Today, as yesterday, is really nothing major in my mind.  It just continues Paul’s sudo-trial before king Agrippa before Paul moves on to see the emperor of Rome, to whom he has appealed.  Agrippa says that Paul really has not reason to be imprisoned and held against his will based on the testimony that he’s seen, which we all kind of knew already.

In the grand scheme of things, there are one of two things, or both, that Paul is likely trying to work out here.  The first is the idea that the further he gets from the local authority making the decision about his guilt against these Jewish accusations, the more simple Paul knew that this case was going to get.  At the local level, the civil leaders would have had in mind to curry favor with the Jews in order to keep peace and control, and to maintain their status as rule by keeping taxes flowing.  The further we get from the local level, the further away from that tainted desire and the closer we get to a decision based on the merits of the case...and the reality that we can easily see is that Paul is not guilty of anything legally-speaking.  So, Paul may be simply playing the game of getting into a setting where the case is tried on the merits of the arguments and not the motivations of the accusers.  On the other hand, secondly, perhaps Paul has in mind something more grand.  Perhaps Paul is working his way towards Rome in a similar way that some people work their way up to the Supreme Court in the US, to create law.  If Paul can be tried in Rome, in front of Caesar, perhaps Paul can essentially acquit Christians in general of any crime against Rome, which would render most of the attempts of the Jews to twist the local legal rule to work against them.  This would render the Jews’ defense of the Christians to a purely religious defense, which would mean the Jews could only argue against the spread of Christianity based on the merits of their faith.  This would be the end of the Jews oppressing Christians via the legal system if it were to work out.  Perhaps Paul was shooting for something more grand, like that.

In that same vein, today my prayer is that I would be more courageous for my faith, as Paul clearly illustrates and demonstrates in his life.  I don’t have the same scale in terms of a stage on which I am presenting my faith, but I can certainly be courageous in how I conduct my life, in how I present myself, in how I work to push myself to grow and combat sin in my life, and in how I speak of my faith.  Though I am not Paul and am not being tried for my faith as Paul, and I thank Jesus for that!, I can certainly be courageous.