Acts 24:23 And he commanded a centurion to keep Paul, and to let him have liberty… He commanded a centurion to keep Paul, and to let him have liberty. It is evident that the prosecution of the apostle by the Jewish party had utterly broken down. No charge could be substantiated which made him amenable to punishment according to Roman law. If Felix had been a free man, and, as a judge, free of all other considerations than the doing of justice, he would have liberated St. Paul at once, declaring publicly his innocence. But Felix was not free. No man is really free who does not dare to do the right. And we can recognize a gracious overruling providence in St. Paul's being kept for a while longer under Roman protection. So great was the enmity against him of the Jewish party, that his life would have been in extreme peril if he had been liberated. Knowing that he was dealing unfairly by the prisoner, and impressed by his dignity of bearing, Felix compromised matters with himself, persuaded himself that he could secure Paul from the schemes of the Sanhedrim by keeping him prisoner; put off Paul's enemies by an excuse that he would confer with Lysias; and privately arranged for Paul to have a real, though not an apparent, liberty. Through all the ages some of the worst wrongs have been done in the name of compromise, which is too often the weak device of those who cannot "stand firm to the right." I. FELIX BOUND. 1. By the weakness of his moral character. 2. By the desire to please an important section of those whom he had to govern. 3. By the consequences of his own wrong-doings, which it cost him all his effort to keep off as long as possible. 4. By the circumstances in which he found himself placed, and which he had no strength of will or purpose to master. The man of vice and self-indulgence enervates his will, and becomes the slave of his sin as truly as does the drunkard. II. PAUL APPARENTLY BOUND. He had been tied by a chain to a Roman soldier day and night, according to the usual Roman custom, and if Felix relaxed this, still Paul was a prisoner in the barracks, and probably a soldier-guard waited on him constantly. If his friends were free to come to him, he was not free to go out to them. If we estimate his character aright, we shall feel that even the slightest form of bondage must have been most painful to him. His was a soul so noble than even the limitations of a frail body were to him an agony. III. FELIX GETTING AS FREE AS POSSIBLE FROM HIS BONDS. Not free enough to say, honestly and. honorably, "This man is innocent of all crime against the state, and must be set at liberty at once." Only able to shake the fetters off enough to say, "Forbid none of his acquaintance to minister or come unto him," and only able to give this order in a private way to the centurion. IV. PAUL REALLY FREE. However he might seem to be still set under outward limitations, nothing can imprison a man save his own wilful sin. Nobody can put any real fetters on any fellow-man. Each man who wears fetters puts them on himself; each man who dwells in a prison goes in himself, and himself bolts the door. "Stone walls do not a prison make, Nor iron bars a cage." But "whosoever committeth sin becomes the slave of sin." So, whatever may have been the limitations of the apostle's circumstances, there was no bondage, for there was no conscience of sin. The freedom of Paul (1) to commune with God, (2) study the truth, (3) to serve the Churches, maybe shown; and it may be pointed out how often the very limitations of a man's circumstances, through sickness or persecution, has found him the freedom for some great and noble service, as may be illustrated from Luther's work while in the Wartburg, and from John Bunyan's work while in Bedford jail. - R.T. Parallel Verses KJV: And he commanded a centurion to keep Paul, and to let him have liberty, and that he should forbid none of his acquaintance to minister or come unto him. |
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