“In a short time would you persuade me to be a Christian?”
— Acts 26:28
Context & Key Themes
Acts 26 is the great set-piece defense speech of Paul’s captivity. Standing before King Agrippa II, his sister Bernice, Governor Festus, military tribunes, and the prominent men of Caesarea, Paul delivers the longest and most polished version of his testimony in the book of Acts. He tells the Damascus road story for the third time in the narrative, this time tailored specifically for a Jewish king who would understand every messianic allusion Paul could make. The speech culminates in one of the most famous exchanges in scripture—Agrippa’s half-mocking, half-honest line, In a short time would you persuade me to be a Christian? And Paul’s disarming reply—Whether short or long, I would to God that all who hear me this day might become such as I am—except for these chains.
The chapter closes with Agrippa, Festus, and Bernice agreeing privately that Paul has done nothing deserving death or imprisonment, and Agrippa’s poignant summary: This man could have been set free if he had not appealed to Caesar. The appeal is done. The road to Rome is open.
The Opening
So Agrippa said to Paul, You have permission to speak for yourself. Then Paul stretched out his hand and made his defense.
Paul’s gesture—stretching out his hand—is the traditional rhetorical opening of an orator. Paul knows how to speak in Roman courts. He also knows that Agrippa, despite his Roman appointment, understood Jewish religious questions better than any official Paul had encountered. This is the audience Paul has been waiting for.
I consider myself fortunate that it is before you, King Agrippa, I am going to make my defense today against all the accusations of the Jews, especially because you are familiar with all the customs and controversies of the Jews. Therefore I beg you to listen to me patiently.
The opening is courteous and substantive. Paul is not flattering Agrippa. He is making a genuine observation—this king, of all the officials Paul has stood before, is the one best equipped to understand the actual theological issues at stake.
The Pharisee Background
My manner of life from my youth, spent from the beginning among my own nation and in Jerusalem, is known by all the Jews. They have known for a long time, if they are willing to testify, that according to the strictest party of our religion I have lived as a Pharisee. And now I stand here on trial because of my hope in the promise made by God to our fathers, to which our twelve tribes hope to attain, as they earnestly worship night and day. And for this hope I am accused by Jews, O king!
Paul frames the whole controversy in terms Agrippa would find persuasive. The promise made to the fathers. The hope of the twelve tribes. The earnest worship of the Jewish people night and day. Paul is on trial for believing in what all Judaism claims to be waiting for. The issue is not whether Paul has abandoned the faith of Israel. The issue is whether what Israel has been waiting for has arrived.
Why is it thought incredible by any of you that God raises the dead? The rhetorical question is pointed. The resurrection is not an exotic doctrine. It is implied by the God of Abraham himself—the God who promised seed, inheritance, and a restored creation. If God is who Israel says he is, resurrection is not absurd. It is exactly the kind of thing this God would do.
The Persecutor
I myself was convinced that I ought to do many things in opposing the name of Jesus of Nazareth. And I did so in Jerusalem. I not only locked up many of the saints in prison after receiving authority from the chief priests, but when they were put to death I cast my vote against them. And I punished them often in all the synagogues and tried to make them blaspheme, and in raging fury against them I persecuted them even to foreign cities.
Paul’s autobiography here is more severe than in the earlier versions. He does not just say he watched over the coats at Stephen’s stoning. He says he cast my vote against them when they were put to death. He used to try to force believers to blaspheme—to renounce Christ under torture. He hunted them even to foreign cities. The historical Saul of Tarsus was not a mild persecutor. He was a lethal one. Paul does not soften his past. Acknowledging how bad he was makes the transformation that follows more credible.
The Damascus Road, Third Version
In this connection I journeyed to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests. At midday, O king, I saw on the way a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, that shone around me and those who journeyed with me. And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.
Paul adds a detail not included in the earlier versions—the voice addressed him in the Hebrew language, and it included a proverbial image. It is hard for you to kick against the goads. The goad was a sharpened stick used by farmers to drive oxen. An ox that tried to kick back against the goad only drove the stick deeper into its own flesh. The saying was a common Greek proverb. It means that resistance to the one who has called you only wounds you further. Paul had been kicking against the goads of his own conscience—perhaps since Stephen’s stoning—and the Lord is now naming that resistance and ending it.
And I said, Who are you, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom you are persecuting. But rise and stand upon your feet, for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to appoint you as a servant and witness to the things in which you have seen me and to those in which I will appear to you, delivering you from your people and from the Gentiles, to whom I am sending you to open their eyes, so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.
This third version of the Damascus road gives more of the Lord’s commission to Paul in direct speech than the earlier versions. The purpose of the appearance is named—appointment as servant and witness. The mission is named—sent to Gentiles to open their eyes, turn them from darkness to light, from Satan’s power to God. The fruit is named—forgiveness of sins and a place among those sanctified by faith.
Every phrase is dense with Old Testament language. Opening blind eyes—Isaiah. Turning from darkness to light—Isaiah. A place among the sanctified—the language of inheritance in the promised land. Paul is describing his mission to the Gentiles in terms that Agrippa, as a Jewish king, would recognize as straight out of the prophets.
The Commission
Therefore, O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision, but declared first to those in Damascus, then in Jerusalem and throughout all the region of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds in keeping with their repentance.
Paul summarizes his whole missionary career in one sentence. The message has been consistent. Repent, turn to God, live lives that demonstrate the repentance is real. This is the apostolic gospel. There has been no innovation. There has been no compromise. Paul has been preaching what Ananias and the Jerusalem church had been preaching from the beginning.
For this reason the Jews seized me in the temple and tried to kill me. To this day I have had the help that comes from God, and so I stand here testifying both to small and great, saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses said would come to pass: that the Christ must suffer and that, by being the first to rise from the dead, he would proclaim light both to our people and to the Gentiles.
Paul’s theological claim is a direct challenge. The Christ must suffer and rise—this is what Moses and the prophets said would happen. Jesus fulfilled it. The gospel is not an innovation on Jewish faith. It is the completion of it. Agrippa, who knew the scriptures, would have recognized every claim Paul was making as a plausible reading of the Hebrew Bible, whether or not he accepted the reading himself.
Festus’ Interruption
And as he was saying these things in his defense, Festus said with a loud voice, Paul, you are out of your mind; your great learning is driving you out of your mind.
Festus can no longer contain himself. A Roman official listening to a man talk about resurrections and heavenly visions and Jewish prophets naturally reaches for the category of madness. Paul’s calm, learned, fervent speech about a crucified Jewish carpenter who was now alive and commissioning missionaries strikes Festus as the raving of a mind overworked by too much scripture study. You are out of your mind is the honest Roman conclusion.
But Paul said, I am not out of my mind, most excellent Festus, but I am speaking true and rational words. For the king knows about these things, and to him I speak boldly. For I am persuaded that none of these things has escaped his notice, for this has not been done in a corner.
Paul’s response is extraordinary. He does not defend his sanity at length. He simply appeals to Agrippa, who lives in the same world Paul does and knows the same scriptures. This has not been done in a corner. The events Paul is describing—the life, death, resurrection, and public proclamation of Jesus—have been going on in Palestine for thirty years. They are public knowledge. Agrippa has been aware of them. Festus’ skepticism is the skepticism of an outsider who never paid attention.
The Turn to Agrippa
King Agrippa, do you believe the prophets? I know that you believe.
Paul has just cornered the king in public. The question is pointed. Agrippa, as the Roman-appointed overseer of the temple, had to maintain public belief in the prophets. His Roman role depended on his Jewish credentials. And Paul is asking the king, in front of his Roman audience, whether he actually believes what he is supposed to believe.
And Agrippa said to Paul, In a short time would you persuade me to be a Christian?
The line has been translated many ways. Some take it as sincere—with a little more effort, you might almost convince me. Others take it as sarcastic—do you think in this little time you can make a Christian of me? The Greek is ambiguous enough that both readings are possible. Probably Agrippa meant it somewhere between the two. He was impressed by Paul’s argument, amused by the directness of the question, and unwilling to commit either way. The ambiguity of his reply may have been deliberate.
And Paul said, 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.
The reply is one of the most gracious sentences in the Bible. Paul looks around the audience chamber. He sees King Agrippa. He sees Bernice. He sees Festus. He sees the tribunes and the prominent men. And he wishes, before God, that every one of them would become what he himself has become—a believer, a servant of Jesus. Except for the chains. He does not wish the chains on them. Only the faith.
The sentence is classic Paul. Willingness to suffer what the gospel requires, combined with love that wants the best for every hearer regardless of their social station or role in his own chains. He is not bitter. He is not begging. He is simply, transparently, desiring that the people in the room would come to know his Lord.
The Verdict
Then the king rose, and the governor and Bernice and those who were sitting with them. And when they had withdrawn, they said to one another, This man is doing nothing to deserve death or imprisonment. And Agrippa said to Festus, This man could have been set free if he had not appealed to Caesar.
The official verdict is unanimous and clear. Paul has committed no crime under Roman law. He could have been released. But the appeal to Caesar had already been made. Roman procedure requires that the appeal proceed. Agrippa’s line—This man could have been set free if he had not appealed to Caesar—is the closing frame of the entire Caesarean imprisonment. Paul is, by unanimous Roman agreement, innocent. He is going to Rome anyway.
Some readers have interpreted Agrippa’s line as a suggestion that Paul made a mistake by appealing. That reading misses the point. The Lord had told Paul he would testify in Rome. The appeal is the means. The Lord did not arrange Paul’s release. He arranged Paul’s transport to Rome through the legal consequence of the appeal. The chains Paul carried out of that audience chamber were the tickets to the imperial capital.
Reflection
Acts 26 is the high-water mark of Paul’s apostolic eloquence in Acts. The speech is polished, theologically rich, historically grounded, and personally compelling. It is also completely unsuccessful as legal defense. No one converts. No one releases Paul. Agrippa and Festus walk out privately agreeing he is innocent and publicly confirming that he will ship to Rome in chains.
The chapter is a study in what faithful witness looks like when the immediate results are apparently none. Paul did not give a better-crafted speech elsewhere in the book. He had the best audience he had ever addressed. He had the clearest opportunity for a breakthrough. And the breakthrough did not come. Agrippa was almost persuaded, but almost is not persuaded. Bernice listened, said nothing, walked out. Festus pronounced him insane in the middle of the sermon. None of them converted.
This pattern is worth holding. Faithful preaching does not guarantee conversion. Paul did everything right—the sermon was masterful, the audience was prepared, the Spirit was at work. And the audience walked away unchanged. The Christian worker who evaluates ministry by immediate response will despair regularly. Paul did not evaluate his ministry that way. He was asked to testify. He testified. What the listeners did with the testimony was not his responsibility. It is still the right way to evaluate gospel faithfulness.
Agrippa’s line—In a short time would you persuade me to be a Christian—is the epitaph of every hearer who responds to the gospel with amused deferral. The response is not rejection. It is not faith. It is that dangerous middle ground of being close enough to be interested, impressed, even moved, without being close enough to surrender. Every generation produces Agrippas. They are harder to reach than the outright opponents, because they believe they have already engaged the matter when in fact they have only tasted it. The gospel demands more than admiration. It demands allegiance. Agrippa was not willing to make the trade. Neither are most people who come to that line.
Paul’s response is probably the best thing he ever said, and it deserves to be held up for its pastoral beauty. I would to God that all who hear me this day might become such as I am—except for these chains. He is in the chains. He wishes none of the wealthy, powerful, free people around him were in chains. He wishes all of them had what he has. This is what gospel love looks like when it has grown into maturity. It does not hoard its treasure. It does not resent what others have not yet received. It wishes, openly and tenderly, that every person in the room knew what the preacher knows. This kind of love is rare and obvious when it appears. It is not manufactured. It is the fruit of a life in which Christ has become so precious that you cannot help wanting others to have him too.
And the chains mattered. Paul named them. He did not pretend they were not there. He did not pretend they did not hurt. But he refused to let the chains become the last word. He wished the faith on the free people without wishing the chains on them. This is one of the most generous distinctions in scripture. The Christian who has suffered for the faith can tend to want the hearer to understand the cost before offering the blessing. Paul refused. The blessing was available on its own. The chains were Paul’s cost, not the hearer’s. The offer was pure gift.
Acts 26 ends with the man who could have been free choosing the chains that would get him to Rome. Paul was the freest person in the audience chamber. He was also the only one in custody. The freedom was not circumstantial. It was in the surrender to what the Lord had called him to do. That kind of freedom is available to every believer who has learned to let go of outcomes and simply testify. Paul had learned it. He stood in chains before a king and spoke like a man with nothing to lose, because he had already lost what the world counts as worth keeping and had gained what the world cannot take away.