In the governor’s residence at Caesarea, where the humid Mediterranean wind drifts in, a heavy silence and tension settle over the marble floor. Beneath the eagle emblem that boasts the grandeur of the Roman Empire, Governor Felix sits dressed in splendid robes. Across from him stands the apostle Paul, clothed in the shabby garments of a prisoner. Outwardly, it looks like an ordinary courtroom—imperial law interrogating a mere criminal. Yet when we behold the scene with spiritual eyes, this is a vast spiritual battleground where the world’s mightiest power collides head-on with a truth the world cannot bear.
The Cold Blade of a Label Hidden Behind Flowery Rhetoric
Russian realist painter Nikolai Ge’s 1890 work What is Truth? offers striking inspiration for understanding this courtroom. In the painting, Pilate wears a magnificent toga, yet stands in dark shadow, turning his back with cynical indifference. By contrast, the humble Jesus Christ stands in bright light, proclaiming truth through silence. The scene in Caesarea is no different. The lawyer Tertullus opens with lavish flattery of the governor, but what lies behind his polished words is a cold blade—branding Paul a “plague” and stigmatizing him as “the ringleader of the Nazarene sect.”
Through his sermon on Acts 24, Pastor David Jang incisively observes that this kind of “labeling” is not merely a legal tactic of ancient courts, but also the world’s typical way of dealing with the gospel today. Because the world fears truth and theological confrontation, it repeatedly avoids the essence and instead tries to silence truth by framing it as “social disorder” or a “threat to the system.” Yet Paul does not flare up in the face of such schemes. Calmly confessing that he is one “in Christ,” he elevates the courtroom’s issue from a merely legal dispute to the theological horizon of resurrection faith. This was not the cringing excuse of a defendant, but a bold, lion-like proclamation that even the courts of this world stand under the sovereignty of God.
A Ruler in Darkness, a Prisoner Standing in the Light
As the trial continues, a strange reversal unfolds. Felix, seated on the judgment bench, grows increasingly uneasy, while Paul, bound in chains, becomes ever more free. Instead of pleading for mercy for his own safety, Paul turns toward the governor and his wife and speaks of “righteousness, self-control, and the judgment to come.” Pastor David Jang interprets this moment as the summit of Paul’s ministry and the gospel’s direct confrontation with power. “Righteousness” is God’s standard aimed at a corrupt ruler; “self-control” is a warning to power drenched in greed; and “judgment” is a thunderous message reminding them of an eternal Supreme Court that stands above imperial law.
Just as the Pilate in Ge’s painting averts his eyes from Jesus, who is Truth, and walks into darkness, Felix too trembles in fear before Paul’s message. His conscience reacts to the light of truth. Yet the tragedy is that the trembling does not lead to repentance. Felix says, “Go away for now; when I have an opportunity, I will send for you.” Pastor David Jang points out that this “procrastination” is one of the most fatal spiritual mistakes a person can make. Fear could have become the threshold of grace, but instead Felix tapped his calculator and refused to step over that threshold. The moment convenience and political calculation drowned out the voice of conscience, the opportunity of salvation vanished like mist.
“I’ll Listen Next Time” Is an Anesthetic That Puts the Soul to Sleep
Felix kept Paul confined for two years. On the surface, it appears to be an unjust “pause” forced upon Paul. Yet Pastor David Jang’s deep meditation on Scripture reinterprets those two silent years not as failure, but as a time of “maturation.” God’s clock never stopped; those two years became a season of preparation in which Paul strengthened the essence of the gospel before going to Rome. Worldly power dragged time out in hopes of a bribe, but God used that same time to protect and refine His apostle.
So today, in whose courtroom are we standing? The world still tempts us to “compromise just enough,” to “choose safe silence over uncomfortable truth.” But Acts 24 presses a question upon us: Will you, like Felix, feel the tremor and still retreat by promising yourself “next time”? Or will you, like Paul—bound and yet free—speak of “righteousness, self-control, and judgment”? As Pastor David Jang’s exhortation reminds us, in the realm of faith there is no “next time.” When the Holy Spirit pierces the heart, that moment is the “now” in which we must decide.
Cowardly power always schemes for a convenient tomorrow, but true faith faces the discomfort of today. In the courtrooms of our workplaces, our homes, and our society, what we must hold onto is not polished argument or worldly savvy. It is the resurrection life of Jesus Christ—only the power of that gospel truly sets us free. May a holy courage come upon us all, so that we do not shrink back before the world’s verdict, but live out the truth boldly, like Paul standing in the light.