September 15, 2023 | Be On Mission
Paul Appeals to Caesar to Avoid Jerusalem
Scripture: Acts 25:6-12(NIV)
6 After spending eight or ten days with them, Festus went down to Caesarea. The next day he convened the court and ordered that Paul be brought before him. 7 When Paul came in, the Jews who had come down from Jerusalem stood around him. They brought many serious charges against him, but they could not prove them.
8 Then Paul made his defense: “I have done nothing wrong against the Jewish law or against the temple or against Caesar.”
9 Festus, wishing to do the Jews a favor, said to Paul, “Are you willing to go up to Jerusalem and stand trial before me there on these charges?”
10 Paul answered: “I am now standing before Caesar’s court, where I ought to be tried. I have not done any wrong to the Jews, as you yourself know very well. 11 If, however, I am guilty of doing anything deserving death, I do not refuse to die. But if the charges brought against me by these Jews are not true, no one has the right to hand me over to them. I appeal to Caesar!”
12 After Festus had conferred with his council, he declared: “You have appealed to Caesar. To Caesar you will go!”
Devotional
Less than two weeks into his new job, Governor Festus requested an audience with prisoner Paul. The first hundred days on the job are considered vital for everyone from new presidents to new pastors. But what gets attention in the first two weeks often shows the real heart of the leader. Festus wanted to make nice with the religious power brokers in his assigned province. So he called Paul in with his accusers bringing the same charges they leveled at him two years earlier.
Paul saw right through the question of Governor Festus who asked if he would be willing to go to Jerusalem to stand trial before the chief priest and his Sanhedrin. Two years earlier Paul’s nephew uncovered and reported their plot to ambush and kill Paul. He knew they would do the same this time. So, as a Roman citizen, Paul invoked his rights to appeal to Caesar himself. Festus agreed, and Paul would be shipped to Rome for trial. He would now be 1500 miles away from the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem. Problem solved.
Of course, we know what they didn’t know. While under arrest in Rome, Paul would witness to more guards, encourage more believers, and write the New Testament letters of Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and 2 Timothy. Paul would be released after his first imprisonment in Rome and traveled again to the places where he had planted the faith. During his second imprisonment in Rome, Paul was executed. Still, the faith was not extinguished. Christianity continued to spread like a wildfire across the Roman Empire.
Paul’s appeal to Caesar prevented his premature death at the hands of the Jewish high priest in Jerusalem, but led to his execution at the hands of the Roman Caesar in Rome about a decade later. In those years, Christianity’s roots grew deeper. The faith would stand strong as persecution escalated under future Roman emperors.
Thank God for His provision and care for the Christian faith from the days of the early church up to today.
Poem
Here We Go Again!
Do we not learn from past occurrence?
How things play out? Test God’s endurance?
Wrath to hold back
Giving slack
See the pattern?
Note the track?
We have all been here before
Here we go again!
Foolishness is on display
Wonder who will win the day?
Duh!
