Please turn in your Bibles, if you would, to Acts chapter 21. Acts chapter 21, I'll begin reading at verse 37 and continue through chapter 22, verse 29. This week and next will be an example, once again, of where chapter breaks are not in a really good place. Last week we saw Paul arrested, today we see him make his defense, or at least attempt to. Acts chapter 21 beginning at verse 37, this is the word of the Lord. As Paul was about to be brought into the barracks, he said to the tribune, may I say something to you? And he said, do you know Greek? Are you not the Egyptian then who recently stirred up a revolt and led the 4,000 men of assassins out into the wilderness? Paul replied, I am a Jew from Tarsus in Sicily, Sicily. A citizen of no obscure city, I beg you, permit me to speak to the people. And when he had given him permission, Paul, standing on the steps, motioned with his hand to the people. And when there was a great hush, he addressed them in the Hebrew language, saying, brothers and fathers, hear the defense that I now make before you. And when they heard that he was addressing them in the Hebrew language, they became even more quiet. And he said, I am a Jew born in Tarsus in Cilicia, but brought up in this city, educated at the feet of Gamaliel according to the strict manner of the law of our fathers, being zealous for God as all of you are this day. I persecuted this way to the death, binding and delivering to prison both men and women as a high priest and the whole council of elders can bear me witness. From them I received letters to the brothers and I journeyed toward Damascus to take those also who were there and bring them in bonds to Jerusalem to be punished. As I was on my way and drew near to Damascus, about noon, a great light from heaven suddenly shone around me. And I fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to me, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? And I answered, who are you, Lord? And he said to me, I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom you are persecuting. Now those who were with me saw the light, but did not understand the voice of the one who was speaking to me. And I said, what shall I do, Lord? And the Lord said to me, rise and go into Damascus, and there you will be told all that is appointed for you to do. And since I could not see because of the brightness of that light, I was led by the hand by those who were with me and came into Damascus. And one, Ananias, a devout man according to the law, well spoken of by all the Jews who lived there, came to me and standing by me said to me, brother Saul, receive your sight. And at that very hour, I received my sight and saw him. And he said, the God of our fathers appointed you to know his will, to see the righteous one and to hear a voice from his mouth. For you will be a witness for him to everyone of what you have seen and heard. And now why do you wait? Rise and be baptized and wash away your sins, calling on his name. When I had returned to Jerusalem and was praying in the temple, I fell into a trance and saw him saying to me, make haste and get out of Jerusalem quickly because they will not accept your testimony about me. And I said, Lord, they themselves know that in one synagogue after another I imprisoned and beat those who believed in you. And when the blood of Stephen, your witness, was being shed, I myself was standing by and approving and watching over the garments of those who killed him. And he said to me, go, for I will send you far away to the Gentiles. Up to this word, they listened to him. Then they raised their voices and said, away with such a fellow from the earth, for he should not be allowed to live. And as they were shouting and throwing off their cloaks and flinging dust into the air, the tribunal ordered him to be brought into the barrack, saying that he should be examined by flogging, to find out why they were shouting against him like this. But when they had stretched him out for the whips, Paul said to the centurion who was standing by, is it lawful for you to flog a man who is a Roman citizen and uncondemned? When the centurion heard this, he went to the tribune and said to him, what are you about to do? For this man is a Roman citizen. So the tribune came and said to him, tell me, are you a Roman citizen? And he said, yes. The tribune answered, I bought this citizenship for a large sum. Paul said, but I am a citizen by birth. So those who were about to examine him withdrew from him immediately. And the tribune also was afraid, for he realized that Paul was a Roman citizen and that he had bound him. Thus far, the reading of God's most holy and infallible word. Perhaps there are times you wonder that if our nation goes downhill enough, where Christianity is outlawed and against the law, and you're arrested, the authorities come into this room and haul us all off. And you wonder, how will I give a defense? What will I say? Now in one sense, we need not fear because Christ has given his disciples, and then ultimately by implication us, a promise that the Spirit would be with us. But we also can't be so naive as to think that we'll have this on-the-spot thought in which we'll suddenly become seminary-level professors of theology and be able to give such articulate information so that the whole kingdom will be changed. There is a joint work here. And we need to understand what the gospel is ourselves. The Spirit will guide us, certainly. But the fact of the matter is, Christians need to always be ready, always be ready to give an answer for the faith that they have, for the hope that they have. We need to do so with gentleness and care. This is Peter's warning in his epistle, and it's also where we get our term apologetics. Well, Paul was such a man. And as you read through, you saw in many respects, you almost wonder if Paul read Peter's epistle, being ready to give an answer for the hope that he have with gentleness and kindness. We are in Jerusalem. Paul had returned here with a large gift for the church there in Jerusalem in need. He went despite the fact that many of his people, his friends, even his very own traveling companions, suggested, begged him not to go. But he went anyway, saying that he was prepared not only to be arrested, but to even die for the sake of the gospel. Well, now he gets to put his money where his mouth is, so to speak. Paul, as we saw last week, was spotted by Jews from Asia, that region of Asia Minor, where he spent a significant amount of time. So of course he was recognized. The crowd was raised up to a tizzy. They were ready to beat him. Indeed, they started to. They were ready to tear him limb from limb until he was rescued by the Romans. What a rescue. And that brings us where we are. Though we looked at his arrest last week, what we look at here just in mere seconds follows what we looked at last week. This is a continuing story. This is not a new chapter, so to speak. There probably shouldn't have even been a chapter break, much less the wrong place that it's in. But there's much to learn from what Paul does here. There are similar things to what we've seen before in what Paul does. That's what I hope to stress today and to show you this afternoon is simply this. Christians ought to be prepared to give a ready defense for the kingdom in the face of opposition. Christians ought to be prepared to give a ready defense for the kingdom in the face of opposition. We're going to look at this under two headings. We'll look at Paul's defense, and then secondly, Paul's citizenship. So first of all, Paul's defense. Look again at chapter 21, verse 37. As Paul was about to be brought into the barracks, he said to the tribune, may I say something to you? And he said, do you know Greek? Are you not the Egyptian then who recently stirred up a revolt and led the 4,000 men of the assassins out into the wilderness? So Paul, up to this point, had been carried. You may recall that they were tearing him limb for limb or attempting to. They were desiring to kill him. And in order to safely transport Paul, the centurions literally had to carry him. So that is where we are. Paul is carried up to the barracks, they're ready to bring him in, no doubt for the questioning that we just read about. But Paul says something, and notice what Paul says. He doesn't say, put me down, I can take care of this. He asks for permission to speak. May I say something? gentleness, kindness, respect, every step of the way. How many of us under such circumstances would be of such a mind? Which is why I wonder if you've read Peter's epistle, being ready to give an answer for the hope with kindness, setting apart Christ as Lord with all gentleness, Paul speaks to the tribune and notice the tribune seems to be a bit taken aback because Paul must have asked him in Greek. And notice the tribune wrongly assumed that Paul was this Egyptian who started a revolt. And apparently there was not that much prior to this, a revolt led by an Egyptian where most of the people that were gathered, these 4,000 mentioned, were either arrested or killed and then the Egyptian escaped. And so the tribune, for whatever reason, thinks that's who Paul is. And then Paul suddenly starts speaking in Greek, and that throws that theory out the window. Now, one of the things about this is, even as we saw last week how the crowd was, one was shouting one thing and one was shouting another, there was confusion everywhere, so much so that the confusion now has spilled into the authorities. Somehow, he got news that this Egyptian was back and this was him. Well, Paul proved that wrong. It just shows how the mob was in a massive state of confused anger and that it spilled into the authority. But again, notice how calm Paul is. There's no hysteria in him. He is completely collected. Paul explains that he's a Jew from a notable city and he asks to speak to the people. permission is granted. And so Paul, with his hand, motions, and it's hard to know for sure because the text isn't exactly clear, but something in Paul's demeanor and his bodily presence seemed to be enough with a wave of the hand to silence the crowd. Then he speaks to them in the Hebrew language. Now, this would be, to be more technical, Aramaic. It is the language of the Hebrews. That's basically what Luke is saying. At this stage, Hebrew as a language was really not the common language for the Jews. It was Aramaic as a result of the Babylonian captivity. So he speaks to them and the crowd gets even quieter. He addresses them, notice, as brothers and fathers. Actually, maybe some of your translations other than the ESV have this. It starts with men. Men, not the generic for men, but males. He is speaking to men, brothers and fathers. And so when he does this, he begins with the fact that he's a Jew. So by identification with the term men, brothers, and fathers, and calling himself a Jew, he identifies with the crowd. Hey, I'm one of you. Everything you got upset about, you have no basis for it. I'm one of you. He identifies with them. And brothers and sisters, in many respects, this is how it should be with our own evangelism. Now, it is true that some people take Paul's words in Corinthians about becoming all things to all men so that as many are saved to an extreme. But what we should do in our everyday evangelism, everyday conversation with those who do not know the Lord is to somehow identify with them. There are times, especially Christians, when they seek to live a holy life that those who are outside the church and they start opening up will look at the Christian and say, well, you can't really understand because you don't go through these things. As a minister, I hear this. When people tell me sometimes there's struggles, I've had people say, well, you don't really understand this because, well, you've got your theological degree, or you've got it all together, or these things aren't a problem for you. Who says? We're still men. All of us have weaknesses. How they play themselves out is a little bit different from person to person. But generally speaking, we all deal with such similar struggles, such similar life. We're human after all. Identify with them. One of the best ways that you can identify with them in your evangelism is to remind them, I'm a sinner too. I don't deserve Christ. I don't deserve heaven. I don't deserve eternal life. I deserve God's wrath, his judgment. But despite that, because I put my faith in him, he saved me. From the outward appearances, people may be the worst of sinners as far as the culture is concerned, but none of us were any better. If they could see into your heart, what would they see? They would see somebody who needed Jesus. And you need to be humble enough to recognize that and humble enough to admit it to the person that you're evangelizing. Well, Paul continues, he goes on to tell them about his education, which the way he describes it makes it clear that he was a Pharisee studying under Gamaliel, whom we've seen before, a strict Pharisee. He was big on the law and not in a good way. He was zealous for God, but that not in a good way. You see, as Christians, we should think the law is important. We should be zealous for God. But as a Pharisee, Paul was zealous for the wrong things. His zealacy toward the law was, I need to obey the law to be saved. rather than the law being my standard of righteousness as a redeemed person. And notice what Paul does, he identifies with them again. Big on the law, zealous for God, even as you are. He recognizes that they're zealous for these things. I know where you're coming from. Let me explain myself. Paul was so big on being zealous for God, being a Jew of Jews, a Pharisee among Pharisees, that he persecuted the way, even unto death. And he returns to Stephen later on. He speaks of Stephen. He sent folks to prison. And Paul says, look, if you don't believe me, go talk to the high priest. They know. They can testify that what I'm telling you is true. Then Paul has a moment, to put it mildly. One day on the way to Damascus, and we know the story, he tells and recounts how he met Christ. We use the expression that he was knocked from his horse, but there's no text that indicates he was even on a horse. But nevertheless, he was still knocked down. He fell face down. He sees the light. He falls to the ground. He hears the voice, why are you persecuting me? Saul learned a lesson, and he is subtly telling the rest of them in his audience right then and there the same lesson. When you persecute those in the church, you're persecuting Christ. Paul is giving them a gentle warning with his own conversion. You're persecuting me right now, but you're really persecuting Christ. This voice, of course, as he discloses to the crowd, was Jesus, the one Paul was really persecuting, and blinded by the light, he's led by the hand to Damascus. As we know, and as Paul recounts, he goes to Ananias, whose own conversation with God is omitted, at least at this portion. But we do understand what takes place. We know what transpires. Paul receives his sight back. Ananias gives him, by God's mouth, his marching orders. Then Paul jumps and he speaks of his return to Jerusalem. And Christ comes to him again in sort of a vision that left him in a trance. Christ tells him, get out of Jerusalem, leave, because they're not going to accept your testimony. Now, interestingly, at this point, that's not what sets the crowd off. It's not even the fact that Paul admits to being an accomplice to the death of Stephen. That doesn't set them off either. What sets them off is when Paul recounts what Christ said to him, I will send you far away to the Gentiles. That's what sets them off. You see, in these particular Jews, there was no love for the Gentiles, and that's putting it mildly, despite the fact of what their very own prophets that they would have read in their synagogues would mention about the nations, plural, coming together to worship God. This interaction with Gentiles is what sets them off. The thing about this is you think about Paul's recounting and Paul's telling and Paul's giving of his testimony of making his defense. Sometimes you can say all the right things and it still won't matter. Last week, we saw how Paul did the right things for the sake of conscience to show that he was zealous for the law, but he still got arrested anyway. Here, Paul says all the right things, and it sets the crowd in a tizzy. Nothing Paul said here was wrong. but simply because we give accurate information, simply because we give a ready defense of our faith in Christ Jesus, a ready defense of our own actions. It doesn't mean the world is going to accept us because we have a well-reasoned argument. These particular Jews are motivated and compelled by hate. And when that happens, there is no reasoning. And this Paul learns. Well, having looked at Paul's defense, let's look now at Paul's citizenship. Look now at verse 22 of chapter 22. Up to this word, they listened to him. Then they raised their voices and said, away with such a fellow from the earth, for he should not be allowed to live. Now, what a statement. It's not even so much get him away from the temple. It's not even so much, get him out of Jerusalem. Just get him off the face of the earth. Such a man should not even live. And you realize that they're saying this simply because Jesus told him to go to the Gentiles. You may be sitting there thinking, that doesn't make any sense. Well, you're right, it doesn't. It makes no sense except for the fact that, as I mentioned, they are driven by hate, hatred of Christ, hatred of Christianity, and hatred of God's people. As we look around the world and we hear news of persecution against Christians and the arguments made against Christianity as to why they're being persecuted, why they're being in prison, why they're being judged and tried, It never seems to make sense. So when we ask the question why, we need to understand that as we do so, it really is just rhetorical. We know why. They hate Christ. They hate his people. Why would it make sense? Sin is insanity. Look, we understand this. There is nobody in this room that at one point in their life, whether as a child or even as an adult, where you were not caught in a lie. And maybe as a child, your parents pushed because they knew the answer. And you sitting there, listening to questions, knew that they knew the answer, and you kept up with your story. We've all done this, no? That's what sin does. You know what you shouldn't do. You know the consequences, and you do it anyway, expecting a different result. I believe it was Einstein who said one of the definitions of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result each time. And finally, you get to the truth, and that wonderful statement, which at the moment irks you, of course, you could have saved all this trouble if you just told the truth. And you know that that statement is true. We're only talking here as an example of what a little lie can do. But that's a picture of what sin does. Sin will make you do the craziest things. And that's what's happening here to Paul. The hatred of Christ and his church will lead people to say and do things that make no sense. And this crowd. He should not even be allowed to live. And notice what they do. They're shouting. They're throwing off their cloaks. They're flinging dust in the air, a very common visual description of their anger and angst over everything that is transpiring. It's the equivalent of just grabbing the nearest thing and throwing it against the wall. This crowd goes back into a rage and the tribune decides to bring Paul into the barracks and examine him. Notice how he's going to be examined though, by flogging. From our 21st century sensibilities, this makes no sense to us either. But the reality is, from the perspective of the Tribune, if you wanted answers, you could break a man to get the answers. So they bring him back in. They attempt to flog him in an attempt to find out why it is they were shouting against him in such a fashion. Note well that this is an example of guilty until proven innocent. But as Paul is stretched out to receive the flogging, to receive the whips, he looks at the centurion and asks him, is it lawful to beat a Roman citizen who is uncondemned. Notice again, Paul is still calm. Put yourself in his shoes. How would you react? You know what those whips will do to you. Even as a child, you adults probably remember when your parents would get the spoon off the wall or the belt off the buckle or whatever the case may be. And you dreaded it because you knew it was happening. You knew it was coming. And yet here's Paul, still calm, I'm sure apprehensive, but still calm. And he reminds everybody with rhetorical questions here that he is a Roman citizen and such treatment is, well, against the law. This is why church tradition concerning his execution under Nero, he was beheaded as opposed to Peter being crucified. Citizens were not crucified. It was a mode of death beneath citizenship. Such with respect to the courts of law, punishments, certain things were reserved for non-citizens. Paul indicates his status as a citizen. They, as citizens, had protection from such interrogation techniques. The centurion, he goes to the tribune, and the tribune comes in to determine if this is what is really the case. Yes, I am a citizen. The tribune says, well, let's test this. I bought my citizenship with a large sum of money, which was probably true in his case. People could buy their citizenship. Paul didn't buy his. He was born a citizen. He's a naturalized citizen, if you will. As such, all the soldiers and the tribune himself, they all withdraw. Isn't it interesting that Paul uses an earthly means here? We're speaking of giving a ready defense for the gospel, but now Paul is using circumstance. Paul is using providence, God's providence in his own life that he's a citizen in order to avoid what is coming. It also will enable Paul further to share the gospel instead of just laying out on a rack, to put it crassly, and be whipped. But it enables him to have a voice to share the gospel. You see, ultimately, with all of this, that's what Paul's concern is, preaching the gospel. Even as we'll see in the coming weeks with Festus, Would that all of you were like me as a Christian, except for these chains. That's Paul's concern. But what did Paul do with the Jewish crowd? He preached the gospel. What is he about to do the next day as we continue at the end of chapter 22? He's gonna share the gospel. You see, at the end of the day, when it comes to persecution and facing trials, our goal should ever be Christ and his gospel. Boy, I make it sound easy, don't I? I'm not pretending it's easy. If anything, that's what this passage is reminding us. It won't be easy. It's here to equip you, to strengthen you, to encourage you, that in the hardest realities of opposition, you can still share Christ. Is that your goal? Does Christ mean that much to you? Or are you more concerned about saving your own skin? Paul was ready to die, but Paul also sees opportunities that are afforded him as a citizen of Rome to be able to stand before various individuals, various rulers, various kingdoms, as it were, and share Christ. That's our goal. You see, this is about Paul giving his defense and Christians having a ready defense. But do you understand that the bulk of this defense is gospel proclamation? We talk about apologetics and evangelism as they're completely different things. They overlap. There's a different emphasis to be sure. But as we give a defense for the hope that we have, what's the object of that hope? It's Christ. And so in the face of whatever persecution and hatred this world has to offer, look at it as an opportunity to share Christ. That's what Paul did. That's what Paul will do. Again, it will not be easy. You may wonder, at what point will the civil authorities decide what we're doing right now is to be considered illegal? Hopefully not in any of our lifetimes. But there's no guarantees. except for the fact that the world hates Christ. But nevertheless, even in such times, the Lord could use that as a means of spreading the gospel. Even as Paul made it to Rome, Paul speaks of the fact that the centurion guards there, Caesar's guards, heard and greeted other churches. Fear not. Everything that comes your way is an opportunity, not just something to be feared, but an opportunity, an opportunity to share Christ with lost, to carry out in your own way. in your own means, the great commission that Christ has given to the church. May we all be ready to give such a defense, such a defense that proclaims the truth of Jesus Christ, His Lordship, and His priestly work on our behalf to redeem sinners such as ourselves. Let's pray.