Living by the Spirit, Following the Way

Almost: Paul’s Defense Before Agrippa and Festus (Acts 26:19-32)

Text: Acts 26:19-32  | 
Series: Living by the Spirit, Following the Way  | 
The Way Church KC — Rosedale, Kansas City, KS

“Almost only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.” Everywhere else, almost is just another word for didn’t. You almost made your flight. You almost turned the oven off. Your surgeon almost got it all. In Acts 26:19-32, we meet a man who got as close to Jesus as a person can get without bowing to him. King Agrippa heard the whole gospel from the apostle Paul, face to face. He understood it. He believed the prophets. And then he stood up and walked out of the room. These are the last words Paul speaks in any of his trials in the book of Acts, and Luke wants us to listen closely, because what happened in that hall in Caesarea has happened in a million rooms since. Someone hears about Jesus clearly, honestly, and personally, and has to decide what to do with him. This sermon from The Way Church KC in Rosedale, Kansas City walks verse by verse through Paul’s obedience, two ways people dodge Jesus, and the prayer of a prisoner who wished a king could be as free as he was.

1. Obey the Light You’ve Been Given

Acts 26:19-23

“I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision” might be the biggest understatement in the Bible. That one sentence covers more than twenty years of beatings, stonings, shipwrecks, and jail cells, and Paul sums it all up as, Well, I didn’t say no. It tells us what Paul thinks the Christian life is. Not “I had a spiritual experience,” but “I had a spiritual experience, and then I did what it said.” There’s a quiet contrast underneath it, too. Paul’s Hebrew name is Saul, from the tribe of Benjamin, and the first Saul from Benjamin, Israel’s first king, got a clear word from God at Gilgal and didn’t obey it (1 Samuel 13). The first Saul lost a kingdom. The second Saul said “I was not disobedient” and gained one.

What did obedience look like? Paul preached in Damascus, Jerusalem, Judea, and to the Gentiles, which is Acts 1:8 with a pair of sandals on. And his message was that people “should repent and turn to God, performing deeds in keeping with their repentance.” The deeds don’t buy the turn; they show it. It’s fruit, not root. When an apple tree is alive, nobody has to tape apples to it. Real repentance always gets specific: call your brother, pay it back, delete the app, tell the truth on the form. Obedience cost Paul, but “to this day I have had the help that comes from God.” That word for help is a military word, reinforcements showing up on the battlefield. Twenty years after Jesus said “stand upon your feet,” Paul is still standing. And what he preaches is “nothing but what the prophets and Moses said”: that the Christ must suffer, and that by being the first to rise from the dead he would proclaim light to everyone. You don’t need a light from heaven at noon. You need to stop being disobedient to the light you already have.

2. Answer the Question

Acts 26:24-28

Right as Paul hits the resurrection, Festus shouts across the room: “Paul, you are out of your mind.” That’s the first way people dodge Jesus: dismiss him. A dead man alive is outside the categories of a practical Roman with taxes to collect. If you’ve heard that line from people you love, you’re in good company. Jesus’ own family said he was “out of his mind” (Mark 3:21). But watch Paul’s answer: “I am not out of my mind, most excellent Festus, but I am speaking true and rational words.” He doesn’t get louder or mock back. And that word rational, sōphrosynē, is the classic Greek opposite of mania. The old King James has it as “soberness.” Festus says, You’re manic. Paul says, No, I’m sober. Following Jesus isn’t losing your mind. It’s getting it back. A lot of us know the fog, from a bottle, a pill, anxiety, rage, or chasing approval, and then Jesus shows up and for the first time in years you can see clearly. The world calls it crazy. Paul calls it sober. And it “was not done in a corner.” Jesus was crucified in public and the tomb was empty in a city full of people who wanted it full. Skeptics are allowed to check.

Then Paul turns to the king: “King Agrippa, do you believe the prophets? I know that you believe.” Agrippa is trapped, so he does what people do when Jesus gets too close. He answers a question with a question: “In a short time would you persuade me to be a Christian?” The King James famously renders it “Almost thou persuadest me,” and even if the better translation is “so easily?” with a smirk behind it, almost is exactly where Agrippa is standing. He understands every word. He doesn’t say no. He just won’t say yes. That’s the second dodge: keep Jesus at arm’s length. Interesting, impressive, not for me. It’s the more dangerous one, because it feels safe. Festus is far from Jesus and knows it; Agrippa is close and thinks that’s good enough. He’s in horseshoe range and thinks it counts. The Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous says it plainly: “Half measures availed us nothing.” Agrippa had the word in his ears and never let it get to his mouth (Romans 10:9). Familiarity can work like a vaccine: just enough Jesus to keep from catching the real thing. Paul’s question still hangs in the air. Not your parents, not the person next to you. You. Do you believe? Answer the question.

3. Wish Them Everything but the Chains

Acts 26:29-32

Paul takes Agrippa’s sarcastic jab and turns it into a prayer on the spot: “Whether short or long, I would to God that not only you but also all who hear me this day might become such as I am, except for these chains.” Look at who he prays for: the king, the governor, Bernice, the generals, the guards, and, since Luke wrote it down, everyone who reads it. Two thousand years later that prayer is still landing on rooms in Kansas City. And look at what he prays. The prisoner looks at the man in royal robes and says, I wish you were like me. Only someone who knows he has something better than a crown says that. Paul is the freest man in the room: free from guilt, free from the fear of death, free from needing anyone’s approval. Agrippa has a throne and is trapped by it. Paul has chains and is free.

Then the tenderest line in the chapter: “except for these chains.” These people have kept an innocent man locked up for two years, and Paul isn’t bitter. He wants them to have everything he has, Jesus, forgiveness, hope, resurrection, and none of what he has suffered. That’s the difference between evangelism that comes from need and evangelism that comes from love. A salesman needs you to buy. Paul isn’t recruiting Agrippa. He’s wishing, the way you can’t stop telling friends about a taco place that’s too good to keep to yourself. The scene ends with the king standing up, the meeting over, and the powerful admitting in the hallway what they wouldn’t say out loud: “This man is doing nothing to deserve death or imprisonment.” Paul goes to Rome anyway, innocent and still in chains, because freedom for Paul was never the main goal. The nations were. So pray for the people you love like Paul did. Short or long. Don’t quit on the long ones.

“Whether short or long, I would to God that not only you but also all who hear me this day might become such as I am—except for these chains.”

— Acts 26:29 (ESV)

Don’t Leave the Room at Almost

Picture that last moment. The king stands, the robes rustle, the generals file out, and Agrippa walks out of the only room in his life where a King was being offered to him. He kept his crown. He watched Jerusalem fall and the temple burn, and when he died Rome simply absorbed his kingdom. He was the last of the Herods to rule. He kept the crown and lost the Kingdom. He almost became a Christian, and almost doesn’t count. But here’s the good news, and it’s the reason Paul could stand in chains and wish a king were like him: Jesus never stopped at almost for you. He “set his face to go to Jerusalem” (Luke 9:51). In the garden he said, “Not my will, but yours, be done.” He’s the one who was truly never disobedient to the heavenly vision. They called him out of his mind. They bound him. He wore the chains and went all the way to the cross, and on the third day he became the first to rise from the dead. Paul said, “I wish you had everything I have except these chains.” Jesus did more than wish it. He took the chains himself so you could have the freedom without them. So whether this is your first Sunday or you’ve been circling Jesus for ten years, close enough to know the songs but never bowing the knee: don’t leave the room at almost. You don’t have to clean up first. You just have to stop dodging the question. Is Jesus crazy? Is he just interesting? Or is he King? If he’s King, come all the way. And if you already follow him, take out those three names and pray Paul’s prayer over each one: God, whether short or long, make them like me, except for the chains.

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Questions People Ask About Acts 26:19-32

What is Acts 26:19-32 about?

Acts 26:19-32 is the end of the apostle Paul’s defense before King Agrippa II and the Roman governor Festus in Caesarea. Paul explains that he obeyed the vision of Jesus he received on the road to Damascus by preaching that people should repent, turn to God, and live changed lives, and that his message is exactly what Moses and the prophets predicted: a suffering Messiah who would be the first to rise from the dead. Festus interrupts to call Paul insane, Agrippa deflects Paul’s direct question, and Paul responds by praying that everyone in the room would become a Christian like him, “except for these chains.” The hearing ends with the officials privately agreeing Paul is innocent, though he still must go to Rome because he appealed to Caesar.

What does “almost persuaded” mean in Acts 26:28?

In Acts 26:28, King Agrippa responds to Paul’s question, “Do you believe the prophets?” with a reply the King James Version translates, “Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian.” Most modern translations render the Greek phrase en oligō as “in a short time” (ESV) or “so easily” (CSB), and many scholars think Agrippa was being sarcastic or evasive rather than sincerely close to converting. Either way, Agrippa understood Paul’s message, believed the prophets, and still walked out without committing to Jesus. The verse has long been used to describe someone who knows the gospel and stays at arm’s length from it, which is why John Wesley preached “The Almost Christian” and Philip Bliss wrote the hymn “Almost Persuaded” on this text.

Why did Festus say Paul was out of his mind?

In Acts 26:24, Festus, the Roman governor of Judea, interrupts Paul with a loud voice: “Paul, you are out of your mind; your great learning is driving you out of your mind.” Festus was a practical Roman official with no background in the Jewish Scriptures, and the claim that a crucified man had risen from the dead fell completely outside his categories. Paul answered respectfully that he was speaking “true and rational words,” using the Greek word sōphrosynē, meaning sober-mindedness, the classic opposite of madness. He added that the events about Jesus were “not done in a corner,” meaning the crucifixion and resurrection were public history that could be investigated.

What does “I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision” mean?

In Acts 26:19, Paul tells King Agrippa that after Jesus appeared to him on the road to Damascus and commissioned him to open people’s eyes and turn them from darkness to light (Acts 26:16-18), he did what Jesus said. The phrase summarizes more than twenty years of preaching in Damascus, Jerusalem, Judea, and among the Gentiles, along with the beatings, imprisonments, and plots that came with it. Paul’s point is that a real encounter with Jesus leads to obedience, not just a memorable spiritual experience. His message called people to “repent and turn to God, performing deeds in keeping with their repentance,” meaning that changed behavior is the evidence of a changed heart, not the price of it.

What did Paul mean by “except for these chains” in Acts 26:29?

In Acts 26:29, after Agrippa deflects his question, Paul says, “Whether short or long, I would to God that not only you but also all who hear me this day might become such as I am, except for these chains.” Paul, a prisoner for two years, is praying that the king, the governor, and everyone in the hall would come to know Jesus as he does and have the forgiveness, hope, and freedom he has, while being spared the suffering he has endured for it. The line shows that Paul shared the gospel out of love rather than bitterness or a need to win an argument. It also shows that Paul, in chains, considered himself freer than the king on the throne.

How does Acts 26:19-32 apply to life today?

Acts 26:19-32 confronts readers with the two most common ways people avoid Jesus: dismissing him as crazy, like Festus, or keeping him at a respectful distance, like Agrippa. It teaches that knowing about Jesus, believing the Bible, and being interested in Christianity are not the same as following him, and that “almost” following Jesus is not following Jesus. It calls Christians to obey the light they have already been given, to answer the Festuses in their lives with calm and kindness rather than volume, and to share their faith from love, praying for the people around them “whether short or long.” It also offers hope to anyone who feels trapped by a past, an addiction, or a fog of anxiety: following Jesus is not losing your mind but getting it back.