What do you and I reason about? This question is prompted by verses in Acts 24. The arrest of Paul which had been predicted by the prophets in the early church possessed by the gifts of the Spirit, had now taken place in Jerusalem.

Paul is brought to Caesarea and kept in custody by the Roman Governor Felix who has a Jewish wife and “having a rather accurate knowledge of the Way” (verse 22, ‘the way’ being the earliest phrase used to describe followers of Christ), the Governor is not willing to aid Paul’s accusers. Instead he arranged for him “to have some liberty” (verse 23) and then, when his wife came, “he sent for Paul and heard him speak about the faith in Christ Jesus. And as he reasoned about righteousness and self-control and the coming judgement Felix was alarmed …” (verses 24,25).

If someone like Paul was alive today and we heard them reasoning about such things, would they alarm us or would we welcome such reasoning? Would we make it part of our reasoning and reason for living? Don’t we make our answer rather obvious by the extent to which we read the Bible – and put what we read into practice?