Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Acts 24:25

And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, Felix trembled, and answered, Go thy way for this time; when I have a convenient season, I will call for thee.

25. And as he reasoned and judgment [ R. V. the judgement] to come ] It was to be no barren faith which St Paul commended, but was to have its fruits in the life. Felix perhaps expected some philosophical dissertation on the subject of the resurrection, and the life after death. His own conduct, of which Tacitus ( Ann. xii. 54, Hist. Act 24:9) speaks as mean and cruel and profligate, would make the subjects on which St Paul addressed him peculiarly disturbing. For what if this man’s teaching should be true?

Felix trembled ] The expression is much stronger. It implies that he was filled with fear. Therefore the Rev. Ver. gives “was terrified.” It can hardly be conceived that St Paul was ignorant of the character of those to whom he was speaking. Felix had been in office long enough to be well known. And the Apostle’s themes were exactly those by which he could find the joints in the governor’s harness. Of “righteousness” his life’s history shews no trace, and for temperance, i.e. self-control, the presence of Drusilla by his side proved that he had no regard. Well might such a man be full of fear at the thought, as St Paul would urge it home, of the judgment after death. But the influence of his terror passed away, for we do not read that the Apostle ever beheld such signs of penitence as led him to quiet the terror, by preaching Christ as the atonement for sin.

when I have a convenient season, I will call for thee] [Rev. Ver. call thee unto me]. The convenient season never arrived. Felix did not change his conduct. When two years more of his rule were ended and he was superseded by Festus, the Jews in Csarea brought an accusation against him before Nero, and had it not been for his brother Pallas’ influence he would have been punished for his cruelty and injustice. We have no record of how long he lived after his recall from Csarea.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

And as he reasoned – Greek: And he discoursing – dialegomenou de autou. No argument should be drawn from the word that is used here to prove that Paul particularly appealed to reason, or that his discourse was argumentative. That it was so is, indeed, not improbable, from all that we know of the man, and from the topics on which he discoursed. But the word used here means simply as he discoursed, and is applied usually to making a public address, to preaching, etc., in whatever way it is done, Act 17:2; Act 18:4, Act 18:19; Act 19:8-9; Act 24:12. Felix and Drusilla intended this as a matter of entertainment or amusement. Paul readily obeyed their summons, since it gave him an opportunity to preach the gospel to them; and as they desired his sentiments in regard to the faith in Christ, he selected those topics which were adapted to their condition, and stated those principles of the Christian religion which were suited to arrest their attention, and to lead them to repentance. Paul seized every opportunity of making known the gos pel; and whether a prisoner or at liberty; whether before princes, governors, kings, or common people, he was equally prepared to defend the pure and holy doctrines of the cross. His boldness in this instance is the more remarkable, as he was dependent on Felix for his release. A time-server or an impostor would have chosen such topics as would have conciliated the favor of the judge, and procured his discharge from custody. He would have flattered his vanity or palliated his vices. But such an idea never seems to have occurred to Paul. His aim was to defend the truth, and to save, if possible, the souls of Drusilla and of Felix.

Of righteousness – peri dikaiosunes. Of justice. Not of the justice of God particularly, but of the nature and requirements of justice in the relations of life the relations which we sustain to God and to man. This was a proper topic with which to introduce his discourse, as it was the office of Felix to dispense justice between man and man, and as his administration was not remarkable for the exercise of that virtue. It is evident that he could be influenced by a bribe Act 24:26, and it was proper for Paul to dwell on this, as designed to show him the guilt of his life, and his danger of meeting the justice of a Being who cannot be bribed, but who will dispense equal justice alike to the great and the mean. That Paul dwelt also on the justice of God, as the moral governor of the world, may also be presumed. The apprehension of that justice, and the remembrance of his own guilty life, tended to produce the alarm of Felix, and to make him tremble.

Temperance – egkrateias. The word temperance we now use commonly to denote moderation or restraint in regard to eating and drinking, particularly to abstinence from the use of ardent spirits. But this is not its meaning here. There is no reason to suppose that Felix was intemperate in the use of intoxicating liquors. The original word here denotes a restraint of all the passions and evil inclinations, and may be applied to prudence, chastity, and moderation in general. The particular thing in the life of Felix which Paul had probably in view was the indulgence of licentious desires, or incontinence. He was living in adultery with Drusilla, and for this Paul wished doubtless to bring him to repentance.

And judgment to come – The universal judgment that was to come on all transgressors. On this topic Paul also dwelt when he preached on Mars Hill at Athens, Act 17:31. These topics were admirably adapted to excite the alarm of both Felix and Drusilla. It evinced great boldness and faithfulness in Paul to select them, and the result showed that he correctly judged of the kind of truth which was adapted to alarm the fears of his guilty auditor.

Felix trembled – In view of his past sins, and in the apprehension of the judgment to come. The Greek emphobos does not denote that his body was agitated or shaken, but only that he was alarmed or terrified. That such fear usually shakes the frame, we know; but it is not certain that the body of Felix was thus agitated. He was alarmed and terrified, and looked with deep apprehension to the coming judgment. This was a remarkable instance of the effect of truth on the mind of a man unaccustomed to such alarms, and unused to hear such truth. It shows the power of conscience when thus, under the preaching of a prisoner, the judge is thrown into violent alarm.

And answered, Go thy way … – How different is this answer from that of the jailor of Philippi when alarmed in a similar manner! He asked, What must I do to be saved? and was directed to him in whom he found peace from a troubled conscience, Act 16:30-31. Felix was troubled; but instead of asking what he should do, he sent the messenger of God away. He was evidently not prepared to break off his sins and turn to God. He sought peace by sending away his reprover, and manifestly intended then to banish the subject from his mind. Yet, like others, he did not intend to banish it altogether. He looked forward to a time when he would be more at leisure; when the cares of office would press less heavily on his attention; or when he would be more disposed to attend to it. Thus, multitudes, when they are alarmed, and see their guilt and danger, resolve to defer it to a more convenient time.

One man is engaged in a career of pleasure, and it is not now a convenient time to attend to his souls salvation. Another is pressed with business; with the cares of life; with a plan of gain; with the labors of office or of a profession, and it is not now a convenient time for him to attend to religion. Another supposes that his time of life is not the most convenient. His youth he desires to spend in pleasure, and waits for a more convenient time in middle age. His middle life he spends in business, and this is not a convenient time. Such a period he expects then to find in old age. But as age advances he finds an increasing disposition to defer it; he is still indisposed to attend to it; still in love with the world. Even old age is seldom found to be a convenient time to prepare for heaven; and it is deferred from one period of life to another, until death closes the scene. It has been commonly supposed and said that Felix never found that more convenient time to call for Paul. That he did not embrace the Christian religion, and forsake his sins, is probable, nay, almost certain. But it is not true that he did not take an opportunity of hearing Paul further on the subject; for it is said that he sent for him often, and communed with him. But, though Felix found this opportunity, yet:

(1) We have no reason to suppose that the main thing – the salvation of his soul – ever again occupied his attention. There is no evidence that he was again alarmed or awakened, or that he had any further solicitude on the subject of his sins. He had passed forever the favorable time – the golden moments when he might have secured the salvation of his soul.

(2) Others have no right to suppose that their lives will be lengthened out that they may have any further opportunity to attend to the subject of religion.

(3) When a sinner is awakened, and sees his past sins, if he rejects the appeal to his conscience then, and defers it to a more convenient opportunity, he has no reason to expect that his attention will ever be again called with deep interest to the subject. He may live, but he may live without the strivings of the Holy Spirit. When a man has once deliberately rejected the offers of mercy; when he has trifled with the influences of the Spirit of God, he has no right or reason to expect that that Spirit will ever strive with him again. Such, we have too much reason to fear, was the case with Felix. Though he often saw Paul again, and communed with him, yet there is no statement that he was again alarmed or awakened. And thus sinners often attend on the means of grace after they have grieved the Holy Spirit; they listen to the doctrines of the gospel, they hear its appeals and its warnings, but they have no feeling, no interest, and die in their sins.

A convenient season – Greek: taking time. I will take a time for this.

I will call for thee – To hear thee further on this subject. This he did, Act 24:26. It is remarkable that Drusilla was not alarmed. She was as much involved in guilt as Felix; but she, being a Jewess, had been accustomed to hear of a future judgment until it caused in her mind no alarm. Perhaps also she depended on the rites and ceremonies of her religion as a sufficient expiation for her sins. She might have been resting on those false dependencies which go to free the conscience from a sense of guilt, and which thus beguile and destroy the soul.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Act 24:25

And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and Judgment to come, Felix trembled.

Pauls reasoning before Felix

Consider–

I. The manner of Pauls preaching. He did not utter dogmatic assertions nor deal in vague declamation, in airy speculation which might please but not profit, in the artifices of rhetoric in order to produce effect.

1. He addressed man as a rational being; his great object was to enlighten the mind and carry conviction to the judgment. True, until the heart be moved no good can be done. But as in nature, so also it is in grace–light must first be created. It would be like tracing figures on the sand, to be effaced by the returning wave, if we excited the feelings of the heart without having beforehand imparted knowledge to the head.

2. He reasoned. But What, asks the infidel, is there in the Christian religion to reason about? It is the religion of babes, not of men. True our religion is fitted for babes; and it is its greatest glory that a wayfaring man, though a fool, shall not err therein. But this is also as true, that among its disciples it tells of a Locke, a Newton, and a Bacon. And on what occasion did ever Christianity shrink back from inquiry?

3. He reasoned. He did not leave the individual, as the saying is, in the hands of God. On the contrary, he bent his whole soul to produce conviction and conversion in the mind of Felix.

II. The topics of which he thus preached. Faith and practice; and what God hath joined together let no man put asunder.

1. He spake concerning the faith in Christ.

2. He reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come.

III. The effect which this sermon produced.

1. That sermon is worthless which does not reach the heart; and that heart must have been hard indeed that could have withstood the reasoning of an inspired apostle and on such important subjects. Felix felt, not grief for sin, only terror on account of its punishment. The apostle had entered with the candle of the Lord into the recesses of his bosom, and disclosed all those images of wickedness which, with all the cowardice of conscious guilt, Felix had striven to conceal from himself. He trembled, like the meanest criminal that ever stood at his own tribunal; like the benighted traveller, when all on a sudden the lightning discloses the awful precipice whose brink he is approaching; like the man under sentence of death, when in his cell at the midnight hour he hears the knocking of the hammer erecting the scaffold on which he is to die on the morrow: he trembled–like Belshazzar when he saw the handwriting on the wall that proclaimed his days to be numbered and his kingdom to be departed from him.

2. These impressions were the result of Gods Spirit; but they were of short duration: like one suddenly awakened out of his sleep, he felt a moments alarm, but he again folded his arms to slumber. Could the apostle have told him how he could be happy without requiring to be holy–how he might escape hell and enjoy earth–gladly would Felix have listened to his message. But since the apostle could preach no gospel but that which proclaimed salvation, not in sin, but from sin, Felix dismisses the preacher, but retains his Drusilla. (W. Auld, jun.)

Of the universal sense of good and evil

I. We learn from this history that there is, even in the worst of men, a natural conscience of good and evil, which may be darkened, perverted, and very much defaced, but is hardly ever quite obliterated and lost. There are certain seasons, which check the insolence of the passions and dispose for gravity and consideration, in which it revives, and represents the malignity of irregular and vicious excesses in a clear and strong light.

II. We may observe from the text what a miserable thing it is to have a conscience burdened with guilt, in that a man dares not trust himself to think for fear of being alarmed and filled with terror and confusion. As long as, men are amused with company or engaged in a hurry of business, or can keep their passions inflamed and silence the voice of reason and natural conscience by a course of intemperance, they may continue stupid and insensible. But when anything happens that damps their gaiety, gives a shock to the mind, and puts them upon thinking, they are soon roused out of their lethargy and entertained with none but dark and gloomy prospects. And nothing, surely, can be a more perverted state of mankind than to derive all their relief, all their peace, from the suppression or extinction of reason. Besides, as guilt is such an enemy to consideration, there is this dreadful circumstance attending it farther to aggravate and enhance its misery, that it cuts off in a great measure the only possible means of the sinners recovery.

III. It is a very natural inference from the text that inculcating the great duties of morality and enforcing the practice of them from a regard of the future judgment is true gospel preaching, and answers in the most effectual manner the excellent design of Christianity. To preach Christ is universally allowed to be the duty of every Christian minister. But what does it mean? It is not to use His name as a charm, to work up our hearers to a warm pitch of enthusiasm, without any foundation of reason to support it. Tis not to encourage undue and presumptuous reliances on His merits and intercession, to the contempt of virtue and good works. No, but to represent Him as a Lawgiver as well as a Saviour, as a preacher of righteousness, as one who hath given us a most noble and complete system of morals enforced by the most substantial and worthy motives, and to show that the whole scheme of our redemption is a doctrine according to godliness.

IV. A sense of guilt makes those things the objects of aversion and horror which, naturally, yield the highest delight and satisfaction. We have an instance in the text of one that was shocked at the strict obligations of justice, without which there can be no pleasure or convenience in human life, and the whole frame of civil societies must immediately be dissolved. It mortifies the epicure and the adulterer to be told of the rules of temperance and chastity, which are absolutely necessary to the health of our bodies, the rectitude and vigour of our minds, and the grand security of what is most dear and sacred to us; and the cruel and revengeful to hear of gentleness, beneficence, and the soft impressions of humanity, though they form the most excellent and amiable character we can possibly conceive of. In like manner, the future judgment of mankind is in itself far from being an object of terror; for that we are moral, accountable creatures is owing to our superior capacities, which are the distinguishing dignity of our nature; and nothing can be a more comfortable reflection to a well-disposed mind than that its integrity will be tried and rewarded by a Being of unerring wisdom, inflexible justice, and unlimited goodness. But to a guilty sinner this is so tremendous a scene, that the mere prospect of it fills him with agony and confusion. He does not consider it as honourable to human nature, because it threatens his vices; cant think of abiding by the sentence of unchangeable rectitude and infinite benevolence itself; and the sum of his wishes is to die like a brute. The future judgment is not revealed with a view to alarm and confound the mind, but to restrain those irregular practices which are the surest ground of melancholy suspicions and inward horror. (James Foster.)

Pauls sermon before Felix

I. The appropriate sermon. I can conceive that Felix expected to have a grand disquisition upon some recondite themes of the gospel. This was not the place nor the time for that.

1. I can imagine how Paul would bring before the mind of Felix the widow who bad been defrauded of inheritance, the fatherless children who were left to beg their bread, the many bribes that he had taken, the false decisions that he had given.

2. Then gently turning to the other subject, I can imagine how he would fix his eyes upon Drusilla and bring the most powerful motives to bear upon her lascivious heart; and then turning to Felix, would remind him that adulterers have no inheritance in the kingdom of God.

3. I can conceive how Felix would bite his lips. Paul gave him no time for passion; for in a fury of impassioned eloquence he introduced the judgment to come. He made Felix think he saw the great white throne, the books opened, and himself arraigned before his Judge; and what the apostle did every minister ought to do. He selected topics appropriate to his audience. But some will say, Ministers ought not to be personal. Ministers will never be true to their Master till they are, I admire John Knox for going, Bible in hand, to Queen Mary, and sternly upbraiding her. I do not exactly love the way in which he did it, but the thing itself I love.

II. The affected audience. What is it that makes men tremble under the sound of the gospel? Some say it is their conscience. Doubtless it is in some sense. But I believe that what some people call natural conviction is the work of the Spirit. In some mens hearts He works with restraining grace, and the trembling of Felix is to be accounted for by this quickening his conscience and making him tremble. But what shall be said of some of you who never tremble?

III. The lamentable disappointment. It is wonderful, said a good man once to a minister, to see a whole congregation moved to tears by the preaching of the Word. Yes, said that minister, it is wonderful; but I know a wonder ten times greater, viz., that those people should so soon wipe away their tears and forget what they have beard. Tis wonderful that Felix trembled before Paul; tis more wonderful that Felix should say, Go thy way. Stop, Felix; let Paul speak to thee a minute longer. Thou hast business; but hast thou no business for thy soul? Dost thou reply, Nay, I must attend to Caesar. Ah! Felix, but thou hast a greater monarch than Caesar. I know what thou durst not say. Felix, thou art turning aside again to indulge in thy lascivious pleasures. Go, and Drusilla with thee! But stop! Darest thou do that, with that last word ringing in thy ears, Judgment to come? You, too, many of you, have often been impressed under the ministry, and on Monday you have said, I must attend to business. Think of men that are dying every day, saying, We must live, and forgetting that they must die! Another replies, I must have a little more pleasure. What! can there be pleasure in turning suicide to thine own soul? But the usual reply is, There is time enough yet. The young man says, Let me alone till I grow old. And you old men, what do you say? When do you hope to find a convenient season? The young may die, the old must! But still the common cry is, There is time enough. What for? Surely you have spent time enough in sin? What! time enough to serve a God that laid down His life for you? No! eternity will not be too long to utter His praise. Thou sayest, Another time. How knowest thou that thou wilt ever feel again as thou feelest now? This morning, perhaps, a voice is saying in thy heart, Prepare to meet thy God. Tomorrow that voice may be hushed. How do you know that you shall live to be warned again? Oh! why will you then dare to procrastinate? Will your soul ever be saved by your saying, Time enough yet? Tillotson well says, A man may say, I resolve to eat, but the resolve to eat would never feed his body. A man might say, I am resolved to drink, but the resolve to drink would never slake his thirst. And you may say, I am resolved by and by to seek God, but your resolve will not save you. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

Paul preaching before Felix

Whatever may have been the motives of Felix and Drusilla, we have before us the singular fact that profligate persons, with not the smallest intention of forsaking their profligacy, could send for a preacher that he might preach to them concerning the faith in Christ. It is a fact which altogether forbids us inferring the piety of the multitude from the earnestness to which they flock to the preaching of the Word. What is there to assure us that in an assembly of eager and riveted listeners there may not now be the Felix and Drusilla, who associate themselves with the hearers of the gospel, and seem to take a deep interest in its announcements. It might well make us tremble to think what profligate characters may be found in the house of God, all apparently hearkening with the most earnest attention to what the preacher has to advance. Note–

I. The topics on which St. Paul expatiated.

1. Although Felix had sent for Paul to hear about the faith in Christ, it was not concerning this faith that the apostle chiefly spoke; he rather dealt with topics which belong to natural as well as revealed religion. He knew that comparatively no moral advantage is obtained by prevailing upon men to take this or that tenet into their creed if they do not suffer it to be influential on their conduct; and therefore it was no object with him to get reception for fresh truths whilst he knew that there were old truths which, though theoretically acknowledged, were practically without power. Felix and Drusilla expected that the apostle would enter at once on controverted points and on some abstruse speculation which might engage the understanding but not touch the conscience. And if it were wisdom in the apostle thus to confine himself to the truths that were acknowledged by his hearers, and so to give them no opportunity to escape, must it not also be so in the modern preacher?

2. But it were unpardonable to speak of Pauls wisdom and overlook his intrepidity. Oh, for his spirit, that there might be no fear of men! The sin which is most likely to prevail in a congregation is the sin against which the preacher should direct most of his preaching. In this way he will be most likely to do good, though he be most likely to give offence; for the courtiers will sit most approvingly and contentedly whilst the vices of merchants are lashed, and merchants whilst those of courtiers; but once let the sermon have a marked reference to the audience, and there will be uneasiness, and in most cases displeasure.

II. The effect which his sermon produced. Of Drusilla you are told nothing. A woman, when she has abandoned herself to wickedness, is far harder to reclaim than man; and it may be proof of the truth of this remark that, whilst Felix trembled, Drusilla was unmoved. Probably he was surrounded by a princely retinue, and did he suffer soldiers and subjects to see him disconcerted by the insolence of a forward enthusiast? Ah! it is not in the pompous train or in armed battalions to give courage when the conscience is once roused. There is no cowardice like the cowardice of guilt, and no power like the power of truth. But, alas for Felix! in place of being moved by his fears in the immediate search after safety, he had recourse, with sinners of every age, to procrastination. He did not entreat the apostle to point out the way of escape, as he had pointed out the danger, but dismissed him. He did not deign to take no further care of the matter; he only deferred what by his trembling he had confessed it right in him to do. And he was not without an excuse. When was the sinner ever at a loss when his sins were to be palliated? He waited for a convenient season. It was not fitting to repent suddenly; there ought to be deliberation. He had, moreover, much business to attend to; he must put public affairs into a little better train, then would he be at leisure for the weighty duties of amendment. And did a convenient season come? Yes, he had many interviews with St. Paul, but with what object? Great God! is it possible! It had been whilst he disclaimed against extortion and avarice that Felix had shook with apprehension! And now this very Felix sends for the apostle, hoping to wring from him a bribe. We ask, Is this possible? Why not? The whole transaction is repeated in our own day, and amongst ourselves. Felix having by delay got quit of his fears, could look upon St. Paul merely as upon one likely to gratify his lust of money; and the man whom the preacher has once made to tremble, but who has crushed the conviction which had in it the germ of conversion, may afterwards look upon the preacher merely as upon one likely to gratify his love of excitement. (H. Melvill, B. D.)

Pauls reasonings

Our text brings before us a very extraordinary scene. The prisoner at the bar seems to be exercising the functions of prosecutor, witness, jury, and handing over his judge, as a condemned culprit, into the hands of the supreme Judge of all, while the judge is neither able to defend or excuse himself. It is not an unusual thing in criminal trials to see the prisoner trembling. Here is a prisoner for whom his judge has no terrors. It is not unusual to see a judge dignified and self-possessed, but here sits a poor trembling wretch on whom the words of the prisoner fall like a death sentence. At last he can stand it no longer. Why should he make himself miserable? If the arguments of the apostle could not be answered, at any rate he might be silenced. But I want to call your attention to the fact that what made Felix tremble was not an exhibition of impassioned rhetoric, but it was a solemn appeal to his reasoning faculties. I by no means disparage appeals to the feelings, inasmuch as we all have hearts, but the strength of these lies in the presence of an intellectual conviction affecting the conscience of those whom we address. I can imagine the governor, prepared to find his prisoner a half-crazy fanatic, commencing his inquiries, while a cynical smile played over his sinister countenance: I understand, Paul, that you are an ardent adherent of one Christ. Can you now explain to me why you make so much ado about this person, who was executed as a common felon? This gave St. Paul his opportunity. In order that I may the better explain to you what Christ is to me, it will be expedient that I should first touch upon certain subjects connected with religion and morality, with respect to which we may probably be able to understand each other. So now it is necessary to form just opinions on those subjects, in order that we may be led to feel our need of Christ. Paul reasoned–

I. Concerning righteousness.

1. The word has its root in the word right. Righteousness springs from that great law of right which pervades all the relations of man to his Maker and to his fellow man. The recognition of these rights and the fulfilment of the claims which they carry with them is righteousness.

(1) God has certain rights in us which we are bound to respect, and these arise out of the nature of our relations with Him.

(a) We are taught that of Him, and by Him, and for Him are all things. He, as the Author of our being, has created us for His own purposes; and therefore we are under an obligation to respect His intentions in thus allowing us to enjoy it. Not to do this is to wrong God, to defraud Him of His rights in us, and thus to break the fundamental commandment of the law of righteousness.

(b) As these claims of God are not arbitrarily imposed, so He cannot withdraw them. George III, when pressed by his prime minister to give his assent to a measure of which he did not approve, exclaimed, Ill not sign it, Mr. Pitt; it goes against my conscience! Then, sir, replied his minister, I have no course open to me but to resign. Very good, Mr. Pitt, very good; you can resign if you like, but I cant. The story may serve to illustrate our present point God cannot resign.

(c) As the result of the existence of these rights of God in us, He must needs claim it of us first, that we should make a full and willing surrender of ourselves to Him, to live for His glory and in accordance with His will; and secondly, He must needs claim it of us that we should abstain from anything that is opposed to His proper relations with us and His will concerning us.

(2) We are also under a certain obligation to our fellow men. Remember that universal bond of brotherhood which pervades the human family, and gives man the claim of kinsmanship upon his fellow man throughout the world. Then think upon the debt that we owe to society. We owe it to society that we have been fed, clothed, housed, educated, trained, and surrounded with all the comforts of civilised existence. Man, next to God, has been our greatest benefactor, and therefore man has certain rights in us. To recognise and respect these is to fulfil the law of righteousness; to ignore these is to break it. I am bound by the debt I owe to my fellow to do what lies in my power to help and benefit him as occasion may offer, and to abstain from injuring him in any way, either morally, intellectually, or physically.

2. How much of the law of righteousness do most men seem to recognise? Only one part out of four. How common a thing it is when we press men about their spiritual condition to meet with the reply, Well, Ive never done any harm to anyone. Granted; does that mean that you have performed your positive or negative duty towards God? or that you have performed your positive duty to your fellow man? The words convey no such idea. The priest and Levite did no harm to the half-dead man, but they failed to do him any good; and you do not even affirm that you have lived to benefit your fellow man any more than they. What then? To put the thing in a familiar form: you pay, or think you pay, five shillings in the pound, and then claim a quittance of the whole debt. That would hardly pass muster in a London bankruptcy court; and can you think that such a composition will be accepted at the last great assize? And what if the five shillings proves to have been paid in base coin? How few of us are there that can truly affirm that we have done no harm to anyone? Where is the godless man that has not done some injury to those around him?

3. We are now in a position to judge ourselves as to whether we are righteous. Does our own heart condemn us? You can judge for yourselves whether it be possible that these claims can be either modified or withdrawn. If they cannot, then you will of necessity begin to feel your need of that which St. Paul found in Christ. When once his eyes had been opened to see what the claims of righteousness really were, and hence to discover his own unrighteousness, there was no rest for him until he had found a new and better righteousness in Christ Jesus.

II. Concerning temperance. As righteousness has to do with the rights which others have in us, so temperance leads us to consider the rights which we have in ourselves. The word conveys the idea of self-mastery–capacity to govern oneself in accordance with the dictates of sound reason.

1. There are within our complex nature certain elements which are obviously designed to be supreme, while there are others that are intended to be subject to control. That this must be so is clear; for if every element within were to assert its own supremacy, our human nature would be like a house divided against itself. We may conclude with sufficient confidence–

(1) That those are the higher elements in our nature, by the possession of which we are most distinguished from the lower animals; and just as the harmony of the outward world is maintained by mans supremacy over the brute, so the harmony of mans nature is to be preserved by the sovereignty of those elements which are distinctively human over those which we possess in common with the lower animals.

(2) That those are the higher elements in our nature which are least dependent upon our material organism, but upon which it must depend for direction and control if our lives are to deserve the name of human.

(3) That inasmuch as we were made in the image of God, the higher elements of our human nature are those which are most Godlike. As God maintains the harmony of the universe by asserting His own supremacy, so man can only hope for harmony in his own being when the God-like has chief sway within.

2. In the maintenance of this supremacy also lies the only security for our well-being, and even for our safety; for while God has made special provisions to prevent the lower animals from falling a prey to their own incontinence by establishing certain checks, He has not thus hedged round man. He is possessed of a moral freedom, and hence can either, by the right exercise of his faculties, rise to a higher level than the animal can aspire to or can sink to as much a lower level by their abuse. We do the animals an injustice when we speak, e.g., of the intemperate man as a drunken brute. Who ever knew of a brute that was of its own will drunken? So, then, there are certain faculties or elements of our nature which should be supreme, and others which should be under control. Where this order exists, there moral harmony ensues; and this is what we understand by temperance. When it is transgressed, moral anarchy must be the result; and this is what we understand by intemperance.

3. Mans moral nature may be compared to a commonwealth, in which there are ignorant and incapable multitudes who need to be governed with a view to their own good, and also intelligent and able men who are fit to govern. Now it has sometimes happened that the supreme power has passed into the hands of an ignorant and fanatical mob, and then have followed the worst and most frightful forms of anarchy. Then, again, it has often happened that from amongst the mob there has arisen some single tyrant who, beginning with being the idol of the mob, has gone on to become its most ruthless enemy; and then sometimes follows the last woful sequel of this inversion of the proper order of things–invasion, a foreign thrall, followed ultimately by national extinction. So when these elements of our nature, which ought to be subject to control, are allowed by the frailty of our will to arrogate to themselves an authority to which they have no claim, man becomes subject to a sort of inward mob rule. Then it not unfrequently happens that from the general moral confusion there emerges into an unholy prominence some specific besetting sin which becomes a sort of tyrant, and brings all our powers and faculties under its own grim and terrible sway. Such a tyrant power is drunkenness, or lust, or avarice, when once it lays hold upon mans nature and becomes a confirmed habit. And this miserable condition invites hostile intervention from without. There is an enemy at the gates who finds our divided and self-betrayed nature at his mercy, and who can thus take possession of our being, and in the end, unless we are delivered out of his hands, procure our utter and irremediable ruin.

4. What hope is there under such circumstances that by the mere action of a will already enervated the captive can break his chains and set himself free?

(1) Perhaps the answer may suggest itself, Surely the only chance for such a man lies in appealing to his own self-interest. Let him see that he is injuring himself, and he will most likely be disposed to gather up all his will power for a mighty effort against this tyrant yoke, and, thus reinforced, he may yet prevail. But those who speak thus do not make sufficient allowance for the bewildering influence which a corrupt moral condition exerts upon the understanding, nor for the actually blinding effect of passion. Look at that drunkard. There was a time when he possessed the affections of a devoted wife, a smiling home, a good reputation, and regular and remunerative employment. Look at him now. In his few lucid intervals he knows that he is destroying himself; but it makes no difference. Or take the case of the libertine, or the case of a man whose incontinence lies in his temper, his speech, or his avarice. They are not less obviously opposed to our personal interest. Or again, idleness, sluggishness, or moral cowardice are all alike clearly opposed to our well-being. No, it is easy to forge those chains for ourselves, but who can snap them? Our minds may be on the side of right, but what about that other law which holds its sway within our members?

(2) No, if there be any help at all for the poor spellbound victim it must come from without. Ah! there is one in our midst today ready to proclaim relief to the captives. Listen to the apostle: For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. Here is a new law–a law that belongs not to poor enslaved humanity, but to that mysterious and Divine Being who invades and takes possession of our humanity. Look at that balloon as it lies there uninflated; it is subject to the gravitating attraction of earth like any other object around. You may lift it up for a moment by help of ropes and pulleys, but its rise is dependent upon your willpower, and as soon as this adventitious force is withdrawn it sinks again. But now fill it with hydrogen gas, and you introduce a substance of such relative gravity to the atmosphere that its law is to rise heavenward. Even so, you may lift your moral nature up, as it were by mere willpower, and anon, when the will ceases to be energetic, it sinks again; but let God the Holy Ghost enter the cleansed and consecrated nature, and at once we begin to rise in the moral scale higher and stilt higher to our proper level as heavens free men. Years ago, when I had a parish in one of our largest towns, I became very much interested in a member of my congregation who was the victim of insobriety. Many and many were the pledges that he signed, but all seemed vain. We were having a very memorable season of spiritual visitation, and night after night this man attended the services, and wan deeply impressed. The last Sunday night arrived. At the close of his thrilling appeal Mr. Moody asked all present who would trust themselves to Christ then and there for salvation to rise and stand up before all while the Christians present were praying for them. At this moment a Christian worker, who was an old acquaintance of the man, saw his friend evidently in great anguish of soul. He crept up to him, and whispered in his ear, Tom, my boy, why arnt you standing up? I cant, Jim; I have tried so often. I should only make a fool of the thing if I fell back again. Tom, my dear fellow, now listen to me. Youve prayed and made resolutions, signed pledges, and done everything except what youre asked to do now; that is, trust yourself entirely to Jesus. Youve never done that. Youre right, Jim, said the other; I have never done that. I will trust Him! and with a sudden decision he rose to his feet; and he found Him trustworthy. From that moment the chain was broken; and five years after Tom passed away, falling asleep in Jesus.

III. Concerning judgment to come.

1. A belief in this may be regarded as a corollary to a belief in the existence of God Himself. If there be a Moral Governor of the universe, we cannot do otherwise than conclude that there is a judgment to come.

(1) There is a very obvious inequality in the way in which punishments are meted out to transgressors in this life. Two persons commit the same sin; the one is detected, the other escapes detection, prospers in the world, and passes in society as a very respectable member of it. Or again, two persons commit the same sin of impurity. The one is a man of high social position and of great wealth; the other, perhaps, some unfortunate girl whose affections he has contrived to entangle. Compare the consequences in the two cases. The one is ruined for life, but the man who made her the thing she is passes himself off as a very respectable gentleman. Surely no man in his senses will say that in the two cases the punishments are equal.

(2) But I can imagine someone rejoining, What you say is all very true; but you must take into consideration the mans subjective penalty. The one offender may suffer more in his conscience than the other. Here again the answer is obvious. Is it the greatest sinner that is the greatest inward sufferer? Here are two persons who have both committed the same sin–the one for the first time in his life, the other for the nine hundred and ninety-ninth. Is it not too obvious to need to be stated that the sufferings of the hardened offender are as nothing compared with those induced by a first offence? Sin is not adequately punished by its outward results in this world; and it is not the greatest offender that suffers the most severe inward penalty. I remember once applying the argument in a homely way to a navvy. When I began to speak to him about his soul and the wisdom of beginning to think about his salvation, he broke out with, Well now, look here, sir; I dont hold with you parsons. You talk about hell, and tell us that were to be punished over there. Now, my idea is that we get knocked about in this life bad enough. I dont think a man will suffer all that here and then be damned afterwards. Well, I said, what do you expect to become of you when you die? Oh, he said, I dont know I Maybe that will be the end of me. Anyhow, I dont see any reason why I should suffer more than I do down here. I replied, Now I will put a case to you. Here is a man, we will suppose, under whom you work, who keeps you at it early and late. He grinds down your payment to the last sixpence; he gets out of you whatever he can, and gives you as little as he can in return. He drives in his carriage and pair, while you go on slaving away on wages that scarcely suffice to keep body and soul together. Money flows in on him; he is returned to Parliament. By and by he becomes My Lord So-and-so; and while he, hard-hearted tyrant as he is, lives in luxury, you still go on toiling and slaving away for him, at the slenderest possible remuneration, till after spending forty or fifty years in his service you die in poverty and are carried to a paupers grave. Now, do you think it is likely if there be a God at all that you and he shall fare exactly alike in the next world? No, sir, said he, with considerable warmth; if theres a God in heaven, he ought to suffer for it. His own common sense told him that if there were a Moral Governor of the universe He must lay a heavy hand in judgment upon the successful oppressor of the poor; and the common sense of all men is here on the side of religion.

2. Now, when I turn to revelation, I find not only the statement that there shall be such a judgment, but also indications of some of its more prominent characteristics.

(1) It will be according to the deeds done in the body–not the professions made or the appearances exhibited.

(2) It will be according to privilege. There are large numbers of persons who plume themselves on having been baptized; but the question is, Have you ever realised the spiritual benefit of which baptism is the symbol? Are you not aware that while that blessed ordinance increases your responsibility, it must also enhance your condemnation unless you respond to the obligations that it imposes? Or again, on the other hand, there are those who pride themselves upon being evangelical Christians and strong Protestants. But better far that you had been a heathen in Central Africa than a nominal Christian, familiar with evangelical doctrine, but a stranger to the power of Divine grace.

(3) It will be according to the opportunities and possibilities which have fallen to our lot in life. To whom much has been given, of him much shall be required.

(4) It will bring to light the secret things of darkness and reveal the counsels of every mans heart, and then shall everyone have praise (or blame) of God according as his lifes work has been.

(5) It will depend upon the presence or absence of our name in the Lambs Book of Life. What the specific penalty in each particular case may be I will not presume to say. Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? I know that it will be exactly what the sin deserves, neither more nor less. Perhaps some of you are saying, How shall I know that my name is written there? That question is not hard to answer. If the Lambs own life has been through faith received into your heart, you may be sure that your name is written in the pages of the Book of Life. There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus. (W. H. Aitken, M. A.)

Trembling Felix

I. The nature of this trembling. We must distinguish between a sanctifying fear (Pro 16:6) which is a grace, an habitual disposition of the soul (Isa 66:2; Ezr 10:3), and the fear which only troubles us for the present.

1. Holy fear is a voluntary work excited by faith believing Gods threatening, and by love which is troubled at the offences done to God. A fear like that of Felix is an involuntary impression arising from the spirit of bondage and irresistible conviction, which for a while puts its subjects into the stocks of conscience, but they seek to enlarge themselves as soon as they can.

2. They differ in their grounds. To be troubled for the offence done to God is a good sign, but to be troubled merely for the punishment due is the guise of hypocrites (Heb 12:17; Mar 10:22).

3. They differ in their effects. Sometimes–

(1) An anxiety about the way of salvation, and then it is good (Act 2:37).

(2) Rage (Act 7:54).

(3) Dilatory excuses, as here.

II. Its cause–the Word.

1. The matter.

(1) Generally–the Word of God has a convincing power.

(a) Partly because of its Author, whose impress is on it (Heb 4:12).

(b) Partly because of its clearness to a natural conscience if it be not blinded (2Co 4:2-18).

(c) Chiefly because of the concomitant blessing (Joh 16:8; 2Co 4:6).

(2) Particularly–the Day of Judgment. This was the apostles great argument (Act 10:42-43; Act 17:30-31; 2Co 5:10-11), because

(a) This made their access to the heart more easy because of its suitableness to natural light (Rom 1:32).

(b) This most befriends the great discovery of the gospel, justification and pardon through Christ, by submitting to His instruction. If He be our Judge we should take the law from His mouth.

(c) This best solves doubts about present providence (Ecc 8:4).

2. The manner. The Word must be applied–

(1) Closely. Paul discoursed of virtues opposite to the vices with which Felix was blemished (Act 2:36-37). In the doctrine delivered we only bend the bow; in application we shoot at the mark.

(2) Prudently. No charge is here made. Paul only presents the looking glass in which they can see themselves,

III. Its effects. It may come to nothing through–

1. Levity (Hos 6:4, cf. Pro 4:18).

2. Addictedness to lusts which is greater than affection to religion (Luk 8:14).

3. Unskilfulness in handling wounds of conscience.

(1) Some think they are never wounded enough; but it is not the depth of the wound, but the soundness of the cure that is to be regarded.

(2) Some heal their wounds slightly, skin them over while they fester within.

(3) Others dissemble till they prove deadly.

(4) Others run to a worldly cure, or by the din of business put off what they do not put away (Amo 6:3).

4. Want of Gods grace, which is forfeited by those who have common helps.

(1) Some put away the Word (Act 13:46).

(2) Some put away troubles of conscience (Gen 6:3).

(3) Some lose all relish for good things and relapse into a carnal savour (Heb 6:3-4).

IV. Uses.

1. Information. We learn–

(1) The power of the Word. Consider Felix–

(a) An unbeliever.

(b) A judge who humbled under his prisoner. Outward disadvantages should not discourage us.

(c) A depraved man. We should despair of none.

(d) A man glutted with worldly happiness. The thoughts of the next world will sour all the sweets of this.

(2) The profitableness of insisting on the Last Judgment as a means of persuasion. It is–

(a) Impartial (Rev 20:12).

(b) Strict and just (Act 17:31).

(c) Final.

(d) Every minute brings it nearer (Jam 5:9),

(3) The soreness of a bad conscience.

(4) The necessity of strict obedience.

(5) The sottishness of those who are not moved so far as Felix was.

2. Caution.

(1) Do not lose the advantage of this common work.

(a) It may be lost partly by delays and dreams of a more convenient season (Luk 14:18), and partly by relapses into our old crimes, as here.

(b) Reasons. It is very dangerous–iron often heated and quenched is the more hard (Pro 29:1). You lose the season wherein God will be found (Heb 3:7; 2Co 6:1-2).

(2) Do not rest in a common work that you hear the Word and are affected; Herod rejoiced, Felix trembled. (T. Manton, D. D.)

The awakening of conscience

Those who have seen Holman Hunts picture of the Awakened Conscience will not soon forget it. There are only two figures–a man and a woman, sitting in a gaudily furnished room, beside a piano. His fingers are on the instrument, his face, which is reflected in a mirror, is handsome and vacant, evidently that of a man about town, who supposes that the brightest part of creation is intended to administer to his amusement. A music book on the floor is open at the words Oft in the stilly night. That tune has struck some chord in his companions heart. Her face of horror says what no language could say, That tune has told me of other days when I was not as I am now. The tune has done what the best rules that were ever devised could not do. It has brought a message from a fathers house. (W. Denton.)

Go thy way for this time; when I have a convenient season I will call for thee.—

Frivolities render men callous to the gospel

When Bonaparte put the Duke dEnghien to death, all Paris felt so much horror at the event that the throne of the tyrant trembled under him. A counter revolution was expected, and would most probably have taken place, had not Bonaparte ordered a new ballet to be brought out, with the utmost splendour, at the Opera. The subject he pitched on was Ossian, or the Bards. It is still recollected in Paris, as perhaps the grandest spectacle that had ever been exhibited there. The consequence was that the murder of the Duke dEnghien was totally forgotten, and nothing but the new ballet was talked of. After this fashion Satan takes off mens thoughts from their sins, and drowns the din of their consciences. Lest they should rise in revolt against him, he gives them the lusts of the flesh, the vanities of pride, the cares of this world, or the merriment of fools, to lead away their thoughts. Poor silly men are ready enough for these misleading gaieties, and for the sake of them the solemnities of death and eternity are forgotten. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

The sinful dismissal

I. A guilty rejection. Go thy way.

1. Its reason.

(1) Because of faithful preaching.

(2) An accusing conscience–which many feel like Ahab and Herodias.

2. Its guilt.

(1) Because God sent the preacher.

(2) It was rejecting Christ.

(3) Resisting the Holy Ghost.

(4) Cleaving to Satan.

II. A prevailing temptation. When I have a convenient season.

1. It supposes a more suitable time than the present. Though surrounded by religious privileges, numbers are ensnared.

2. It estimates religion as a secondary matter. Dreadful thought that religion should be set aside for earthly pleasures and profits–the poor trifles of a day!

III. A fatal delusion. I will call for thee. But did he? The delusion is apparent, inasmuch as–

1. Those who have stifled convictions are the most hardened–Noahs hearers, Sodom, and the Jews in our Lords day.

2. No sinner will call for light unvisited by the Holy Spirit.

3. It is not certain that a future call will prevail.

(1) Means may not be at hand.

(2) Fear alone may rule in the heart.

(3) The insulted Spirit may have fled (Pro 1:28). (Congregational Pulpit.)

Ordered back to the guard room

Felix sent Paul back and adjourned the subject of religion because–

I. He did not want to give up his sins. There was Drusilla; if he became a Christian, he must send her back to Azizus, her lawful husband–the case with many practically today. Tonight, some of you will have to decide between unlawful amusements and eternal salvation. Delilah sheared the locks of Samson; Salome danced Herod into the pit; Drusilla blocked up the way to heaven for Felix; and unless some of you repent, you shall likewise perish. Yet I fear some of you will say, Dont be so precipitate. I have a few tickets yet that I have to use. I have a few engagements that I must keep. Go thy way for this time. I know that it is easier when you are in a boat to pull with the stream, but what if, tonight, you should be within a few yards of the vortex? Turn your boat around, and, as with a death grip, pull for your eternal life, crying, Lord, save me, I perish!

II. He was so very busy. In ordinary times he found the affairs of state absorbing, but those were extraordinary times. The whole land was ripe for insurrection. And so some of you look upon your goods, profession, memorandum books, and you see the demands that are made upon your time, patience, and money, and while I am entreating you about your soul and the danger of procrastination, you say, Go thy way for this time, etc. Oh, Felix, you might better postpone everything else, for do you not know that the upholstering of Tyrian purple in your palace will fade, and the marble blocks of Caesarea will crumble, but the redemption that Paul offers you will be forever? and yet you waive him back to the guard room.

III. He could not give up the honours of the world. He was afraid he would compromise himself. Yet what were those honours worth when in two short years they were torn from him, and when he disappeared covered with infamy? Conclusion: Have you never seen men waiting for a convenient season? I say to a boy, Seek Christ. He says, No; wait until I get to be a young man. I say to the young man, Seek Christ. He says, Wait until I come to mid-life. I meet the same person in mid-life, he says, Wait until I get old. I meet the same person in old age, and he says, Wait until I am on my dying bed. I am called to his dying couch; and yet he whispers, I am–waiting–for–a more–convenient–season–and he is gone! I can tell you when your convenient season will come. It is now. Do you ask me how I know this? I know it because you are here; and because the Holy Spirit is here; and because the people of God in this church are praying for you. Now is the best time, as it may be the only time. (T. De Witt Talmage, D. D.)

The convenient season

1. The man who does not listen to a strain of sweet music may be pardoned for not appreciating it; but the man who listens, only to respond with a shuffle, must be very cold and dull. Yet such seems to be the outrage which the man commits who interrupts the loving overture which calls him to the feast, with the earth-croak of his farm, his merchandise, his yoke of oxen, or his marriage peal. Felix is just in the same position as the people who made light of the call; that is, he is called to make up his mind concerning the same privileges. But he certainly is not so cold as those who make light of it or those who make excuse. They were more or less at ease, but Felix trembles. An uneasy conscience, however sad a thing, is more hopeful than placid deadness or blithe indifference. There is more chance for a man who is on the rack than for one who is dead. There is more hope of a man with the hot-ache than of one who is frozen. Here is a man trembling under the truth. Surely that is better than one who is callous to it or laughing at it. Still it is a condition eminently unsatisfactory. It is a shuffle after all, for it proceeds on a fallacy. The plea of convenience is a delusion. It is never convenient to cut off an arm or to pluck out an eye, and yet it may be imperative. To send away the messenger of truth, however painful the news he brings, will not change his tidings or alter the necessity of receiving it. When a man begins to tremble at his conscience, there is no convenient season for getting the trembling calmed; but there is one wise and sure season, and that is now.

2. We have sometimes heard this incident dealt with in a strain which has seemed to render but scant justice to Felix himself. The common way is to represent Felix as sending Paul away to get rid of him; that the convenient season never came; and that it was simply, out of sight, out of mind. Then this is followed out into an analogy between sending away the messenger because the message is despised, and stifling conscience, resisting and grieving and quenching the Spirit. Now this (without qualification) amounts to an injustice, by putting a stern construction on his conduct when a milder one would be equally natural. It seems possible, and even probable, that his motive was that he might go away and reflect alone upon what he had heard, and seek further instruction when less excited and more able to appreciate it. And here we hit a blot upon the methods of some of our more zealous teachers. They are impatient of a calmness which may be more devout than mere excitement. They do not leave room for the exercise of the judgment. They reiterate the emphatic now with a passion which sometimes overacts itself. They cannot wait for the leaven to work. If a man turns away and says, I cant go farther now; I will see you again tomorrow, it is a common thing to hear an exclamation, Oh, tomorrow may never come; today is the day of salvation. Now, in a sense, this is true, but not in the sense intended. Conviction of sin, and righteousness, and judgment to come, may be a momentary, or it may be a gradual thing; and at least it requires time to work out its effects and results. Gods method is one of calm appeal: Come now, and let us reason together. The physician sees his patient again and again, and watches his case carefully.

3. We have tried to do justice to Felix, and we would fain do justice to you. We have ventured the hypothesis of an honest motive for his dismissal of the pleader. But the honesty or otherwise of your motive will prove itself in one of two ways. You will seek to put yourself within reach of the argument again when the season of solitary reflection has passed. If the convenient season never comes, that will be proof that you stifled the argument to still your fears. And you will put yourself into communication with the messenger to say, either that you want to be taught further, or else that you have tidings for him that a greater Teacher has been with you in your solitude; and looking out of self to Christ, the light came, the righteousness was sealed to you, and the judgment to come has passed away. Take today as the convenient season for this. Put nothing that is important off till tomorrow. If you tremble at righteousness and judgment to come, seek your assurance by accepting the righteousness and redemption which have already come, and which Christ is offering you today. Dont raise impediments, dont raise the old cry of being unworthy and wicked. Accept Christ; and, whatever it may cost you, do it now. Is it not true that putting off decision does make the ear grow heavy and the eye grow dim? Is it not true that there was a time when the music of the gospel rang more sweet to you than now, and the smile of Jesus had a fairer charm than pleases you today? And why? Not because the tune is altered or the visage changed. But because you have heard, but have not listened; have looked, but have not loved. (Arthur Mursell.)

Delay of repentance

I. The longer we delay returning to God and seeking His mercy through the Saviour, we must increase our guilt and add to that condemnation which we have already incurred.

II. By delay we must diminish the blessings and increase the evils of our present condition.

III. Delay may produce such insensibility to sin and its consequences as to render it improbable that sinners should awaken to a sense of their danger, repent, and lay hold of the hope that is set before them. Far be it from us to fix limits to the mercy of the Most High. He may, without doubt, have mercy on whom He will have mercy, and if it so please Him He may change even in death the heart of the most hardened sinners; yet small reason, surely, have such sinners to expect at such a period so peculiar an interposition; and to delay repentance now, and to rest their salvation on the hope of it, is of all infatuations the greatest and most fearful. Yet even this hope, faint as it is, may not be granted.

IV. Consider the shortness and uncertainty of human life. The work is great which is given us to do. The object is higher than all others for which we are to prepare, and it is during our stay on earth alone that this work can be done and this preparation can be made. And is the period of our continuance here so long that it should be wasted in vanity and sin, or that we should shorten by delay the time which is assigned for a purpose so unspeakably important? (S. MacGill, D. D.)

The convenient season

A man always finds a convenient season for doing what he loves best. Whether it is working, or eating, or sleeping, or pleasure seeking, or money getting, or place hunting, if it has his heart he will find time for it. If he does not find a convenient season for accepting the offer of salvation, it is because he values something above that. He thinks more of the life that nor is than of the life which is to come. He fails to realise how much more of joy there is in the present life to one who has Christ for his Saviour, than to one who is not at peace with God. The convenient season for taking hold of the richest treasure God can give to man, and for receiving the best of blessings, is now. He who is not ready to be saved when the lifeboat is at the wreck will never have a more convenient season for his rescue. This hour is your convenient season for that which is best worth your attention and doing. (H. C. Trumbull, D. D.)

The convenient season

Felixs excuse is that of those–

1. Who know indeed the vanity of the world, but are too indolent to tear themselves from its pleasures.

2. Who feel indeed the disgrace of the slavery of sin, but are too weak earnestly to repent.

3. Who have experienced indeed, in a measure, the power of the Word of God, bus are too frivolous to resign themselves entirely to it. (Leonhard and Speigelhauer.)

Now, now!–Not by and by

Felix had sent for Paul evidently not as a judge, but partly with a view to try to get a bribe out of him, and partly because he had some kind of languid interest, as most Romans then had, in Oriental thought, and perhaps too in this strange man. Or he and Drusilla were possibly longing for a new sensation. So they called for the apostle, and the guilty couple got a good deal more than they bargained for. Christianity has sometimes to be exceedingly rude in reference to the sins of the upper classes. As Paul goes on, a strange fear began to creep about the heart of Felix. It is the watershed of his life that he has come to, the crisis of his fate. Everything depends on the next five minutes. The tongue of the balance trembles and hesitates for a moment and then, but slowly, the wrong scale goes down. Go thy way for this time. Ah! If he had said, Come and help me to get rid of this strange fear, how different all might have been! The metal was at the very point of melting. What shape would it take? It ran into the wrong mould, and, as far as we know, it was hardened there.

I. This incident is an example of the fact that men lull awakened consciences to sleep and excuse delay in deciding for Christ by half-honest promises to attend to religion at some future time. Felixs anxiety is to get rid of Paul and his disturbing message for the present. But he does not wish to shut the door altogether. So he gives a sop to his conscience to stop its barking.

1. Let me remind you that however beautiful the message of Gods love in Jesus Christ is, there is another side to it which is meant to awaken mens fears. You bring a man like Felix, or a very much better man, into contact with righteousness, temperance, judgment to come, and the effect of a direct appeal to moral convictions will always be more or less to create a dread that if I set myself against the law of God, that law will crush me. The fear is well founded, and not only does the contemplation of Gods law excite it. Gods gospel comes to us, and just because it is the best good news, it begins often by making a man feel what a sinful man he is, and how there hang over him consequences bitter and painful.

2. The awakened conscience, like the sense of pain, has got a work to do–to warn you off dangerous ground. Now have you used that sense of wrong-doing to lead you to Christ, or what have you done with it? There are two men in this book who pass through the same stages of feeling up to a certain point, and then they diverge. Felix becoming afraid, puts away the thing that disturbs him; the Philippian jailor becoming afraid (the phrases in the original being almost identical), like a sensible man, says, What must I do to be saved? The fear is of no use in itself. It is only an impelling motive that leads us to look to the Saviour.

II. Some of the reasons why we fall into this habit of self-deceiving indecision and delay.

1. The instinctive, natural wish to get rid of a disagreeable subject–much as a man, without knowing what he is doing, twitches his hand away from the surgeons lancet. So a great many of us do not like these thoughts about righteousness, and temperance and judgment to come, and make an effort to get our minds away from the subject because it is unpleasant. Do you think it would be a wise thing for a man, if he began to suspect that he was insolvent, to refuse to look into his books, and let things drift. And what do you call people who, suspecting that there may be a great hole in the bottom of the ship, say, Oh! she will very likely keep afloat until we get into harbour? Certainly it is not wise to shuffle a thing out of sight because it is not pleasing to think about.

2. The notion that it is time enough to be religious when you get a bit older, and that religion is all very well for people that are turned sixty, but that it is quite unnecessary for you. Some are tempted to regard thoughts of God as in place only among medicine bottles, or when the shadows of the grave begin to fall on our path. Young men will be young men; We must sow our wild oats; You cant put old heads on young shoulders–practically mean that godlessness belongs to youth, and virtue and religion to old age, just as flowers to spring and fruit to autumn. I beseech you not to be deceived by such a notion.

3. The habit of allowing impressions to be crowded out by cares, enjoyments and duties of this world. If you had not so much to do at college, if you had not so many parties and balls to go to, if you had not your place to make in the warehouse, if you had not this, that, and the other thing to do, you would have time for religion. Here tonight some serious thought is roused; by tomorrow at midday it has all gone. You did not intend it to go, you simply opened the door to the flocking in of the whole crowd of the worlds cares and occupations, and away went the shy solitary thought that, if it had been cared for and tended, might have led you to the Cross of Jesus Christ.

4. Because you do not like to give up something that you know is inconsistent with Christs love and service. Felix would not part with Drusilla, nor disgorge his ill-gotten gain. He was therefore obliged to put away from him the thoughts that looked in that direction.

III. Some reasons for present decision.

1. Delay is really decision the wrong way.

2. There is no real reason for delay. No season will be more convenient than the present. Every time is the right time to do the right thing.

3. There is nothing to wait for.

4. Every time that you delay to accept this message you make yourselves less capable of receiving it another time. If you take a bit of phosphorus and put it upon a slip of wood, and ignite the phosphorus, bright as the blaze is, there drops from it a white ash that coats the wood and makes it almost incombustible. And so when the flaming conviction, laid upon your hearts, has burnt itself out, it has coated the heart, and it will be very difficult to kindle the light there again. Felix did send for Paul again, and repeated the conversation, but we do not know that he repeated the trembling.

5. Delay robs you of large blessing. Why should you postpone possessing the purest joy, the highest blessing, the Divinest strength?

6. Delay inevitably lays up for you bitter memories and involves dreadful losses. There are good Christian men and women who would give all they have if they could blot out of the tablets of their memories some past hours before they gave their hearts to Christ. I would have you ignorant of such transgression.

7. No tomorrow may be yours. Delay is gambling, very irrationally, with a very uncertain thing–your life and your future opportunities. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)

Procrastination

If unbelief has slain its thousands, procrastination has its ten thousands. Where one sinner is frightened into religion, a hundred are deceived to ruin by the sirens voice crying Tomorrow. The devil cares not how moral a man is, nor how anxious he is about his soul, so long as he is disposed to wait on a future opportunity. Procrastination is both the thief of time and the great harvest gatherer of lost souls.

I. Tomorrow has no place in the economy of salvation. From first to last, with God and His offered mercy, it is now, today! There is not one promise in the Bible for tomorrow, or the next opportunity.

II. Today is the most favourable season any sinner will ever have to seek God in the way of repentance. A convenient season to repent of sin and return to God will never come. Repentance is a bitter cup to all. To love what one has hated, and hate what one has loved, will never be found convenient. Come when it will, it will be crucifixion, a going counter to all the strong currents of human nature. And if you have not resolution, strength, for this today, you will have less inclination and strength for the distasteful service tomorrow.

III. The law of habit comes in here as a tremendous factor. It cost you a struggle to resist conviction the first time Gods Spirit wrought upon you. But now it has grown into a habit, under its fell power you can resist every appeal without effort.

IV. The means of salvation, when resisted, lose more and more of their power, till finally they cease to have any saving influence. The Word of God ceases to alarm. The voice of conscience is hushed. The tender heart is gone. The striving Spirit is grieved away. The Sabbath and the sanctuary lose their charm. Chastisements no longer check the downward trend. Awful monitions of a hastening doom!

V. Meanwhile the outward obstacles to salvation are continually augmenting both in number and in influence over the sinner. Evil habits, associations, entanglements, the infirmities of age, etc., block up the way of life and draw with the strength of a leviathan towards perdition. (J. M. Sherwood, D. D.)

Procrastination

There was a man in Chicago who twice determined to give his heart to God, but never had the courage to acknowledge Christ before his ungodly companions. When recovering from a long sickness, he still refused to come out boldly on the side of Christ, saying, Not yet; I have got a fresh lease of life. I cant be a Christian in Chicago. I am going to take a faith in Michigan and then I will profess Christ. I asked him, How dare you take the risk? He said, I will risk it; dont you trouble yourself any more about my soul. I have made up my mind. The very next week he was stricken down with the same disease. His wife sent for me, and said, He dont want to see you, but I cant bear that he should die in such an awful state of mind. He says, my damnation is sealed, and I shall be in hell in a week. I tried to talk and pray with him, but it was no use; he said his heart was as hard as a stone. Pray for my wife and children, but dont waste your time praying for me. His last words were, The harvest is past, etc. (D. L. Moody.)

Procrastination

It is a solemn thing to say tomorrow, when God says today; for mans tomorrow and Gods today never meet. The word that comes from the eternal throne is now, and it is mans own choice that fixes his doom. (D. Matheson.)

Delay: reasons for

An Indian and a white man became Christians. The Indian, almost as soon as he heard the gospel, believed and was saved; but the white man struggled on in darkness for a long while before he found light. After their peace in Christ, the white man said to the Indian: Why was it that I was kept so long in the darkness, and you immediately found peace? The Indian replied: I will tell you. A prince comes along and he offers you a coat. You look at your coat and you say: My coat is good enough, and you refuse his offer; but the prince comes along and he offers me the coat, and I look at my old blanket, and I throw that away, and take his offer. You, sir, continued the Indian, are clinging to your own righteousness; you think you are good enough, and you keep your own righteousness; but I have nothing–nothing; and so when Jesus offers me pardon and peace, I simply take it. (T. De Witt Talmage, D. D.)

Delay in religion

I. General remarks.

1. That kind of preaching which tends to alarm the soul is far from being agreeable to the carnal mind. The sluggard does not like to be awakened out of his slumbers, nor the epicure to be called from his revels; neither does the thoughtless sinner wish to be roused from his sloth and carnal security. He dreams that all is well, and he chooses to dream on. He says to the seers, See not; and to the prophets, Speak unto us smooth things. The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means, and my people love to have it so. Ahab said of Micaiah–I hate him: for he never prophesieth good unto me, but always evil! The upright Christian loves a soul searching ministry. Let the righteous smite me, it shall be a kindness, etc. But the language of the hypocrite, or self-soothing sinner, is like that of Felix. Such characters have no objection to hear of the love of God to a sinful world, but do not like to hear of His wrath. But let them remember that the time is coming when the contempt they have cast on faithful ministers will only tend to aggravate their guilt and ruin (Isa 30:10-11; Jer 5:31; Mat 3:10; 2Ch 25:16; 2Ch 18:7; Psa 141:5; Eze 2:5).

2. Those who are merely the subjects of convictions generally do what they can to stifle them. They love their ease, and would chase away what they call melancholy reflections. Saul, under distress of mind, calls for music. Cain, in much the same situation, goes and builds a city. And thus today one gets rid of his terror by involving himself in a hurry of business, and another by plunging himself into dissipation and excess (Hos 6:5.)

3. There are few men so hardened in sin, but they design to attend to the concerns of their souls at some time or another. When I have a convenient season, etc. Thus many resolve to reform and repent at some future period. It is time enough for them to thick about religion when they are settled in the world, or to think of dying when death knocks at the door. It is easy to swim with the tide, and vain would be the attempt to swim against it: they will therefore enjoy themselves while they may. Few men are lost for saying they will not repent; but many for saying they will, but not yet. The young man who seemed resolved to follow Christ wanted first to go and bury his father. And the excuses for not coming to the marriage supper do not intimate an absolute refusal, but only a delay.

II. The folly and danger of neglecting the concerns of our soul, and putting them off to a more convenient season.

1. The concerns of our souls are of the greatest importance, and therefore ought not to be trifled with. Some things are profitable, and others pleasant; and many such things may engage our attention; but one thing is needful, and must be attended to.

2. Life is very uncertain. The rich man talks of having goods laid up for many years, etc. Many men seem never to be convinced that they have souls till they come to lose them; or to think of a future state till they are just entering upon it. They put far off the evil day; but it must come, and may come when it is least expected. Satan, who now tempts us to delay a little longer, will hereafter persuade us that we have delayed too long.

3. Delays increase difficulties. The heart becomes more hardened, the conscience more seared, convictions return less frequently, and sinful habits are more and more strengthened and confirmed. God also, provoked by our negligence and contempt of His mercy, may justly say of us as He did of Ephraim: He is joined to idols, let him alone! (B. Beddome, M. A.)

Uncertain of tomorrow

Said a little girl who had just been reading the newspaper account of an explosion, Mother, dont you think that people who work in powder mills ought to be pious? There was a good deal of human nature in that question. The world, like the little girl, thinks that all who are especially exposed ought to be prepared for sudden death. But is not the whole world a vast powder mill? Is it not filled everywhere with the elements of destruction? The very air we breathe may become poisonous and slay us. The water we drink may contain some deadly ingredient which neither sight nor taste can detect. We are encompassed ever by unseen dangers. We are never certain of tomorrow. Then should we not be prepared, whatever our age, our business, or our locality, for sudden death?

Self-interest rebukes indecision

You have said this often to the Spirit of grace; but you would not treat anyone thus unceremoniously who should call upon you to minister to your happiness. If a friend should indicate to you the means of acquiring a fortune, or open before you some new avenue to honour and pleasure, how eagerly would you listen to his conversation, and examine with deliberation its every detail. You would not dismiss him from your presence until he had satisfied your minutest inquiries; and even then you would urge him again and again to revisit you. Your interest would be the more deeply excited if he presented before you two distinct objects of acquisition, both of which could not be procured, and between which a choice on your part were absolutely essential. And yet, when a heavenly inheritance is presented, and you are told of its permanency, and happiness, and bliss, you hesitate, as you contrast it with earthly fame and fortune, and know not which to choose!

Fatal procrastination

Some years ago, a young man sat in one of these pews before me. He listened to an impassioned sermon from the preacher who that night occupied the pulpit, urging them, and pleading with them to give their hearts to Christ. This young man was much affected, and when the after meeting was intimated, he turned to a companion and said, I will stay to it. I do not care though they do speak to me, they can only bring me to Christ, and that is what I want. But his companion laughed at him. Man, you are a fool; if you stay here everyone will laugh at you. The young man made a feeble effort to resist his friend; but at last permitted himself to be led out, doubtless pacifying his conscience with the thought that at some other time he would have the matter settled once and for all. Foolish fellow, lost opportunities are never regained, and similar ones seldom occur. The next day was spent in a public house, where the name of Christ was never heard except as an oath. Going home late in the evening, he and his companion had to cross the railway. Their senses were too dulled with their carousal to observe the lights of an express train as it approached them, until with a swoop and a flash it was upon them, and in another moment this young man who the night before was almost persuaded lay dead upon the railway track. For him it had been the last opportunity, as this may be to some of you, to whom I can only give Gods message, Now is the accepted time. (W. Ross.)

Ruinous adjournment

Causes in court are adjourned, sometimes because the witnesses are not ready, or because the plaintiff is not ready, or because the defendant is not ready, and sometimes because the judge is not ready, until the bill of costs is ruinous–so there are men and women who have adjourned the cause of the souls salvation from youth to middle life, from health to sickness, from prosperity to adversity, until death eternal will be the bill of costs to pay. (T. De Witt Talmage.)

Destructive sedatives

Physicians tell us that the constant use of sedatives slowly but surely deadens the energies and saps the vital force. Good resolutions for tomorrow are a pleasant soothing syrup for our conscience today, but there is a danger lest its activity be injured, and its power of remonstrance destroyed: we want mental tonics, not sedatives. (Dora Hope.)

Procrastination in Russia

Sei tchas! sei tchas! Dont believe what the priest or the dictionary tells you about the meaning of that expression. The dictionary will tell you that it means immediately, but thats all nonsense. In the mouth of a Russian it means in an hour, next week, in a year or two, never–most commonly, never. Like many other words in Russian, sei tchas can be only understood after long experience. (Mackenzie Wallace.)

Too late

Felix trembled but procrastinated. And so many now are affected by their state and danger, but they put off seeking religion till they become indifferent about it, and till it be too late. Ministers are often not sent to visit persons till they are dying, or unconscious, or quite unable to attend to the conditions of salvation, just as medical men are sometimes not applied to till the disease is past remedy. It is often a calamity to be too late for the post, too late to meet a friend, too late to catch the train, or the ship which has to sail. But it will be an eternal and infinite misery to delay seeking salvation till the door of mercy is forever closed. The road of by and by leads to the town of Never. Today is the day of mercy, tomorrow may be the day of doom. (H. R. Burton.)

The danger of delay in religious decision

In a pastorate of twenty years in one of the oldest churches of this commonwealth, three hundred and eighty persons joined the church. The minister made note of certain facts concerning each. Of this three hundred and eighty, three hundred and five joined the church before the age of thirty; thirty-eight between thirty and forty; twenty-two between forty and fifty; eight between fifty and sixty; three between sixty and seventy; three between seventy and eighty; one between eighty and ninety. As the decades pass the numbers rapidly decrease; and as the years pass we know that the intensity of the desire, that the frequency of the coming of the desire to love God lessens. The desire may fade at an early age: it may never depart in a life that rounds the century. But, remember, it may fade any year; remember, it must grow fainter as time passes; remember, it may cease, and cease forever. (G. P. Thwing.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 25. As he reasoned of righteousness] ; The principles and requisitions of justice and right, between God and man; and between man and his fellows, in all relations and connections of life.

Temperance] , Chastity; self-government or moderation with regard to a man’s appetites, passions, and propensities of all kinds.

And judgment to come] ; The day of retribution, in which the unjust, intemperate, and incontinent, must give account of all the deeds done in the body. This discourse of St. Paul was most solemnly and pointedly adapted to the state of the person to whom it was addressed. Felix was tyrannous and oppressive in his government; lived under the power of avarice and unbridled appetites; and his incontinence, intemperance, and injustice, appear fully in depriving the king of Emesa of his wife, and in his conduct towards St. Paul, and the motives by which that conduct was regulated. And as to Drusilla, who had forsaken the husband of her youth, and forgotten the covenant of her God, and become the willing companion of this bad man, she was worthy of the strongest reprehension; and Paul’s reasoning on righteousness, temperance, and judgment, was not less applicable to her than to her unprincipled paramour.

Felix trembled] “The reason of Felix’s fear,” says Bp. Pearce, “seems to have been, lest Drusilla, who was a Jewess, and knew that what she had done was against the law of Moses, might be influenced by Paul’s discourse, and Felix’s happiness with her disturbed. What is said of Felix, Ac 24:26, seems to show that he had no remorse of conscience for what he had done.” On the head of Drusilla’s scruples, he had little to fear; the king of Emesa, her husband, had been dead about three years before this; and as to Jewish scruples, she could be little affected by them: she had already acted in opposition to the Jewish law, and she is said to have turned heathen for the sake of Felix. We may therefore hope that Felix felt regret for the iniquities of his life; and that his conscience was neither so scared nor so hardened, as not to receive and retain some gracious impressions from such a discourse, delivered by the authority, and accompanied with the influence, of the Spirit of God. His frequently sending for the apostle, to speak with him in private, is a proof that he wished to receive farther instructions in a matter in which he was so deeply interested; though he certainly was not without motives of a baser kind; for he hoped to get money for the liberation of the apostle.

Go thy way for this time] His conscience had received as much terror and alarm as it was capable of bearing; and probably he wished to hide, by privacy, the confusion and dismay which, by this time, were fully evident in his countenance.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

These two, righteousness and temperance, the Christian religion do indispensably require; and all true worship without these, will not make up our most holy religion, or give to any the title of a religious or a holy man. But Paul chose rather to discourse of those than any other virtues, because Felix was most defective in them. He would lay his plaster where there was a sore, though it pained the patient, and he should get little thanks for his labour. Had great men but such faithful preachers, it might contribute very much to hinder them in their career of sin, and by that means help to mend the world.

Temperance; or continence; the want of which is charged upon both these great persons, being taxed by historians for adultery; so that Paul preaches here as John Baptist did once to Herod, very suitably, though not gratefully. Yet in the discharge of his duty he meets with no trouble, not so much as a reproach, which probably the sense of the judgment to come might contribute to.

Judgment to come; whatsoever is present, this is certainly to come: and the secret reflections that wicked men have upon it in the midst of their fullest enjoyments, mingle fears and terrors with them. Hence their surda vulnera, misgivings and inward guilt; as its contrary, the peace of God, passeth all understanding.

Go thy why for this time; Felix, not liking such discourse, the subject being too quick and searching for him, put it off longer. And so men put off the consideration of their duties, and of the judgment that will pass upon every one according unto what he hath done in the flesh, till the Judge be, as it were, set, and their case called.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

25. And as he reasoned ofrighteousnesswith reference to the public character ofFelix.

temperancewithreference to his immoral life.

and judgment to comewhenhe would be called to an awful account for both.

Felix trembledand nowonder. For, on the testimony of TACITUS,the Roman Annalist [Annals, 9; 12.54], he ruled with a mixtureof cruelty, lust, and servility, and relying on the influence of hisbrother Pallas at court, he thought himself at liberty to commitevery sort of crime with impunity. How noble the fidelity and couragewhich dared to treat of such topics in such a presence, and whatwithering power must have been in those appeals which made even aFelix to tremble!

Go thy way for this time; andwhen I have a convenient season I will call for theeAlas forFelix! This was his golden opportunity, butlike multitudesstillhe missed it. Convenient seasons in abundance he found tocall for Paul, but never again to “hear him concerning the faithin Christ,” and writhe under the terrors of the wrath to come.Even in those moments of terror he had no thought of submission tothe Cross or a change of life. The Word discerned the thoughts andintents of his heart, but that heart even then clung to its idols;even as Herod, who “did many things and heard John gladly,”but in his best moments was enslaved to his lusts. How many Felixeshave appeared from age to age!

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come,…. The apostle not only discoursed concerning the doctrine of faith in Christ, but insisted upon the duties of religion: and particularly he reasoned upon righteousness; not justifying righteousness, that is only the righteousness of Christ, and which rather belongs to the doctrine of faith in Christ; but the exercise of justice, or the doing of righteousness between man and man; which was agreeably to the light of nature, to the law of God, and Gospel of Christ, and is a virtue highly necessary in a judge, and was greatly wanting in Felix; who, as the historian says d, was guilty of much cruelty and injustice throughout this government and therefore very appropriately did the apostle fall on this subject: and he might also reason concerning the necessity of a righteousness, in order to justify before God, and to appear before him with acceptance, and to enter into heaven: he might show, that it was the loss of righteousness which was the reason of the first man being removed from his place and state of happiness, in which he was whilst innocent; and that to admit persons into heaven without a righteousness, is contrary to the pure and holy nature of God, who loves righteousness, and hates iniquity; and particularly would not be agreeable to his justice, which requires a perfect righteousness; yea, it would be uncomfortable to holy men themselves, to have ungodly and unrighteous persons with them in heaven: he might also reason upon the want of righteousness, which is in every man; how that the first man having lost his righteousness, all his posterity are destitute of one; and that they are not able to work out one acceptable to God, and which will justify in his sight; that the thing is impracticable and impossible, and that that which men call a righteousness is not one, at least is not a justifying one: he might insist upon the unprofitableness of a man’s own works of righteousness for such a purpose, by observing the imperfection of them; and that justification by them is contrary to God’s declared way of justifying sinners, is derogatory to his free grace, would make null and void the death of Christ, and encourage boasting in men; and all this he might reason about, in order to convince him of the necessity and suitableness of the righteousness of faith in Christ, he had before been discoursing of: and very pertinently in the next place did he insist on “temperance”; or “continence”, and chastity; since Felix had enticed away another man’s wife, and now lived in adultery with her: and who was now with him, whilst hearing this discourse; which concluded with an account of “judgment to come”; how that Jesus Christ is appointed the Judge of quick and dead, and that all must appear before him, stand at his bar, and be accountable to him for all their actions, and be judged by him, which will be done in the most righteous manner: he might argue this, not only from the Scriptures of the Old Testament, of which Drusilla might have some knowledge, such as

Ps 96:13, but from reason, from the relation which men stand in to God, as his creatures, and therefore are accountable to him for their actions; and from the justice of God, which in many instances, in the present state of things, is not manifest: good men are afflicted and suffer much, and bad men flourish and enjoy great prosperity; wherefore there must be another state in which things will have another turn, and justice will take place: he might from hence conclude the certainty of a future judgment; and the universality of it, that it would reach to all men and things, and would proceed according to the strict rules of justice, and in the most awful manner; and that a true and just sentence would be pronounced and strictly executed: upon which account of things,

Felix trembled; his conscience was awakened, accused him of the injustice and incontinence he had been guilty of; and his mind was filled with horror, at the thought of the awful judgment he could not escape, which Paul had described unto him; nor could he bear him to discourse any longer on these subjects:

and answered, go thy way for this time, when I have a convenient season, I will call for thee; he signifying he was not at leisure now to hear him any longer; when he had a spare hour he would send for him, and hear him out; but this was only an excuse to get rid of him now, and lull his conscience asleep, and make it quiet and easy; which he was afraid would be more and more disturbed, should he suffer Paul to go on preaching in this manner: it is a saying of R. Judah e,

“say not when I am at leisure I will learn, perhaps thou wilt never be at leisure.”

d Tacit. Hist. l. 5. e Pirke Abot, c. 2. sect. 4.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

Was terrified ( ). Ingressive aorist middle of , “becoming terrified.” ( and ) old word, in the N.T. only Luke 24:5; Acts 10:5; Acts 24:25; Rev 11:13. Paul turned the tables completely around and expounded “the faith in Christ Jesus” as it applied to Felix and Drusilla and discoursed ( , genitive absolute) concerning “righteousness” () which they did not possess, “self-control” or temperance () which they did not exhibit, and “the judgment to come” ( ) which was certain to overtake them. Felix was brought under conviction, but apparently not Drusilla. Like another Herodias her resentment was to be feared (Knowling).

Go thy way for this time ( ). The ancient Greek has this use of (Tobit 7:11) in the accusative of time, “as for the present or holding the now.”

When I have a convenient season ( ). Second aorist active participle of the old verb , to find a share in, to obtain. It was his “excuse” for dodging the personal turn that Paul had given.

Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament

Righteousness, temperance, the judgment to come. Three topics which bore directly upon the character of Felix. Tacitus says of him that he “exercised the authority of a king with the spirit of a slave;” and that, by reason of the powerful influence at his command, “he supposed he might perpetrate with impunity every kind of villainy.” He had persuaded his wife Drusilla to forsake her husband and marry him. He had employed assassins to murder the high – priest Jonathan, and might well tremble at the preaching of the judgment to come. Temperance [] is, properly, self – control; holding the passions in hand.

Trembled [ ] Lit., having become in fear. Rev., better, was terrified.

For this time [ ] . Or, for the present. Very literally, as to what has itself now.

Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament

1) “And as he reasoned of righteousness,” (dialegomenou de autou peri dikaiosunes) “And as he discoursed concerning righteousness,” before God and toward men, while Felix and his wife Drusilla apparently lacked both, knew nothing of the righteousness of God, that comes to atone for sinners, by repentance toward God and faith in Jesus Christ, Act 20:21; Rom 4:4-6; 2Co 5:21.

2) “Temperance, and judgement to come,” (kai egkrateias kai tou krimatos tou mellontos) “And concerning self-control and concerning the coming judgement,” he discoursed, because an appointment for accountability for sins of intemperance, righteousness, and rebellion of Jesus Christ, has been made to and for every person, and for every sin, Ecc 12:13-14; Mat 12:36; Act 17:31-32; Heb 9:26-27.

3) “Felix trembled, and answered,” (emphobos genomenos ho pheliks apekrithe) “Felix becoming afraid, or terrified, replied,” with paleness, conviction, and trembling, brought on by the power of the word and spirit of God that cuts to, pricks, and gives understanding to the hearts or emotions of unsaved men and women, Pro 1:22-23; Heb 4:12; Act 9:5; Joh 16:7-11; Rom 2:4-5.

4) “Go thy way for this time; (to nun echon poreuou) “For the present and till I send for you, get out,” or you go and stay gone, stay away. Like the rich young ruler who turned and went away sorrowfully,” convicted of the Holy Spirit, because of his own sin of covetousness, or greed for more money, Felix too turns away, perhaps for hell forever, Mat 9:21-22; 2Co 6:2.

5) “When I have a convenient season,” (kairon de metabaion) “Then when I have a season by and by,” a more convenient time, which so far as history recounts never came – He bid good-by, turned his back on one who wanted to be the best friend he had ever had, Heb 3:7; Heb 4:7; Pro 29:1; Pro 27:1.

6) “I will call for thee.” (metakalesomai se) “I will call for you, of my own accord,” otherwise just don’t bother calling on me, is the idea – He damned his soul with preacher don’t call me, I’ll call you,” covetous, yet hopeful that money would be paid him by Paul to loose him, Act 24:26; Mat 19:21-22; 1Ti 6:17-19; Luk 18:20-21.

DANGER OF DELAY

There was a man in Chicago who twice determined to give his heart to God, but never had the courage to acknowledge Christ before his ungodly companions. When recovering from a long sickness, he still refused to come out boldly on the side of Christ, saying, “Not yet; I have got a fresh lease of lie. I can’t be a Christian in Chicago. I am going to take a farm in Michigan, and then l will profess Christ.” I asked him, “How dare you take the risk?” He said, “I will risk it, don’t trouble yourself any more about my soul. I have made up my mind,” The next week he was stricken down with the same disease. His wife sent for me, and said, “He don’t want to see you, but I can’t bear that he should die in such an awful state of mind. He says, ‘My damnation is sealed, and I shall be in hell in a week.”‘ I tried to talk and pray with him, but I was no use; he said his heart was as hard as stone. “Pray for my wife and children, but don’t waste your time praying for me.” His last words were, “The harvest is past.”

– D. L. Moody.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

−

25. And as he disputed. Felix hoped that he should take some delight in Paul’s sermon; as men who are desirous of new things do willingly feed their ears with subtle disputations; also he meant to satisfy his wife’s desire without his own trouble; now, he is enforced to feel that force of the Word of God, whereof he never thought, which driveth away all his delights. Paul, out of bonds, disputeth of the judgment of God; he which had power to put him to death, or to save his life, is afraid and quaketh as if he stood before his own judge; neither doth he find any other comfort, but to send him away out of his sight. Let us first learn by this, what great force of the Spirit of God there was both in the heart and also in the tongue of Paul, because he seeth that he must speak in the name of Christ, he doth not behave himself like an underling; − (593) but he declareth the embassage which was enjoined him, with a grace, as from on high, and having forgotten that he was in bonds, he denounceth the heavenly judgment in the person of Christ. And now seeing Felix’ heart is so pricked with the voice of a prisoner, the majesty of the Spirit doth show itself in that also, which Christ extolleth; when the Spirit shall come he shall judge the world, etc., and that force of prophesying, which the same Paul setteth forth elsewhere ( 1Co 14:24). Also, that is fulfilled which he saith in another place, that the word of God was not bound with him; which he did not only stoutly maintain and affirm to be true, but which did effectually pierce into the hearts of men, (and that of such as were proud of their greatness) as if it did lighten from heaven. −

Again, we must note, that although the reprobate be stricken with the judgment of God, yet are they not renewed unto repentance by that terror alone. Felix is touched indeed, when he heareth that God shall be the Judge of the world; yet he fleeth therewithal from his judgment-seat, (whereof he is afraid) so that this is feigned sorrow, which doth not work salvation. Therefore, repentance requireth such fear as may both engender a voluntary hatred of sin, and may also present a man before God, that he may willingly suffer himself to be judged by his word. And this is a token of true profiting when the sinner seeketh for medicine there, from whence he received his wound. Furthermore, this place doth teach that men are then examined and tried to the quick, when their vices, wherewith they are infected, are brought to light, and their consciences are called back unto the judgment to come. For when Paul disputeth of righteousness and temperance, he did rub Felix sore upon the gall; forasmuch as he was both a man given to filthy pleasure, and also to dissolute riot, and given over unto iniquity. −

(593) −

“

Non submisse agit,” he does not act crouchingly.

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

THE DANGER OF DELAY

Act 24:25

THE picture is, Paul Before Felix, the prisoner before the judge, and yet, before the touches of the inspired penman are all given, the picture is so changed that Paul is the judge and Felix the man on trial; Paul the courageous one and Felix the man filled with fear; Paul the free man and Felix the man in bonds.

This Apostle always so changes the circumstances of his trials. When the Sanhedrin had him before them, he stood up and cried, as touching the resurrection of the dead I am called in question, and so silenced every Pharisee in the company, because the Pharisees believed also in this same resurrection.

When, before Agrippa, he tells of his conversion so eloquently that the king is angered and says, Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian, and here before this Roman procurator, he so reasons of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, he makes himself appear the judge and Felix the culprit.

Truly, as Charles Spurgeon once remarked, The man who believes in the Gospel and determines to spread it is made a grand man. Paul was little in stature only; every other way he was a giant, and kings feared before his face. He was not one of those preachers of whom Thomas Dixon once spoke, For a goody-good preacher, I have always entertained only pitying contempt. What a sublime calling indeed to go about the earth patting everybody on the back, with Its all right; everything is all right; the devil is all right. I think I would rather my boy would go back to the farm in North Carolina and grub stumps, maul rails, hoe corn and plow a mule, as his father did, than be such a man. Paul was not a goody-good preacher; nor was Jesus, though He was an impersonation of love, in any sense of the term, a goody-good preacher. I came not to send peace, but a sword. But the blade He wielded was the surgeons knife, not the cimeter of the Saracen.

Every man who has to speak before the prominent, either proves himself a preacher for good by being courageous and speaking the truth, or else a poor stick of a pretender by being cowardly and saying smooth things.

Three things impress me in this text.

FELIX WAS FAVORED WITH FAITHFUL PREACHING

And as he reasoned of righteousness (or justice, the word means), temperance (or self-control), and judgment to come, Felix trembled.

Notwithstanding the fact that Paul was before a great man, he poured out no sickly adulations, no eloquent flatteries. Paul was a poor politician, but a most magnificent Christian.

First of all he reasoned of righteousness, or justice. He did this before a man who was a judge, whose business it was to mete out justice. How appropriatepreaching to a man about his occupation! No preacher who deals in glittering generalities, never seeking to get at the real conduct of men, is doing Gods will. Whether Paul knew the history of Felix we do not know, but it would seem most likely that he did. Felix had been a slave, was freed by Claudius, and became one of the infamous favorites of that emperor. It is often true that the man who goes from the bottom of society to the top, gets a swelled head in consequence, and becomes a servant of evil, and to this Felix was no exception.

As the governor of Judea, he was guilty of extortion in taxation, and of living a life of unbridled lust, and so badly did he behave that even Nero, the tyrant, was not pleased with him and recalled him, and but for Pallas, Felixs brother, who was influential with Nero, he would have lost his head. To such a man then, Paul reasoned of justice, of justice. I expect Paul said, You are a judge; you are put here to mete out justice; do you do it? The people know whether you do or not, and God knows, and God will call you into account. Your injustice has cried to Heaven, and the sentence of conviction is already passed against you. A judge and yet unjust! Unjust, Felix, you know you are unjust!

Years ago, in Chicago, the papers told a story of a certain judge, who, having a man on trial before him, pointed his cane at the man and said, There is a great rogue at the end of this stick, to which the prisoner replied, At which end of it, judge?

The rogue here was at the Felix end, and Paul was faithful enough to tell him so. There are few such preachers as that now. As one has said, We have come upon cringing times and cringing preachers.

Many of us study what will be the popular thing, and seek to please. Out with such preaching! It means perdition both for our hearers and ourselves. As I look back over my own life, I hold in highest esteem those ministers of the Gospel who set my faults before me, and who struck fear of sin into my heart; who uttered the word that convicted and condemned.

It is not compliments the man being eaten of a cancer needs, it is the surgeons knife. The faithful physician will not hesitate to cut, for he inserts the blade to save.

Paul also preached temperance, or self-control. At that point his words went deeper still, cut closer to the very heart of Felixs conduct. He had long since loosed the reins and had given himself over to unbridled lust. In the 24th verse we read, And after certain days, when Felix came with his wife Drusilla. But she was not his wife; she was a Jewess, the daughter of Herod Agrippa, a woman noted for her superlative charms, and voluptuous spirit. She had been engaged to Antiochus, but he learned her character and refused to marry her. She was afterward wedded to a king, who though a heathen, accepted the Jewish religion in the hope of her love, but she deserted him and took up with Felix, the man who is now before Pauls face.

Many a preacher would have carefully studied his sentences in order to mark out any paragraph, line, word, or letter, that could suggest this illegitimate relation, and so wound the feelings of this honored auditor. Not so with Paul! He was not so much interested for himself, not so ambitious to sustain his reputation in the presence of the great, as he was to uncover sin and reclaim souls, and he knew that Felix could never be saved as long as he lived in this relation, and he did not hesitate to tell him so.

Paul appreciated the danger of such an utterance. He was not unacquainted with the end of Johns life. He remembered that for just such an utterance the great Baptist had lost his head and died in his early days, and that this same house of the Herods to which Drusilla belonged, was responsible for his decapitation, and yetand yetPaul preached on self-control.

If we may judge from other sermons of his, it is likely that he went back to the Old Testament for illustration, and reminded this Roman Governor of what came to David for a similar sin. I believe, as I live, that if we had more of such preachers today, we would have fewer people living in lawless relations.

Back in the book of Ezekiel, the 33rd chapter, we read these words:

If the watchman see the sword come, and blow not the trumpet, and the people be not warned; if the sword come and take any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at the watchmans hand (Eze 33:6).

Soon we shall see Pilate over a pail of water vainly endeavoring to wash the stain of Christs blood from his polluted fingers. Foolish effort! The better way to be free from the blood of men is the way of Ezekiel,

Nevertheless, if thou warn the wicked of his way to turn from it; if he do not turn from his way, he shall die in his iniquity; but thou hast delivered thy soul (Eze 33:9).

Again, Paul reasoned of judgment to come. Through the centuries the voice is sounding still. What he must have said is something like this, Felix, injustice will not escape the judgment of God. Felix, incontinence invites Gods wrath. You will have to come into judgment yourself. That judgment means for you death and hell, except you repent.

But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone (Rev 21:8).

Faithful preaching! No wonder God advanced Paul; he was worthy. I believe today that God has His offices, and that in many respects they are the best offices, for those preachers who are loyal to conviction.

You know the story of W. H. Milbourns appointment as chaplain of the United States Congress. It is this: In 1845 Milbourn, who was then a circuit rider, was on a journey from St. Louis to Wheeling, W. Va. He went by boat. On board were a number of congressmen making their way to Washington. The young preacher was astonished at the oaths that came from these representatives of the nation, at their betting, card games, and their excesses in whiskey-drinking.

By and by, as the boat slowly made its way up the Ohio, the Sunday came, and these men, with others, invited this young minister to preach. He readily consented and delivered a good discourse, at the end of which he turned to these congressmen and said, with the deepest feeling, I understand, gentlemen, that you are members of the Congress of the United States, and as such you are, or should be, the representatives not only of the political opinions, but also of the intellectual, moral and religious condition of the people of this country. If I am to judge the nation by you, I can come to no other conclusion than that it is composed of profane swearers, gamblers and drunkards. Consider the influence of your example upon the young men of the country. What a school of vice you are helping to keep up! If you insist upon the right of ruining yourselves, do not, by your example, corrupt and debauch those who are the hope of the land. I must tell you that as an American citizen I feel disgraced by your behaviour. As a preacher of the Gospel I am commissioned to say that unless you renounce your evil courses, repent of your sins and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ with your hearts unto righteousness, you will certainly be damned. The judgment to come!

Milbourn was faithful. He quit the presence of these men, supposing that they would hate him forevermore, but he had not been in his stateroom an hour when one of them rapped at the door and said, I have been requested to wait upon you by the members of Congress on board, and present to you this purse (which contained between $50 and $100) as a token of their appreciation of your sincerity and faithfulness, and to ask if you will allow us to use your name at the coming election as a candidate for chaplain to Congress. If you will consent, we feel sure we can secure your election, and they did.

It does not always mean promotion to put the judgment before the great, so far as earthly honors are concerned, but to preach the Gospel faithfully, showing sin as it is, and Christ as the only way of salvation, always means promotion.

FELIX WAS FILLED WITH FEAR OF JUDGMENT

He felt the truth. He was not an utterly abandoned man. Deep as he had gone into sin, some conscience was still preserved. No man is hopelessly lost so long as he feels the truth of Gods Word, so long as conscience smites and convictions come. The one man that is most utterly given over to Satan is the calm manthe man who can hear any sort of a minister and be little or nothing moved by what he says; the man who could listen to a Paul preaching of justice and yet be nothing disturbed by his own injustice; of continence and be little distressed concerning his own lust, and of the judgment to come, and laugh at it as unlikely! I had rather take chances with Felix, who felt the truth, than with that moral man, even, who knows no conviction of sin, for the simple reason that when a man sees his wrong, he may seek to get right before God, but so long as he is satisfied, no changes are in the least likely. But we would not have you presume that you are going to be saved simply because you are not conscienceless as yet.

David prayed, Keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins, and there is danger that the devil will come along and say, Oh, well, you are not lost yet. You feel the truth of what the minister says. You are troubled about your sins, you will be saved as yet. That old deceiver knows that by this suggestion he can keep you continuing in evil practice, and that is his purpose.

I have read a humorous story of a gentleman who told a drinking darkey that he must either stop his liquor habit, or it would kill him. To which the negro answered, Major, I fear I done been at it too long and cannot stop. Why, Eph, answered the white man, it is never too late to mend; never! After a long spell of thinking Eph replied, Well, Major, if dats so, I guess Ill keep on a while longerthe devils delusion!

That is what he said to Pilate. He felt the truth, but he did not act upon it. That is what he said to Ananias. He felt the truth, but he did not act upon it. That is what he said to the scribe. He felt the truth, but he did not act upon it. It is a good thing to feel the truth, but it is not salvation. To stop with a conviction is to perish.

Again, Felix feared the result. He was no Ingersoll as touching the future. He was no Sadducee to say, That is all right from your standpoint, but as for me, I dont believe in any resurrection, in any angel, in any spirit, in any judgment to come. It is all a myth; it is a bug-bear to make people afraid. Clear out with you!

On the contrary we read, And Felix trembled. But fear is not enough. Mr. Moody said rightly, Repentance is not fear. Many people confound the two! They think they have to be terrified. They are waiting for some fear to come down upon them.

But those who are made afraid do not always repent. Often men at sea, during the times of terrible storm, have grown so afraid that they have set aside their profanity, given up their card-playing, shuddered at the thought of gambling, and have even been pious and prayerful, but when the danger has passed, they go back to their swearing again, deal the cards faster than ever, and gamble till the morning breaks. It is a good thing to fear, but fear does not finish salvation.

In Revelation we are told that the fearful and unbelieving * * shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.

He confessed his fault. Not so much with his lips as with his knees! While Paul talked, they knocked together, and as distinctly confessed his faults as though he had said to Paul, It is all true; my injustice, I know; my incontinence, everybody knows; my evil course is as open as a book. But even that does not always save a man.

I have an acquaintance, a friend who has drunk a great deal, who has gambled considerably and given himself over to other sins at times, who many, many, many times has come to me and confessed his faults, cried over them as bitterly as children weep over their hard falls, and forgotten the dangers as quickly, and has gone backbackback to this same evil way, again, and again, and again.

FELIX FAILED BY TRUSTING TO FUTURE SEASON

Go thy way for this time; when I have a convenient season, I will call for thee. Satans suggestion; poor soul! When you accept that, when you say that, you accept the seal of Satan; you say, I deliver myself over to the devil for a time, and the devil understands, yes, and for eternity.

Resolutions for the future are worth nothing. Felix made them firmly. He was determined to do the right, but he let Satan say, Dont begin now. Wait! After a while you may not love Drusilla so much; in a little time, when you have accumulated more money, it will not be necessary to oppress the people so much; when you have laid up for yourself great riches and are independent, and Drusilla has proved unfaithful, or has grown old and no longer arouses your lust, then it will be easy to cease injustice and give up incontinence, and get ready for the judgment. I expect Felix thought he was the author of all that reasoning, but he was not not one sentence of it, not one word of it, not one letter of it. Satan suggested it all.

I have read so many of Dr. Talmages sermons that I have learned his style and can tell it wherever I find it, without looking to see what name is signed. Dr. Joseph Parkers style is unique enough for the same recognition, and it does seem to me that we ought to understand Satans suggestions. They are all of a kind, pieces from the same cloth, cut to fit dextrously into any position needed, but always black, deceitful, destructive. Do right! Yes, but dont do it now. Ah, thats the devil! Next Sunday night will be a better season. That is Satan! Wait this week and see if your doubts wont be driven away. Thats the devil! God never speaks that way. He says, To day is the day of salvation.

Resolution! Resolution! Truly Mr. Moody has said, In all the Bible, there is no book of resolutions, but there is a book of Acts. That is what God wants!

Felix delayed action. He said it is right, but not now! Has it ever occurred to you that the thing that is right cannot be done too soon? It is an honest question as to whether it can be done soon enough. Delay not to do the right.

A man may hesitate so long as he is not sure that a thing is right, but as soon as he sees a thing to be sane, sensible, essential to salvation, then he must act, or like Felix he may fail through trusting the future.

Col. Rohl, the Hessian commander, at Trenton was playing cards, when a messenger brought a letter stating that Washington was crossing the Delaware. He put the letter in his pocket without reading it until the game was finished. Then he rallied his men only to die just before his troops were taken prisoners.

Marden comments on this episode, Only a few minutes delay, but by it he lost honor, liberty and life.

Napoleon was right when he said, Every moment lost gives an opportunity for misfortune.

Let me plead against this Satans suggestion convenient season. For how long a time before this instance Satan had been using that suggestion, I do not know, but I do know that ever since the time of Felix, he has been destroying souls by that same suggestion.

Every Sunday night, while I preach, he passes between the pews of the auditorium and whispers to the inner ear of convicted, trembling souls that same speech, Its right, you ought to do it; you must do it; but dont do it to-night. There will be a more convenient season. The majority of those that hear that suggestion yield to it. The majority of those that yield to it will be destroyed by it.

Years since, I went down into Central Illinois and held a meeting. There was a man present in those services who became deeply interested, deeply convicted of sin, deeply desirous of salvation. Several times the tears were seen flowing freely from his eyes. One morning he rushed from the house before the services were finished. A man tried to stop him at the door, but he burst into sobs saying, Not now, but sometime; sometime I will. A day or two before I left I found him down town and had a long talk with him, and he said, as Felix of old, Its right, I am determined, but there will be a more convenient season. I am in debt. When I have made my credit good before my fellows, then I will accept and confess Christ. I pled, warned, quoted the Word, but all in vain. I went back to Chicago and had been at home two weeks when a message came saying that at eight oclock in the morning that man was taken with a violent pain in the temple. At ten oclock in the day he was unconscious; at five oclock in the afternoon he died.

Delay is the devils invitation for soul destruction. Ah, there is a better way. It is the way reported by a man who was prominent in Ohio. He wrote to Mr. Moody in these words, When I was nineteen years old, I was reading law with a Christian lawyer in Vermont. One day his good wife invited me to go with her to class-meeting. I accepted the invitation and found about a dozen persons present in a little schoolhouse. The leader was an earnest man, and when the meeting was over, he went the rounds and spoke to every person, and finally reached me.

When I saw him coming, I said to myself, Now this man will ask me if I am a Christian, and I will tell him I am not, but want to be, and expect to be some time, and he will answer, Why not begin now? Is there any intelligent reply I can make to that question, Why not now?

By this time he had reached me. Putting his arm upon my shoulder he said, Brother Charles, have you anything to say? Yes, sir. I answered, with joy, I have just decided within the last thirty seconds that I would begin a Christian life, and I begin it now. And as we knelt to pray, somewhere between the time when I started to kneel and when my knees struck the floor, the Lord converted my soul, and I cried, Glory to God. What further I said, I do not know, but to me it was all glory, glory, for I had done as God said.

The African Association, of London, wanted to send Ledyard, the traveler, to Africa. They sent a commission to say, When will you be ready? He replied, I am ready now.

John Jervas, later the Earl St. Vincent, when asked how soon he could join his ship, replied, Ill go now.

Collin Campbell, appointed commander of the army in India, when asked how soon he could set out, replied, At once.

That is what we need for salvation. Behold, today is the day of salvation!

Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley

(25) Righteousness, temperance, and judgment.The first word, like our English justice, includes in Greek ethics the duties which man owes to man. Temperance answers to a term with a somewhat wider sense than that which now attaches to the English word, and implies the state in which a man exercises control over all the passions that minister to sensuality, while he yet falls short of a perfect harmony between Reason and Emotion (Aristot. Eth. Nicom. vii. 7-10). What has been said of Felix shows how faulty his character was in both these respects. The selection of the unwelcome topics shows how little St. Paul belonged to the class of those who compassed sea and land to make a proselyte (Mat. 23:15). It would apparently have been easy to bring about this result with Felix and his wife, had the preacher been content to speak smooth things and prophecy deceits, to put the patch of a ceremonial Judaism on the old garment of a sensual life; but instead of this he presses home the truths which their state needed, and seeks to rouse conscience to something like activity. His own experience (Rom. 7:7-23; Php. 3:7-8), had taught him that, without this, neither doctrine nor ritual availed to deliver the soul from its bondage to evil, and bring it into the kingdom of God. But he does not confine himself, as a merely ethical teacher might have done, to abstract arguments on the beauty or the utility of justice and temperance. Here, also, his own experience was his guide, and he sought to make the guilty pair before whom he stood feel that the warnings of conscience were but the presage of a divine judgment which should render to every man according to his deeds. It will be noted that there is no mention here of the forgiveness of sins, nor of the life of fellowship with Christ. Those truths would have come, in due course, afterwards. As yet they would have been altogether premature. The method of St. Pauls preaching was like that of the Baptist, and of all true teachers.

Felix trembled, and answered . . .Conscience, then, was not dead, but its voice was silenced by the will which would not listen. Felix treats St. Paul as Antipas had treated the Baptist (Mar. 6:20). He does not resent his plainness of speech; he shows a certain measure of respect for him, but he postpones acting till a more convenient season, and so becomes the type of the millions whose spiritual life is ruined by a like procrastination. Nothing that we know of him gives us any ground for thinking that the convenient season ever came.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

25. Reasoned Or rather conversed. Righteousness, temperance Namely, the righteousness and temperance required under Christ’s kingdom. Righteousness excludes all injustice or dishonesty; temperance ( self-control) excludes all irregular or excessive indulgence of any lust or appetite. How the true law of righteousness would destroy him, Tacitus tells us by saying that “he presumed on committing all crimes with impunity.” How the law of self-control would condemn him was illustrated by his adulteress at his side.

Judgment to come A vivid description of the second advent of this Jesus-Messiah to judge the unrighteous and the sensual, (Matthew 26,) such as Paul could draw, (2Th 1:7-10,) completed Felix’s disturbance.

Trembled The Greek word is was fearful, not trembled. It describes an internal alarm, not an external commotion.

Go He probably interrupted Paul, as being unable to bear the terrible picture of his own character and impending doom.

A convenient season Not a more convenient season for repentance. It does not appear that he had any thought of repentance; but, being discomposed by the exciting description of judgment, he says, Leave me; I will call you again when I have occasion.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

‘And as he reasoned of righteousness, and self-control, and the judgment to come, Felix was terrified, and answered, “Go your way for this time, and when I have a convenient season, I will call you to me.” ’

When asked to expound the truth about ‘the faith of Jesus Christ’ Paul did not dampen his message down so as not to cause offence. He knew the facts about Felix, and about his wife. He knew them for what they were. Felix possibly expected an interesting discourse on the resurrection, but he got more than he bargained for, for Paul spoke of righteousness, that is of righteous living and God’s righteousness and how no man is righteous before God and the question of how a person could be righteous with God and of how Christ could provide that righteousness. He also spoke of ‘self-control’. The word indicates especially self-control with regard to sexual matters. It has been translated chastity. In other words he went right to the heart of their own relationship, and the sin that had been involved. He pulled no punches, and no doubt informed them what Jesus had taught on the matter. He was seeking to convince of sin and righteousness and judgment (Joh 16:8-11). He laid them bare in the eyes of God. And he spoke of judgment to come, and the One Who would be Judge (Joh 5:22; Joh 5:26-27). He faced them both with the fact that there was a resurrection of the just and the unjust and that they must then give account of themselves to God. Thus they needed to be ready for it (compare Act 17:30-31).

Luke adds, ‘Felix was terrified’. To terrify a man like Felix required straight preaching and conviction by the Holy Spirit. He and his wife had been made to face up to their sins and their future consequences if they did not repent. But sadly Felix sent him away without making any commitment, saying that he would discuss the matter at a more convenient time. Neither he nor his wife appear to have responded to his message, and seemingly his wife had no further interest in following it up.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Act 24:25. And as he reasoned of righteousness, &c.. How suitable this discourse was to the character and circumstances of the persons to whom it was addressed, appears sufficiently from the former note, and from the note on Act 24:2 but see more in the Inferences. It may be proper here to obviate some mistakes, and perhaps dangerous ones, which have been drawn from this passage; as if reasoning on these topics was sufficiently preaching of faith in Christ. “This (says Dr. Benson,) was St. Paul’s preaching Christ, or the faith of Christ:” whereas, if the reader will cast his eye on the preceding verse, he willfind that the foundation of St. Paul’s discourse was concerning that faith in Christ, the great Messiah, which this great apostle ever laid down as the ground-work of what he delivered; in strict conformity with what he himself had said,Other foundation can no man lay, than that which is laid, namely Jesus Christ. Upon this foundation alone he always raised the amiable and important superstructure of holy and virtuous practice; and agreeably hereto, upon the present occasion, speaking of faith in Christ, as the great and important subject of his ministry, he took an opportunity from the peculiar characters of his principal hearers, to dwell upon subjects in a particular manner adapted to them, and at the same time inseparably dependant upon that faith in Christ which he preached. And undoubtedly this is the true and important method of preaching Christ; and they who think they discharge this duty properly, and imitate St. Paul’s example, by preaching of righteousness, temperance, and other moral virtues, separately and independently from their living foundation, faith in Jesus, not only mistake this matter greatly, but certainly have not the least countenance from the apostle’s practice in this plac

Act 24:25. When I have a convenient season, &c. And I will take some future opportunity to called for thee. This is fully expressed by the original. St. Paul must, no doubt, discern those marks of confusion, which would be so apparent in Felix’s countenance, and which would give him some hopes of succeeding through grace in this important attempt for such a conversion, and consequently would animate him when he resumed the discourse: this must of course have increased in Felix a conviction of the apostle’s innocence, and an esteem for his virtues; yet, in spite of all, he was so far from genuine repentance, that he would not do justice to St. Paul. However, the conviction might perhaps prevail so far, as to engage him to perfect in his resolution of not delivering him up to the Jews. How affecting an instance and illustration of the treachery of the human heart! See on ch. Act 26:24.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

Act 24:25-26 . What a sacredly bold fidelity to his calling! Before one, who practised all manner of unrighteousness and incontinence (the victim of his lust sat beside him!), “cuncta malefacta sibi impune ratus” (Tac. Ann . xii. 54), Paul, his defenceless prisoner, discoursed on righteousness, continence , and the impending last judgment . Such is the majesty of the apostolic spirit in its (1Co 2:4 ). The extraordinary phenomenon strikes even the heart of Felix; he trembles. But his ruling worldliness quickly suppresses the disturbing promptings of his conscience; with the address of a man of the world, the conference is broken off; Paul is sent back to his prison; and Felix remains reprobate enough to expect from such a man , and in spite of the Lex Julia de repetundis , a bribe, and for this purpose in fact subsequently to hold several conversations with him.

] for the present . See Kypke, II. p. 124; Bornemann and Rosenmller, Repert . II. p. 282.

.] tempus opportunum nactus . Here consequently Paul had spoken , 2Ti 4:2 .

A comma only is to be placed after . , as , Act 24:26 , does not stand for the finite verb, but is a further definition to . Also before ( wherefore ) a comma only is to be placed.

] Certainly Felix had not remained in ignorance how the love of the Christians had their money in readiness for Paul. “Sic thesaurum evangelii omisit infelix Felix ,” Bengel.

Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary

DISCOURSE: 1810
PAULS DISCOURSE BEFORE FELIX

Act 24:25. And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, Felix trembled, and answered, Go thy way for this time; when I have a convenient season, I will call for thee.

MEN usually persist in sin without duly reflecting on its consequences. Hence the peace which they enjoy, notwithstanding they are exposed to the displeasure of the Almighty; yet the voice of warning and reproof will sometimes alarm them. Too often, however, the alarm is only of short duration. This was the case of Felix, when awakened by the preaching of Paul

I.

The subjects of the Apostles discourse

He was sent for to explain the principles he professed, but he was not satisfied with gratifying the curiosity of his hearers; he endeavoured to reach their consciences, and convince them of their sins. On this occasion he spoke of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come.
Hence we observe that,

1.

The subjects are essential parts of the Gospel

[Many confine their ideas of the Gospel to the one subject of justification by the faith of Christ. But the Apostle when dilating on the faith of Christ, introduced the subjects mentioned in my text. The knowledge of these is in fact necessary to a just comprehension of that. We must see our desert and danger as transgressors of the law, before we can ever duly appreciate the Gospel.]

2.

They are of deep and vital interest to every child of man

[Doubtless they were of peculiar importance to such abandoned characters as Felix and Drusilla [Note: Felix had induced Drusilla to forsake her own husband, and to marry him: he was moreover remarkably avaricious and oppressive.]: but they are necessary to be impressed on us also. Under the term righteousness we must comprehend all the duties which we owe to our neighbour; and under that of temperance, all that relates to the government of our own appetites and passions. Though we be not guilty of adultery, and avarice, and oppression in their grosser forms, we may find much under these heads for humiliation before God. At the day of judgment we must answer for every secret violation of Gods holy law. The prospect of that awful account may well endear to us the Gospel of Christ.]

3.

They commend themselves to our reason no less than to our faith

[St. Paul reasoned with his Royal auditors on these subjects. To bring home to the heart of a heathen the salvation of Christ, much previous knowledge was requisite; but to bring him to a sense of his guilt and danger, nothing was necessary but an immediate appeal to his reason and conscience; and, when addressing persons who are ignorant of revelation, we shall do well to adopt the Apostles plan.]
What degree of success attended his efforts will appear from,

II.

The effects it produced

On Drusillas mind it seems to have produced no effect
[She, as a Jewess, must have often heard these subjects treated; but, having sinned against light and knowledge, she was unaffected by all she heard: and thus are many hardened even by the Gospel itself.]
But Felix trembled
[A curious and uncommon sight! The judge trembling at the reasonings of his prisoner! But well might he tremble at the review of his past life and at the prospect of a future retribution. And who has not reason to tremble, if he have not fled to Christ for refuge and found acceptance with God through him? Take the holy law of God, my brethren, and try yourselves by it. Surely there will not be one who will not cry out, as Felix should have done, What shall I do to be saved?]
He forbore however to improve the occasion as he ought
[He promised himself a more convenient season for attending to the concerns of his soul. But what season could be more suitable, than when the Spirit of God was striving with him, and his conscience was awake, and an inspired instructor was at hand to lead him to a Saviour? Could he have better hopes of success, when he had seared his conscience, quenched the Spirit, confirmed his evil habits, and delivered himself up to the chains of Satan? The hoped-for day, alas! never arrived. He still for two years longer continued his avaricious and oppressive habits [Note: ver. 26, 27.]. O that he had known the day of his visitation, and improved his day of grace!]

Let his example serve as a caution to us

[All of us have known, in some measure, the motions of Gods Spirit. All of us have felt, at times, some general apprehensions respecting the account which we must give at the day of judgment. But how many have silenced their convictions, in hopes of finding some more convenient season for attending to them! And how many have died before the hoped-for opportunity arrived! Let us beware of this device of Satan, whereby he upholds his kingdom in the world [Note: He does not tempt any to resolve that they will never repent: but takes the more plausible method of insinuating that they will have a more convenient season for repenting.]. Let us remember, that the same temptations will recur, and the same motives influence us at future periods. Let us attend to that salutary advice of the Apostle [Note: Heb 3:13; Heb 3:15.]and let us seek, without delay, that godly sorrow which worketh repentance unto salvation [Note: 2Co 7:10.].]

Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)

25 And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, Felix trembled, and answered, Go thy way for this time; when I have a convenient season, I will call for thee.

Ver. 25. Of righteousness, temperance, &c. ] Whereas Felix did many things there tyrannously and had greater regard to gain than to justice; and whereas Drusilla, a Jewess, was not only married to an uncircumcised man, but also a filthy adulteress, -Paul in a certain kind of grave wisdom, which yet had joined with it great liberty of speech, reasoneth and disputeth of things that he knew principally lacking in his hearers.

Felix trembled ] See the force of conscience, which, like Samson’s wife, conceals not the riddle, Jdg 16:17 ; like Fulvia a courtesan, who declared all the secrets of her foolish lover Gneius, a noble Roman, bewrays (maligns) and betrays those that harbour her. She is a watch and will at length give warning. (Sallust. Bell. Cat.)

Go thy way for this time, &c. ] The president of St Julian’s being sent to Angrogne would have forced a poor man to rebaptize his child. He, after he had prayed, required of the president that he would write and sign the same with his own hand, that he would discharge him before God of the danger of that offence, and that he would take the peril upon him and his. The president hereat was so confounded, that he spake not one word a good while after. Then said he, “Away, thou villain, out of my sight.” After that he was never called more. (Acts and Mon.)

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

25. ] It is remarkable that Tacitus uses of Felix (Ann. xii. 54) the expression ‘cuncta malefacta sibi impune ratus.’ The fear of Felix appears to have operated merely in his sending away Paul: no impression for good was made on him.

Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament

Act 24:25 . .: Paul does not gratify the curiosity of Felix and Drusilla, but goes straight to the enforcement of those great moral conditions without which, both for Jew and Greek, what he had to say of the Messiahship of Jesus was unintelligible; how grievously Felix had failed in righteousness the events of his period of government proved, cf. Tac., Ann. , xii., 54, “cuncta malefacta sibi impune ratus,” through the evil influence of Pallas, Tac., Hist. , v., 9. .: R.V. margin “self-control,” Latin, temperantia , Vulgate, castitate . The presence of Drusilla by his side was in itself a proof how Felix had failed in this virtue also, . being specially applicable to continence from sensual pleasures (Wetstein); opposed to it is , 1Co 7:5 (= ), “incontinence,” Arist., Eth. , vii., 4, 2. In N.T., Gal 5:23 , 2Pe 1:6 ( bis ), cf. Tit 1:8 . The word is found in Sir 18:15 ; Sir 18:30 , 4Ma 5:34 . St. Paul gives a double proof of his courage in reasoning thus not only before Felix but before his wife, for like another Herodias her resentment was to be feared. .: “the judgment to come,” R.V., preserving the force of the article omitted in all E.V [384] except Rhem.: “ubi etiam illi, qui nunc judices sedent, judicandi erunt” (Wetstein). . ., see on Act 10:4 , cf. the attitude of Antipas with regard to the Baptist, Mar 6:30 . , cf. Tob 7:11 ( 1 ), and for instances in Greek writers see Wetstein. ., cf. Polyb., ii., 16, 15. . (Alford, Blass). So far as we know, no more convenient season ever came, see reading in [385] text.

[384] English Version.

[385] R(omana), in Blass, a first rough copy of St. Luke.

Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson

Acts

PAUL BEFORE FELIX

FELIX BEFORE PAUL A Sermon to the Young

Act 24:25 .

Felix and his brother had been favourite slaves of the Emperor, and so had won great power at court. At the date of this incident he had been for some five or six years the procurator of the Roman province of Judaea; and how he used his power the historian Tacitus tells us in one of his bitter sentences, in which he says, ‘He wielded his kingly authority with the spirit of a slave, in all cruelty and lust.’

He had tempted from her husband, Drusilla, the daughter of that Herod whose dreadful death is familiar to us all; and his court reeked with blood and debauchery. He is here face to face with Paul for the second time. On a former interview he had seen good reason to conclude that the Roman Empire was not in much danger from this one Jew whom his countrymen, with suspicious loyalty, were charging with sedition; and so he had allowed him a very large margin of liberty.

On this second occasion he had sent for him evidently not as a judge, but partly with a view to try to get a bribe out of him, and partly because he had some kind of languid interest, as most Romans then had, in Oriental thought-some languid interest perhaps too in this strange man. Or he and Drusilla were possibly longing for a new sensation, and not indisposed to give a moment’s glance at Paul with his singular ideas.

So they called for the Apostle, and the guilty couple found a judge in their prisoner. Paul does not speak to them as a Greek philosopher, anxious to please high personages, might have done, but he goes straight at their sins: he reasons ‘of righteousness’ with the unjust judge, ‘of temperance’ with the self-indulgent, sinful pair, ‘of the judgment to come’ with these two who thought that they could do anything they liked with impunity. Christianity has sometimes to be exceedingly rude in reference to the sins of the upper classes.

As Paul went on, a strange fear began to creep about the heart of Felix. It is the watershed of his life that he has come to, the crisis of his fate. Everything depends on the next five minutes. Will he yield? Will he resist? The tongue of the balance trembles and hesitates for a moment, and then, but slowly, the wrong scale goes down; ‘Go thy way for this time.’ Ah! if he had said, ‘Come and help me to get rid of this strange fear,’ how different all might have been! The metal was at the very point of melting. What shape would it take? It ran into the wrong mould, and, as far as we know, it was hardened there. ‘It might have been once, and he missed it, lost it for ever. No sign marked out that moment from the common uneventful moments, though it saw the death of a soul.’

Now, my dear young friends, I do not intend to say anything more to you of this man and his character, but I wish to take this incident and its lessons and urge them on your hearts and consciences.

I. Let me say a word or two about the fact, of which this incident is an example, and of which I am afraid the lives of many of you would furnish other examples, that men lull awakened consciences to sleep and excuse delay in deciding for Christ by half-honest promises to attend to religion at some future time.

‘Go thy way for this time’ is what Felix is really anxious about. His one thought is to get rid of Paul and his disturbing message for the present. But he does not wish to shut the door altogether. He gives a sop to his conscience to stop its barking, and he probably deceives himself as to the gravity of his present decision by the lightly given promise and its well-guarded indefiniteness, ‘When I have a convenient season I will send for thee.’ The thing he really means is-Not now, at all events; the thing he hoodwinks himself with is- By and by. Now that is what I know that some of you are doing; and my purpose and earnest prayer are to bring you now to the decision which, by one vigorous act of your wills, will settle the question for the future as to which God you are going to follow.

So then I have just one or two things to say about this first part of my subject. Let me remind you that however beautiful, however gracious, however tender and full of love and mercy and good tidings the message of God’s love in Jesus Christ is, there is another side to it, a side which is meant to rouse men’s consciences and to awaken men’s fears.

If you bring a man like the man in the story, Felix, or a very much better man than he-any of you who hear me now-into contact with these three thoughts, ‘Righteousness, temperance, judgment to come,’ the effect of such a direct appeal to moral convictions will always be more or less to awaken a sense of failure, insufficiency, defect, sin, and to create a certain creeping dread that if I set myself against the great law of God, that law of God will have a way of crushing me. The fear is well founded, and not only does the contemplation of God’s law excite it. God’s gospel comes to us, and just because it is a gospel, and is intended to lead you and me to love and trust Jesus Christ, and give our whole hearts and souls to Him-just because it is the best ‘good news’ that ever came into the world, it begins often not always, perhaps by making a man feel what a sinful man he is, and how he has gone against God’s law, and how there hang over him, by the very necessities of the case and the constitution of the universe, consequences bitter and painful. Now I believe that there are very few people who, like you, come occasionally into contact with the preaching of the truth, who have not had their moments when they felt-’Yes, it is all true-it is all true. I am bad, and I have broken God’s law, and there is a dark lookout before me!’ I believe that most of us know what that feeling is.

And now my next step is-that the awakened conscience is just like the sense of pain in the physical world, it has a work to do and a mission to perform. It is meant to warn you off dangerous ground. Thank God for pain! It keeps off death many a time. And in like manner thank God for a swift conscience that speaks! It is meant to ring an alarm-bell to us, to make us, as the Bible has it, ‘flee for refuge to the hope that is set before us.’ My imploring question to my young friends now is: ‘Have you used that sense of evil and wrongdoing, when it has been aroused in your consciences, to lead you to Jesus Christ, or what have you done with it?’

There are two persons in this Book of the Acts of the Apostles who pass through the same stages of feeling up to a certain point, and then they diverge. And the two men’s outline history is the best sermon that I can preach upon this point. Felix becoming afraid, recoils, shuts himself up, puts away the message that disturbs him, and settles himself back into his evil. The Philippian jailer becoming afraid the phrases in the original being almost identical, like a sensible man tries to find out the reason of his fear and how to get rid of it; and falls down at the Apostles’ feet and says, ‘Sirs, what must I do to be saved?’

The fear is not meant to last; it is of no use in itself. It is only an impelling motive that leads us to look to the Saviour, and the man that uses it so has used it rightly. Yet there rises in many a heart that transparent self-deception of delay. ‘They all with one consent began to make excuse’; that is as true to-day as it was true then. My experience tells me that it will be true in regard to a sad number of you who will go away feeling that my poor word has gone a little way into their hardened hide, but settling themselves back into their carelessness, and forgetting all impressions that have been made. O dear young friend, do not do that, I beseech you! Do not stifle the wholesome alarm and cheat yourself with the notion of a little delay!

II. And now I wish next to pass very swiftly in review before you some of the reasons why we fall into this habit of self-deceiving, indecision, and delay-

‘Go thy way’ would be too sharp and unmistakable if it were left alone, so it is fined off. ‘I will not commit myself beyond to-day,’ ‘for this time go thy way, and when I have a convenient season I will call for thee.’

What are the reasons for such an attitude as that? Let me enumerate one or two of them as they strike me. First, there is the instinctive, natural wish to get rid of a disagreeable subject-much as a man, without knowing what he is doing, twitches his hand away from the surgeon’s lancet. So a great many of us do not like-and no wonder that we do not like-these thoughts of the old Book about ‘righteousness and temperance and judgment to come,’ and make a natural effort to turn our minds away from the contemplation of the subject, because it is painful and unpleasant. Do you think it would be a wise thing for a man, if he began to suspect that he was insolvent, to refuse to look into his books or to take stock, and let things drift, till there was not a halfpenny in the pound for anybody? What do you suppose his creditors would call him? They would not compliment him on either his honesty or his prudence, would they? And is it not the part of a wise man, if he begins to see that something is wrong, to get to the bottom of it and, as quickly as possible, to set it right? And what do you call people who, suspecting that there may be a great hole in the bottom of the ship, never man the pumps or do any caulking, but say, ‘Oh, she will very likely keep afloat until we get into harbour’?

Do you not think that it would be a wiser thing for you if, because the subject is disagreeable, you would force yourself to think about it until it became agreeable to you? You can change it if you will, and make it not at all a shadow or a cloud or a darkness over you. And you can scarcely expect to claim the designation of wise and prudent orderers of your lives until you do. Certainly it is not wise to shuffle a thing out of sight because it is not pleasing to think about.

Then there is another reason. A number of our young people say, ‘Go thy way for this time,’ because you have a notion that it is time enough for you to begin to think about serious things and be religious when you grow a bit older. And some of you even, I dare say, have an idea that religion is all very well for people that are turned sixty and are going down the hill, but that it is quite unnecessary for you. Shakespeare puts a grim word into the mouth of one of his characters, which sets the theory of many of us in its true light, when, describing a dying man calling on God, he makes the narrator say: ‘I, to comfort him, bid him he should not think of God. I hoped there was no need to trouble himself with any such thoughts yet.’

Some of my hearers practically live on that principle, and are tempted to regard thoughts of God as in place only among medicine bottles, or when the shadows of the grave begin to fall cold and damp on our path. ‘Young men will be young men,’ ‘We must sow our wild oats,’ ‘You can’t put old heads on young shoulders’-and such like sayings, often practically mean that vice and godlessness belong to youth, and virtue and religion to old age, just as flowers do to spring and fruit to autumn. Let me beseech you not to be deceived by such a notion; and to search your own thoughts and see whether it be one of the reasons which leads you to say, ‘Go thy way for this time.’

Then again some of us fall into this habit of putting off the decision for Christ, not consciously, not by any distinct act of saying, ‘No, I will not,’ but simply by letting the impressions made on our hearts and consciences be crowded out of them by cares and enjoyments and pleasures and duties of this world. If you had not so much to study at College, you would have time to think about religion. If you had not so many parties and balls to go to, you would have time to nourish and foster these impressions. If you had not your place to make in the warehouse, if you had not this, that, and the other thing to do; if you had not love and pleasure and ambition and advancement and mental culture to attend to, you would have time for religion; but as soon as the seed is sown and the sower’s back is turned, hovering flocks of light-winged thoughts and vanities pounce down upon it and carry it away, seed by seed. And if some stray seed here and there remains and begins to sprout, the ill weeds which grow apace spring up with ranker stems and choke it. ‘The cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts of other things entering in, choke the word, and efface the impression made upon your hearts.

Here as I speak some serious thought is roused; by to-morrow at midday it has all gone. You did not intend it to go, you did not set yourself to banish it, you simply opened the door to the flocking in of the whole crowd of the world’s cares and occupations, and away went the shy, solitary thought that, if it had been cared for and tended, might have led you at last to the Cross of Jesus Christ. Do not allow yourselves to be drifted, by the rushing current of earthly cares, from the impressions that are made upon your consciences and from the duty that you know you ought to do!

And then some of you fall into this attitude of delay, and say to the messenger of God’s love, ‘Go thy way for this time,’ because you do not like to give up something that you know is inconsistent with His love and service. Felix would not part with Drusilla nor disgorge the ill-gotten gains of his province. Felix therefore was obliged to put away from him the thoughts that looked in that direction. I wonder if there is any young man listening to me now who feels that if he lets my words carry him where they seek to carry him, he will have to give up ‘fleshly lusts which war against the soul’? I wonder if there is any young woman listening to me now who feels that if she lets my words carry her where they would carry her, she will have to live a different life from that which she has been living, to have more of a high and a noble aim in it, to live for something else than pleasure? I wonder if there are any of you who are saying, ‘I cannot give up that’? My dear young friend, ‘If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out and cast it from thee. It is better for thee to enter into life blind than with both eyes to be cast into hell-fire.’

Reasons for delay, then, are these: first, getting rid of an unpleasant subject; second, thinking that there is time enough; third, letting the world obliterate the impressions that have been made; and fourth, shrinking from the surrender of something that you know you will have to give up.

III. And now let me very briefly, as my last point, put before you one or two of the reasons which I would fain might be conclusive with you for present decision to take Christ for your Saviour and your Master.

And I say, Do not delay, but now choose Him for your Redeemer, your Friend, your Helper, your Commander, your All; because delay is really decision in the wrong way. Do not delay, but take Jesus Christ as the Saviour of your sinful souls, and rest your hearts upon Him to-night before you sleep; because there is no real reason for delay. No season will be more convenient than the present season. Every time is the right time to do the right thing, every time is the right time to begin following Him. There is nothing to wait for. There is no reason at all, except their own disinclination, why every man and woman listening to me should not now grasp the Cross of Christ as their only hope for forgiveness and acceptance, and yield themselves to that Lord, to live in His service for ever. Let not this day pass without your giving yourselves to Jesus Christ, because every time that you have this message brought to you, and you refuse to accept it, or delay to accept it, you make yourselves less capable of receiving it another time.

If you take a bit of phosphorus and put it upon a slip of wood and ignite the phosphorus, bright as the blaze is, there drops from it a white ash that coats the wood and makes it almost incombustible. And so when the flaming conviction laid upon your hearts has burnt itself out, it has coated the heart, and it will be very difficult to kindle the light there again. Felix said, ‘Go thy way, when I have a more convenient season I will send for thee.’ Yes, and he did send for Paul, and he talked with him often-he repeated the conversation, but we do not know that he repeated the trembling. He often communed with Paul, but it was only once that he was alarmed. You are less likely to be touched by the Gospel message for every time that you have heard it and put it away. That is what makes my place here so terribly responsible, and makes me feel that my words are so very feeble in comparison with what they ought to be. I know that I may be doing harm to men just because they listen and are not persuaded, and so go away less and less likely to be touched.

Ah, dear friends! you will perhaps never again have as deep impressions as you have now; or at least they are not to be reckoned upon as probable, for the tendency of all truth is to lose its power by repetition, and the tendency of all emotion which is not acted upon is to become fainter and fainter. And so I beseech you that now you would cherish any faint impression that is being made upon your hearts and consciences. Let it lead you to Christ; and take Him for your Lord and Saviour now.

I say to you: Do that now because delay robs you of large blessing. You will never want Jesus Christ more than you do to-day. You need Him in your early hours. Why should it be that a portion of your lives should be left unfilled by that rich mercy? Why should you postpone possessing the purest joy, the highest blessing, the divinest strength? Why should you put off welcoming your best Friend into your heart? Why should you?

I say to you again, Take Christ for your Lord, because delay inevitably lays up for you bitter memories and involves dreadful losses. There are good Christian men and women, I have no doubt, in this world now, who would give all they have, if they could blot out of the tablets of their memories some past hours of their lives, before they gave their hearts to Jesus Christ. I would have you ignorant of such transgression. O young men and women! if you grow up into middle life not Christians, then should you ever become so, you will have habits to fight with, and remembrances that will smart and sting; and some of you, perhaps, remembrances that will pollute, even though you are conscious that you are forgiven. It is a better thing not to know the depths of evil than to know them and to have been raised from them. You will escape infinite sorrows by an early cleaving to Christ your Lord.

And last of all I say to you, give yourselves now to Jesus Christ, because no to-morrow may be yours. Delay is gambling, very irrationally, with a very uncertain thing-your life and your future opportunities. ‘You know not what shall be on the morrow.’

For a generation I have preached in Manchester these annual sermons to the young. Ah, how many of those that heard the early ones are laid in their graves; and how many of them were laid in early graves; and how many of them said, as some of you are saying, ‘When I get older I will turn religious’! And they never got older. It is a commonplace word that, but I leave it on your hearts. You have no time to lose.

Do not delay, because delay is decision in the wrong way; do not delay, because there is no reason for delay; do not delay, because delay robs you of a large blessing; do not delay, because delay lays up for you, if ever you come back, bitter memories; do not delay, because delay may end in death. And for all these reasons, come as a sinful soul to Christ the Saviour; and ask Him to forgive you, and follow in His footsteps, and do it now! ‘To-day, if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts.’

Fuente: Expositions Of Holy Scripture by Alexander MacLaren

reasoned. Greek. dialegomai. See Act 17:2.

righteousness. Greek. dikaiosune. See App-191.

temperance = self-control. Greek. enkrateia. Only here; Gal 1:5, Gal 1:23. 2Pe 1:6. The adjective enkrates only in Tit 1:8 and the kindred verb only in 1Co 7:9; 1Co 9:25.

judgment. Greek. krima. App-177.

trembled and = having become terrified. Greek. emphobos. See Act 10:4.

for this time = for the present.

have. Greek. metalambano, to partake of, or obtain a share of. Occurances, Act 2:46 (eat); Act 27:33. 2Ti 2:6. Heb 6:7; Heb 12:10.

convenient season = season, or opportunity. Greek. kairos. Compare Gal 1:6, Gal 1:10 Heb 11:15.

call for. Greek. metakaleo. See Act 7:14. The season never came for hearing what Paul had to teach, though he found opportunity to see if he could get a bribe.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

25.] It is remarkable that Tacitus uses of Felix (Ann. xii. 54) the expression cuncta malefacta sibi impune ratus. The fear of Felix appears to have operated merely in his sending away Paul: no impression for good was made on him.

Fuente: The Greek Testament

Act 24:25. , as he reasoned) Paul had no desire to insinuate himself into their good-will by subtle disquisitions. Along with his discourse concerning faith in Christ, he also conjoined what needed to be spoken to the judge Felix, and to the same Felix and Drusilla in their private capacity. [Drusilla was not even the lawful wife of Felix.-V. g.]-, the judgment) The article not being added to the first and second head of those particulars which are here enumerated, forms an Epitasis [Emphatic addition.-Append.]- , being struck with fear, trembling) Truth makes Felix to fear even a prisoner in bonds. [Who should not be struck with fear?-But he who is so struck should suffer himself to be urged forward to repentance and faith, so that fear may give place to love.-V. g.]- , for the present time) Such a present time having been neglected in this life, shall hereafter cause gnawing remorse to each of the damned. Procrastination is dangerous.- ) Instead of , most copies have , owing to alliteration with .[140] LXX., Psalms 55 (54):3, . [This very time should have been the convenient season.-V. g.]

[140] Hence the more recent margin of Bengel prefers , which the older had reckoned among the less established readings.-E. B.

is the reading of BC: of A. No very old authority favours , except Chrysostom be considered such.-E. and T.

Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament

righteousness (See Scofield “Rom 10:10”).

trembled becoming afraid; (Greek – , “afraid”).

Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes

The Lash of the Law

And as he reasoned of righteousness, and temperance, and the judgement to come, Felix was terrified, and answered, Go thy way for this time; and when I have a convenient season, I will call thee unto me.Act 24:25.

I

Waiting for the Sermon

1. The scene of this incident was Csarea. The sermon was preached in the presence of Felix, the Roman governor of the province. Look at him, as he sits there, with a woman of extraordinary beauty at his side. He has made her his own by ruthlessly breaking up the domestic circle of another. She is only eighteen years of age; a princess by birth, and, though she knew it not, soon to die. She was a Jewess by nation, and there was at that time a Jew in prison at Csarea, for Christs sake. What more natural than that Drusilla should wish to break in upon the tedium of official life by hearing Paul plead? Felix had told her of the speech of the orator Tertullus, and of Pauls answer. Her curiosity was stirred; she wished to see and hear this countryman of hers, whose fame was so widely spread. And so it was arranged that Paul should appear before Felix and Drusilla.

2. It needs courage to preach to only one or two persons. There are those who can preach to the crowd. It takes a man with the vision of the Cross to preach to two people. It takes courage to preach to the man who sits in a high position, when he is close to you, when he is in his own house and you are sitting at his table, or in his own room face to face.

3. It was the glory of St. Paul that he became all things to all men; we are here helped to understand what he meant by this boast. Had he seen before him one of the weary and heavy-ladena Philippian jailor, crying out of the depth of a contrite and penitent heart, What must I do to be saved?the Apostle would have changed his voice, would have brought other things out of his treasure-house. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be savedBehold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the worldso had he reasoned of the faith in Christ to him. But he saw none such here; on the contrary, a proud stout-hearted sinner, sitting in the seat of judgment, but executing unrighteous judgment there, and to this man he reasoned of righteousness, and temperance, and the judgement to come.

II

The Appropriate Sermon

The details of the argument we do not know, the heads we do. Probably there would be an appeal to the Jewish Scriptures, with which Drusilla could not fail to be familiar; probably also to the Stoic and Epicurean maxims which floated in the then atmosphere of Roman thought, and could not have escaped the notice of Felix; certainly there was the intensity of a living conviction; certainly also a masterly division of the subject into heads of the deepest and largest interest. There are three heads.

i. Righteousness

He reasoned of righteousness; perhaps it is more true to say he reasoned of justice. Doubtless righteousness has to our minds a larger sense, but St. Pauls expression on the whole implies more generally what we mean by justice.

Justice! It is one of those fundamental and primary intuitions, of the existence of which in the human mind we can give no rational account, except that it is there by the will of the Creator. It is simply a fact about mana fact which gives the lie to materialistic philosophythat he is consciouscertainly more or less consciousof the power of the moral law and of the absolute obligation laid upon him to obey it. Now, justice is a fundamental principle in the moral law. It has been defined to be the constant and perpetual will to render to every man his right.

Were I certain that one prayer and only one was to be granted to me, I would breathe it for the righteousness of the king, as the best means of reaching the interests of the world at large.1 [Note: Abdullah bin Al Mubarak.]

But Justice has two aspectsJustice to Man and Justice to God.

1. Justice to Man. Let us look at some of the rights of man which are safeguarded by justice.

(1) First of all a man has a simple, a most elementary right to his own property. It is a mistake to suppose that the laws which govern and repress dishonesty are sufficient to ensure this elementary right as against those who disregard it. Here is a man who fancies that he should like to become the owner of something which he sees in a shop; perhaps he is moved by some passing whim, perhaps he wishes to make money out of it, perhaps he is driven to desperation by the pangs of hunger. He watches his opportunity, he appropriates the property, and finds himself convicted as a thief in the strong clutches of outraged law. But here is a man, well dressed, well supplied with the necessaries of life, moved by no unbearable pangs of hunger, who passes the same shop, is moved with the same desire of acquiring; and he, instead of stealing the article, goes in and buys it, but does not pay for it, knowing that he cannot pay for it then, and, perhaps, will have some difficulty in paying for it at all. In the sight of God he has virtually stolen those goods. And people who can ill afford it are deprived of their means of livelihood because he holds what is really their property.

Now we must know that every excellence which is peculiar to a thing is lovable in that thing: as in a man to be well bearded, and in a woman to have her face entirely free from hair; or in a setter to have a good nose, and in a greyhound to be fast. And the more peculiar to a thing the excellence is, the more lovable it is. Hence, although every virtue is lovable in man, that is the most lovable in him which is the most human; and this virtue is justice, which is so lovable that, as Aristotle says in the Ethics, even her enemies love her, namely, thieves and robbers.2 [Note: Dante, Conv. ii. 2 (trans. by Toynbee).]

(2) And if man has a right to his property, much more has he a right to his life. It is strange how long the system of slavery lingered on with its systematic disregard of the most elementary rights of man. The slave as the living machine, without rights and without recognition, remained as one of the most gigantic monuments of the perversion of the idea of justice in the minds of those who, on the whole, loved justice and conceived themselves to be just. And we must remember that slavery still exists even in the most free countries. There are those who are enslaved by the advancing tide of luxury, which demands more and more ministers to its selfish enjoyment. Men and women crowded together without decent accommodation, forced to live close to those to whose luxuries they minister, men and women who toil day and night to make luxuries cheaper for those who insist on having more and more of them and paying less and less for their enjoyments, who are dressed in finery which represents the lives of men, and eat and drink the good things which have been purchased from barely remunerated labour. There is the slavery, again, which lives on the sin and degradation of others, one of the most appalling spectacles of modern civilizationmen who profess to believe in Christ, or who at least live in a Christian land, openly despising and degrading souls for whom Christ died. No more fearful denunciation runs through the pages of the Bible than this: Woe unto the world because of offences! for it must needs be that offences come: but woe to that man by whom the offence cometh!

In Birmingham one of the principal home industries is carding hooks and eyes. First the eyes are stitched on to the card. Then the hooks are linked into them, and finally stitched on to the card384 hooks and 384 eyes have to be linked together and stitched on to a card for the munificent wage of one penny! And the worker has to provide her own needles and thread. With incessant work she may earn three shillings a week. What wonder that the children, even at the age of five years, are pressed into the work. One mother said: You must either make the children work, or let them starve. A machine has been invented to do this work, but it is cheaper to employ low-paid human labour. In this industry, as in many others, the workers, who are often widows with young families, are able to live only through outdoor relief, or charitable gifts. They do not earn their living: they are subsidized out of the rates, and their subsidy is really a grant in aid of wages, and so long as it is given, will keep down wages.1 [Note: D. Watson, Social Problems and the Churchs Duty, 118.]

(3) If a man has a right to his life, he has also a right to that which makes for happiness in life. How very little we think in our ordinary conversation of the value to our neighbour of his reputation, his character, or his position. The smallest caprice is looked upon as sufficient to justify the sarcastic cut, the cynical stab, the damaging suggestion which demolishes, to our satisfaction, our neighbours too exuberant life.

When over the fair fame of friend or foe

The shadow of disgrace shall fall; instead

Of words of blame, or proof of thus and so,

Let something good be said.

Forget not that no fellow-being yet

May fall so low but love may lift his head:

Even the cheek of shame with tears is wet

If something good be said.

No generous heart may vainly turn aside

In ways of sympathy, no soul so dead

But may awaken strong and glorified,

If something good be said.

And so I charge you, by the thorny crown,

And by the cross on which the Saviour bled,

And by your own souls hope of fair renown,

Let something good be said.

2. Justice to God. But if Justice is the virtue which bids us do that which right requires in our dealings with our fellow-men, Christianity, in the higher light which she has thrown upon these virtues, has felt even more that Justice is the virtue which bids us do what is right in our dealings with God. Every Christian, who thinks at all, feels that God has a right to the service and obedience of His creatures.

(1) God has a right to our ambition. Life itself is, or should be, carried out in obedience to vocation. Let us ask ourselves, Are we giving God His due in this respect? Are we doing what we ought for the Great Being who sent us into this world, not to eat and drink and be crammed with useful knowledge, and then push and struggle again, and perhaps die exultant because we had beaten a companion in the competitive examinations of life, and stood one step higher on its dizzy ladder? The idea is wrong in itself, it is not the profession but the vocation that we have to consider. If we have got Gods call, and recognize our duty to Him, then it matters not where we work. The servant of God will glorify a cabin, a man who forgets God will degrade a palace. Let us cease the mere struggle to get on, and put God first. Am I glorifying God by my actions in honest, serious life, lived in His sight? Is this world the better because I am alive? Is society purer because I move in it? Is the place of business more worthy because I am there? Justice within my heart assigns the first place in life to God who made it.

O patient Christ! when long ago

Oer old Judas rugged hills,

Thy willing feet went to and fro

To find and comfort human ills

Did once Thy tender, earnest eyes

Look down the solemn centuries,

And see the smallness of our lives?

Souls struggling for the victory,

And martyrs, finding death was gain,

Souls turning from the Truth and Thee,

And falling deep in sin and pain

Great heights and depths were surely seen,

But oh! the dreary waste between

Small lives, not base perhaps, but mean:

Their selfish efforts for the right,

Or cowardice that keeps from sin,

Content to only see the height

That nobler souls will toil to win!

Oh shame! to think Thine eyes should see

The souls contented just to be

The lives too small to take in Thee.

Lord, let this thought awake our shame,

That blessed shame that stings to life,

Rouse us to live for Thy dear name,

Arm us with courage for the strife.

O Christ! be patient with us still;

Dear Christ: remember Calvarys hill,

Our little lives with purpose fill!1 [Note: Margaret Deland.]

(2) God has a right to our activity. How sad it is to count the number of those who sit idly looking on as the pushing, anxious stream grinds its way past them. There they sit, men and women, who seem to have lost energy for everything and to have missed their place in life. My Father worketh hitherto and I work. To be idle is to fail in one of those marks of resemblance which ought to distinguish man made in the image and likeness of God as the son of His Heavenly Father. To us all, whether early in the morning or at midday, or even at the eleventh hour, the voice of God speaks through our slumbering sense of Justice, and says: Why stand ye here all the day idle? Go ye also into the vineyard, and whatsoever is right that shall ye receive.

If, as a flower doth spread and die,

Thou wouldst extend me to some good,

Before I were by frosts extremity

Nipt in the bud;

The sweetness and the praise were Thine,

But the extension and the room

Which in Thy garland I should fill were mine

At Thy great doom.

For as Thou dost impart Thy grace,

The greater shall our glory be.

The measure of our joys is in this place,

The stuff with Thee.

Let me not languish, then, and spend

A life as barren to Thy praise

As is the dust, to which that life doth tend.

But with delays.

All things are busy; only I

Neither bring honey with the bees,

Nor flowers to make that, nor the husbandry

To water these.

I am no link of Thy great chain,

But all my Company is a weed.

Lord, place me in Thy concert; give one strain

To my poor reed.1 [Note: George Herbert.]

(3) God has a right to our homage and worship. This we offer to no one else; but Justice demands that we should offer it to Him. Do we realize that God has a right to our prayers and praises and our worship? It is not a question of our inclination, but of Gods due, whether or not we say our prayers. It is not a matter of our own whims and fancy, but of Gods honour, whether or not we come before His Presence with thanksgiving, and show ourselves glad in Him with psalms. God has a right to one day in seven which He claims as His due. He has a right to at least a small portion of our time every day in the morning and in the evening. It is the very least we can give as a recognition of Him who gives us all, and who never yet received the gifts of His creatures without returning to them a bountiful interest in that which enriches life and happiness.

Bright shadows of true Rest! Some shoots of blisse;

Heaven once a week;

The next worlds gladness prepossest in this;

A day to seek

Eternity in time; the steps by which

We climb above all ages; Lamps that light

Man through his heap of dark days; and the rich,

And full redemption of the whole weeks flight.2 [Note: Henry Vaughan.]

ii. Temperance

1. The largeness of the word. The second topic on which St. Paul reasoned was temperance (R.V. margin self-control). The presence of Drusilla by the side of Felix was in itself a proof of how he had failed in this virtue, for the Greek word is specially applicable to continence from sensual pleasures. Our modern use of the word temperance falls far below the meaning of the word employed by St. Paul. That of which St. Paul reasoned with Felix was the larger virtue of self-restraint, of self-command, generally. He taught himstill occupying the ground rather of nature and reason than of Revelation and the Gospelthat every man ought to be able to command himself; to say No to appetite when it passes its just limit; to bridle inclination; to coerce lust; to say to himself, This I will do, because it is right, and, This will I not do, because it is wrong. Temperance is the holding of the reins of conduct in the hand of the will, and the regulating of that will itself by the ordinances of reason and of God. The absence of this power, or the loss of it, is the cause of all the sins and of all the miseries which have made this world a scene of suffering and of desolation.

2. There are certain well-defined stages in the development of temperance. For let no one believe for one moment that a virtue like this grows up in us without effort, or is inherited with transmitted qualities.

(1) Know Thyself. To him who would possess the virtue of temperance there comes first of all this message to the soul, Know Thyself. It is a great moral help to know ourselves, to know our history, to know our constituent elements, to know the ills to which we are exposed, and the Divine help which it is ours to welcome. It is being freely discussed now whether or not it is desirable to warn young people beforehand in a definite way of the dangers that must inevitably cross their path. It is a question beset with difficulties, and, in view of the priceless and irreparable value of innocence where it can be maintained, a question which can be entertained only as the lesser of two evils; but at the same time there is no doubt that a wise estimate of his own peculiar dangers, a prudent calculation of his force, and a just appreciation of the enemys real strength would help a man.

(2) Control Thyself. A man once asked his spiritual adviser what was the meaning of dying unto sin, and he was told in a symbolical manner that it was to behave like a dead man in the presence of that which moves or excites to sin. This state of deadness to desire is temperance, but it can only be attained through the constant application of self-control all through life. Does anything pass within the portals of our heart of which the will has no cognizance, or is powerless to resist? You remember how the Apostle spoke of a self-control which brings every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ?

I do not ask for any crown

But that which all may win,

Nor try to conquer any world

Except the one within.

Be Thou my Guide until I find,

Led by a tender hand,

The happy kingdom in myself,

And dare to take command.

(3) Deny Thyself. Know thyself, Control thyselfthese are good and essential; but further, from her throne of excellence, Temperance cries, Deny thyself. The will must not wait to be attacked, the will must not wait to show that it is master in days of turbulence, and in the fierce blasts of passion. Before the attack comes, while all is peaceful, when no tempter is in sight, while all is calm, the will must exercise herself in her discipline by self-denial. The way to resist indulgence in things unlawful is to accustom the powers and faculties to obedience in giving up even things lawful.

3. Christian Temperance. When, through the cross of Christ, we get the right attitude towards God, when our life fronts God, all is changed, and temperance becomes not a negative virtue, but a positive one. Then everything is beautiful, pure, every wish, every motive, every purpose, every imagination, every fancy clothed in a white robe.

But as I sat scrawling these silly figures on brown paper, it began to dawn on me, to my great disgust, that I had left one chalk, and that a most exquisite and essential one, behind. I searched all my pockets, but I could not find any white chalk. Now, those who are acquainted with all the philosophy (nay, religion), which is typified in the art of drawing on brown paper, know that white is positive and essential. I cannot avoid remarking here upon a moral significance. One of the wise and awful truths which this brown-paper art reveals is this: that white is a colour. It is not a mere absence of colour; it is a shining and affirmative thing: as fierce as red, as definite as black. When (so to speak) your pencil grows red hot, it draws roses; when it grows white hot, it draws stars. And one of the two or three defiant verities of the best religious moralityof real Christianity, for exampleis exactly this same thing. Chastity does not mean abstention from sexual wrong; it means something flaming like Joan of Arc. In a word, God paints in many colours, but He never paints so gorgeouslyI had almost said so gaudilyas when He paints in white.1 [Note: G. K. Chesterton, Tremendous Trifles.]

iii. The Judgment to Come

Every Coming of the Lord is associated with judgment; inevitably and necessarily the Coming of Christ to any soul is the judgment of that soul; it was so when He was here on earth; souls were judged by His very coming. This child, said Simeon to the astonished Mary in the temple, is set for the falling and rising up of many in Israel; and for a sign which is spoken against. And so it came to pass. By His mere presence He divided men and separated them. There was a judging wherever Christ appeared. Mens characters stood revealed. The bias of the soul declared itself. Men classified themselves; tried by the touchstone of His character, of their own accord, they took their stand, some on the right and others on the left. God sent not his Son into the world, says John, to judge the world, and yet the actual result of His coming was a judgment. This is the judgment, he goes on to say, just a sentence or two further down, that the light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light, because their works were evil. He judged the world by His presence in it. The essential goodness of Peter and John and James and Zacchus, and the essential evil of the chief priests and scribes, stood disclosed by contact with Jesus. And every coming of the Lord involves judgment still. His coming to us as individuals in the appeals and strivings of His Spirit implies a judging. The good heart and the evil heart stand revealed by the answer given to His pleadings and calls. Suppose that at this moment Jesus presents Himself to us; and suppose we bow Him out of our heart and life; suppose we say to Him in effect, We will not have Thee to reign over us. The judgment has taken place! We have declared ourselves amongst the goats upon the left hand. And His coming to a nation in the great crises of its history implies and involves a judging. As Lowell says

Some great cause, Gods new Messiah,

offering each the bloom or blight,

Parts the goats upon the left hand,

and the sheep upon the right,

And the choice goes by for ever

twixt that darkness and that light.

But in the Creed we have the statement that Christ who is seated at the right hand of the Father will come to judge the quick and the dead.

1. Let us first look at the Certainty of this Judgment.

(1) What does Scripture say? And as Paul reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgement to comeno, that is not precisely what Luke wrote. Read the verse again in the Revised Version: Paul reasoned of the judgement to come. It was no misty idea of a coming judgment that floated dimly through the speakers mind; he thought of that day when the books would be opened and God should judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ. And to this bear all the Scriptures witness. Let us turn to the Old Testament and read those many anticipations of the day of the Lord to be found so often in the writings of the prophets. Then let us open the New Testament, and immediately the truth rises before us in sharpest and most unmistakable distinctness. When the Son of man shall come in his glorythey are His own wordsand all the angels with him, then shall he sit on the throne of his glory; and before him shall be gathered all the nations; and he shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separateth the sheep from the goats; and he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left. And if from the words of Jesus we turn to the records of the early Christian Church, to the Acts of the Apostles and the various Epistles that follow, the result is the same. It would be impossible, says Dr. Denney, to overestimate the power of this final judgment as a motive in the primitive Church. When Peter went to expound the Gospel for the first time to a Roman centurion, this was how he summed up the sacred commission given to him and the other disciples: He charged us to preach unto the people and to testify that this is he which is ordained of God to be the Judge of quick and dead. When Paul proclaimed the Gospel in Athens an essential part of his message was this: God hath appointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.

(2) But it may be doubted whether the expectation of a judgment is more a point of natural or of revealed religion. Certainly, if revelation declares, conscience ratifies. The sense of accountability is one of those ultimate facts of human nature, inconceivable upon the modern molecular hypothesis, which any teacher who professed to deal remedially, or even philosophically, with that natureSocrates as well as Christcould not but recognize. And so it is stamped deep and legible on every page of the Gospel. We shall be judged according as our works have been; and the conscience, whatever its testimony may be worth, echoes, We shall be so judged. Our Master may seem to have gone for a while into a far country, but He will return, He says, and reckon with His servants.

2. If the Final Judgment is a certainty, its character becomes most vital to us. Amid the thousand false, low standards upon the commonest matters of morality accepted and acted upon by the young, the pleasure-seeking, the fashionable, the money-getting, the ambitious, it is well to try to accustom the mind to set before itself clearly and distinctly the principles that will governthat we feel must governthe righteous judgment of God; well to anticipate, to make ourselves seem to hear that terrible sentence which we know will be passed against us if we are deliberately leading impure, selfish, false, dishonest livesif we are resisting Gods call to repentance and doing despite to the Spirit of Grace.

(1) This Judgment will often mean the reversal of human judgment. A Day of Judgment means that once at least we shall be judged perfectly, that all things will be seen as they really are. Here and now we hide ourselves from one another; often we hide ourselves from ourselves; as Morley truly says, People have understandings with themselves here. But then all disguises will drop off, the hearts counsels will be made manifest, the lifes long-kept secrets revealed.

In one of Dean Churchs letters, a letter written not long before his death, there is a sublime figure, not unworthy, as Morley says, of the Dante which its author so much loved and so well understood: I often have a kind of waking dream, he wrote: up one road, the image of a man decked and adorned as if for a triumph, carried up by rejoicing and exulting friends, who praise his goodness and achievements; and on the other road, turned back to back to it, there is the very man himself, in sordid and squalid apparel, surrounded not by friends, but by ministers of justice, and going on, while his friends are exulting, to his certain and perhaps awful judgment.1 [Note: G. Jackson.]

(2) That Judgment which will mean the reversal of many of our judgments will be itself final and irreversible. What may happen between death and the judgment we know not. That which theologians call the intermediate state lies for the most part in shadow, and, save for a few fitful and uncertain gleams, the New Testament itself leaves the darkness unbroken. But all Scripture agrees in representing the judgment of the great day as final. Of any change, of any revision beyond that, it gives no hint, it holds out no hope. Indeed, may we not almost say that in the nature of things it must be final, for it is the judgment of perfect wisdom and perfect love?

It is impossible to dogmatize. The larger hope, as people term it, is only a hope at the best. The thing about which Scripture leaves us in no shadow of doubt is the immense, critical, and decisive influence of this life. Upon the life we live momentous and eternal issues hang. We do not know what may happen in the endless ages of eternity; what we do know is that it is the gentle Christ who tells us that the broad way leads to destruction; that sin entails the worm that dieth not and the fire that is not quenched; that some go to eternal punishment and some to eternal life. You seem, sir, said Mrs. Adams to Dr. Johnson, in one of his despondent hours, when the fear of death and judgment lay heavy upon him, to forget the merits of our Redeemer. Madam, replied Johnson, with his usual blunt honesty, I do not forget the merits of my Redeemer, but my Redeemer has said that He will set some on His right hand and some on His left.

I remember as a child seeing my mother examine a piece of cloth or dress fabric in the evening under the gaslight, and then she would say, Wait until the morning till we see how it looks by daylight. Let us take heed we are not deceived by how things look in the glare and glitter of the lamps of time; let us resolve to see them in the clear steady radiance of etemity.1 [Note: G. Jackson.]

3. Let us thank God that He has made the Judgment to come a matter of revelation.

One who has since passed within the veil often said to me, I thank God that there is a judgment to come. At the time I could hardly say Amen! Judgment scarcely seemed to me a theme for a doxology; yet he was rightit is a thing to thank God for! It nerves all virtuous endeavour, it is the pulse of patience, the soul of perseverance, the safeguard against the bitterness of despairthis appeal to a higher tribunal. And from the earliest ages the Church of Christ has felt that she could not only solemnly say, but reverently and gratefully sing it too

We believe that Thou shalt come to be our Judge,

We therefore pray Thee help Thy servants

Whom Thou hast redeemed with Thy Precious Blood!2 [Note: J. M. Gibbon.]

When with these eyes, closed now by Thee,

But then restored,

The great and white throne I shall see

Of my dread Lord;

And lowly kneeling, for the most

Stiff then must kneel,

Shall look on Him, at whose high cost

Unseen, such joys I feel.

Whatever arguments or skill

Wise heads shall use,

Tears only and my blushes still

I will produce.

And should those speechless beggars fail,

Which oft have won,

Then taught by Thee I will prevail,

And say, Thy will be done!3 [Note: Henry Vaughan.]

III

The Effect of the Sermon

i. Felix was terrified

1. Paul knew that there was in every man something that would respond to the manifestation of the truth. He knew that he had a message for Felixeven Gods message; and presently there was that in the bearing of the man whom he addressed which abundantly justified his confidence. Felix was terrified. He may have shared, he probably did share, in the widespread scepticism or unbelief of the educated heathen of the age. He had overlived all faith in the things which his own religion taught him, of the rewards laid up for the good, of the punishments reserved for the wicked. Tartarus and Elysium, Minos and Rhadamanthus with their seats of judgment, the wheel of Ixion, the stone of Sisyphus, the whips of the Furies, all these, no doubt, were poets fictions, old wives tales, dotards dreams for him. Dismissing these, he may have long since dismissed with them the truth which was behind them all, that kernel of truth whereof these were but the husk and outer covering. But now at Pauls words, that truth, so old and yet so new, revived in him againjust as by some chemical applications the writings on parchment, long since apparently effaced by age, may start into life again. Besides the voice of the Apostle, there was another voice in his own heart, deep calling unto deep, which told him that this was true, which compelled him to set his own seal to the Apostles words; and Felix was terrified.

2. The awakened conscience is just like the sense of pain in the physical world, it has got a work to do, and a mission to perform. It is meant to warn us off dangerous ground. Thank God for pain! It keeps off death many a time. Felix was on the high road to utter hardness and blindness of heart, but he had not arrived at that condition yet. For this is the strange characteristic of sin, when carried to the extent of producing spiritual blindness and hardness of heart, that those solemn glimpses of an unseen world, those feelings of horror at the thought of the loss of Gods favour, become at length like the dreams of infancy, and are regarded as little; but Felix was terrified.

3. But impulse is not to be a resting-place. Emotion is not the goal. Is that altogether a needless warning? It is possible to cultivate a spurious emotionalism, a luxury of emotions, which may come to be regarded as the marrow and essence of true religion. True religion is not merely the enjoyment of certain feelings; it is the translation of them. There is a wide difference between good impulse and good life, and the work of true religion is to translate the one into the other. We have to take the impulse, given us by God, and translate it first into resolution and then into action. That is religion, to take divine impulse, and, by the process of living, translate it into finished and eternal achievement.

Dr. Wayland Hoyt tells the story of a captain whom he met in the pilot-house of a Missouri River steamboat, and who asked his judgment concerning his conduct. He said that when he was a young man, and was first married, his wife was a Christian, and to please her he began to go to church; he never could hear singing and not be moved; the songs they sang in the church touched him strongly. They brought up forgotten memories and unloosed the springs of feeling; he was overcome. Because he wept, they thought he had become a Christian. His wife, the minister, and many friends pressed him to join the church. But, said the captain, I could not. I told them I had simply been stirred by songs as I always am. I knew I had not given up my evil ways.

ii. Felix put off Decision

1. Felix answered, Go thy way for this time; and when I have a convenient season, I will call thee unto me. Felix broke off the audience, saying that when he found another opportunity he would summon Paul again for a public audience. But Paul remained in Csarea two full years waiting for the second hearing. Felix did indeed send for Paul againbut we do not read that he felt any emotion again. He communed with him often. But why? Was it to deepen his impression? Was it that he might obtain more perfect knowledge of the way of Christ? Was it that he might better learn how to flee from that wrath of God at which he shuddered? The sacred historian shall tell us why he sent for Paul, and communed with him often. He hoped that money should have been given him of Paul, that he might loose him. All that was meanest, all that was basest, all that was most unrighteous in the man had revived again, and in all its old strength and malignity.

If we take a bit of phosphorus and put it upon a slip of wood, and ignite the phosphorus, bright as the blaze is, there drops from it a white ash that coats the wood, and makes it almost incombustible. And so when the flaming conviction, laid upon our hearts, has burnt itself out, it has coated the heart, and it will be very difficult to kindle the light there again.1 [Note: A. Maclaren.]

The great bell of Moscow, the largest bell in the world, was east more than two hundred years ago, and has never been raised, not because it is too heavy, but because it is cracked. All was going well at the foundry, when a fire broke out in Moscow. Streams of water were dashed in upon the houses and factories, and a tiny little stream found its way into the bell-metal at the very moment when it was rushing in a state of fusion into the colossal bell-mould, and so the big bell came out cracked, and all its capacity of music was destroyed. The historic incident presented itself as a symbol of our thought. Here is a divinely-given impulse, like soft and molten metal, just flowing into the mould of our first thought, and hardening into noble and steadfast decision. And an insidious doubt or compromise is allowed to have its way, and trickle in at the vital moment when impulse is just shaping into the image of the divine likeness, and all is spoilt, and the bell of heavenly impulse does not ring out the music of a redeemed and sanctified life. It is this intrusion of the compromise that works such destruction in our spiritual life. Life would abound in heavenly bell-music if we took every divine impulse and offered it the mould of a ready and willing decision. Teach me to do Thy will.2 [Note: J. H. Jowett.]

Take my feet, and let them be

Swift and beautiful for Thee.

2. What is a convenient season? It is a season when you can do a thing just as easily as not. When a friend asks you to do something, if convenient, you answer: Oh yes; it is entirely convenient. No trouble at all. That is what is meant by a convenient season. Well, does a convenient season ever come to repent? It never does. A man has to put himself to great inconvenience when he makes the change.

The Apostle spake of judgment just,

And certain unto men as death;

Prince Felix felt as if the thrust

Of deadly arrows stayed his breath:

Ill hear thee at convenient time,

He said, his terror to dissemble;

But when can guilt conveniently

Invite the truth that makes it tremble?1 [Note: T. T. Lynch, The Rivulet, 143.]

3. Go thy way, said Felix. If only we could be sure that a voice was Gods, we would obey it swiftly and gladly; but the pain of life is that its silences are so long, and so seldom broken by a voice which we can with confidence welcome as divine. But is that voice so very rare? or is it not rather that we have not schooled ourselves to understand the language in which it speaks? For it sometimes speaks as a rising terror in the heart. Go away, cries Felix, in a sudden access of terror. It is to Paul that he is speaking, but what are those awful words but a tragic farewell to Godthe God who was pleading with him through the mighty presence of Paul?

The peasants of southern Russia say that an old woman was at work in her house when the Wise Men of the East, led by the star, passed on their way to go and seek the infant Saviour. Come with us, they said. We are going to find the Christ so long looked for by men. Not now, she replied. I am not ready to go now; but by and by I will follow on and find Him with you. But when her work was done the Wise Men had gone, and the star in the heavens which went before them had disappeared.2 [Note: L. A. Banks.]

There are two sworn enemies of my soul. Their names are Yesterday and To-morrow. Yesterday slays his thousands. What he seeks to do is to plunge me down into darkness and despair. You have had your chances, he says, such golden chances, and you have trampled them all under foot. There will be no more priceless opportunities for you. Ay, but To-morrow slays his tens of thousands. He has recourse to just the opposite expedients from those of Yesterday. Brave vows and valiant promises that will never be fulfilled; good resolutions that may lull my conscience into sleep,these are his deadly weapons. When I have a convenient season, he bids me say to the Saviour and the Spirit of God, I will send for Thee. And how pitifully often the convenient season never dawns.1 [Note: A. Smellie.]

4. Go thy way. Let us think what reasons influence us to make this reply.

(1) First, there is the instinctive, natural wish to get rid of a disagreeable subject,much as a man, without knowing what he is doing, twitches his hand away from the surgeons lancet. So many of us do not like these thoughts of the old Book about righteousness and temperance and the judgement to come, and make a natural effort to get our minds away from the contemplation of the subject because it is painful and unpleasant. But would it be a wise thing for a man, if he began to suspect that he was insolvent, to refuse to look into his books or to take stock, and let things drift, till there was not a halfpenny in the pound for anybody? What would his creditors call him? And is it not the part of a wise man, if he begins to see that something is wrong, to get to the bottom of it, and as quickly as possible to set it right? What do we call people who, suspecting that there may be a great hole in the bottom of the ship, never man the pumps or do any caulking, but say, Oh! she will very likely keep afloat until we get into harbour? Would it not be a wiser thing, if, because the subject is disagreeable, we should force ourselves to think about it until it became agreeable?

(2) Some of us say to the messenger of Gods love: Go thy way for this time, because we do not like to give up something that we know is inconsistent with His love and Service. Felix would not part with Drusilla, nor disgorge the ill-gotten gain of his province. Felix therefore was obliged to put away from him the thoughts that looked in that direction. Felix was ambitious. He was unpopular with the Jews, but this was in his favour at Rome. He might become emperor. Who could tell? To turn Christian would ruin his prospects. His duty was clear enough, but just now it stood in his way of personal elevation.

(3) Some of us fall into this habit of putting off the decision for Christ, simply by letting the impressions made on our hearts and consciences be crowded out of them by cares and enjoyments and pleasures and duties of this world. And if some stray seed here and there remains and begins to sprout, the ill weeds which grow apace, spring up with ranker stems and choke it. We did not intend it to go, we simply opened the door to the flocking in of the whole crowd of the worlds cares and occupations, and away went the shy solitary thought which, if it had been cared for and tended, might have led us at last to the Cross of Jesus Christ.

(4) But the fourth reason brings the most grist to the Devils mill. It is the inherent tendency in men to procrastinate and to compromise. Remember the foolish virgins who found it too late to enter in; the guests called to the feast, who chose rather to look after their worldly interest, and thus were shut out from the kingdom of God; the people whom Christ called, and who wanted first to attend to their friends and business, and with whom Christ would allow no delay. Can we help seeing that what makes people put off in worldly business and put off in religion is exactly the same thing, namely, a dislike to what has to be done, and that the dislike is not likely to become less by this waiting for a more convenient season?

The Lash of the Law

Literature

Banks (L. A.), Paul and his Friends, 121.

Burrell (D. J.), A Quiver of Arrows, 172.

Church (R. W.), Village Sermons, 1st Ser., 231.

Forbes (A. P.), Are you being Converted? 69.

Fraser (J.), University Sermons, 118.

Goodwin (H.), Parish Sermons, 2nd Ser., 179.

Hobhouse (W.), The Spiritual Standard, 130.

Little (W. J. Knox), The Journey of Life, 64.

Little (W. J. Knox), Manchester Sermons, 62.

MFadyen (J. E.), The City with Foundations, 221.

Maclaren (A.), A Years Ministry, i. 165.

Price (A. C.), Fifty Sermons, iv. 17.

Smith (Gipsy), As Jesus Passed By, 139.

Spurgeon (C. H.), The New Park Street Pulpit (1858), No. 171.

Trench. (R. C.), Westminster and other Sermons, 32.

Vaughan (C. J.), The Church of the First Days, 534.

Vaughan (J.), Sermons (Brighton Pulpit), i. No. 296.

Fuente: The Great Texts of the Bible

he: Act 17:2, 1Sa 12:7, Isa 1:18, Isa 41:21, Rom 12:1, 1Pe 3:15

righteousness: Act 24:15, Act 24:26, 2Sa 23:3, Job 29:14, Psa 11:7, Psa 45:7, Psa 58:1, Psa 58:2, Psa 72:2, Psa 82:1-4, Pro 16:12, Ecc 3:16, Isa 1:21, Isa 16:5, Isa 61:8, Jer 22:3, Jer 22:15-17, Eze 45:9, Dan 4:27, Hos 10:4, Hos 10:12, Amo 5:24, Amo 6:12, Joh 16:8, 1Jo 3:7, 1Jo 3:10

temperance: Pro 31:3-5, Ecc 10:16, Ecc 10:17, Isa 28:6, Isa 28:7, Dan 5:1-4, Dan 5:30, Hos 7:5, Mar 6:18-24, Gal 5:23, Tit 2:11, Tit 2:12, 1Pe 4:4, 2Pe 1:6

judgment: Act 10:42, Act 17:13, Psa 50:3, Psa 50:4, Ecc 3:17, Ecc 5:8, Ecc 11:9, Ecc 12:14, Dan 12:2, Mat 25:31-46, Rom 2:16, Rom 14:12, 1Co 4:5, 2Co 5:10, 2Th 1:7-10, 2Ti 4:1, Heb 6:2, Heb 9:27, 1Pe 4:5, Rev 20:11-15

Felix: Act 2:37, Act 9:6, Act 16:29, 1Ki 21:27, 2Ki 22:19, Ezr 10:3, Ezr 10:9, Psa 99:1, Psa 119:120, Isa 32:11, Isa 66:2, Jer 23:29, Hab 3:16, Rom 3:19, Rom 3:20, 1Co 14:24, 1Co 14:25, Gal 3:22, Heb 4:1, Heb 4:12, Heb 12:21, Jam 2:19

Go: Act 16:30-34, Act 26:28, 1Ki 22:26, 1Ki 22:27, Pro 1:24-32, Jer 37:17-21, Jer 38:14-28, Mat 14:5-10, Mat 22:5, Mat 25:1-10

when: Act 17:32, Pro 6:4, Pro 6:5, Isa 55:6, Hag 1:2, Luk 13:24, Luk 13:25, Luk 17:26-29, 2Co 6:2, Heb 3:7, Heb 3:8, Heb 3:13, Heb 4:11, Jam 4:13, Jam 4:14

Reciprocal: 1Sa 18:12 – afraid 2Ch 18:25 – and carry him back Job 21:31 – declare Psa 15:4 – a vile Psa 98:9 – with righteousness Jer 36:16 – they were Hos 11:10 – shall tremble Hos 13:13 – an Mat 13:19 – and understandeth Mat 14:4 – General Mar 4:16 – which Mar 11:18 – feared Luk 21:15 – which Joh 16:11 – judgment Joh 18:38 – What Act 26:24 – Festus Rom 1:18 – who hold 1Co 1:27 – General 1Co 6:9 – unrighteous 1Co 16:12 – when Tit 2:2 – temperate

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

TREMBLING AT THE JUDGMENT

Felix trembled.

Act 24:25

And well he might! for he was now brought face to face with three things which had never troubled him before, but either of which was enough to make him tremble. The first thing was Sin; the second was God; the third was Judgment to come. The verse from which I draw my text speaks also of righteousness and temperance, but I do not think it was either of these that made the covetous old judge tremble. I believe it was Judgment to come, and that subject would include the other two things I have named; and I think the Apostle would speak of them in the order I have named them.

He would first speak of sin. No doubt he knew that Felix was what even the world would call a bad man, by which would be meant a man not living up to the light of his conscience; and he must have been a very bad man to have hoped that money should have been given him of St. Paul, that he might loose him. Felix stood to St. Paul in the relation of a judge. In that capacity he was utterly unworthy of his position. He would prostitute the sacred cause of justice for his own venal purposes. His judgment-seat was corrupt! You are no longer surprised, then, that when the Apostle reasoned of judgment to come he touched a raw place, even in the hardened soul of the tyrant. Felix trembled. He saw the greatness of his sin, and though he repented not, he trembled. He sawcan we doubt it?the spotless purity of God painted by the Apostle in vivid contrast to the baseness of his own character, and though the goodness of God did not in his case lead to repentance (Rom 2:4), he felt a twinge, and trembled. More than all, he heard, doubtless for the first time, of that terrible but just judgment to come, which must one day be his portion, and which would, unless he repented, bring about such a terrific retribution for his misconduct in the judgment-seat; and hearing all this, can you wonder that he winced under the castigation and trembled?

Following this line of thought, I would bring you, first of all:

I. Face to face with your own sin.Until a man has fairly faced this great enemy there is little hope of reasoning with him with any success, either about judgment to come or anything else. I grant that to one who is pure-minded the recollection of past sin causes mental pain of the most acute description; I know also that the feeling of being awakened to sin for the first time comes as a shock, often so severe as to make a man most intensely miserable for days or weeks, or even more. It is undoubtedly an awful thing to discover ourselves as being rebels against God, despisers of His goodness, wanton rejecters of His mercy. But I will tell you what is more awful still. It isNot to feel your sin! The poor sinner just roused to a sense of his miserable state may indeed with reason feel great dejection, but the man who ought to tremble is you who are still unconscious of your peril, you who have remained so long insensible to every argument that has been addressed to your mind, and to every effort that has been made with a view to rescue your perishing soul. It is to you that I speak, and that not in anger, but in love, when I sayFace your sin!

II. Felix was brought by the Apostles reasoning face to face with God.Not only his sin troubled him, but he felt a passing tremor of awe at the revelation of Gods goodness contrasted with his own wickedness. Now, to face God is the solemn duty to which I now call you. It is a fiercer ordeal even than the last, that of facing your sin. But it must be done. All religion has this object, to bring men face to face with God. Shrink not from the ordeal. Make it your business to seek out God. In every means of grace you may find Him. In the Holy Eucharist He specially manifests His Presence, and to this great Sacrament I lovingly bid you, and suggest to you that the spirit in which you should come to that Feast of Love is best expressed in the Psalmists words, Thy face, Lord, will I seek (Psa 27:8).

III. But if you will not face your sin, nor seek unto God, then I can only reason with you as St. Paul reasoned with Felix, and leave you to a profitless trembling at the fear of judgment to come. The certainty of that judgment is established beyond all possibility of doubt or cavil by almost every book of Holy Scripture. How terrible a trial it will be, even for those that pass through it in safety, Jesus Christ has Himself declared. Prophets and apostles, saints and doctors of the Church, martyrs and confessors, priests and holy laymen, have all combined in different ages to force upon men this great question, Are you ready to face the Judgment Day?

Rev. J. H. Buchanan.

Illustration

A priest one day watched from his sacristy the people as they came into church. One face arrested his attention. It was that of a man who plainly bore the mark of Cain upon his brow. Sin, shame, and woe were all plainly revealed in the lines of that face. I will seek him after service, said the good priest to himself, and see if I can help him. Service ended, the man of God went into the porch and awaited his friend. He approached. But only by his clothes could he be recognised. The face was not the same. Every trace of shame and woe was gone. An air of calm and manly humility lit up the features which had been so dark. Nevertheless, I will speak to him:Friend, a word with you if you will. Step in here. When you came into church you were miserable. Is it not so? Even so, sir, very miserable. And now you are happy? Is that so? Very happy, sir, very happy. And may I ask what has wrought the change in so short a time? The priests kindly manner bespoke confidence, and the other replied, Sir, I have been during the last half-hour face to face with my sin, and I have found strength to resolve to go forth and fight it. Hitherto I have been afraid of it. Now, I begin to think it is afraid of me. Pray for me, that I may overcome.

Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary

5

Act 24:25. The subjects of this verse are in response to the request in the preceding one, to discuss the faith in Christ, which shows that the Gospel contains more than just the “first principles.” These subjects were especially appropriate at this time, for both Felix and his wife were very unrighteous people. He had induced her to desert her former husband to marry him, for no other motive than lust on the part of each. Thayer defines the original word for temperance, “Self-control,” then explains it to mean “the virtue of one who masters his desires and passions, especially his sensual [fleshly or carnal] appetites.” Judgment to come is defined by Thayer, “The last or final judgment.” Being a judge himself and acquainted with the dignity of judicial sentences, Felix could feel the weight of Paul’s prediction and was made to tremble, which is defined in the lexicon “to be terrified.” A convenient season. The second word does not appear in the original Greek as a separate term. The phrase is from KAIROS which Thayer defines “opportune or seasonable time.” The word has been translated in the King James Version by the single word “time” in 63 places.

Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary

Act 24:25. And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, Felix trembled. The subjects upon which Paul seems to have spoken when summoned before Felix and Drusilla, on first thoughts appear to us somewhat strange. No doubt they were very different to the themes the governor and his wife expected to have heard dwelt upon by the imprisoned Nazarene leader, he hoping probably, as a politician, to learn more of the relations existing between the sect in which Paul was so distinguished a leader, and the dominant Jewish schools of thought; and the Jewish princess expecting doubtless to hear from the lips of the Christian preacher something of the teaching, and perhaps new details respecting the death, of the Founder of his faith. One in the position of Drusilla had, too, no doubt heard strange rumours of the visions of Paul. She would hear from his own lips what had convinced one who, in early life, had been so famous a Phariseewhat had determined a man with the bright onlooks of the young Saul to throw in his lot with a despised and persecuted sect.

But both Felix and Drusilla were disappointed. The Christian teacher apparently never touched on the evidences of his faith, said nothing of his own lifenothing in connection with his own experience of shame at the hands of men, or of surpassing glory at the hands of God. With that marvellous power none seem to have been possessed like the inspired Paul, he spoke of life rather than of doctrine, with evidently special reference to the brilliant but mistaken lives of the pair who, surrounded with all the majesty of the ensign of the great Empire, sat in royal state, while he stood a friendless, poor-clad prisoner before them.

It is doubtful if many besides the personal attendants were present at this hearing or hearings of the accused. Most likely Paul gave Luke a very short description of what took place. The three famous words rendered righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, were without doubt Pauls own expressions. Luke took them down from his masters lips. Our English translation very poorly represents the Greek original of righteousness ( ) or justice, a word embracing those varied duties which every upright citizen owes to another, how much more one set over his fellows as a judge! Such a reminder, couched in the burning words of a Paul, must indeed have struck home to the heart of the unscrupulous covetous Roman satrap, who only looked upon his high office as a source of gain to himself. Temperance., is very inadequately Englished by temperance. The Greek word has a far broader significance; it denotes especially self-control, the power of conquering ones own passions and lusts. The virtue was not unknown even in the story of Pagan Rome; and Felix companion, the Jewess Drusilla, would call up before her mind many a fair example set by noble Hebrew matrons in the old days of Israel, an example she had never tried to follow! Judgment to come. No doubt this theme was especially brought into prominence owing to the fact of the resurrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust, forming so central a feature in Pauls teaching, and also because it was the subject of part of his defence when he was tried before the Sanhedrim, and before Felix (Act 24:15, and chap, Act 23:6; Act 23:8). We can picture Pauls oratory on these momentous occasions, speaking his Masters words before two such perfect representatives of the old worldthe man, the heir of Pagan tradition, the unjust judge, the selfish ruler, the evil example to all that luxurious society in which he reigned as chief, living for the day, utterly careless of the futurethoroughly and earnestly carrying out the Pagan teachers cheerless advice, Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. The woman, a fair specimen of the Jewess of the last age of Jerusalem, when the people loved with a strange passionate fervour the doctrine and ritual of Moses and his interpreters, but allowed neither doctrine nor ritual to touch or affect the inner life. The characters of Caiaphas and Annas, and of the sisters Drusilla and Bernice, were the natural outcome of the teaching of the Rabbinic schools so sternly condemned by the Lord Jesus.

We can well imagine from what armoury Paul had drawn those weapons which pierced the triple-guarded breast of the selfish and courtly Roman voluptuary, and left him quivering with a nameless terror. No doubt among those precious parchments we read of in his last sad words to Timothy not many years later (2Ti 4:13), were records written by the older apostles, men who had been with the Lord during the days of His earthly teachingmemories of the Divine words uttered in those solemn hours of communion, and many of which we now possess, most precious gems, set in the gold of the gospel setting. No doubt, too, in his frequent intercourse in past years with Barnabas, with men like Philip, in his rarer meetings with the holy Twelve, had Paul heard, not once nor twice, the treasured words of Jesus, the Masters solemn teaching as to the true meaning of righteousness, the glorious beauty of chastity and self-conquest, His many-coloured pictures of the awful judgment morning. And when, moved by the Holy Spirit, he repeated to the Roman governor these words of the Risen One, whom he (Paul) had beheld, not as the others had seen Him in His poor earth dress, but once more clothed with His glory robes, and girt with the light of heaven, Felix, trained in a school which taught its scholars to believe in nothing, to hope for nothing, to dread nothingFelix the Epicurean, the atheist, the selfish scoffer at truth and honour, at innocence and purity, as he listened to the Nazarenes definition of justice and self-conquest, as he gazed on his picture of the future judgment of the just and the unjust, with Drusilla the Herodian princess by his sideFelix, we read, trembled.

And answered, Go thy way for this time; when I have a convenient season I will call for thee. But the alarm caused by Pauls burning words of truth had no permanent effect, at least not then; the only effect they appear to have had was, that he sent away Paul. He does not resent, well writes a recent commentator, his plainness of speech; he shows a certain measure of respect for him; but he postpones acting till a more convenient season, and so becomes a type of the millions whose spiritual life is ruined by a like procrastination. Nothing that we know of him gives us any ground for thinking that the convenient season ever came. Singularly enough, after two years, Felix, accused by the Jewish people, was summoned to Rome to give an account of his Judan stewardship to the emperor. Thus, by the providence of God, he was once more in the same city with Paul. Did he then avail himself of that convenient season? The recording angel alone knows.

Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament

25. Under the summons to speak concerning the faith in Christ, Paul was at liberty to choose the special topic of discourse, and did so with direct reference to the character of his hearers. (25) “And as he reasoned concerning righteousness and temperance, and judgment to come, Felix, being full of fear, answered, Go your way for this time, and when I have a convenient season, I will call for you.” The common version, “Felix trembled,” may be true, but it is claiming more for the effect of Paul’s discourse than is asserted by Luke. He was “filled with fear,” which shows that Paul addressed him on these appropriate topics, not in a spirit of bravado, but in that earnest and solemn strain which alone can penetrate the heart. This feeling was the beginning necessary to a change of life; but lust and ambition smothered the kindling fires of conscience, and the common excuse of alarmed but impenitent sinners was urged to get rid of the too faithful monitor. It is a sad warning to all who thus procrastinate, that to neither Felix nor Drusilla did the season ever come which they thought convenient to listen to such preaching. Felix was soon dismissed in disgrace from his office; and Drusilla, with a son by Felix, perished in that eruption of Mount Vesuvius which ingulfed the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum.

Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)

25. And while he reasoned concerning righteousness [i. e., justification], temperance [i. e., egkrateia, from ego, I, and kratos, government; hence that beautiful self-government in perfect harmony with the Divine law, which is but another name for entire sanctification, showing up the practical side], and judgment to come. This was an astounding revelation to that avaricious, ambitious, licentious Oriental potentate, not only awfully corrupt in his administration, swindling his subjects for paltry pelf, but debauched in his private life, at that time living in adultery with his wife Drusilla, a royal Jewish Herodian, celebrated for her beauty, the wife of Azizus, the king of Emesa, whom Felix had maneuvered to seduce and leave her royal husband, elope with him and become his wife. To this corrupt and debauched royal train, Pauls sermon on justification, sanctification and final judgment was a thunder-clap of trepidation and dismay from beginning to end. How wonderful the power of the gospel! Here you see the prisoner in chains standing on the lofty pinnacle of Divine truth and inflexible justice, his regal prosecutors in tears, trembling at his feet! Sorry to say, the record of Felix is anything but good. Though he trembled and quaked under the first gospel sermon of Paul, he wore off his convictions, heard Paul ever and anon two whole years, only hardening under his ministry, like multiplied millions who tremble with an earthquake conviction when they first hear some powerful preacher of the Sinai gospel. Unfortunately they pass the gracious opportunity, resist the Spirit, wear off their conviction, become immovable and finally drop into hell. With such, who have actually passed the dead line, this old wicked world is rapidly getting filled up. Felix and Drusilla then and there passed the fatal borne and plunged into ruin temporal and, we fear, eternal, the latter perishing with her only son in an eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, buried alive in the burning lava, doubtless a prelude of hells unquenchable flame, and the former, at the expiration of Pauls two years imprisonment, accused of maladministration, summoned to come to answer charges before the Emperor, narrowly escaping with his life, only to be cast away into perpetual banishment, thus both of them signally verifying the awful warnings so timely given by Paul, but sadly by them depreciated and rejected. Instead of bringing Lysias from Jerusalem, and giving Paul a fair trial, as he had promised, he kept him there two whole years actuated only by the sordid hope that some of Pauls friends would pay a big lot of money for his release. Finally, at the end of the two years his own awful troubles set in, culminating in his dethronement, arrest and prosecution for his life under accumulated charges from maladministration. Hence in his awful emergency, friends were scarce. Consequently he purchased the friendship of the Jews by leaving Paul a prisoner in chains, though from the time of his trial, when first he became a prisoner, well assured of his innocence and his own duty to release him.

Fuente: William Godbey’s Commentary on the New Testament

Paul’s emphases in his interview with Felix and Drusilla were those things Jesus Christ had promised the Holy Spirit would convict people of to bring them to faith. These things were sin, righteousness, and judgment (Joh 16:8-11). Felix and Drusilla were notoriously deficient in all three of these areas. It is not surprising that Felix became uneasy. He apparently was willing to discuss theology but not personal morality and responsibility. These subjects terrified him (Gr. emphobos).

Felix’s decision to postpone making a decision about his relationship to God is a common one. Often people put off this most important decision until they cannot make it. This is probably why most people who make decisions for Christ do so when they are young. Older people normally get harder to the gospel. [Note: See McGee, 4:620-21.] We do not know if Felix ever did trust Christ; there is no evidence that he did.

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)