts 21 · chapter mention

to avoid this whole situation.

And if you Go back.

If you remember what happens is that Paul believes that God is

calling him to go back to Jerusalem, if you remember the phrase

that he used.

He says, I am bound by the Spirit to go to Jerusalem.

Didn't have to go to Jerusalem, but he believed that God

was leading him there.

And then he had all these people on the path to get back to

Jerusalem, telling him, God has told us that you're going to

face persecution there, Paul, so don't go.

And Paul says, well, I'm going to go.

And a lot of commentators will say that he was disobeying God.

I don't believe that he was actually.

I believe that God did reveal to these people that he would face

persecution.

But I believe that these people took it further and said,

hey, there's going to be persecution, so you should avoid

it.

But what we're learning here in this passage is that even though

there was persecution in the path of Paul, it was God's plan for

him to go through this.

And if you go back to Acts chapter 21 and you go to verse 13,

Acts 21 · chapter mention

you're going to see where Paul's heart was through all of this.

Now, it doesn't mean that Paul doubted God.

It doesn't mean that he didn't doubt God.

It just means that when Paul went to this trial, right before

this trial, he had a decision that he had to make.

Was he going to be committed to what God had called him to do,

or would he be kind of what we would call lukewarm in his decision?

But we see in verse number 13 in Acts chapter 21.

Acts 21 · chapter mention

Then Paul answered, what mean ye to weep and to break mine heart?

For I am ready not to be bound only, but also to die at Jerusalem

for the name of the Lord Jesus.

And so Paul says, two years ago, over two years ago, I gotta

go to Jerusalem.

I'm willing to be thrown in prison.

I'm willing to die for the gospel of Jesus Christ.

And so Paul here is demonstrating full commitment.

He's demonstrating being sold out for what God has called him to

do, no matter what people are doing around him, no matter how difficult

the path might be.

And I think this is an awesome example of patience and faithfulness

in the face of difficulty.

Because God has given Paul a call.

And we know that call came all the way back in Acts chapter 9.

Acts 9 · chapter mention

Paul's goal was to not only preach to the Jews, to the Gentiles,

but to kings and leaders.

And that was God's plan for Paul at the very beginning.

And so here in this case, we know that Paul is just fulfilling

God's plan in his life.

And so let's go to chapter 26, and we're going to look at Paul and

Agrippa's conversation here, and it's a very interesting one.

It's a very popular one when it comes to the idea of presenting

the gospel to difficult people.

By the way, Agrippa is.

Is Herod, basically, he's one of the lines of.

Of the people that, you know, named Herod.

So he's a descendant of the Herod that tried to kill baby Jesus.

He's a descendant of Herod that saw Jesus before Jesus went

to the cross.

And so Herod Agrippa is his name, is living here with his wife,

and they're living a life of sin.

And we're going to talk a little bit more about that in a little

bit, but that's the setting that we have here.

Verse 1.

Then Agrippa said unto Paul, thou art permitted to speak for thyself.

So essentially, what Agrippa says is, a lot of people have been

speaking for you.

A lot of people have been telling me what you're all about.

But it's your chance now to tell me anything.

You have an open floor.

You, you can tell me whatever you want.

Appeal to me for your innocence.

He says, you're permitted to speak for yourself.

So Paul could have said a lot of things.

Paul could have decided to basically wiggle his way out of the

situation that he's in.

But Paul takes this opportunity not only to prove that

he's innocent, but also to preach the gospel.

And that's his number one decision here.

And so it says, then Paul stretched forth the hand and answered

for Himself.

Verse 2.

I think myself happy, King Agrippa.

Now, how many of us could say that we were happy to do what he's

doing right now?

I don't think that I could say that I was happy, but he says, I

think myself happy, King Agrippa, because I shall answer for

myself this day before thee, touching all the things whereof I

am accused of the Jews.

And so though Paul was a prisoner, he was pleased, he was

blessed to speak before Agrippa one because he was giving

evidence to prove that he was innocent, but also he's pleased to

preach the gospel to kings and rulers like God had called him to

do.

And sometimes it's difficult for us to have any joy and happiness

in the midst of a difficulty, but it's seeing the gospel purpose

in what God has for us.

And so we know that no Doubt.

Paul saw the Gospel purpose in this opportunity to speak to Agrippa.

Verse 3.

Especially because I know thee to be expert in all customs and questions

which are among the Jews.

So Paul says, I'm glad to talk to you because you know a lot about

the Jewish customs, you know a lot about the Jewish beliefs.

And so you're going to understand me when I tell you what

I'm about to tell you.

He says, wherefore I beseech thee to hear me patiently.

So he basically says, I know you know a lot about Jewish customs,

so please be patient because I'm going to build a case.

I'm going to point you to the truth.

Verse 4.

My manner of life from my youth, which was at the first among

my own nation at Jerusalem, know all the Jews which knew me from

the beginning, if they would testify that after the most straightest

sect of our religion, I lived a Pharisee.

So, so what is he doing here?

Basically, Paul is giving his biography and he says, I I.

Even though we know he was born in Tarsus, very shortly after

he was born, the Bible clearly teaches that he did move to Jerusalem.

And probably at a young age he was living in Jerusalem.

And we know that he took that next step of being in the strictest

sect of the Pharisees.

And so Paul was a faithful Jew, but he was known to be a faithful

Jew above all other Jews.

And so he comes there and he is well known in that way.

And so all the people in Jerusalem would have known Paul for

his religion, for his.

For his beliefs, for his traditional actions in the Jewish

customs.

Verse 5, which knew me from the beginning, if they would testify

that after the most straightest sect of our religion,

I lived a Pharisee.

And now I stand and am judged for the hope of the promise made

of God unto our fathers.

So he says, the reason why they're judging me is because what

I preached unto which promise are 12 tribes instantly serving God,

day and night, hope to come, meaning remember what he was thrown

in jail for?

Preaching the resurrection, preaching the truth of Jesus resurrecting

from the dead.

Because they were okay with Paul teaching religion and teaching

morality and teaching the law.

What they're upset about is Paul teaching that there's the resurrection

of the dead in Jesus Christ and in those that believe in him.

So he says, why is everyone upset with me?

Because they believe that there is going to be a resurrection

of the dead.

He says they're hoping for that.

So why are they upset?

He says, for which hope's sake, King Agrippa, I am accused

of the Jews.

He says, I'm being accused of preaching about the resurrection.

And so Paul is trying to explain his case to Agrippa here.

And so that's really what his initial door opening conversation

is.

Verse 8.

Why should it be, though a thing incredible with you that God

should raise the dead?

He says, why do you think that it's weird or strange that God would

raise the dead?

Because that's obviously something that they would have believed.

That is obviously something that they were totally comfortable

with talking about, that God would raise people from the dead

one day.

They had a problem with Jesus doing that.

But he says he's trying to build a case for, for the truth of

Jesus.

Verse 9.

I barely thought with myself that I ought to do many things contrary

to the name of Jesus of Nazareth, which thing I also did

in Jerusalem.

He says, there's a lot of people that were against Jesus.

I understand that because I was against Jesus.

At one point he says, I did that in Jerusalem.

And many of the saints did.

I shut up in prison.

So now he's given his testimony of his sinful past.

He says, I threw people in prison for worshiping Jesus, having

received authority from the chief priests.

And when they were put to death, I gave my voice against them.

And so we even see that he was part of putting people to death for

believing in Jesus.

And I punished them oft in every synagogue and compelled them

to blaspheme.

Think about that.

Think about what Paul's goal was before he became a believer.

It was his goal not only just to kill Christians, but you see here,

he says he compelled them to blaspheme, to become heretics.

Think about the opposite of Paul's calling now.

At one point in Paul's life, he was trying to get people not to

believe in Jesus, to.

To recant their faith.

And now it's the complete opposite.

He's trying to get people to believe.

And so he's showing this change that's happened in his life.

And so he says, I compelled them to blaspheme.

And being exceedingly mad against them, I persecuted them even

unto strange cities.

And so at the end of the day, what we can see here is that Paul

is describing really his heart.

Before he came to the place of, of salvation.

He said he compelled them to blaspheme.

He was upset against them, he persecuted them.

And so ultimately we see that Paul's heart was a heart of anger.

And really that's what we see with persecution anyway when, when

people are persecuting it doesn't come necessarily out of a

heart of joy and love.

It's coming out of a heart of evil.

It's coming out of a heart of anger and rage.

And so we see that Paul, before he was saved, was characterized

by anger and bitterness and persecution.

And so ultimately we know that Paul's heart was in the wrong place

before he came to Christ.

And so he's explaining this transformation.

So now in verse 12, Paul is going to start talking about what

changed him.

And this is really what we have to do when we're giving the

gospel to people, even people like Agrippa, who knew the Jewish

customs, who in some ways was religious or at least understood

religion, and probably held some power in the land and had some

sway and some influence with people.

We could say a lot of different things.

We.

We could appeal to a lot of different aspects.

But what does Paul do?

Paul appeals to his own personal testimony.

He says, this is who I was.

I was a religious person.

I was a person filled with anger.

I was a person that persecuted people, that worshiped Jesus.

But then he's going to talk about his conversion, his change.

And when we share our.

Our faith with people, I think it's important for us to share our

testimony, to share what Jesus Christ did for us, what he changed

in our life.

Verse 12.

Whereupon, as I went to Damascus, with authority and commission

from the chief priest, he says, so I was leaving to persecute

people there In Damascus at midday, O King, I saw in the way

a light from heaven above, the brightness of the sun shining round

about me and them which journeyed with me.

And when we were fallen to the earth, I heard a voice speaking to

me and saying in the Hebrew tongue, saul, Saul, why persecutest

thou me?

It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.

Now you guys know the story.

Paul has probably told the story three or four times already

in giving the testimony of his salvation.

Verse 15.

And I said, who art thou, Lord?

And he said, I am Jesus whom thou persecuted.

But rise and stand upon thy feet, for I have appeared unto thee

for this purpose.

And so right here we're going to see what God told Paul as his

purpose.

And.

And Paul takes this purpose seriously.

It says, to make the a minister or a servant and a witness

both of these things which thou has seen and of those things

in which I will appear unto thee.

And so Paul's purpose from the very beginning was to proclaim the

message of God, to be a servant and a witness of the things

that God has done.

What he continues to do and what he will do.

And that's really ultimately who we are when we're presenting

the gospel to people is we're presenting the truth of what Jesus

has done for us, what he continues to do for us, and what

he will continue to do for other people that believe in him.

And so Paul understood his purpose.

He says, I was changed.

I went from trying to get Christians to blaspheme Christ to

now bring people to become believers in Jesus Christ.

From blasphemy to belief, from persecution to preaching.

That's an amazing thing to think about in the transformation

of the life of Paul.

And so he's appealing to Agrippa.

This is what changed me.

And folks, I know that probably most of us in this room

weren't where Paul was.

Hopefully none of you were persecuting people and getting people

to blaspheme Christ.

But at the end of the day, God has changed us.

He has changed our heart.

He has changed our desires.

And that's how we present the gospel to people.

Verse 17.

Delivering thee from the people and from the Gentiles, unto

whom now I send thee to open their eyes and to turn them from

darkness to light.

That's one of my favorite analogies when it comes to the aspect

of salvation.

From taking ourselves to a place of light and the Lord brings

us from darkness to light.

That's the picture of the Gospel.

And from the power of Satan unto God that they may receive forgiveness

of sins and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith

that is in me, man.

Verse number 18 is a really great summary of what happens in

the gospel.

And folks, I think that so many times we cloud up the gospel

with things that we've been told or things that make sense to

us.

It's very, very important for us to stay in the word of God and

define the gospel and salvation by what the word of God

says in the verse 18.

What happens in salvation?

Our eyes are open.

We turn from darkness to light.

We turn from the power of Satan into the power of God.

We receive forgiveness of sins.

We have an inheritance or a blessing among us as.

As we are sanctified by faith that is in me.

Verse 19.

Whereupon, O king Agrippa, I was not disobedient unto the heavenly

vision.

He says, no, I wasn't going to disobey what God called me to do.

I'm going to do it.

I'm obedient.

Verse 20.

But show first unto them of Damascus and at Jerusalem and throughout

all the coast of Judea and then to the Gentiles that they should

repent and turn to God and do works meet for repentance.

So Paul's heart here is to get people to turn away from their wicked

lives, to repent and turn to God and to work for him.

Verse 21.

For these causes, the Jews caught me in the temple and went

about to kill me.

So he says, you really want to know why they threw me in jail?

It's not because I was persecuting them.

It's not because I was telling them that they can't believe what

they're believing.

It's because I preached the gospel.

Paul holds nothing back here.

He says, I'm preaching the truth.

Verse 22.

Having therefore obtained help of God, I continued unto this day,

witnessing both to great, to small, and to great, saying none

other things than those which the prophets and Moses did say should

come.

So he says, all I'm doing is preaching the fulfillment of the

Old Testament, that Christ should suffer and that he should

be the first that should rise from the dead and should show light

unto the people and to the Gentiles.

What we're seeing here is what we would call a master class in appealing

to the Gospel, to people, no matter who they are.

And all Paul is doing is pointing to the truth.

He knows that Agrippa understands what has been taught

in the Old Testament.

He understands that Agrippa knows the prophets and believes the

prophets and says, well, if you believe the prophets and if you

believe the Old Testament, you're going to see that Jesus is

the fulfillment of all of that.

And he's just the first one that's going to rise from the dead.

But everyone's going to rise from the dead that believe in Jesus

Christ.

And so he.

He paints this beautiful picture.

He preaches this strong gospel message, and we're going to see the

outcome of this.

Verse 24.

And as he thus spake for himself, Festus said with a loud

voice, paul, thou art beside thyself.

Much learning doth make thee mad.

You don't know what Festus is saying in.

In the.

The language of their day.

He's basically saying, you have become so smart, you've become

foolish.

You're crazy.

You're crazy for preaching this message.

You're crazy for living this life.

You're crazy for going to jail and being willing to be persecuted

and die for this faith.

Festus did not understand.

It was silly to him.

But we do know that the Bible says that preaching the cross to

those that are perishing is going to be foolishness.

Folks, what, what we do on Sunday mornings, what we do in our

Christian life, how we raise our children, what we do in giving

to God through our talents and through our treasures.

What we do in commitment to him makes no sense to people who

don't understand the truth of Jesus Christ, who don't understand

the Gospel.

There's a lot of things that we could be doing in our lives that

are going to be what we would call more beneficial to our good.

But at the end of the day, what we have to do is we have to

understand that the Bible says very clearly that there is no other

way.

There is a narrow way.

There is one path.

And so what we see here is that Festus is looking at Paul and

says, paul, you preaching this message is silliness.

It's foolishness.

It doesn't make any sense.

Obviously Paul was, was very educated.

We know that through what he says here.

He says, much learning doth make thee mad.

And so Festus does not understand.

Festus is just stiff arming the Gospel.

He says, this doesn't make any sense.

Verse 25.

But he said, I am not mad, most noble Festus.

So Paul turns around, he says, I'm not mad, but speak forth the

words of truth and soberness.

I think that one of the statements I heard not too long ago

was this.

When we live in a world of lies, the truth seems crazy, right?

Because we're around so much deception, right?

And the deception starts from the enemy.

We know that Satan is the father of lies.

But when, when Satan gives those lies to the world.

The world.

Now we know the Bible.

When we say the world, we're not talking about like the physical

dirt.

We're talking about the world system.

The world system is full of lies, right?

And that's really evident today.

We don't know what to believe.

Like you turn on the Internet, turn on the tv.

It's hard for us to know what is truth, right?

And so if we start appealing to what is more compelling, we might

be pulled over to a compelling lie.

I don't know if any of you have, probably most of you have a

better understanding of artificial intelligence than I do.

But the truth is, is that you can turn on and watch a video that's

not really happening, but it can look really convincing.

And today if you turn on your phone, you can pull up a video, you

can see a video pretty much playing and doing anything.

And what's happening today is that many people are being deceived

and saying, well, that looks compelling, that looks real.

So I'VE got to believe that.

But that's been happening from the very beginning.

Satan is going to package his lies in a very compelling, very attractive

way.

And so what Paul says is this.

No, I'm not mad.

You're the one that's mad.

That's what he's essentially saying.

He says, I'm preaching the words of truth and soberness and

the word of God will always bring us to that place of truth.

That, that word of God is always going to be bringing us to

a place of being sober minded.

And so obviously when we preach the truth, people are going

to really be upset with that.

I mean, very, very quickly, just preach the gospel for about

five minutes.

People are going to be upset with that.

People are going to be upset with the fact that the Bible calls

us sinners.

The Bible's going to tell people that there's only one way

to salvation.

The Bible's going to tell people a lot of things that go against

culture today.

And people are going to call us mad.

People are going to be upset with that.

I don't know if you guys saw that today in the news.

There was a church up in Michigan, they got attacked and they're

calling it a terrorist attack.

And thank goodness the security team was able to come together

and protect the people.

But the truth of the matter is, is that the more we live for

the truth, the more people are going to come against that.

People that are living in darkness don't want to be revealed.

Right?

If we turned out all these lights in this room and we, we sat

in here for like a day, all right, maybe even like eight hours,

we would get used to the darkness.

And the moment we flip that bright light on, it would make all

of us recoil.

It would make all of us, it would hurt.

And that's what's happening in the world today.

Everyone has been living in darkness for so long that when the

light of the truth is shining on them, it hurts.

They recoil from that.

That doesn't make any sense to them.

And so I remember it was Pastor Spicer.

He always like, he would always want the lights on in the

office.

He's like, hey, men, men love darkness rather than light.

We should have light in here.

No darkness in here.

Always want to turn all the lights on.

And I appreciated that.

But the truth of the matter is, is that that's exactly what's

happening here.

Festus cannot understand the truth.

And for him it seems crazy.

Paul says, no, I'm preaching truth and soberness.

Verse 26.

For the king knoweth of These things before whom also I speak freely.

So Paul says, no, Festus Agrippa understands what I'm saying

about the Old Testament.

He understands what I'm saying.

He says, and I'm speaking freely to him.

For I am persuaded that none of these things are hidden from him,

for this thing was not done in a corner.

So he says, look, the thing that Jesus did, the things that we

see in Scripture, they're not done in private.

It's very evident to people.

It would have been evident for the people that live back at that

time frame to know what Jesus did and to know his miracles and

to know his power, but yet they were turning a blind eye to

the evident truth right before them.

And that's what we see today.

You know, there's a lot of people that say, you know what?

I would just believe if there was enough proof.

If God would just come down right now and show me the truth,

I would believe.

And the answer to that is he already has, right?

2,000 years ago, Jesus came down and demonstrated everything

that he needed to demonstrate.

It's recorded in his Word, and we have everything that we need.

And the vast majority of the people that say, I need to have proof,

even if Jesus came down and showed himself to them, they would

deny it, and they would say, it's a.

It's a vision.

It's a.

It's an hallucination.

It's some kind of artificial intelligence.

And I even.

I saw that one time there was this.

This famous atheist.

He was.

He was debating somebody and they said, well, what if, you know,

the intelligent design basically was the debate.

And they were saying, you know, could.

Would you concede that, you know, something implanted this on

the Earth and something grew to who we are today?

And he says, yes, maybe.

He goes, possibly it could have been aliens that came and dropped,

you know, some things down.

So this guy was willing to believe in aliens that came and planted

in this earth people and could not believe and couldn't.

His could.

He couldn't, in his brain, come to the fact of identifying who

God was and identifying that that could actually happen.

What I would say is this.

There's a lot of people that are rejecting the truth of God because

of the fact that they don't want to be accountable to the truth

of God.

They don't want to be accountable to a higher power.

Verse 28.

Then Agrippa said unto Paul, excuse me, go back.

Verse 27, Paul turns the king Agrippa.

So this is Paul's invitation, and this is important.

This is why we talk to people when it comes to the understanding

of the Gospel.

Because if you just talk and leave it out there, that's one thing.

Another thing is to put the test out there.

Are you willing to believe this?

Verse 27.

King Agrippa believest thou the prophets.

He says, hey, Agrippa, do you believe in the prophets?

I know that thou believest.

He says, so if you believe in the prophets, then you have to believe

in Jesus.

Verse 28.

Then Agrippa said unto Paul, almost, this is some of the saddest,

you know, words in Scripture.

Almost, thou persuadest me to be a Christian almost.

And what was holding Agrippa back?

There's a lot of theories about what was holding King Agrippa

back.

Some would say that it was.

It was Festus over there.

Festus was a man of power.

And you just called Paul crazy for believing in this.

And so maybe Agrippa was afraid of what Festus would say if

he believed.

Or.

Or some would say that maybe it was his wife that was holding

him back, who was there.

We don't know for certain.

Ultimately, it was a lack of belief.

But he says, almost thou persuaded me.

And basically in the.

In the Greek, it literally means in a little bit you could persuade

me.

And it just.

If maybe I just need a little bit more.

I just need a little bit more.

I need a little bit.

Maybe it's a little bit more time, a little bit more proof, whatever

it is.

He says, in a little bit you could persuade me.

Verse 29.

And Paul said, I would to God that not only thou, but also all

that hear me this day were both almost and altogether such as

I am, except these bonds.

And so what does he say here?

He says, you know what, Agrippa, I hope you and everybody

else, you don't just come close to being saved, but you completely

trust in Jesus Christ.

He says, I hope you have what I have.

Except.

He says, except for these bonds.

He says, I don't.

I don't wish this on anybody.

I don't wish anyone this type of persecution.

He goes, but I wish that you.

I pray that you would come to Christ.

And that's really the way that our prayer should be, that.

That people could understand the blessings that we have in our

life, to understand the hope that we have in our life, to understand

the confidence that we have in our life.

And so Paul says, I.

I hope that.

I pray that God would save not only you, but all those that are

here today.

Verse 30.

And when he had thus spoken, the king rose up and the governor

and Bernice, his wife, and they that sat with them.

And when they were gone aside, they talked between themselves, saying,

this man doeth nothing worthy of death or of bonds.

He said, this.

This guy is not guilty of anything.

He doesn't deserve to die.

He doesn't even deserve to be in jail.

Then said Agrippa to Festus, this man might have been set at liberty,

let go, if he had not appealed unto Caesar.

So even at this point, Agrippa's like this guy.

Paul made the wrong decision.

He should have never appealed to Caesar.

He could have been out right now.

But Paul knows that God has a purpose for him to preach the gospel,

preach the gospel to the highest court, the highest authority.

And so Paul preaches the gospel message.

So what can we learn from this?

What can we learn from the lesson of Paul preaching to Agrippa?

I think there's a couple things that we can learn here that

we should be joyful when we have the opportunity to preach the

gospel to anyone, specifically people of high authority.

And though he was a prisoner in chains, Paul said he was joyful.

And so that's one lesson that we could learn.

One other thing that we could see is that Paul preaches the gospel

unapologetically and completely.

I think it's important for us when we preach the gospel to people,

to preach it unapologetically and completely, persistently.

Paul understood and knew how he should appeal the gospel to Agrippa.

So know our audience.

Agrippa knew the prophets.

Agrippa knew the Jewish customs.

And so that's what Paul appeals to there.

Paul appeals to the truth that Agrippa understood.

And so Paul used Festus's outbursts to appeal to the king.

And so Paul brought this to Agrippa and says, do you believe?

And there's that point of decision there.

Do you believe?

He doesn't say, what do you do?

He doesn't say, how much church do you go to?

He doesn't say, how many offerings do you give?

He says, do you believe?

Do you believe the prophets?

Do you believe the Scriptures?

And so when Paul called Agrippa to faith in the prophets

and ultimately to Jesus, what does Agrippa do?

Agrippa refuses to believe.

And he says, you know what, Paul?

You almost persuaded me.

You almost got me there.

And I think another lesson that we can learn here is that no

matter what case we bring to a person, it's ultimately the Holy

Spirit that saves them.

I can have the greatest argument, I can have the greatest

message that I've ever preached in my life.

But at the end of the day, it's the Holy Spirit's work in that

individual's life to come to faith.

And so Agrippa's reply basically is you can actually almost,

through the text, see his.

His sorrow in it.

You almost.

You almost convince me.

And so almost being a Christian means what?

That I'm not a Christian.

And there's a lot of people out there that are almost there,

and there's a lot of people that maybe we're tempted to give

up on.

The Bible says that we have to keep going, we have to be consistent,

we have to be persistent.

And so ultimately, what we can see here is that there's a lot of

lessons.

And so what stopped Agrippa, I don't know.

But I think the biggest thing that we can point to is the fact

that he did not believe.

But Paul appeals with his testimony, with the power of God

to Agrippa and all those that were there.

And so what I would say here tonight is, is the challenge for

us, and it's a challenge for me is a lot of times I see sharing

my faith as a burden.

I see sharing my faith as an inconvenience.

I see sharing my faith as something that is going to cause

me fear and trepidation.

But what I would say is that let's be like Paul.

Let's.

Let's get to a place in our life.

As Acts 26, verse 2 says that he was happy to share with the king,

Acts 26:2

he was happy to share his faith.

And I think all of us at some point in time could have a testimony

of God's power in our life.

I mean, think about the testimonies that were given this

morning.

The fact that that fella had all these things that happened in

his life and transpired that protected him from a plane crash

and.

And God healed him from cancer.

Like, we all have testimonies like that.

We all have times in our life that we can point to and say, wow,

that was a God thing.

That was something that I could not explain for myself.

Hey, those are things that we should be excited about telling other

people to.

To.

So, so he appeals to Caesar.

And so that's what King Agrippa thinks is Paul's worst decision.

He says Paul could have been free, but no, he appealed to Caesar.

Why did he have to do that?

Well, we know why he had to do that.

Because it was ultimately God's plan for him to present the

gospel to Caesar and to all those that were in Rome.

And so Paul Says, I wish that you could believe.

I hope that you can believe.

I pray that you can believe.

But ultimately, you have to make that decision for yourself.

And so we're going to see in chapter 27, Paul is going to be sent

to Rome, and Paul is going to.

We, you know, today, in today's time, we jump on a plane,

we're there within a day.

We're going to see that Paul is going to get on a ship and there's

going to be a storm and there's going to be a shipwreck,

and there's going to be a lot of things that happen between the

time Paul gets to Rome.

And then, even after Paul gets to Rome, he doesn't immediately go

to Caesar.

He isn't immediately persecuted for his faith.

He's thrown in prison there, and he's got to wait.

So a lot of Paul's latter life is a lot of waiting and a lot of

thinking.

And we know a lot of writing, all the prison epistles came through

the time.

And so we know that God had a plan for Paul in prison.

And I, I, one of the, one of the.

I mean, honestly, we were going to be announcing here very

soon that we were planning a trip to Israel in 2026.

And obviously, you guys see the news and know that that might

not be happening.

Probably not happening.

We had just gotten word that everything was clearing up over there.

Believe it or not.

I was talking to the representative, and we were.

We were, like, praying about it.

We're like, okay, we're gonna bring it to the church.

And, you know, we were excited.

And literally, like, three days later, all this stuff started

transpiring, and we're like, okay, all right, so maybe God doesn't

have that plan.

But the point I'm trying to make is one of the places that was

a really sobering place was when we went to Caesarea.

When we went to Caesarea Maritime, that's where Paul was held.

And we saw all the different places, and then we went to this

place and it was, it was.

You could tell it was a room.

And a lot of people, the, the archaeologists there said that this

would have been a prison cell.

And I thought about.

I'm like, I wonder, I wonder if this is the exact place that Paul

was being held while he was waiting in captivity there for two

years.

I don't know for sure, but it took me back.

And it took me back to that place in my mind where I thought

about, hey, you know what, what was Paul thinking when he was

there, when he was writing these letters.

And ultimately, we know what his thinking was.

If you go to the book of Philippians, Philippians, chapter

one, he said, you know what, if it takes me to go to jail and

go through all these problems, and if it takes me to go to death

for people to trust in Jesus, great.

That's what I want.

And that's.

That's amazing to see that Paul's heart for his people, his

heart for the j.

It's one thing that he had heart for his own people, by the

way, his people are the ones that betrayed him.

But then Paul had a heart for the Gentiles, Paul had a heart for

those leaders.

Paul had a heart for all these people.

And so the Bible very clearly tells us as a believer, we should

have that same heart.

We should have that same desire.

Now, God hasn't called you maybe to preach to a king.

He hasn't necessarily called you to go to prison, but he has called

you to do something in your life.

And I think that all of us understand to some degree the basics

of our call.

And if you want to know the basics of the call, you can go to

the very end of the Book of Matthew, you can go to the very beginning

of the Book of Acts.

And we have what's called the Great Commission.

We have the Great Commission to tell people about Jesus.

But more than just tell people about Jesus, the Bible says to teach

them to make disciples.

And I know for me, one of the goals in my life is to help people

find the truth of Jesus.

But not only find the truth of Jesus, but also follow the truth

of Jesus.

Because it's one thing to come to Jesus and believe in him, it's

another thing to grow in our understanding of him.

And I believe that that is something that all of us have been

called to do in our lives, is to bring people to Jesus and to teach

them what it means to walk in the truth of his word.

So Paul comes to Agrippa, and Agrippa says, almost out persuaded

me.

And so we see God working even in the midst of difficulty with Paul.

You can go back to Acts, chapter 9, verse 15.

Acts 9:15

From the very beginning, we know that it was God's plan for Paul

to bear witness to the kings and to the leaders.

And we see that happening through Felix Festus Agrippa.

And ultimately we're going to see that not necessarily in Scripture,

but we are going to see that as he goes in church history and

appeals to Nero.

And Nero is an evil, evil leader who is going to persecute

Paul and ultimately put him to death.

But nonetheless, Paul was faithful through it all.

And I hope that we can stay faithful as well.

Well, we're going to go ahead and close out here in chapter 26.

And next week, Lord willing, we'll be back and we're going to

read and go through chapter 27 and we're going to see Paul's path

because Paul is going to be shipwrecked, he's going to be snake

bit.

Some of you guys know that story.

It's a pretty neat story.

But we're going to see Paul's ups and downs, circumstances, ups

and downs.

But we're going to see a standard of faithfulness in his life,

not only his faithfulness, but most importantly, God's faithfulness

to him.

And so we're getting closer and closer to the end of the Book

of Acts.

It goes there Through Acts, Chapter 28.

Acts 28 · chapter mention

And then we'll be done.

And some people will ask, what are we going to be doing next?

I'll be announcing that here in the next few weeks.

We're going to be moving on to another study here on Sunday evenings.

And I hope that this studying the Book of Acts has helped you.

I think that one of the things that has helped me in the study of

the Book of Acts and is just to understand what mattered to God

in the early church.

And, and what, what it's, what it's taught me through this study

is that many of the things that we believe are so important

in today's church really weren't important to the Lord back

at the time of the early church.

I don't, and I'm gonna speak frankly here, and I don't want to

get anyone upset, but I don't see anybody in the Book of Acts saying

that they weren't picking a church because there wasn't enough

programs for them.

Okay.

They, they were there because of the fellowship that they had ultimately

with Christ and with each other.

It was a family.

It wasn't like we have today with churches being consumeristic.

Well, this church is going to bring this, this and this.

I like the music here, I like the programs here.

I like the preaching here.

And so therefore I'm just going to, you know, the truth is,

is that back then, yes, I do believe that at the core of it, you

could go to Acts, chapter 2, verse 42, and you could see was at

Acts 2:42

the heart of their fellowship.

It was, it was fellowshipping with one another.

It was the preaching of the word of God.

It was the breaking of bread and the, in the remembrance, in that

regard, and it was prayer.

And one of the things that I've seen is that we've so commercialized

Christianity in our world today.

And I'm not saying there's anything wrong with trying to seek

a good Bible believing church and pick the church that's right

for you.

But what I am saying is that so many times in churches we can

look at the things that really didn't matter so much to the Lord

back then and put that as our priority.

And the things that really did matter for the Lord back then, we

just kind of put as a back burner.

And so what I would say is that there's nothing wrong with ministries.

There's nothing wrong with children's ministries, there's nothing

wrong with men's ministries, ladies ministries, you know, different

ministries that we have.

But what we would say is this, that at the core of that, it's why

are we doing what we're doing?

And the big thing that has gone through my mind as we've been

studying the book of Acts is this, why are we doing.

And fill in the blank.

Why do we have this ministry?

Why do we do this?

Why do we meet here?

Why do we meet now?

Why do we give this way?

And a lot of the things in my own life, I've had to realize that

a lot of the things that I'm the most comfortable with are things

that I'm just comfortable with because that's traditionally what

we've always done.

And there's nothing wrong with tradition.

There's nothing wrong with understanding that to be that.

That's what I'm comfortable with.

But at the end, what we understand is that, and Paul taught

against this, if the traditions take precedent over what

God says, then that's when we have an issue.

And so if we have everything in line and our priorities, the big

thing is priorities, right?

The biggest thing is priorities.

Think about this.

How many of you, how many of you were hungry today?

Raise your hand.

Some of you were hungry.

During my preaching this morning, I heard some of the stomachs

growling from up here.

Just kidding, I.

Did you guys smelt that, those hot dogs cooking out there?

No.

How many of you were hungry and you ate?

You remembered to eat.

It was a priority, right?

Some of you said, no, I skipped a meal.

Okay?

Your priority is that you skip that meal.

But we all understand priorities.

We, we, we all understand that list of priorities.

And, and so for some of us, what happens is, is that though that

priority list, okay?

So putting God first and all the things that God calls us to do.

And.

And then it goes down like.

And so there.

There are certainly things in our life that should take priority

over other things.

But what happens is, is that God being the top priority and ourselves

being.

Should be the bottom priority in many cases.

What we usually do is we usually flip the script and we put

ourselves up here and we put everything else that God has when

we have enough time, right?

When, When I get to it, when, When I have enough here, when I.

We could be like Agrippa, like, in a little bit, I'll believe,

right?

And remember what happened with.

There was a Felix when he said, there's a.

At a more convenient time, I'll believe at a more convenient

time.

I'll do that at a better time.

And what's happened for me is sometimes my.

My priorities have shifted to, hey, you know what.

What brings me pleasure.

Instead, our priorities should be, ultimately, how do I glorify

God?

Because when something is a priority for us, we will make sure

that we are getting it done.

We will make sure that it's important to us and that we will

be there.

And so what I'm saying here this evening is that I think all

of us, including myself, everyone, everyone needs to reevaluate

priorities and say, what is my spiritual priorities?

And I would encourage you, actually, not just to make it a theoretical

thing, like, I'm actually encouraging you to either write it

down or record what are your priorities?

What's your list of priorities?

Because if you don't.

If you don't plan for something, it's not going to happen.

So if you say, well, you know what, Pastor, I do have a priority.

I want to read my Bible every day.

It's a priority for me.

Okay, fantastic.

We'll put that priority over something else that isn't as important

to you in the spiritual realm.

Okay.

You know, I.

I want to make sure that I'm serving in this ministry.

I want to make sure that I'm doing this for the Lord.

Well, put that on the list and make sure that's the top priority.

My family's.

My family's high on that priority list.

It's not at the top because if I put my family before Christ, I'm

missing out.

But what I'm saying is, is that my family is high in the priority

list.

Sometimes my priorities get shifted.

Sometimes my hobbies take priority over the things that I should

be doing.

And I go here and I go there.

The truth is, is at the end of the day, we have to look and we have

to say, lord, align Allow me to align myself with what your priorities

are.

So align my priorities with his priorities.

And I think that's a lesson from the Book of Acts that we can

take with us.

And I hope that it's been a blessing for you.

I encourage you to read through the Book of Acts here and

there, remind yourself of what happened.

Because a lot of the things that are happening with Paul and

the book of Philippians, in the book of Romans and the book of

Ephesians, Colossians, all these books that you know of, a lot

of that is tied together with what's happening in the Book of Acts.

And so it pieces the puzzle together for us.

It helps us understand it better.

So when we hear in Philippians chapter one about Paul being in prison

and we see his heart there, we can connect the dots and say, yeah,

that was his heart back there in the Book of Acts.

And it.

I believe that when we see the Bible from that perspective, from.

From it not just being 66 separate books, but when we see it

as one book, we understand it from the perspective of, hey, this

makes more sense.

And for me, that's what made things click in my brain when I used

to.

You know how I used to read my Bible?

I'm getting off on a tangent here, Brother Dan, but I'm just going

to keep going.

I used to read my Bible like this.

I would sit at home and I go, what am I going to read?

So when I was a high schooler, I would just open my Bible to any

page.

I would just open it up and I would just read three or four verses

and I would.

That would be my Bible reading for the day.

I might open up the Song of Solomon, I might open up to Ezekiel.

I might not know what I'm talking about there, what I'm reading.

But when we have a formulated plan of, okay, I'm going to read

this book of the Bible, I'm going to understand it in context.

I'm going to understand it from the perspective of who Jesus

is and what he has done for me.

Then it's going to make a lot more sense.

And so that's why we go book by book.

Sometimes it's long, sometimes it's tiresome when we go through

long books.

But the reason why we do it is because it's helping us understand

the bigger picture of the Word of God.

So I wanted to share that with you guys before we.

We stopped here this evening.

Well, let's go ahead and close in a word of prayer.

I've got a few announcements and then you guys can be dismissed.

Lord, I thank you for this time that you've given us.

I thank you for the opportunity to come together tonight

to study your word, to look into this wonderful story of Paul

appealing to Agrippa with the truth of the gospel and ultimately

going to appeal to Caesar.

And so Lord, I pray that we can present the truth of the Gospel

to those around us.

We don't know who our Agrippa is.

We don't know who our Felix and Festus is.

But Lord, open that door for us.

Give us eyes to see, Lord.

Help us to see those opportunities.

Lord, help us to have someone this year, just maybe one person

that we can tell the truth of Jesus Christ to and ultimately teach

them what it means to walk in accordance to your word.

Pray that you be with our fellowship to follow.

Pray that you keep us safe as we go our separate ways.

This evening we ask all these things in Jesus name, Amen.

Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist Church

Podcast.

I hope that this sermon has been a blessing for you.

You you would like to find out more information about our church

or this sermon, you can find us at middletownbaptistchurch.org

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You can also email me directly at Josh Massaro Middletown BaptistChurch.com

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Thank you so much.

God Bless.

Have a wonderful day.