Acts 9

Acts 9:1-31

THE OF SAUL Acts 9:1-31. THE Book of Acts well deserves its name. As we have already remarked it would be difficult to find in all literature a volume, through all the pages of which there runs so much of intense movement as through this fifth Book of the New Testament. The first chapter presents the ascension of our Lord. No man who ever read the record of His being received up by a cloud out of sight, can forget it. The second chapter contains the account of the marvelous revival of that first Christian Pentecost. In the third chapter the lame man is healed and the excited people given fresh attention to apostolic teaching. In the fourth chapter Peter’s sermon offends the priests and rulers. With John he is arrested and enjoined to preach no more.

In the fifth Ananias and Sapphira are stricken dead for their falsehood before the Holy Ghost. In the sixth Deacon Stephen is on trial, and in the seventh he is stoned to death. In the eighth Philip looms, and in the ninth, Paul. What soul is so dead as not to find in the Book of Acts records that stir the deepest recesses and excite the highest interest? In teaching this ninth chapter we purposely ignore its text and deal with its hero—Paul.F. B. Meyer says, “The method of God’s introduction of His greatest servants to the world differs widely. In some cases they rise gradually and majestically, like the dawn, from the glimmer of childhood’s early promise to the meridian of mature power and usefulness.

In other cases they flash like the lightning on the dark abyss of night. Sometimes God charges a man with a message and launches him forth suddenly and irresistibly. Such a man was Elijah, with his, ‘Thus saith the Lord, before whom I stand’; John the Baptist, with his, ‘It is not lawful for thee to have thy brother’s wife’; such also was Savonarola, of Florence, with many another. And such was Stephen.” In one sense it is true that Stephen rises suddenly. Of his antecedents little is said, but the brief record is of the highest importance. His birth is not mentioned; his parents are not named; his youth is passed without remark; but as a member of the Church he was known as a man “full of faith and of the Holy Ghost”, and when this is said, no man need be surprised to find him taking up at once a position so important; and in view of that, no man need be surprised either that the people and the Elders and the Scribes laid hold upon him and went about to accomplish his death.

The world in the Church and the world out of the Church have no time for the man who is “full of faith and of the Holy Ghost”. They are ever ready to take off their coats and cast stones at him until he is dead.

The young man at whose feet they laid their coats, when Stephen was stoned, was this same Saul. As Joseph Parker says, “He was an apt scholar. He made rapid progress in his bad learning. * * * * First of all, he watched the clothes of the men who stoned Stephen; then he consented that it was well done, and in the third place he took up the matter earnestly himself with both hands, being no longer an onlooker, but a leader.” And when the Church felt his hand they recognized the heaviest that had yet been raised against them, for it is written, “He made havoc of the Church, entering into their houses, and haling men and women, committed them to prison” (Acts 8:3).Knowing, as we do know, that this man began so badly and ended so blessedly, it cannot prove profitless to give some study to the processes of this change. I want to speak to you, first of all, of Saul, the Pharisee; then of Saul, the Persecutor, and lastly of Paul, the Peerless Preacher. SAUL, THE His birth is of interest. In his Epistle to the Philippians (Philippians 3:4-5), he refers to this birth, saying, “I might have confidence in the flesh. If any other man thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust the flesh, I more: Circumsized the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews”. We are wont to lay stress upon nobleness of birth. Books of genealogy are prized by those families, who, through them, can trace an honored or wealthy ancestry. But I believe Paul had a better conception of good birth than obtains in present public opinion.

He claimed a religious parentage. His boast was not so much that he belonged in the line of kings or was descended from the rich, but rather that he was an offspring of Abraham, the friend of God. Every man through whose veins there pulses the good blood of godly fathers is to be congratulated. Far better to be born in the house of faith than beneath the roof of fashion; far better to be bred in the atmosphere of prayer than in the air of pretense. When God would send His own Son into the world, he proved the Divine judgment of this whole matter by having Him born of the same nation out of which came Saul. If I were a Jew I should never be jealous of any man’s genealogy, seeing that in my veins there coursed the very same blood that ran through the veins of the King of kings. His education was of note. Tarsus at that time was no mean city—a place of active merchandise, a port of many vessels, a center of much religion, and students were no strangers to its streets. It is not likely that the growing boy was privileged to sit at the feet of the philosophers of the hour, since most of them were anti-Jewish in their opinions; but it is certain that he studied the Law and letters of his own people, beginning at the age of five. Thus early he would learn to read the Scriptures. At six years of age they would put him at the feet of a Rabbi; at ten he would be instructed in the Law; at thirteen confirmed, because somewhat familiar with the same; a little later they would post him off to Jerusalem, to sit at the feet of Gamaliel, and along with his intellectual training, they would teach him a trade, for every son of a Jew had to know a trade as surely as to be familiar with the traditions. I wish that the children of the present hour might enjoy a similar training.

Too many of our little ones are growing up in ignorance of the Word of the Lord; too many of them are taken out of the schools and forced to run the streets or delve in the shops, at the only period of life when an education is probable—I had almost said, possible; too many of them are incited to a study of all skeptical philosophies, and too many are permitted to play truant to education on the physical side, to come to their maturity without any equipment for a position or any knowledge of a trade. On this point I should elaborate but for the circumstance that I recently gave a whole sermon to this subject. I call your attention from the subject of education to that of Saul’s character. A few days since, a woman who had recently lost a beautiful boy of fifteen summers came to see me about some services shortly to be held at the grave, and as I listened to her speak of his virtues, I found myself in the heartiest sympathy with all the pride his parents had ever taken in him. And I can imagine, had we sat down with Paul’s mother and father, we would have been stirred by the glow of their faces as they pictured to us the character of their son; “touching the Law, a Pharisee; * * touching the righteousness which is in the Law, blameless” (Philippians 3:5-6), would have been their report. He was not of the company of those young men who counted it smart to sin, or brave to blacken the character of others. Had cigarettes existed, he would not have supposed his stature increased by sucking at one; had those of his own age been wont to assemble at the saloon, their cries to him to make one of them would have been in vain. In moral excellence he was such a boy as true fathers take pride in, and praying mothers plead with God their babes may become. And to moral cleanliness there was added in his character an unusual zeal. It expended itself in the persecution of the Church of God, and flashed forth afterwards in the proclamation of the faith which he once persecuted. He might have been justly included in the term Boanerges, for like James and John he was indeed a Son of Thunder; and had Jesus ever enjoyed the opportunity to speak of him, as He did of John the Baptist, He might have asked a similar question, “What went ye out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken with the wind? But what went ye out for to see? A man clothed in soft raiment”?

And there would have been in His words the same irony, and He would have added, “But what went ye out for to see? A prophet? yea, I say unto you, and more than a prophet” (Matthew 11:7-9).For I do believe that if there is any man in whom God takes interest and through whom God can accomplish His purposes, it is the man of will—the man whose character has in it both fervor and strength. I don’t wonder John Calvin accomplished what he did, when I study this side of his nature. You remember that his coat of arms had upon it this significant illustration, a hand offering a burning heart unto God. Such was Saul, the Pharisee, in birth, in education, and in character. SAUL, THE When one studies this man’s youth, he is somewhat surprised to find him in the business of killing Christians, and naturally asks wherein they had offended him. First of all, he was offended by the egotism of this “New Way”. Every Pharisee supposed himself to be the special custodian of true religion; and to find one preaching or teaching who did not belong to his sect, was an offense greater than that which high churchmen feel toward dissenters; yea, greater even than that which Romanists entertain against Protestants. You may remember that Jesus once healed a man who had been blind from his birth, and when this man was brought to the Pharisees, they asked him how he received his sight, and he told them plainly what Jesus had done. And when they reviled him, he answered, “Why, herein is a marvellous thing, that ye know not from whence He is, and yet He hath opened mine eyes: * * since the world began, was it not heard that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind. If this Man were not of God, He could do nothing” (John 9:30; John 9:32-33). To this argument the Pharisees answered and said unto him, “Thou wast altogether born in sin, and dost thou teach us?

And they cast him out”.That was Saul’s grievance that these plain, unlettered men should assume to be spokesmen for God, and prophets of a true faith. And that offense is not wholly passed away to this hour.

There is many a man with a smattering of knowledge who would never consent to give attention to any Christian who knew less of science than himself, or employed poor English. He puts to all such the question, “Dost thou teach me?” and casts them out. And yet the big brained Henry Drummond followed Mr. Moody all about England; hung upon every word that passed his lips; paid little or no attention to his poor English, because he recognized in him God’s prophet and realized that the words he uttered were charged with Divine wisdom. Henry Ward Beecher was one of the most versatile men of his day. So liberal was his intellect and generous his range of thought that he won for himself the title of “The Shakespeare of the Modern Pulpit.” Yet Henry Ward Beecher, in one of his sermons, tells us that he learned more of the grace of God from the lips of an ignorant black man than was taught him by all the instructors of his youth beside.

Ah, beloved, grammar is no test of God’s prophet; knowledge in science is no sufficient measure. Does he know the Word?

Are grace and truth in his lips? Answer me that question before you pronounce him an egotist and turn him persecutor. Again Saul was angered by the dogmatism of this “New Way”. This sermon of Stephen’s has in it no uncertain sound. He shows a wonderful familiarity with the Old Testament history; and when he comes to interpret that history, he cuts those who hear him to the heart, by charging them with resisting the Holy Ghost, with persecuting the Prophets, and with having slain the just One (Acts 7:1-53). Then it was that they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears, and ran upon him with one accord, and cast him out of the city, and stoned him (Acts 7:54, ff). Plain, positive preaching has never been popular with a great part of the world. They dub it dogmatic and then pretend to be seized with a horror of the dogmatism.

But Christianity is nothing if it is not dogmatic. It has no reason for its existence if it be not positive.

If it is only one of many religions, if it has no claim above its competitors then it has no claim at all. It is only a few years ago that Dr. Behrends was departing from the Baptist denomination. At that time he thought our creed too strict, and our emphasis of truth overwrought. But after having plunged himself into something of liberal thought, and having swung around the circle of criticism, he returned to the faith of his fathers, and before he died wrote his book, “The Old Testament Under Fire”. This was a noble defense of dogmatic teaching. In that volume he says, “In much of our current literature I miss definiteness. There is more and better rhetoric than in Jonathan Edwards, but there is much less and much poorer logic.

There is more fog than light. The outlines are shadowy and the substance vanishes when hands are laid upon it. The fathers are freely criticised, but empty speeches are substituted for their solid structures. I am sure that this cannot last; and many a volume now praised as a valuable contribution to theological thought will drop out of sight before its author has become invisible. I want clear thinking. The Church and the world want it. And the very first evidence that we have ploughed through the fog which has settled down upon us, will be books in which things are said that the reader can understand, and pulpits that will preach the old Gospel with the old incisiveness. It is high time that this work were begun.

For myself, I must confess that I should starve if I had only the theologians of the last decade. I am glad the old are with me and that the New Testament is in my hands. And I am afraid that the people in the pews are starving because there is no clear-cut theology in the pulpit.” And this persecutor was impelled by a sense of duty. Speaking of his experience afterward he says, “I was a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and injurious; but I obtained mercy, because I did it ignorantly in unbelief” (1 Timothy 1:13). The most savage man and the man capable of doing the most dreadful things is the man who is at once conscientious and criminal in his conduct. But this blasphemer, this persecutor, and this injurious man whose name was Saul, suddenly became the peerless preacher we have long called Paul. PAUL, THE Breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, he was journeying to Damascus to bring thence the disciples, when suddenly there shined roundabout him a light from heaven, and he fell to the earth (Acts 9:1-5). A moment more he was asking, “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do”? (Acts 9:6).His conversion was sudden but sure. One moment ready to slay the Lord’s disciples; in the next he declares himself among them. And yet I do not believe the whole change came in that short time. My opinion is that the impression made by Stephen’s sermon never departed from this man’s mind. At the time the sermon was delivered, Saul resented its every sentence, but what matter? “The Word of God is sharper than a two edged sword, dividing asunder even the joints and the marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12).

And when this light broke over Paul, it was of a piece with the light that had played about him when Stephen spake. I have preached to men who have gone out of the house in anger, anathematizing my words solely because they had felt the point of the Sword of the Spirit. A young woman came near breaking up one of my meetings and necessitated a reproof, and afterward penitently confessed that her bad behavior was solely due to her disposition to escape the impressions the Word was making upon her mind. His conversion was attended with a call to preach. The text is, “He is a chosen vessel unto Me, to bear My Name before the Gentiles” (Acts 9:15). If any man is going to succeed in the ministry, his call to preach must be definitely Divine, and divinely definite. There are too many trials and too many temptations, too much of discouragement, too much of difficulty in the way of a Gospel work for any man to attempt it who does not have beneath him an unshakable conviction that God has commissioned him. His success was through the power of the Spirit. Few men ever more clearly apprehended the office of the Holy Ghost than the Apostle Paul; and no man ever enjoyed the guidance of that same Spirit into the truth as it is in Jesus Christ more definitely than he. It was the consciousness of Jesus’ love and the clear appreciation of Jesus’ character and commission that kept him in the straight way, until he could say, “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith” (2 Timothy 4:7). Through all his tribulations, all of his anguish, all of his persecution, famine, nakedness, perils, stripes, imprisonments, he, like Job of old, never lost his hold upon God. And there are few things more pathetic and fewer still more beautiful than to listen to this man, whose family have cast him off, whose nation regards him as a renegade, whose faithfulness to the Truth has brought him to every possible hardship—to penury, persecution, imprisonments, stripes, and even death, saying, “For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39).

Acts 9:32-43

PETER, THE MIRACLE WORKER Acts 9:32HEREIN is an indication of the rapid spread of the Gospel. The Church at this place is easily accounted for when it is remembered that Philip passed from Azotus to Caesarea, preaching in all the cities between (Acts 8:40). The saints at this place were doubtless the fruits of his ministry. Modernists have tried to make it out that Scriptures which have not an evident spiritual intent can have no spiritual profit, and famous writers have even affirmed, “There are whole pages of the Old Testament that can in and of themselves by no legitimate method be made to minister to the soul’s welfare and evidently were not written for that purpose,” and yet one of the most recent writers, and one who is not unacceptable to critics themselves, has called attention to a number of instances by which men have been converted by the very passages intended in that remark. It might not seem a matter of special interest that Philip moved from Azotus to Caesarea, and preached as he passed through the cities, but in it is a historic base for this report concerning Peter’s find at Lydda, and had to do with the creation there of an atmosphere in which Peter could do such marvelous works, and marvelous they are. The remaining part of the 9th chapter and the 10th of Acts recites miracles not exceeded, and gives occasion to a discussion under three heads: The Miracles of Peter, The Mission of Peter and The Message of Peter. THE OF PETER The text makes it perfectly evident that Æneas was a member of the Church at Lydda, a special saint among the members of that little city. For eight long years he had been bedridden; his malady was most malignant. Palsy had paralyzed him, and while it had not despoiled his spirit, produced in him skepticism or made him the easy victim of morose sorrows, it had rendered him utterly impotent in body. To him Peter came and the record of his healing here is clear and specific. Peter’s address presented Christ as the cure for incurables. Ӕ ?neas, Jesus Christ maketh thee whole: arise, and make thy bed. And he arose immediately” (Acts 9:34), One thing about Christ which could neither be denied nor discredited was His wonder working. Enemies and friends alike were compelled to affirm, “We never saw it on this wise”. The healing was a perfect healing of one for whom men had no hope. That is like Jesus Christ. It is true that God has made a promise, “My grace is sufficient for thee”, which the sick often appropriate, and prove the same in the sweetness of their lives when they truly trust the Word. It is also true that He has promised the sick to “make their bed in their affliction”, and He does temper the pillow to the fevered brow of the believer. It is also true that our God, in Christ, is capable of the yet better and bigger thing, namely, the perfect restoration—“Jesus Christ maketh thee whole”, and Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever. His purpose toward the saint is no less gracious now than in the day of Ӕ ?neas. His proclamation for the saint is no less effective. He is not only the One that “forgiveth all our iniquities”, but He also hath power to “heal all our diseases”. Jesus is none other than Jehovah-Rophi, “I am the Lord that healeth thee”.Joseph Parker truly says, “But you are not the people to wait for such crises in which to invite the Lord’s anointed to your house. Send for Him that day when every table is laden with flowers and every corner of the dwelling is ablaze with His own sunshine.” Doubtless one reason why we have such difficult times to secure the Christ in our houses when sickness smites and sorrow is on and death draws nigh, is in the circumstance that He has not been a welcome guest when all was well. Peter believed Christ to be life for the dead. “Now there was at Joppa a certain disciple named Tabitha, which by interpretation is called Dorcas: this woman was full of good works and alms deeds which she did” (Acts 9:36). God’s answer to prayer begets further faith. The healing of Ӕ ?neas had doubtless spread to Joppa and led the friends of Dorcas to feel that burial was not justified, and to hope that if Peter came, a resuscitation of this dear friend might be expected. That was the effect of healing upon their faith. That a kindred result was accomplished in Peter was made perfectly evident when, in response to their invitation, he went at once and, coming into the home of death, pushed the weeping friends aside, and in secret made his appeal to God, and then, turning to the body, said, “Tabitha, arise!” and apparently experienced no surprise when she opened her eyes, but rather gave her his hand and lifted her up, and when he had called the saints and witnesses, presented her alive. Every answer to prayer effects an increase of faith. There is a strange psychological effect concerning one’s study of his own image as reflected by a mirror. The moment he turns from the mirror, he forgets what manner of man he is, but that mental aberration is not so strange as the speedy forgetting of some work of grace. In that work we have seen Christ, but when tomorrow’s crisis is come, if we could but remember what manner of man He was, we would put our case into His hands with confidence, knowing that with Him it is one, whether He say, “to the sick of the palsy, Arise and make thy bed”, or to the buried dead, “Come forth!” Christ’s promise to His Apostles when He commissioned them to the “lost sheep of the house of Israel” was, “As ye go, preach, saying, The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead”. Peter belonged to that company and is simply exercising here his proper prerogative. Later, when the seventy were sent out, the commission was extended, but the miraculous powers were limited. “Whatsoever city” was their field, “healing the sick” was their privilege, but not so with “raising the dead”. People sometimes say, “If the miracle is continued, and the sick are to be healed, why then do you not raise the dead?” We answer, “The apostolic privilege was one thing, and the privilege of the disciple another.” See Mark 16:17-18. Peter was an Apostle, and when he said to the dead woman, “Arise,” he had back of him a Divine commission, and in his risen Christ, the resurrection power. “Welcome, thou victor in the strife, Almighty now to save! Today we triumph in thy life, Around thine empty grave. “Our greatest foe is put to shame, His short-lived triumph o’er, ‘Our God is with us,’ we exclaim, We fear our foe no more.”Peter’s ministry demonstrated the effectiveness of the miracle as a message. When Ӕ ?neas was made whole, “all that dwelt at Lydda and Saron saw him and turned to the Lord”. It is likely that the word “all” here is used in an accommodating sense, just as we say, “The whole town attended church,” when the congregation is exceedingly great. When Dorcas was raised from the dead, “it was known throughout all Joppa and many believed on the Lord” (Acts 10:42).The one reason why the message is non-effective in many churches is that there is no miracle in the midst. I have in the city of Memphis, Tenn. a friend, Dr. Ben Cox. He once published in the Memphis News Scimitar what he terms a “Confession”, and in that he says, “For a number of years I have been more or less interested in the passages of Scripture in the last chapters of Mark and James, and other places, but have either lacked courage or conviction enabling me to step out on the promises of God. I am frank to confess, I rebelled, as many others do, against the idea of putting a few drops of oil on a person’s forehead when having prayer for the sick. I could see nothing in it. * * * * * * I was led to invite Brother Collins here because the news had come to me of the marvelous manner in which the Lord was blessing him and his associates in New Orleans. I simply expected that he would be here one or two weeks, conducting the noon prayer meeting and perhaps have a short sermon at night.

Nobody in Memphis is more thoroughly surprised and dazed than I am at the marvelous happenings we have witnessed the last three weeks. Very many people are coming to me saying, ‘Dr. Cox, this makes me think of the days when Christ was upon the earth’. “At the beginning of this wonderful revival meeting, I saw scarcely anything in the matter except the blessings brought to the people by the Lord healing the sick in answer to prayer. The tremendous evangelistic feature did not appeal to me; I had not thought of it. I am now thoroughly convinced that Jesus intended these two streams should flow on side by side, as that great Baptist preacher of Boston, Dr. A. J. Gordon, used to contend.

Traditionalists and materialists have dammed up one of these streams, claiming the days of miracles are past, but they do not seem to be able to show the chapter and verse which teaches that the days of miracles are past. Jesus plainly says, ‘Greater works than these shall ye do because I go to My Father’, and as dear Gordon used to put it, ‘The force of the stream is stronger because the source of the stream has been raised.’” People are constantly making evangelistic plans. The average pastor’s study is flooded with evangelistic programs. Year succeeds year and the evangelistic tide ebbs! Why? Because these plans and programs do not anticipate the reappearance of Christ, the Miracle Worker. Men want the salvation of their fellows as the fruits of their own endeavor and it will not come that way. The rejected Christ will be recalled in all His plenitude of power, or the church perish. Evangelism without the miracle is unknown. The miracle without the evangelistic results is equally unknown. The Divine miracle has forever been the entering wedge ‘for evangelism. It is the sign of God in the midst. That true, converts come easily and often! THE MISSION OF PETERThe last sentence of the 9th chapter leads naturally to the story of the 10th—“And it came to pass that he tarried many days in Joppa with one Simon a tanner”. Possibly due to the ceremonial laws of the Jews, the business of tanning was despised. An eminent rabbi is quoted as having said, “It is impossible that the world can do without tanners, but woe to that man who is a tanner.” He was not permitted either residence or shop inside the city limits; hence the significant statement of Simon, the tanner, that “his house was by the seaside.” Peter was beginning to break with Jewish customs when he consented to be entertained by this practical outcast. To lodge with a Jew who was under condemnation is a step toward fellowship with a Gentile who is regarded by the Jews as a dog. But in order to take that step, two visions were essential. The first was granted to Cornelius and the second to Peter himself. And in the study of these two visions, we have Peter’s Response to the First Vision, Peter’s Experience of a Second Vision, and Peter’s Interpretation of the Same. Peter’s response to the first vision. The subject of this vision was Cornelius, a Centurion of the band called the Italian Band, hence a Roman citizen, a Gentile, and yet a devout man, “one who feared God and his whole house”. So far, he had yielded to Jewish teaching, and instead of worshiping many gods, had feared the Name of Jehovah and worshiped Him alone. Faith is always fruiting in righteousness and the result in this instance “was much alms to the people” and constant “prayer.” At three o’clock in the afternoon, an hour often devoted to prayer, the angel of the Lord came to Cornelius and bore testimony that his prayers and alms had come before God for a memorial, and gave direction to “send men to Joppa, and call for one Simon, whose surname is Peter. He lodgeth with one Simon a tanner, whose house is by the seaside. He shall tell thee what thou oughtest to do” (Acts 10:5-6).Men have long debated the question, “Will the heathen be saved?” Some one who relies upon his reason is constantly affirming that it must be so or God will be unjust. “Since the heathen have not had the Gospel, how can they be held responsible for rejecting Christ?” If that argument were sound, missions would be a sin, enlightenment an iniquity. If ignorance is redemption, then woe to the man who lifts its darkened veil and lets in the light! On the other hand, this text makes it fairly clear that a man may be accepted of God without knowing the Name of Christ, but it is when he, himself, has sought to find the true Way and stands ready to receive light from whatever source, and lives up to the light after it comes. There has long been a story current to the effect that Brainerd found in the Northwest an Indian whose custom was to retire daily into the forest and pray to the Great Spirit to pardon his personal sins and save him and his people. We can readily believe that such an Indian was accepted of God, and can even imagine that God may have sent Brainerd to make known to that Indian the more perfect way. It is a truth—Christ is our authority for it—“if any man is willing to do the will of God, he shall know of the teaching”, and it is very doubtful if there has ever been a heart on the earth who truly cried to God ‘for light and life, but some way God got to him both. It may have been the cry of a man like Cornelius that compelled Carey to leave cobbling and sail for India. It may have been the cry of a man like Cornelius in the heart of Africa that drew Livingstone to the Dark Continent. It may have been the cry of a man like Cornelius that brought Morrison across the seas to benighted China; that sent Verbeck to Japan, and Williams to the South Sea Islands. No one will ever measure the might of a sincere petition. If faith as a grain of mustard seed can remove mountains, surely such a faith as that exercised by Cornelius in the mighty God would move Him to create, equip and commission a missionary. A few years since we sent out from the Northwestern Bible School eight or nine young people. Three of them went to India, two to Africa, and two to South America. I do not know; the principle on which the minds of each of these was made up. It is doubtful if they could defend their choice at all, but each of them felt a tug. How do we know but that there was some marvelous medium of spirit through which the cry of men in South America reached the ears of Mr. Lange, or the yearning of some men and women in Africa was committed to Mr. and Mrs.

Rosenau, or the pathetic longing of certain seeking souls in India was brought by the blessed Spirit to the heart and mind of Miss Olson and Miss Johnson and Miss Levang? I do not believe God would let such a man as Cornelius go to his grave in darkness. Peter had to go. An Apostle had to come. Such prayers cannot go unanswered simply because God is God. But in order to respond, Peter himself must experience a vision. Drawn aside from his journey, he went to the top of his host’s house to pray at about the sixth hour. Hunger smote him; a trance came upon him; a sheet descended from Heaven, filled with four-footed beasts and creeping things and fowls of the air. A voice came, “Rise, Peter; kill and eat”. But Peter said, “Not so, Lord, for I have never eaten anything that was common or unclean”. That is a suggestive phrase. It is bad enough to be in Simon the tanner’s house; Jews declare uncleanness is here. But now to eat wild beasts, creeping things and fowls of the air—that is unthinkable to the Jew. But thrice over the command came, and God’s statement, “What God hath cleansed call not thou common”, and the sheet was received up again into Heaven. There is no indication that Peter killed anything or that he ate anything. That was not the purpose of the vision. The purpose was to show him that what God had cleansed was clean indeed, and open the way for a Gentile work. The purpose was to impress him with the ‘fact that if God justify the Gentile and send His Spirit upon the Gentile, he became as surely a saint as was any saved Jew. All of this conspired to prepare Peter to respond to the man that waited without to conduct him to Cornelius’ house. The preacher needs a preparation to preach as surely as the inquirer needs a preparation to hear and to receive. The vision of Cornelius fitted him to hear and to understand, and the vision of Peter fitted him to go and to speak. They came alike from God. In each record an angel appeared, but in no instance did the angel tell the message. God’s ministers are privileged above angels. The Divine program is preached by one’s fellowmen. The Spirit’s voice is not always an audible one, but none the less clear on that account, and the man who obeys it will find properly prepared people to whom to preach. When Philip went down the South way, the Ethiopian treasurer was waiting for his coming. The same Spirit that convicted the treasurer commissioned Philip. Some years ago in Temple, Texas, I rode up and down on an elevator run by a young colored man. One day when there was no one else on the elevator, instead of getting off at my floor, I took a few minutes for conversation with him on the subject of giving his heart to Christ. I did not at the time know exactly why, although I felt prompted to do so. I have ridden with hundreds of other elevator men and had no such impulse. But that day the prompting was clear. Years went by.

I heard nothing from it until I visited Fort Worth, Texas. The meeting in that city was over and I had been at home perhaps a month when I had a letter from a man in far Western Texas, who said, “I have seen by the papers that you were preaching in Fort Worth. I hoped against hope to get away from duties and get down for a day at least to hear you again. You may not remember me, but I am the colored boy who used to run the elevator in the hotel at Temple when you held the meeting there, and to whom you talked one day. As a result of that conversation, I have lived a Christian life for eight years, and you can imagine how much I wanted to see you and tell you what the conversation had meant to me”. If only Christian people yielded to the promptings of the Spirit to bear their testimony, the march of the Church of God would be a continuous victory. But let us further consider Peter’s interpretation of the vision. This call to direct a Roman citizen and a Roman officer into the way of life was at once a commission to the Gentile world and a declaration of the Divine principle, namely, “God is no respecter of persons”. To be sure the Jews are the people of promise and God can never make a promise to any people without keeping His Word; but they were never intended to be the solitary subjects of grace. From the beginning “God so loved the world”, and always in God’s thought of grace there was neither Jew nor Gentile. The great Joseph Parker says, “He will not allow the Jew; to come in by one way and the Gentile to come in by another way. He does not say to the Jew, ‘You shall come up the front avenue; you shall drive to the portals of your father’s house in chariots drawn by steeds of fire, wearing harness of gold, and you Gentiles must come in at midnight by some unfrequented path that will be pointed out to you by some condescending person.’ He says, ‘There is no difference; for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God’. How is it to be then? By ransom, by sacrifice, by propitiation, ‘through faith in His Blood’. Are there those who would have it explained? They must be denied.

Are there those who think of blood in some narrow, common, vulgar, debasing sense? Then they do not take God’s view of the meaning of the term blood. This is not a murder; it is a sacrifice. This is not a measurable quantity of hot fluid rushing from the fountains of life; this is an offering—never to be explained in cold words, yet to be felt when the heart is most tender, penitent, broken, self-helpless. When the heart is in that receptive mood, it will know the meaning of the words, ‘Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world’. Where is boasting then?

Gone! Who can find it? None! By what law is it excluded? The law of works? No, but by the law of faith, the new law, diviner, higher, larger law.” THE MESSAGE OF PETERThe 10th chapter concludes with Peter’s message. This begins with the 34th verse and eventuates in the 48th, and involves some fundamental facts. First, The salvation of all is through the risen and ascended Lord. “The Word which God sent unto the Children of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ; He is Lord of all” (Acts 10:36-43), etc. read for all the world like a declaration of “Christian fundamentals.” The inspiration of the Bible is in the 36th verse, “The Word which God sent”; the declaration of the Deity is in the same verse, “He is Lord of all”. The matchless ministry of the Lord is in the 37th verse, “Was published throughout all Judaea, and began from Galilee, after the baptism which John preached”. His anointing is in the 38th verse, “Anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power”. His miraculous workings are in the same verse, “Healing all that were oppressed of the devil”. His crucifixion is in the 39th verse, “Whom they slew and hanged on a tree”. His resurrection is in the 40th verse, “Him God raised up the third day, and shewed Him openly”.

His commission is in the 42nd verse, “He commanded us to preach unto the people”. His office of judge is in the same verse, “And to testify that it is He which was ordained of God to be the judge of quick and dead”. His Saviourship is in the 43rd verse, “To Him gave all the Prophets witness that through His Name whosoever believeth in Him shall receive remission of sins”.Henry Van Dyke in speaking of “Redemption” makes statements that sound like an interpretation of this Scripture. The inspiration of the service that we render to this world, to our homes, our country, our fellowmen, springs from the recognition that a price has been paid for us; the vital power of noble conduct rises from the deep fountain of gratitude, which flows not with water, but with warm heart’s blood. How, then, shall a like power come into our religion? How shall it be as real, as living, as intimate as our dearest human tie, unless we know and feel that God has paid a price for us, that He has bought us with His own precious life? And this is the truth which the Gospel reveals to us. This is the price of which the text speaks. It is the incarnation, life, sufferings and death of the Son of God. This is the great ransom which has been given for all. He gave Himself to poverty, to toil, to humiliation, to agony, to the Cross. He gave Himself for us, not only for our benefit, but in our place.

He bore the trials and temptations which belong to us. He carried our sins. He endured our punishment. Through torture and anguish He went down to our death. Through loneliness and sorrow He descended into our grave. If it were merely a human being who had done this for us, it would be much.

But since it was a Divine being, it is infinitely more precious. Think of the Almighty One becoming weak, the glorious One suffering shame, the holy One dwelling amongst sinners, the very Son of God pouring out His Blood for us upon the accursed tree! It is this Divinity in the sacrifice that gives it power to reconcile and bind our hearts to God. It is God Himself proving how much He loves us by the price which He is willing to pay for us. It is God Himself manifest in the flesh to redeem us from sin and death, in order that we may belong to Him entirely and forever. Words fail me to express the splendor and might of this great truth as it is revealed in the Holy Scriptures. It is the wisdom of God and the “power of God unto salvation”. It is the supreme revelation of the Divine nature which is like the human nature, and yet so far outshines it as the sun outshines a taper. It tells us what God will do for us, for “He that spared not his own Son, but freely delivered Him up for us, how shall He not also, with Him, freely give us all things?” It tells us what we owe to God, “for He died for all that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him which died for them and rose again”. It is the source and center of a true theology. It is the spring and motive of a high morality. It is the secret of a new life, redeemed, consecrated, sanctified by the Son of God, who “loved us and gave Himself for us”.This redemption is to Jew and Gentile alike by Jesus Christ.“While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on them which heard the Word and they of the circumcision which believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost. “And they heard them speak with tongues and magnify God” (Acts 10:44-46). This was in fulfilment of the Psalmist’s statement, “Thou hast ascended on high, Thou hast led captivity captive; Thou hast received gifts for men; yea, for the rebellious also, that the Lord God might dwell among them” (Psalms 68:18).I am increasingly persuaded that the true interpretation of the Scriptures, “To the Jew first and also to the Gentile”, has had its literal fulfilment. “It was necessary”, according to Paul and Barnabas, “that the Word of God should first have been spoken to you (Jews): but seeing ye put it from you and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles,“For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have sent thee to he a light to the Gentiles that thou shouldst be for salvation unto the ends of the earth” (Acts 13:46).The Jews rejected Christ in His first appearance. With few exceptions they will walk in darkness now until Christ come again. What they refuse to accept by faith, they will be compelled to acknowledge by vision, and so deep will be their grief over the blunder of having put away their own Messiah, that their penitence shall be accepted, and “a nation shall be born in a day”! The conclusion of Peter’s message was the command of baptism.“Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptised, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we?“And he commanded them to be baptised in the Name of the Lord” (Acts 10:47-48).There is a strange argument, made by my Quaker forefathers, that the baptism of the Spirit renders needless the baptism in water. Peter did not so consider. On the contrary, he felt that the inner experience should be immediately symbolized by this outer ceremony. That is what water baptism is. It is the only ceremony that typifies death to sin, burial with Jesus Christ and resurrection to walk in newness of life; and unless it become a symbol of these essential truths, it is indeed a meaningless ceremony. “Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.“For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection;“Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin” (Romans 6:4-6).Types and symbols are sometimes louder than speech itself. Certainly that is a truth concerning the ordinance of baptism when properly administered. In the language of the great Moravian writer, “Witness ye men and angels, now Before the Lord we speak, To Him we make our solemn vow A vow we dare not break; “That, long as life itself shall last Ourselves to Christ we yield; Nor from His cause will we depart, Or ever quit the field.”