Acts 5

Acts 5:1-16

DIVERSE POWERS IN THE CHURCH Acts 4:32 to Acts 5:16. WHEN we concluded our last discourse, the disciples were at prayer and “the place was shaken where they were assembled together; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spake the Word of God with boldness”. These are conditions producing always such consequences as we find recorded (Acts 4:32-33).The remaining portion of this story illustrates some great truths, and truths that as surely need emphasis today as they could have needed it in the first century. Herein we find The Unifying Power of the Holy Spirit, The Destroying Power of Self-Deception, and The Evangelizing Power of Divine Healing. THE POWER OF THE HOLY SPIRIT“The multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common.“And with great power gave the Apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon them all” (Acts 4:32-33).What a marvelous presentation of the fact that an overshadowing and indwelling Holy Spirit produces unity in devotional spirit, unity in doctrinal expression, and unity in sacrificial distribution! Unity in the devotional spirit! They “were of one heart and soul”. In this day, when men are at variance one with another, liberalists are fond of reminding us that diversity characterizes the gifts of the Holy Ghost; and they often appeal to two chapters of Scripture in support of that theory— Romans 12, and 1 Corinthians 12. But a more careful study of these Scriptures will show that they do not present diversity of opinion as the expression of the indwelling Holy Ghost. In Romans, Paul is writing of the gifts of grace as they are administered by the Spirit, but he presents none that are antagonistic or even lacking in harmony with the rest. In I Corinthians he is writing of “spiritual gifts”, but he affirms their unification as the Spirit administers them. “All these, the one and selfsame Spirit worketh”.

Inharmony of sentiment within the professed body, the Church, is never the work of the Holy Spirit, but a sign of His absence from some hearts. When Paul wrote to the Corinthians concerning the tongues movement, he put certain of them under condemnation because of confusion. “How is it then brethren, when ye come together each with a song, with a teaching, with a tongue, with a revelation, with an interpretation?

Let all things be done unto edifying. If any man speak in an unknown tongue, let it be two, or at the most three, and that in turn and let one interpret” (1 Corinthians 14:26-27, R. V.)— a plain intimation of the fact that they were babbling, producing a confusion of noise and inharmony of sentiment. On the other hand, when he wrote to the Ephesians, he describes those filled with the Spirit as “speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in their hearts to the Lord”. In the first instance there was inharmony, no Holy Ghost; in the second, the filling of the Spirit assured a perfect harmony of sentiment. One could quote a passage, another sing a hymn, but the order was perfect; the same sentiment dominated both.If the human body, dominated by a single mind, finds its various members in a cooperation as hearty as the organic union is perfect, so the Church of God, administered by the Spirit, will exercise diversities of gifts in unity of action being of one heart and soul.The Unity in doctrinal expression. “And with great power gave the Apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus” (Acts 4:33).

The very truth that is now the occasion of division in the professing church, was, under the Spirit’s administration, universally accepted; and testimonies concerning it knew no dissenter. More and more liberals tend to minimize doctrine and the New Theologian would have us believe that such a thing as unity of faith never existed with the Apostles, and is in no sense essential to twentieth century religion.

From the beginning it was not so. Dr. Edwin W. Rice reminds us that “three great creeds of the early days —The Apostles, the Nicene and the Athanasian Creed—stood for a Christian unity and teaching. And,” he continues, “some modern critics think they have found evidences of many types or forms of organization in the primitive church and have attempted to show that the early historical interpretation of the church by apostolic men was a mistaken one. In the view of these critics the New Testament in general and the Book of Acts, in particular, not only describe, but even sanction, by precept and example, divisions in the apostolic church, and the New Testament sets forth four or five distinct primitive types similar to the denominational divisions existing in Christendom.

This view boldly flies in the face of all the ecumenical creeds and councils and of all ecclesiastical history in the first three centuries of the Christian era, for the first rudimentary forms of the church belief that preceded the perfected Apostles Creed recognize, with more or less clearness, the unity of Christians and the unity of the church. The profoundest thinkers and the acutest critics believe that the New Testament emphasizes Christian unity and deprecates schism.” No less an authority than Prof.

Chas. W. Shiels of Princeton, said, “Christianity became a compact organization in the midst of pagan society, with its sacraments and its Scriptures, and it continued thus compact and undivided for some centuries afterward. In that one Catholic, apostolic church, we have an example and model of church unity, not only as consistent with Christian unity, but as expressing and maintaining it. Indeed, it is only in and through such church unity that Christian unity can find due and full expression. Without such unity it must remain as a vague ideal or crude sentiment, if it be not a mere pretext for schism and excuse for sectarianism.” This was even more true of doctrine than of organization. Only the superficial student has been able to find conflict of doctrinal teaching in the New Testament. Not an Apostle that ever doubted the Virgin Birth; that ever called into question the miracle working; that ever debated the resurrection of Jesus from the grave save Thomas, and he was soon cured; that ever taught else than the blood atonement, or entertained other expectation than the soon coming of Christ in power and glory to sit on David’s throne. Diversities in doctrine are marks of modernism, the results of intellectual skepticism; and if it is to find defense, it must be outside of the Book we call the Bible. The great commentators, Jamieson, Faucett and Brown, speak of “the Spirit having rested upon the entire community in such a way as melting down all selfishness and absorbing even the feeling of individuality in an intense and glowing realization of Christian unity”. Nor did they escape divergence of opinion by “soft-pedaling” their ideas and carefully working down each word lest it should strike with power. They were not engaged in the negative business of “a series of tentative suggestions”. In the language of Joseph Parker, “They hurled it across the heavens; they uttered it with thunder; they spake it with the accent of the soul.” They presented no apologies to anybody for their faith in the Deity of Jesus, nor did they try to make friends and fellow-laborers of those who denied His resurrection from the dead. God forbid that we, their successors in opportunity, should fail of their convictions and courage. If the Book be true, preach it without apology!

If it be false, fling it from you! The hour has struck—yea, the hour has always existed, when men should know the truth, for the truth alone can make men free. And truth is not a compromise! Truth is not a circle of debate! Truth is intolerant. It cannot compromise, and the truth is that “Jesus is risen”!

Tell it out! Dying men need it. The day demands it. But we have in this Scripture, also, the unity in sacrificial distribution.“Neither was there any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold,“And laid them down at the Apostles? feet and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need” (Acts 4:34-35).Communism of goods? Yes! Socialism in practice? Never! There is not the slightest intimation in this text that any man was compelled to part with his personal possessions. There is not even an intimation that he was expected to do it.

It was a purely voluntary act—the first-fruits of being filled with the Spirit. Christianity is volitional! Repentance is impossible apart from the consent of one’s will. Regeneration never takes place without that consent. Apart from the same consent, the fruits of the Spirit are impossible. The man who unwillingly sold his possessions and gave them would not be accepted of God.

His animating motive of pride, a good name, a reputation for charity, would all be offensive to the Holy Ghost. It might deceive men, but not God. “Man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh an the hear”.“…God abhors the sacrifice, Where not the heart is found.” “The Lord loveth a cheerful giver”, and we are told that the word in the original means “the hilarious” giver—the man who gives with joy; the woman who, with every sacrifice, has in her own soul a sweet content. If the Spirit of God administered in the Church of God, the entire membership would know the meaning of “unity in sacrificial service”. But, alas for the professing church, we have introduced immediately THE POWER OF SELF- “Joses, who by the Apostles was surname d Barnabas, (which is, being interpreted, The son of consolation,) a Levite, and of the country of Cyprus,“Having land, sold it, and brought the money, and laid it at the Apostles’ feet” (Acts 4:36-37).“But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possession,“And kept back part of the price, his wife also being privy to it, and brought a certain part, and laid it at the Apostles’ feet.“But Peter said, Ananias, why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost and to keep back part of the price of the land?“Whiles it remained, was it not thine own? and after it was sold, was it not in thine own power? why hast thou conceived this thing in thine heart? thou hast not lied unto men, but unto God” (Acts 5:1-4).How full a suggestion! They succeeded in deceiving themselves; they attempted to deceive the Apostles; they provoked the Spirit to their own destruction. They succeeded in deceiving themselves. One can easily imagine the process of reasoning that took place between this man and his wife. “Barnabas has given his entire place. We are equally well off, perhaps better. If we sold ours and gave as much as he, we would have an equal reputation with him, would stand just as high in the affection of our fellow Christians, and we could do it and keep back a considerable part. It is our own affair. No one need be the wiser.

Our gift will be generous and if we lead Peter and the rest of the Apostles to think it is our all, our reputations will be secure.” What a profound pity that one cannot give without the devil getting in his suggestions of selfishness, pride, arrogance! Yea, one may not even pray without having Satan interjecting opposite thoughts! From the beginning of the church, this Ananias and Sapphira event has troubled many souls, but it involves no enigmas. God did not continue to exercise discipline in His church as He wrought it this day. It was fully essential that the one Spirit-filled church of the world should be retained long enough to become an ensample before it was permitted to be defiled; hence the judgment against this lie. But while God has changed His custom, yielding as He always does to mercy as against judgment, man has not changed his. The experience of Ananias has not sufficed to teach us the scarlet of his guilt. We go on after the Ananias manner.

More lies are told by men in the matter of their contributions to the church than almost any single subject of Christian conversation. More deceptions are wrought over the proportion of one’s income which he is putting on the altar, and more self-deception is practiced in this matter than in almost any other of church experience. Hundreds of people think and openly avow that they are tithing and more, who would not dare to keep books with the Lord. I had a dear friend in the South, who in his early life earned a most modest income, and his wife continually quarrelled with every contribution he made, affirming he was impoverishing his house by paying into the church. He finally gained her consent to the keeping of a strict account and laying aside one-tenth of every dollar as holy unto the Lord. The result was that he gave far more than had been his custom. His fortune grew, the favor and goodness of God begat repentance in his wife’s heart, and the last report I had from them they were contributing thousands of dollars per year and were the happiest couple in Texas. And this self-deception is not only practiced in the matter of giving of one’s means, but also of his time and his energy. As Joseph Parker writes, “No man has done all he can do,” and as he confesses, “I could have done ten times more; I could have prayed more; I could have preached more; I could have suffered more. And when a man stands up in my presence and says, ‘I have done all I could and God knows it,’ he makes me afraid. I was told of persons who were supposed to be worth 5 and 20,000 pounds, and at the communion of the Lord’s table, never contribute a coin, but put in the communion card alone. Is it possible? Thy money perish with thee!

Keep it! Keep it! Take it in the coffin with thee! Make a pillow of it! Make a footstool of it! Make a lining of it!

Thou whited sepulcher! Ananias lied without speaking. That is the worst form of falsehood. The blundering speaker of a lie may be converted, but the actor of a lie can only be killed.” They attempted to deceive the Apostles. “They brought a certain part and laid it at the Apostles’ feet”. They would be thought well of by the leaders. It would be an interesting thing, in great world movements and so-called Christian drives, to know how many men are animated solely by the desire to stand well with the leaders. I have known men to favor every single progressive movement put up by leaders; to talk for it and grow eloquent about it, and contribute nothing toward it. Ananias would have made a good member of a State Board; in fact, I have met him there many a time. Practically every Board is made up of two classes—Barnabas on the one side, who is an advocate of progression and is willing to make all reasonable sacrifices for the same, and Ananias, who is equally an advocate of progress but will forever keep his eye on the first chance.

Jacob is dead, but his sons are a multitude; and Ananias is buried, but his successors are like the sands of the sea or the stars for number. The professing church has men who can deceive even the very elect, but this is not the end. When man and wife agree together on such a course the case is almost hopeless. Adam and Eve agreed in sin and it lost to them the Garden of Eden, and since that day thousands of couples have consulted to connive and found themselves driven beyond the gates of Paradise. I am not intimating at all that Adam and Eve went to hell, nor am I saying that such was the final experience of Ananias and Sapphira. I do not believe it.

God chastens His own children rather than bastards and might be utterly justified in destroying the body of His own to save the soul. We can readily understand that a lie on the part of a sinner would never be so offensive to the Holy Ghost as the saint’s deception; the falsehood of strangers does not hurt the father’s heart as the faithlessness of his children. They provoked the Spirit to their own destruction. Temporal death against sin is its very first sentence. Up to the present hour few men have escaped it, and yet, when it comes suddenly and immediately upon the commission of a sin, it strikes the world dumb and brings amazement to the Church of God. In the early days of the Church God attempted to keep it clean, and when a member disgraced it, He removed the member; but when apostasy involves the majority He removes the Church instead. You will remember what He said to the Laodicean Church, “Because thou art lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I will spue thee out of My mouth”, and to the Church of Ephesus, “Repent and do the first works, or else I will come unto thee quickly and remove thy candlestick out of its place”. As one great preacher has said, “It is vain to attempt to keep up the outward, when the inward has given way. Is there anything more ghastly to the religious eye and spiritual imagination than a church out of which God has gone? The building stands there, of undiminished magnitude, and undimmed beauty of form and color, and undiminished commodiousness, but God has gone! The Bible is read, and not read.

It is not the Bible that the man mumbles, but a book which he has found somewhere, out of which the Spirit has been driven. The very selfsame old hymns are sung that fifty years ago caused the walls to vibrate as with conscious joy, and though the music is exact in technicality and well performed as to mere lip service, the old passion is not there, and the hymn rises to the ceiling, bruises itself against the beams of the roof and falls back, a service unrecognized in Heaven. This accounts for all the results of statistics as to attendance upon places of worship; for all the dilapidated husbandry of the church; for all the boundless provision of mere space and accommodation and machinery without eliciting the sympathy and consent of the great heart of man. We have lost the Spirit or we have forgotten that there is diversity of operation even under the same Spirit, and we have been trying to maintain old economy without new inspiration. What has to be done? Not to mend the outside, but fall to praying and to bring to bear upon Heaven the violence of our impatient necessity and the sacred ambition of men who have found by prolonged and bitter experience that all answers worth having are to be had from Heaven only.” Finally, and all too briefly, I must state it, THE POWER OF DIVINE HEALING “And by the hands of the Apostles were many signs and wonders wrought among the people; (and they were all with one accord in Solomon’s porch.“And of the rest durst no man join himself to them: but the people magnified them.“And believers were the more added to the Lord, multitudes both of men and women;)“Insomuch that they brought forth the sick into the streets, and laid them on beds and couches, that at the least the shadow of Peter passing by might overshadow some of them.“There came also a multitude out of the cities round about unto Jerusalem, bringing sick folks, and them which were vexed with unclean spirits; and they were healed every one” (Acts 5:12-16).The miracle always attracts a multitude. It was when signs and wonders were wrought among the people that the crowds came. We talk of the reason the churches are empty now, and wonder why people no longer flock to them; why in great spacious auditoriums a feeble few gather and attempt a sleepy service of praise. But the reason is not far to seek. When there is no sign of God’s presence, the people will not continue to patronize. You have to take your choice then between a few souls who cannot cease from their forms and ceremonies, and putting on a sideshow that would do credit to a street in Cairo, or the presence of God.

But when and where was a miracle ever wrought manifestly from God without the immediate coming together of a veritable concourse? Hundreds of times have the Papists started the story that God was working a miracle at some place, and every time the crowds set in that way, and Rome profits accordingly.

Why? After all, there are weary hearts by the thousand and tens of thousand that want to find God. The man, therefore, who attempts to take the miracle out of religion, if he succeeds, will take the heart out of it; he will take hope out of it, because he will take God out of it. God, instead of being the Author of natural law and forever limited by the same, never moves His hand, His foot, His tongue, without a miracle. The true miracle is the sign, the insignia, the positive proof of Divine Presence. The miracle commonly results in converts. It would be interesting to study the record in the New Testament of the instant results of every miracle wrought. This Book of Acts abundantly illustrates that fact. When in the second chapter the miracle of tongues appeared, the people “thronged to the place”. When in the third chapter, Peter, in the Name of the Lord, healed the man at the Gate Beautiful, “the people ran together unto them in the porch that is called Solomon’s”. When in the fifth chapter the miracle of judgment was wrought against Ananias and Sapphira, “believers were the more added to the Lord, multitudes both of men and women”.

When in the ninth chapter, Dorcas was brought back from the burial shroud and it came to be known throughout Joppa, “many believed on the Lord”. When in the twelfth chapter, Herod is smitten by the hand of the Lord, “the Word of God grew and multiplied”.The church that has God at work in it, manifesting His power by grace and by judgments, is the church upon which the people will attend and in which conversions will be accomplished.

Little wonder that men doubt the experience of regeneration when they attend churches as complete in forms and ceremonies as they are destitute of God. If we would have the miracle of conversion come back, then we must bring back the Christ. His presence, His power, His work is always a wonder. Enthrone the Christ afresh and there will be no failure in the growth of the church.Finally,The immediate effect of the miracle is social service.“They brought forth the sick into the streets, and laid them on beds and couches, that at least the shadow of Peter passing by might overshadow some of them.“There came also a multitude out of the cities round about unto Jerusalem, bringing sick folks, and them which were vexed with unclean spirits: and they were healed every one” (Acts 5:15-16).Thousands of articles have been printed on “How to Set the Churches to Work”. Eloquent orations have been delivered on how to interest men in the bodies and souls of their fellows, or how to secure sacrificial endeavor for the sake of a needy world. It is all answered in one thought, “Bring God in.”The moment His miraculous Presence is recognized and His miraculous, power is experienced, social service is sure.

Men sometimes talk as if this social service propaganda were a novelty; as if the early church had no notion of doing ought than teach the great fundamentals. On the contrary, the fundamentals of Scripture, when properly apprehended and proclaimed, have never failed to produce the finest of social fruits.

History is replete with illustrations of this fact. The apostolic commission and constitution are documents which throw much light upon this subject. No less an authority than Dr. Geo. T. Stokes says, “These constitutions prove that the church in the third century was one mighty cooperative institution, and an important function of the bishop was the direction of that cooperation.” The second chapter of the fourth book of the Apostolic Constitution lays down, “Do you therefore, O bishops, be solicitous about the maintenance of orphans, being in nothing wanting to them, exhibiting to the orphans the care of parents; to the widows the care of husbands; to the artificer, work; to the stranger, an house; to the hungry, food; to the thirsty, drink; to the naked, clothing; to the sick, visitation; to the prisoners, assistance.”When once we give place in the church to the Holy Spirit, there will be no lack of social service.

The spiritual church will forever be a serviceable church. Dear old Joseph Parker saw that fact gladly and said, “The church can only do great social duties and continue with constancy in great social sacrifices in proportion as its heart is constantly inspired by the Holy Spirit.”

Acts 5:17-32

THE OF Acts 5:17-42. JOHN BUNYAN makes his “Pilgrim” progress by a path that is not always smooth, by steps that are not always easy; and yet, in “Pilgrim’s Progress”, he is supposed to have presented the best uninspired picture of Christian experience written to date.The “Christian” of his conception had “Sloughs of Despond” to pull through, “Giants of Despair” to wrestle with, “Lions” of menacing mien to face, “hills of difficulty” to climb, “sharp stones” to press beneath his feet and even “Apollyon to fight”. Bunyan’s conception was altogether a Biblical one, and when one reads the New Testament he is impressed with the conflicts of Christianity, and justifies Uhlhorn in the choice of his theme.The Book of Acts is a marvelous history of Christianity in its beginning steps, and there the Apostles of Jesus go from conflict to conflict. That early Church experienced little danger of drowsiness, and they couldn’t have suffered from ennui. The battlefield, itself, in the day of violent attacks and counterattacks, is a symbol of the true Church of God. It, like an army, lives in a conflict and by conquests.In continuing, therefore, this study of Acts, beginning with Acts 5:17 and concluding with the end of the chapter, we call attention to certain features of church experience that are ensample features; they mark the face of the church in every century.You will note here Politics in Religion; you will read here of the Powers of Three Worlds, and you will find here Apostles of Real Worth. IN “Then the high priest rose up, and all they that were with him, (which is the sect of the Sadducees,) and were filled with indignation,“And laid their hands on the Apostles, and put them in the common prison” (Acts 5:17-18).These two verses are like most Scripture—significant and suggestive.

They make plain certain features of the Jerusalem First Church life; for instance, the quiet triumph of an ecclesiastical party, the unexpected storm in the political teapot, and the evident intolerance of professed liberals.The quiet triumph of an ecclesiastical party. Then the high priest rose up, and all they that were with him.” The high priest was the chosen head and consequent leader of an ecclesiastical party.

It was known as the party of the Sadducees. The bracketed phrase, “which is the sect of the Sadducees”, is more properly translated, “which is the heresy of the Sadducees”. In fact, the Greek word translated “sect” means exactly “heresy”. These were the “New School” in Judaism. They were the Rationalists who opposed angels, spirit and all miracles. The resurrection was their particular offense.

Like the Modernists of the present day, they had no affirmative faith, but were deniers of orthodox teaching. Being without an appeal to Holy Writ, their political ambitions had to be carefully engineered, and by smooth and even expert methods they sought and secured control of the Sanhedrin, having made one of their number the high priest; and in the power of their political organization, they opposed and persecuted the Apostles, not because they were Pharisees, but because they held to the great fundamentals of the Old Testament teaching—angels, spirit, miracles, and above all, the resurrection from the dead.It may seem strange that such a party should come into control of a Jewish Sanhedrin, when one remembers how clearly the Jewish Scriptures presented the very subjects against which the Sadducees savagely set themselves.

But certainly men of this day can understand. We are repeating this part of Acts. Once more rationalists have, by “pussyfoot” methods, captured great Christian assemblies and conventions, securing again and again the chief offices of the same and always with the intent of putting down and silencing men who hold to the full teaching of God’s Word; men who believe in angels, spirits, miracles, the resurrection from the dead and related truths of revelation. The only way these men can secure office and hold the same is the way of party politics, and the greater the politician the less anxious he is to engage in debate with anybody. His method is never the stormy, but always the silent one. He knows that in open argument he would be worsted; but he also knows that by clever planning and quiet wire-pulling and dexterous penmanship, he may carry his point.I saw a few years since a fine example of this Modernist method.

The Y. W.

C. A., in session at Cleveland, after four years of bitter debate (a debate that sundered the sisters making up its membership into two utterly antagonistic factions,) finally voted, by a majority, to put away the evangelical church membership test, and adopted a pious but meaningless phrase, in accommodation of Unitarian, Christian Science and Roman Catholic sentiment. A Baptist minister present, who belongs to the Modernist party, wrote up that convention in an extended and apparently complete article. He glided over the resignation of Mrs. Shepard, the most notable Christian woman in America; he ignored her speech of protest, quoting not a single sentence; he made no mention whatever of the fact that she had a following of hundreds, including Mrs. Gladden and other brilliant women, and, at the conclusion of his article, one would never have dreamed that his party had come into power by political methods that would have done credit to Tammany in its darkest deeds.

That is the Modernist method! They have no intention of entering the arena with the man who wields the “Sword of the Spirit”; they trust “the pen” above “the Sword” and “the whisper of a secret session” above all appeals to either history, prophecy or Gospel; and Sadducees to-day sit in practically every bishopric saddle in the Methodist denomination in America and have been able to capture the chief offices again and again in the conventions of other denominations.But this Scripture also narratesThe unexpected storm in the political teapot.

The shrewd politicians are perturbed! The calm, quiet, cultured section of the Sanhedrin is excited. Their pleasant foreheads are creased. On each of their countenances thunder clouds gather. The only word in the dictionary big enough to express their feelings is “indignation”. What has happened? One would naturally imagine that the Pharisees had caught them napping; had turned some better political trick than the expert Sadducees had been able to put over; had elected, by some unexpected ballot, all the chief officials. But nothing of the sort!

A few ignorant and unlearned fishermen—men whose ministry had not been standardized—had risen up to teach. Multitudes had been going after them. The entire population was in danger of believing the quotations of Scripture made by the lips of these common, not to say contemptible, men! In other words, the trouble had come from an all unexpected quarter. How often it is so! The great and powerful gather together, whisper their opinions to each other, agree upon their method of procedure, plan the continuation of clique power, and lo! suddenly there is a monkey-wrench in the machinery.

The wheels are not turning, but breaking; the belts are not moving, but straining; the looms are not weaving, but ravelling!A few years ago a certain Baptist State Convention was captured by Modernists. They got a State secretary who sympathized with the liberal teachings of a certain university.

He systematically surrounded himself with a company of leading men whose leanings were in the same direction. He set to work to fill the pulpits of the State with expositors of new thinking. It all worked beautifully. Then a man, well advanced in years, moved into the State and commenced with a church which had an honorable record, but only comparative influence. Ere long there was a conflict of teaching between the leading pulpit of the city and this plain expositor of God’s Word. The debate waxed. The Association split into two factions. The majority went with the conservative man.

The feeling spread to the Convention itself and shortly the State was aflame. The Convention, by the coercive methods of court procedure, attempted to take property from orthodox pastors and orthodox people. The chief charge was premillennialism, a Biblical and Baptist doctrine. The test cases had gone against the Convention in most instances. Ecclesiastical officials proposed a conference and said that in some way the difficulty ought to be settled and the aggrieved elements brought to a reconciliation, to all of which the conservative brethren rejoined:“About eleven years ago nearly 2,000 Baptists in one city of the State of openly declared their loyalty to our Lord Jesus Christ and determined that they would not fellowship nor regard as Baptists those who substitute humanism or liberalism for the Word of God. This decision has never been changed but is constantly growing firmer, and the number in the State holding to this purpose has greatly increased.“During the period above mentioned that particular Convention has extended the hand of fellowship to liberals or humanists who reject the authority of the Scriptures and has promoted them and elected them to places of influence, direction and control.

Against this unbaptistic course we have protested in vain.“We are asked to send our missionary money to the State Treasury to support humanistic schemes, and men who are humanists, as State workers, and so-called missionaries, educators, and Bible School literature publishers, but this we cannot do. We are responsible to God and must invest His money in men who are true to Him and His Word.“Threats have been made against premillennialists, and action has been taken by at least two Associations, and suits have been brought against at least two churches with the approval, as we believe, of the State Board.

These things raise a question in our minds as to whether this request for a conference may not be the first step in some desperate action to be taken at the meeting of the Convention.“We can never compromise. God has spoken and we must obey Him. The only way we can work together is for the Convention to free itself from the liberals, and adopt such articles of faith and rules of order as will enable it to protect itself from humanists or liberals.“We cannot participate in the New World Movement so long as its loftiest purpose is mere civilization through social service, and with the purpose to invest a large share of the income in Germanized education. Neither can we endorse the destruction of our sacred inheritance in Baptist principles and achievements by the liberalistic propaganda of the federated and community church.“We are not in accord with the employment of such an army of overseers and promoters as now burdens and perverts the work of our Baptist Conventions. Many of their schemes are unbaptistic, unscriptural and not of God. We fear there are many of our denominational leaders entirely unacquainted with Satan and his wiles. ‘Certain men have crept in unawares’ who are really the ministers of Satan transforming themselves into ministers of righteousness.

Our work as a denomination cannot prosper until we return to the Scriptures and the way of the Lord. Humanism threatens the very existence of the denomination.“We are Baptists through and through, and will stand by that only which is Scriptural.

We cannot compromise. If now you wish to stand upon Scriptural and Baptistic ground and put the liberals out, then we are willing to confer with you at a time and place that may be agreed upon, but otherwise it is useless, ‘for there is nothing to confer about, so far as we are concerned, except a way to eliminate from our convention mission fields and schools, the Unitarians, infidels and liberals who have ‘crept in unawares’.“We want it understood that we have no thought of giving up our rights in the convention, but as Baptists we shall earnestly contend for the ‘faith once for all delivered’, and the honor of the Baptist name in the State of M.”This was signed by four prominent pastors.Truly the Lord can bring to His opponents trouble from unexpected quarters. With a worm, He can thrash a mountain!When the Hivites, the Canaanites and the Hittites became over-confident and set their faces against the people of God, God sent an angel to guide His people in the way and hornets to drive the enemy before them, until the last man was gone from the land, that His own people might inherit the same. Hornets are not difficult to hatch and, in the language of the colored man, they can quickly “organize for business”, and when once they go to war, nobody will debate the effectiveness of their methods. Let potentates take notice! It is the unexpected that happens!Still further, we have The evident intolerance of professed Liberals.

These were the men who had been condemning the Pharisees for their “bigotry”; who had written arguments again and again against “dogmatism”; the very men who had pled for “liberty of opinion”; who had objected to “external authority” and proposed an era of “personal liberty”. But now when prophets of God exercise that “personal liberty of opinion” and preach “angel”, “spirit”, “miracle”, “resurrection”, they are not perturbed; they are mad!

They are not calm, they are bitter; they are not complacent, they are cruel; they are not moralizing, they are murderous.That is Modernism for you. The story might have been written yesterday and published in “The Forum” of “The Baptist” or “The Congregationalist”; in fact, it was written. A slight change in expression, no change in spirit. And, mark you, there is another translation here that is significant in the last degree. The word “indignation” is more correctly translated “jealousy”. Since the days of the Apostles, jealous indignation has not burned against orthodoxy as it burns this morning.

The hatred manifested when Martin Luther rebelled against precepts and practices of Rome; the bitterness felt when Savonarola proclaimed the Gospel of God; the anger exercised when Charles Spurgeon refused to compromise with the destructive critics of his land— these were all tempests in teapots beside the rising tide of hatred in the hearts of Modernists now living. Their every speech reveals their spirit; their message is denunciatory.

Their softest phrases veil dire threats. Their increasing conviction is that, having captured offices in certain denominations, they own the denominations themselves, and should be disturbed by no pleader for orthodox religion or conservator of historic faiths.In spite of all the disgust they have felt at the failure of the Interchurch, they have for political reasons held in check their real sentiments. They attempted the Russian fable of the swan, the crab and the pike, which were brought together and harnessed in order that they might be hitched to a common load. No sooner was the harness on, than the swan flew up and the crab crawled backward and the pike made with all haste for the water, leaving the load where it was! They charge up the whole fault to the swan. He had no right to fly upward!

He should have gone with the crab and he should have seen to it that the pike did proper team-work.Yes, we have refused to cooperate. We confess it, and by refusing we have revealed the fact to the world that sweet Liberals become the sourest of living men when once they cannot have their own way.

Charles Spurgeon spoke from a keen observation when he said, “If you want a bitter sneer, a biting sarcasm, or a cruel action, I commend you to these large-minded gentlemen. They are liberal to everybody except those who hold the truth, and for those they have a reserve of concentrated bitterness which far exceeds wormwood and gall.”We pass from this to thePOWERS OF THREE WORLDSThe underworld committed the Apostles to the common prison; the upperworld released and commissioned them to the Temple; the middle world sought compromise and softened a death sentence to stripes.We are beginning now to see how the Book of Acts was “written for our learning”.The underworld committed them to a common prison. The high priest and Sadducees—the liberal party—laid hands upon the Apostles and put them in a common prison. But, you say, the high priest is not from the underworld and the Sadducees are not evil spirits. Are you certain? Satan has always had his minions in ecclesiastical office.

He had his Judas even among the Apostles, and in Paul’s day there “were ministers of righteousness” who were Satan’s servants. In fact, Satan is himself indicted as one who “transformeth himself into an angel of light”.

We expect, if the truth were known, the progress of the Church of God has been as often held back by ecclesiastical potentates, and Prophets of God have as often suffered at their hands, as from any other single source. As Paul wrote to the Ephesians (Ephesians 6:12), “We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world and against spiritual wickedness in high places”. At any rate, the day these men put hands upon the Apostles and thrust them into prison, they were the devil’s agents. Every man who opposes one who is a true Apostle of “the faith once for all delivered”, does the devil’s pleasure, and to that extent becomes a minion of the underworld.The upper world released and commissioned them to the Temple. “But the angel of the Lord by night opened the prison doors, and brought them forth, and said, Go, stand and speak in the Temple to the people all the words of this life” (Acts 5:19-20). What an answer to all of the Sadduccees’ philosophies existed in this single circumstance! We suspect the Apostles had fallen asleep and the angel wakened them—a type of the time when the “dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and shall live”.

The presence of angels and their exhibitions of power were an absolute answer to Sadducean philosophy. The fact that they took them out without opening doors or disturbing guards, was a death-blow to Sadducean naturalism, and then they commissioned them to “go, stand and speak in the Temple to the people all the words of this life”.

They knew perfectly well that “the resurrection of Jesus” from the grave and the consequent resurrection of all believers at His coming, would be themes involved in that full Gospel. It is hard to kick against the goads. It is impossible to fight against God. You can deny angels if you want to do so, but that will not stop their ministry. You can scoff the miracle as often as you like, but while you are speaking it is occurring. You can laugh the resurrection to scorn, but the day will come when the risen Christ will hold such in derision.

The time of His laugh will be on; “The Lord shall halve them in derision; He shall mock when their fear cometh”.But the most interesting part of this Scripture to me relates itself to a third class.The middle world compromised and softened the death sentence to stripes. “The captain with the officers went and brought them without violence” (Acts 5:26). That is the first part of the compromise.

We are told why they did it. “They feared the people?”. When they brought them and set them before the council, the high priest said, “Did not we straitly command you that ye should not teach in this Name”‘? And when the answer of the Apostles was such as to excite them afresh, then Gamaliel stood up, one of the old Pharisees who had a soft side to him; who was always being quoted by the Sadducees and could be counted on to cast an occasional and deciding vote with them, and consequently claim them as his friends, while they utilized him and chuckled over his lack of stamina and his consequent value to the critical party in critical times. He was a doctor of the law and had a reputation among all the people, that is, he stood well with both sides. That is the poorest compliment that was ever paid, and his speech was of the soft, political sort. He reminded them of Theudas and how he came to naught, and of Judas and how he perished, and his following was dissipated; and by these historic instances, he softened the anger of the Sadducees, and then by appealing to them to wait in the execution of their ill-will against the Apostles, he threw a sop to the Pharisees, and as he supposed, proved himself also a friend to the Apostles, “and to him they agreed and having beaten them, they commanded they should not speak in the Name of Jesus and let them go”.

The most difficult man to deal with in great ecclesiastical conflicts is the middle man—the man who runs with the hare and hunts with the hounds; the man who always believes in getting by without trouble and who is always seeking a way to solve a difficulty politically, irrespective of principle. At this present moment and in the controversy that rages to-day between orthodoxy on the one side and the most Christless skepticism on the other, the Gamaliels of the land are not standing up with and for the apostles of the faith.

They are pleading with the Liberals to be less angry, and they are begging the conservatives to be less pronounced. They do not want the true apostles of the faith to perish; but if a scourging could be substituted and silence could be insured, they would not only consent to that, but frame the resolutions to effect it.Some years ago, George Lorimer spoke of the political endeavor to dethrone the Christ and bring Him down to the level of a mortal man, and of the smooth way in which that attempt was being carried on. He likened it to the instance in which an executioner, sent to behead Charles I, bowed before the king, kissed his hand and begged his pardon for undertaking the unpleasant business in which he was engaged, but beheaded him just the same. So now at the opening of the 20th Century, infidelity, wearing a mask and sharpening the ax, will not be slow to cut off the head of Christianity when the propitious moment arrives. Dr. Dollinger once spake of the advancing pressure of unbelief as “the festering wounds which are causing every community to languish”, and of that Dr.

Lorimer said, “The danger of the hour is that indifference, or rather apathy may betray the most sacred interests of humanity”. Some one has said, “England has so fed upon the pap of compromise as to be unable any longer to conceive a muscular resolution,” and it may so fall out that the disciples of our Lord, in their desire to avoid contention, and in their good-natured tolerance of deadly heresies, may become traffickers and bargainers in holy things, and soon cease to have sufficient iron in their consciences to vigorously resist the encroachments of even undisguised enemies.

The policy of non-resistance I deplore. Occasionally some well-meaning soul arises in the midst of the battle and sententiously utters the misleading platitude, “Truth is mighty and will prevail.” And at times religious journals, presumably having nothing better to write on, take ministers to task for introducing apologetics into the pulpit, advising them “to preach the Gospel”, when the minister knows and the editor knows that the question of the hour is whether that same Gospel is still credible to the enlightened understanding.But we must take up the last part— OF REAL WORTHThe record is short but the Scriptures are suggestive.“They commanded that they should not speak in the Name of Jesus, and let them go.“And they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His Name.“And daily in the temple and in every house, they ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ” (Acts 5:40-42).Look to it now!They quit the council with undaunted courage. As they stood before that august company, they refused to cringe. As they listened to their stern commands, they batted not an eye. At the utterance of threats of lash and prison and death, they felt with Paul, “We are ‘not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ’.” They were no weaklings. The Gospel ministry was never meant for weaklings and weaklings were never meant for the ministry.

Dear old Joseph Parker, the man of the leonine head and lion heart, said of some of our forefathers in the ministry who were men of convictions and consequent courage, “They bore scars for medals; they took honors in the school of suffering; they graduated in the dungeon and in the wilderness and their breath was like the fresh air that blows around a mountain top. Do I speak to any young man who is about to enter the ministry?

Any gentle, delicate, pale, frail creature who is going to take up the Apostolic banner or, at least, the silken end of it? It is hard work! You can make it easy if you please, but in so pleasing you offend God. Wherever this Gospel is preached, it must create antagonism. We have indeed, by a tacit compact, villainous in its every syllable, agreed to shut up the unpleasant, and to confine the disagreeable, and to hold converse upon only such topics and principles as soothe and comfort us, and assure us of our personal safety. Why, Christianity began as a fighting religion. When did it lay aside its first charter? Christianity came as a fire, as a sword, as a voice of judgment.

When did it pass through a transformation which robbed it of its combativeness and made it as other faiths? When was this Samson shorn?”Their worthy successors will not waver now before the apostles of Modernism, nor will they blanch, though persecution comes and prisons open and death itself threatens. With Peter and the other Apostles, they will still say, “We can but speak the things which we see and hear”.They rejoiced to suffer shame for Christ’s sake. They had never expected to be preachers of the Gospel apart from such experience. Had not Jesus said,“They will deliver you up to the councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues;“And ye shall be brought before governors and kings for My sake, for a testimony against them and the Gentiles” (Matthew 10:17-18)?When did the promise of Jesus ever fail? True men don’t wish themselves out of the ministry when a Sadducee scorns them, nor whine when a stripe falls across the shoulder, nor join Elijah in a juniper tree despondency when opponents multiply.

On the contrary, that is the testing time and their true characters shine brighter in the midst of persecutions. God knows that, and hence His willingness to leave us sometimes to the ill-luck of conflict, battle, prison and even death.

It is said that when King Edward III. heard that his son, the Black Prince, was having a hard battle with the French, he smiled to think he was put at last in a place where he would show his true valor. When he was implored to send reinforcements to him, he refused, saying, “Let him so get honors this day as to have them undivided.”Charles Spurgeon comments upon this piece of history after this manner: “The Lord Jesus, the Captain of our salvation, puts some of His followers into places of great peril and sends them no help that their faith and consecration may be tested and proved.”FinallyThey continued their testimony and increased the same. Had they not said, “We cannot but speak the things which we have both seen and heard”? Now they are showing that was no idle speech. Long years afterward, Paul, gathering other Christians into an assembly with himself, and becoming the spokesman, said,“We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair;“Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed;“Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.“For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.“So then death worketh in us, but life in you.“We having the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I believed, and therefore have I spoken; we also believe, and therefore speak” (2 Corinthians 4:8-13).This Apostle, at a little later date, simply carried the courage of these earlier men to more marvelous heights, and illustrated the fact that the true Apostle is daunted by nothing;“In labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft.“Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one.“Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep;“In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren;“In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness” (2 Corinthians 11:23-27).He carried on! Bearing his witness, exalting Christ, preaching the glorious doctrines of grace, the great necessity of regeneration, the certainty of the resurrection, the promised return and everlasting life! Give us ministers after the Pauline sort, believing absolutely the Pauline Gospel and all the minions of hell will not long hold back the Kingdom of God, and Satan himself, the god of this world, will not long retain his supremacy against the coming Son of Man.