REPENT + RETURN TO GOD

(8-minute read)

All humans hold some kind of belief. We believe that we will be alive tomorrow and so we plan ahead the things that we will do. We believe that our hearts are healthy enough to sustain us in a cycling marathon so we sign up. We believe that our jobs will be secure, so we take an extended vacation at ease. Of course, we are really talking about the level of confidence we have in something or someone. However, many people today struggle to believe in God. Instead of a judgmental response, we ought to ask them what kind of god they do not believe in. At the same time, it is important for us to examine our own concept of God because (let’s not kid ourselves) even among Christians, we can hold very diverse and dissimilar ideas of who God is.  

This week’s guest speaker, Pastor Lai Keet Keong, walked us through three common concepts of God through the eyes of Antonius Felix, Porcius Festus and Herod Agrippa II who consecutively presided over the apostle Paul’s long-drawn-out multi-jurisdiction trial based on false accusations by the Jews.

Concept 1: Through The Eyes of Antonius Felix

Acts 24 provides us with the background of who Antonius Felix was and the entirety of Paul’s house arrest under Felix’s rule. In a nutshell, although his name ‘Felix’ means happiness, his cruel and brutal reign brought much hardship to the people. He came to power through the ranks of slavery and therefore, exercised his kingly power with the low self-esteem of a slave. It would not be wrong to call him a ‘slave governor’. He was greedy and covetous, self-gratifying, intemperate (unrestrained), and led a licentious life with a sense of immunity against sin. He knew how unfairly Paul was treated but he did nothing in the hope that Paul would bribe him to get out of house arrest. He appeased the Jews and stayed on their good side by keeping Paul in arrest for two years without trial. 

In a private meeting with Felix and his wife, Paul spoke directly to Felix about ‘righteousness and self-control, and the judgment to come’. It was an edgy conversation that made Felix recoil - what people tend to do when something hits too close to home. Paul could not be faulted if he chose safer conversation topics because speaking directly to Felix’s misconception of God was like a prisoner’s death wish. 

Scripture tells us that ‘Felix was afraid and said, ‘That’s enough for now! You may leave. When I find it convenient, I will send for you.’ Isn’t this behaviour familiar to us? When people point out our habits or blind spots, we tend to make a quick exit with a lame excuse. 

Felix’s idea of god was someone who served his needs. Today, many believers think that when our job is going well, when our relationships are smooth-sailing, when we live by the maxim ‘as long as we are happy’, we are on God’s good side because God only wants ‘good’ for us. Frankly, if God is God only if He meets our expectations, wouldn’t that make us god?

Do you see shadows of Felix in yourself? Is God good only when He gives you what makes you happy? When there is no answer, no breakthrough or no solution in sight for your problems, is God still God to you? Is your relationship with God a transactional one contingent on how much He meets your expectations? Contrastingly, Job’s life story (from the book of Job) is a humdinger of a relationship with God based on literally nothing. No wealth, assets, health, family well-being, and even mature friends to help him get up on his feet. Nothing but God’s value and character alone.

Concept 2: Through The Eyes of Porcius Festus

In Acts 25, we find Festus a fair and reasonable secularist who lived by the books, but he was an agnostic who saw faith and life after death as nothing more than superstitions. Under pressure from elite Jews and mounting threat of mob justice (Acts 25:2, 7), he became a people pleaser and a populist politician. 

However, during Paul’s brief appearance before Festus, he successfully appealed to Festus’ sense of logic and equity in his self-defence, and elevated the importance of truth and the eternal consequences of acting with truthfulness. 

As a result, Festus unknowingly circumvented the Jews’ plot to murder Paul in Jerusalem by granting him his request to appear before Caesar in Rome (Acts 25:11). This effectively set in motion a string of irreversible events that would take Paul to Rome.

Concept 3:Through The Eyes of Herod Agrippa II

Agrippa came from a line of Herod – his grandfather King Herod The Great ordered the massacre of all male infants under two years old in Bethlehem, and his father King Herod beheaded John the Baptist. Not surprisingly, Agrippa II was equally wicked, incestuous (like his grandfather), privileged and lived with self-entitled pomp. 

In his self-defence, Paul showed deference that appealed to Agrippa’s inflated ego, “King Agrippa, I consider myself fortunate to stand before you today as I make my defense against all the accusations of the Jews, and especially so because you are well acquainted with all the Jewish customs and controversies. Therefore, I beg you to listen to me patiently.” (Acts 26:2-3).

Then, he launched a narrative about his encounter with Jesus and his radical conversion. Paul could discern that King Agrippa II perceived God as part of the Jewish custom and tradition, and wasted no time to share about his personal encounter with God to highlight the transformation to his life.

King Agrippa, who was familiar with followers of Jesus (‘The Way’), intuitively sensed the personal impact of Paul’s testimony. Without skipping a beat, he asked Paul, ‘Do you think that in such a short time you can persuade me to be a Christian?’ to which Paul replied, ‘Short time or long – I pray to God that not only you but all who are listening to me today may become what I am, except for these chains.’ (Acts 26:28-29).

Paul embraced his call to speak to the Gentiles (that is, non-Jews) - in private or public spaces, to hospitable or hostile audiences - sacrificing personal safety to speak with integrity, clarity and truth with the urgency of one who was ready to take any personal risks for the benefit of others. 

In all of Paul’s statements and conversations about God, he was acutely aware of different perspectives that the three rulers held about God. Having seriously misunderstood who God was before encountering Him on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:1-6), Paul was less interested in preaching and proselytizing than he was in pointing people to the Way that he once rejected. 

This is in stark contrast to the common excuses we give for passing up opportunities to have uneasy conversations, or advocating for others even when it helps. How often have we heard or used excuses like ‘leave it to God’s timing’, or ‘simply not my style’. Many of us have enough knowledge of God to sound Christian but not committed enough to allow our relationship with Him to change us. We describe believers who live by their Bible-based convictions as being too intense and ‘radical’ for our taste. We like to hang around Christians who are not too ‘serious’, ‘progressive’, ‘ambitious’ or ‘aggressive’. Many of us still think of the church as solely a place that puts us in groups and on duty rosters, helps us find practical resources, introduces us to job opportunities; but no one should tell us how to live. After all, people in civilized societies should decide for themselves what is right and wrong, good and bad. Inter-dependence is too invasive and intrusive. They think that the church should play it safe; selectively forgetting that the twelve apostles had fundamentally turned the world upside down with their early teachings. 

The truth is that God wants all of us to have healthy and robust personal relationships with Him - something  we cannot do alone without allowing ourselves to be honest, vulnerable and accountable with others. 

At the same time, God is all inclusive: He calls the socially inept as much as He calls the extroverted orator. Opportunities for uplifting conversations abound in all the ordinariness of human life around us. Like Paul, we should not refrain from taking relational and personal risks to act in the best interest of someone else to put their lives back on track with God. 

Is your self-perception tainted by woundedness and pride? Is your concept of God jaded by human disappointments and life’s setbacks? Return to God and find your rest in Him (Isaiah 30:15). God has a wonderful promise for everyone in Jeremiah 33:3, “Call to Me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.”

This is a summary and reflection based on a virtual BIR Session held on 11 November 2023.