After his arrest in Jerusalem three men were put in charge of Paul in sequence; Claudius Lysias, Felix, and Festus. Each man felt that he was caught between a rock and a hard place. The rock was the Roman law to protect their citizens. Paul’s status of a citizen of Rome provided the motivation for the leaders to grant him due process and spare his life. Paul would be kept safe, if not free, because of his Roman citizenship. The hard place was the volatile Jewish people. A riot among the Jews under each man’s watch would not look well within the Roman political structure. One by one these men with political aspirations passed on their problem citizen to someone else. Even Festus sought to rid himself of Paul by sending him to the emperor for trial. Paul’s situation shows us a picture of how Christians fit in this world; we don’t. The confusion that Christian faith introduces to any culture is a display of God’s power that is at work in the life of faith. In the midst of such chaos we need to remember to keep our mission and our focus in line with God’s plan, just as Paul did.
Stuart
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