Acts 22:22-29 “Paul’s Arrest”

Maybe you think that faithful Christians never get arrested? After all, we are law abiding citizens. However, history tells us that of the early apostles Paul, Peter, Silas, James, John and Philip were all arrested at one point. Today’s scripture, in fact, tells of the third arrest of Paul. And, who can forget that Jesus himself was arrested, put on trial, found guilty, and punished with death on the Cross.

Guess what? I have been arrested and multiple times threatened with arrest by officers. Let me tell you that it is not that hard to get arrested. There are so many laws on the books that it is almost impossible to live your daily life without breaking some of them on occasion. At the time I was arrested I was only 17 years old. I was visiting Berlin, Germany. I crossed from West Berlin to East Berlin, the communist side via the subway. I handed over my American passport, but had completely forgotten that I kept a fifty dollar bill in the passport just in case of emergencies. The East German border guards assumed that I was smuggling currency or trying to bribe somebody. Whatever the case, they decided to take me into a small concrete windowless room with the single light bulb just like in the movies. They strip-searched me and asked me the same questions over and over again. It took me about two hours to finally convince them that I was just a stupid kid. I was allowed to cross back into West Berlin after that.

I was also once detained by police on a train in communist Yugoslavia for drug dealing because I had given pepto bismal tablets to another traveler. A guard had seen it, and decided it was illegal drugs. I was able to talk my way out of that one.

I have been threatened with arrest here on Kauai, just in case you are thinking that communist countries are the problem! I had made several complaints against police officers here in Waimea, so the next thing I knew the Waimea substation commander came to my office and threatened to arrest me for “jay walking” on Ola Road, where we live. I countered with “Ola Road has no sidewalks or curbs–then it would be a citation not an arrest. Are you sure you want to stand before a judge?” In other words it was just police harassment. Still I was threatened with arrest. It is not pleasant. I do not recommend it. That particular police officer retired by the way.

A couple weeks ago I had a conversation with Pastor Zach who leads the prison ministry here on our island at KCCC. We annually support his ministry by the way. I want to tell you that that is a really important ministry. For no matter if the law says you have done something wrong or not, being arrested is a traumatic experience. Being physically restrained by another human and then losing your personal freedom is something I hope most of us will never experience. Now, this is the apostle Paul’s THIRD arrest! Think about that!

When Paul is arrested this time; however, he employs a clever tact to get out of being physically harmed by the Pharisees in the Temple who want to stone him for blasphemy. What does he do? The Roman guards that are watching the area at the time intervene. “Sorry, you do not get to kill people; that is our job,” they tell the Pharisees. This is exactly what happened with Jesus, if you recall. That is why technically it was the Roman guard that crucified Jesus! Rome reserved the right to capital punishment. Paul turns to the arresting centurion and says, “Hey, you gonna let these thugs kill a Roman citizen?”

Now, being a Roman citizen back then was not quite a get out of jail free card, but it carried a lot of weight. The fact that Paul addresses the centurion is significant. Centurions were connected people. One became a centurion in order to later get a seat in the Roman Senate. So, the centurion would be far more politically connected than the tribune or commander of the barracks. The centurion would not want to cross any other major families in Rome for sure! He does not know who Paul’s patron in Rome might be, but he is not going to risk being humiliated at this point. Arresting a Roman citizen could get him into a lot of trouble politically.

Citizenship is an issue that keeps coming back to Saint Paul, by the way. It becomes a central issue in his letters to the churches. In Philippians 3:20 for instance, Paul explains that he really is not a citizen of Rome but rather of heaven! And, we can all be citizens of heaven! No matter to whom or where we are born, we can all belong to the Kingdom of God.That is great because honestly we cannot control who our parents are or where we are born, but we can choose the Kingdom of Heaven under our Lord Jesus! Moreover, no entity on earth can challenge or take away your citizenship in heaven! You do not have to worry about any goon squads knocking on your door!

Jesus himself states as much when he is being questioned by Pontius Pilate: John 18:36 “My Kingdom is not of this world. . . .” You see, there is nothing anyone can do to me on this planet that really matters because I have been born again into the Kingdom of God and know my Lord is Jesus.

Saint Paul also writes in Galatians 5:1 Christ’s own words “For freedom I have set you free!” Yes, I am the citizen of a free country called “heaven.” Nobody on this planet can take that away. Even if you kill me today, you would just be releasing me to the freedom of Christ! This is good news to set the captives free, Luke 4:18. This is when Jesus reads Isaih in the Temple as a young boy. This is what he reads and then proclaims is fulfilled.

I have to back up a little bit because we see something in this scripture about Paul’s being arrested that may not make much sense to us today. It says in verse 24 that the Roman guard was going to “examine Paul by flogging him.” Some bibles use other words here. The word literally is μαςτιξ (like the English word “masticate,” meaning to put your teeth into something), this being a reference to the Roman “flagrum” whip that had teeth sewn into the cords to do the most amount of damage to the flesh and cause extreme pain. This is the whip that was used on Jesus before his trial. This is what Paul is facing now. Many people back in the day were simply killed during “questioning” by this practice.

The idea of it is to force a confession of course. This strange form of jurisprudence is still used today in many places, so please be careful if you are arrested overseas! It is not a nice way to end your vacation.

As I mentioned last week in the sermon, Saint Paul in 2 Corinthians 11:24-25 states, “. . .Five times I have received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I received a stoning. . . .” In other words, he understands the pain he is about to have to endure again for the sake of his witness. Surely he knows that God and his angels will see him through what would be counted as his sixth official beating for the sake of his faith in Jesus. Yet, he sees that there might be an opportunity to further the Gospel by claiming his Roman citizenship in this moment.

I believe that Saint Paul sees his arrest this time as another opportunity to minister to those who would otherwise never hear the gospel. You may recall that Paul had been arrested before in the town of Philippi? How did that turn out? In Acts 16 we read that he was put into prison, but God caused an earthquake, the prison gates were opened, but Paul and Silas stayed there singing songs and speaking of Jesus. The jailor was converted along with his family. Saints Paul and Silas were set free by the chief magistrate of the town then.

So, Paul sees that being arrested again might lead to a new prison ministry. This really is a turning point in his journeys because from here on out, he would be under arrest of the Roman Empire, yet he continues to do incredible ministry and eventually takes the word of the Lord all the way to Rome. Yes, he gets to Rome under arrest! Yet, one must say he is completely “free” in Christ!

I want you to think about whatever it is that might be arresting to you right now in your life, holding you down, and binding you up! Saint Paul spends the next five and half years under arrest. In that time, he writes most of his letters, refines his theology for us today, does incredible miracles, and leads thousands more to Christ. How is God using you now?

I like to recall Martin Luther, the reformer of our faith, who did most of his writing while under confinement at Wartburg castle. He translated the entire Bible into colloquial German so anybody could read it!

Martin Luther King Jr. wrote his “Letter from the Birmingham Jail” from the Birmingham jail! Standard reading now in high school!

When we are arrested in our lives, that is when our Spirit can soar! So, focus more on the spiritual life when your physical life is hard! See the opportunity to find that freedom in Christ. Remember that you are a child of Christ and that your true citizenship is in heaven with your Lord Jesus.

Amen.