Almost Persuaded

 Greetings to you all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ,

     Acts 26:28 says, “Then Agrippa said unto Paul, Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian.”

     The words “never” and “always” are used rarely in our little house.  There is one word, however, that gets used a lot and it is the word, “almost.”  You may have also heard the words, “I’m almost ready” or “I am almost finished.”  I have come to the conclusion that this word has no time limits on it whatsoever.  The word can mean a minute to an hour to a day, and so on.  In many areas of life, it has absolutely no meaning  other than to say, “I recognize that someone is waiting for me,” or that something was not quite completed but could be finished at a later time if conditions were to allow it.

     In the above passage, King Agrippa used the word in his sentence in regard to the statement of the Apostle Paul.  The only problem with Agrippa’s statement, is that it has far more results than just a minute or a day.  To almost be a Christian is to not be a Christian at all.  No matter how close one comes to being a Christian, in the end, when the judgment occurs, the result will be the same in that the person who is almost a believer, will be cast into hell for all eternity.  I was there  for thirteen years.  I had already been baptized three times, I knew the vocabulary of the believer, I could sing the songs, I attended church Sunday morning, Sunday Evening and Wednesday evening and attended all of the special meetings such as mission conferences but was still not a Christian.  I could take a person through the Romans Road of salvation, but I still was lost myself.  You are either a believer or a nonbeliever.  You are either saved or lost .  You will have either one birth and two deaths, or two births and one death.  There is no almost .  Ivory soap is 99.44 percent pure, but that is n ot pure enough for salvation.  It has to be one hundred percent.  Unfortunately, Agrippa’s statement is like many people who sit in the church pews today.  They may be at the door but they have not yet entered in.  We may need to ask people in what they are depending on in order to get to heaven.  We might  be surprised by the answer.  One person t old me recently, “It’s because of my job.  Who else would do it?”  I said, “Well, I haven’t heard that one too much.”  Praise God that He has made the way simple and clear that  even a child can understand it.  How about you?  Do you understand it or would you be like King Agrippa and say, “Well, almost….”