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Sketches from the Life of Paul
Christian associates, whose hearts were shocked and saddened at the
swift realization of their forebodings.
The centurion in charge of the detachment delivered his prisoner
to Felix the governor, also presenting a letter with which he had been
intrusted by the chief captain:—
“Claudius Lysias unto the most excellent governor Felix sendeth
greeting. This man was taken of the Jews, and should have been
killed of them; then came I with an army, and rescued him, having
understood that he was a Roman. And when I would have known
the cause wherefore they accused him, I brought him forth into their
council; whom I perceived to be accused of questions of their law, but
to have nothing laid to his charge worthy of death or of bonds. And
when it was told me how that the Jews laid wait for the man, I sent
straightway to thee, and gave commandment to his accusers also to
say before thee what they had against him. Farewell.”
After reading the communication, Felix inquired to what province
the prisoner belonged, and being informed that he was of Cilicia, he
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ordered him to be kept in Herod’s judgment hall, stating that he would
hear the case when the accusers also should come from Jerusalem.
The case of Paul was not the first in which a servant of God had
found among the heathen an asylum from the malice of the professed
people of Jehovah. In their rage against Paul, the Jews had added
another crime to the dark catalogue which marked the history of that
people. They had still further hardened their hearts against the truth,
and had rendered their doom more certain.
There are but few who perceive the full import of the words of
Christ, when in the synagogue at Nazareth he announced himself as
the Anointed One. He declared his mission to comfort, bless, and
save the sorrowing and the sinful, and then, seeing that pride and
unbelief controlled the hearts of his hearers, he reminded them how
God had in time past turned away from his chosen people, because of
their unbelief and rebellion, and had manifested himself to those in a
heathen land who had not rejected the light from Heaven. The widow
of Sarepta and Naaman the Syrian had lived up to all the light they
had. Hence they were accounted more righteous than God’s chosen
people who had backslidden from him, and sacrificed principle to
convenience and worldly honor.