Bible Commentaries

Chapter65

Prayer

Almighty God, everything is in thine hands. It is thine to set up and to pull down; to make rich and to make poor. It is well. "Even Acts 18:1-6

1. After these things he departed from Athens [ Acts 1:4], and came to Corinth [Julius Csar had rebuilt Corinth, constituting it a colony and the provincial capital, Acts 1:12. It was now again, after lying waste from b.c146 to b.c46 , the greatest commercial city in Greece, while Athens was but a superannuated university town, Acts 17:21].

2. And he found a certain Jew named Aquila, a man of Pontus by race, lately come from Italy [from Rome, his dwelling-place, whither also he returned, Romans 16:3] with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had commanded all the Jews to depart from Rome [Suetonius tells us the name of the chief agitator of the Jews was Chrestus; not "Christus," which name he rightly spells when mentioned. Chrestus was a common slave name].

3. And he came unto them; and because he was of the same trade, he abode with them, and they wrought [to assume that Aq. and Pris. were Christians already, in order to account for Paul's intimacy with them, is both gratuitous and ignores the actual reason, the Jewish custom, which Luke gives]: for by their trade they were tent-makers [tent-tailors. A Cilician industry; the goat-hair rugs themselves were called cilicia].

4. And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and persuaded Jews and Greeks [proselytes of the gate].

5. But when Silas [ Acts 17:10] and Timothy [ Acts 17:14-15] came down from Macedonia [from Thessalonica, whither, on second thoughts—comp. Acts 17:15 with 1 Thessalonians 3:1—Paul had directed Timothy to go], Paul was constrained by the word [G. "seized upon by the word." The opposite experience is when the minister has difficulty in "finding a text"!], testifying to the Jews that Jesus was the Christ [Messiah].

6. And when they opposed themselves [to this word], and blasphemed, he shook out his raiment [ Matthew 23:35; Romans 13:2], and said unto them, Your blood be upon [ 2 Thessalonians 1:8] your own heads; I am clean; from henceforth I will go unto the Gentiles [ Acts 13:46].

At Corinth

"PAUL departed from Athens." The Athenians said when they left him, "We will hear thee again of this matter." How like selfish human talk that is! They forgot, what we too forget, that there are two parties in every contract. When did it occur to a selfish man that he had anything to consider but his own purpose and his own convenience? It did not occur to the Athenian mind that perhaps Paul himself would not be there the next day! "Paul departed"—the sun goes, the preacher ceases to preach, the vain hearer says, "I will hear thee again concerning these things," and perhaps when that hearer returns Paul is not there! How then? We think the sun will always be present. We take for granted that our mercies, privileges, and opportunities will always be available. This is vanity; this is selfishness; this is the very sin of sin. We read in sacred Scripture that "the door was shut." The laggards came again and found that the door was shut. They never thought about the door being possibly closed! We think we can go to church when we like, and take up the broken hymn where we left it. Some day we shall find that "the door is shut." We go back to Mars" Hill and find the teacher gone. "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord "—the famine that kills the soul! Whilst Paul is available make the most of him. Whilst the Redeemer tarries tarry along with the sacred Presence. "Seek ye the Lord while he may be found; call ye upon him while he is near." There have been those who went away to buy oil for themselves, and when they came back the chance was gone; there was nothing left but the outer darkness! Now is the accepted time!

"Paul departed from Athens and came to Corinth," the apostolic journey, as we have seen, of about forty miles. Probably he did not go by road; that might have taken him a long time. The supposition is that he crossed by water for about five hours, and then walked some eight miles to Corinth, and Corinth did not know he had come! The only event that lifts up Corinth in history was an event that Corinth knew nothing of! Corinth was the Venice of Southern Greece, so situated as to catch two civilizations—the east and the west; and a right gay city was Corinth! The Corinthians could drink and dance and follow the devil through all the mazes of his pranks and antics! The Corinthians were skilled in sin. There was no city superior to it in its devotion to the altar of darkness. A little blear-eyed Jew went into it with a sore heart, and Corinth that night sang as loudly, drank as deeply, showed its finery with as base and vain a profusion as if the wandering Jew had never been born! The man may have come into London last night who will invest the metropolis with its sublimest fame. Poor man! living in one of the poorest lodging-houses in all the city, perhaps having hardly enough to pay for this morning's breakfast—perhaps he may be in this house. We do not know what is happening. Give us drink enough, meat enough, drum and trumpet and dance enough, and what care we what Jew or Gentile is making his way amongst us? We have no eye but for purple and fine linen, and no palate but for sumptuous fare. Poor Jew with the Christian fanaticism in his heart! Poor, ill-shapen Jew, laughed at by every man of form and nobleness, with an idea in his mind that the world is to be saved by the Cross! Put him in anywhere, his room is better than his company. All things fail but truth. The fine gold becomes dim, and the canker-worm eats the fine clothing, and the painted cheek shows at last its well concealed ghastliness, and the noble frame falls down a meal for death, a festival for worms! But truth, spiritual truth—the kind of truth that gets down through the fancy, imagination, taste, feeling, right away into the very heart's heart, that lives when gorgeous palaces and Corinthian grandeurs and vanities are forgotten—this is immortality. Not iron, or brass, or things of outward beauty made with hands, but the inner loveliness, the meek and quiet spirit, the pure heart, the truth-loving mind, the soul that yearns for God—these shall abide. The sun himself shall sink in years, but the truth of the living God will be the light of the universe when that poor celestial spark is utterly forgotten!

Had the visit to Athens been without advantage? We were sorry for Paul when he turned away from the Athenian city, mocked by Athenian taste. We felt grieved that such a fire should have been extinguished by such indifference. Was the visit, then, wholly without advantage? No. It involved a great lesson to Paul upon the art and mystery of preaching. He preached better at Corinth than he did at Athens. We noticed that in his Athenian discourse there was hardly an evangelical tone. It was a classical speech; it was addressed to a speculative question; it involved that which was practical indeed, but the whole subject was approached in a philosophical spirit. Men are not philosophers, and that is the reason why philosophy seldom touches them. He who speaks to the heart is the true Christian philosopher. In going his forty miles from Athens, Paul seems to have said to himself, "No more preaching like that for me. Give me another chance and I will preach in another tone." So when he came to Corinth he did, and when he wrote to the Corinthians he said, in the second chapter of his First Epistle, "And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of Acts 18:7-11

7. And he departed thence [from the synagogue, where the words of the previous verse were spoken], and went into the house of a certain man named Titus Justus, one that worshipped God [a proselyte], whose house joined hard to the synagogue.

8. And Crispus [ 1 Corinthians 1:14], the ruler of the synagogue, believed in the Lord [G. believed the Lord], with all his house; and many of the Corinthians hearing believed, and were baptized.

9. And the Lord said unto Paul in the night by a vision: Be not afraid, but speak, and not hold thy peace;

10. For I am with thee, and no man shall set on thee to harm thee, for I have much people in this city.

11. And he dwelt [G. "tarried," as Luke 24:49] there a year and six months, teaching the Word of God among them [writing thence two Ep. to the Thess, the earliest of all the N. T. writings].

Encouragements—Divine and Human

IN the fifth verse we read that "Paul was pressed in the spirit;" in the seventeenth chapter and the sixteenth verse we read that Paul's "spirit was stirred in him." In both cases there was a paroxysm. It was not a little transient excitement, or momentary ruffling of the feelings, it was really what we ourselves never feel now—agony. He could stand it no longer; his soul was in pain. He would have been more accustomed to it now. Would God we could recall our early enthusiasm, our virgin passion, our first burning hate of sin. We are familiar with it; we pat its black head! There was a time when Paul could not look upon idolatry without his soul writhing in pain, and when he could not look upon Jewish obstinacy and unbelief without his breast heaving with violent paroxysm. We can now drive through whole miles of idolatry, unbelief, worldliness, and sensuality, and sit down at the other end to the smoking feast, as if we had come through hell blindfolded. Familiarity has its acute and terrible danger. Paul was a man of conviction. He really believed in his soul that there was no other name given under heaven among men whereby they could be saved but the name of Christ. That faith will not lodge in the same heart with indifference. That faith wants a whole heart to itself. It says, "If this salvation is worth anything, it is worth everything." That old martyr-faith is dead.

In the sixth verse we read, "And when they opposed themselves"—literally, set themselves in battle array—"and blasphemed, he shook his raiment [symbolically], and said unto them, Your blood be upon your own heads; I am clean: from henceforth I will go unto the Gentiles." We do sometimes long to be missionaries; to plough a virgin soil; to name the name of Christ to men for the very first time; to meet men to whom the Gospel would be news. Paul did not say he would give up the work. Paul was not the man to lay hold upon the plough of the heavenly kingdom, and to turn back; Paul would not even keep company with a young man who had broken faith with him in the Christian work; so if he himself had at last broken down in the middle of it, surely then the pillars of heaven would have been rottenness, and earth's base built on stubble! He went clear through with it to the end. The old Paul—"such an one as Paul the aged"—sat down and said, "I have fought a good fight"; lay back in his bed, and said, "I have finished my course." Let us never give up the work. We may give up this corner of the vineyard or that; we may leave localities, but we must not leave the Cross. We may turn in vexation of soul from stolid unbelief and preach to ignorant and bewildered heathenism, but do not let the work have less of our energy because we have been disappointed in this or that particular circle.

A little encouragement would cheer us now. One ray of sunlight shooting athwart this gathering gloom would make us young again. Here it is in the seventh verse. Paul departed from that quarter of Corinth, "and entered into a certain man's house, named Justus, one that worshipped God, whose house joined hard to the synagogue. And Crispus, the chief ruler of the synagogue, believed on the Lord with all his house; and many of the Corinthians hearing, believed and were baptized." "One that worshipped God"! Is there any greater phrase in all human speech? Perhaps you are waiting in order to know something about God before you worship him. You can never know anything about God except—GOD! But the little, inventive, ingenious, industrious, fussy human brain wants to define God and classify his attributes, and practise upon him a kind of spiritual vivisection. The firmament will not be taken to pieces! I preach GOD, not some view of God. If you begin to have "views" of God, you will begin to have sects and classes, orthodoxies and heterodoxies, divisions, and whole libraries of pamphlets with nothing in them but words. Worship is greater than any definition of worship. God is the undefinable term. The soul knows him, but cannot get the mouth to speak Him. In this stupendous temple words may soon be lies. What is your feeling? Is there an uprising in your heart that can only say, "Abba!" "Father!" That uprising of the heart is the miracle of Christ, the inward and wondrous working of the Holy Ghost. Why do you not order back your obtrusive intellect, and tell it to be still in the presence of such an experience? Many of us could be almost good if we could hold our tongues! Some of us could almost pray if we were dumb!

When Crispus, the chief ruler of the synagogue, believed, many of the Corinthians thought they would believe too. A quaint commentator has said that great men are the looking-glasses into which ordinary men look to see what they ought to be like. There was much human nature among the Corinthians! It is so with all departments of life and thought. This is not an argument on one side only, but on every side of human life. What we want, then, is courage on the part of those whose influence is legitimately beneficial and extensive. If you, the head of the house, could say, "Let us worship God," many within the house might respond affectionately and earnestly, "So be it." We must have leadership—may that leadership always be in an upward and solar direction.

A little encouragement now, I say, would come in well. Here it is again in the ninth verse, in another form. "Then spake the Lord to Paul in the night by a vision, Be not afraid, but speak, and hold not thy peace; for I am with thee, and no man shall set on thee to hurt thee: for I have much people in this city." These words express a Divine encouragement; they are addressed to every sincere heart; they were not spoken once for all and limited to a personality and a place, they are spoken from the heavens every day to every earnest labourer. The time of visions has not gone for ev. To-day it is possible to hold heart-to-heart fellowship with God. Even now the spirit can assure itself that it is reading the very will of God and doing the very behest of heaven. Paul was accustomed to visions. The first vision startles a man; the second is expected; the third longed for; and the last hailed with thankfulness and expectation, for it is the vision of heaven—the vision of rest. God took the census of Corinth from a religious point of view; he said, "I have much people in this city." He was going to work miracles in Corinth. Apparently there was not a saint in the whole place. As Athens was "wholly given to idolatry," so Corinth was, apparently, wholly given to sensuality. We cannot tell where God's people are. The ancient prophet thought that he alone was left; but God told him that he knew of seven thousand who had not bowed the knee to Baal. Surely there are more good and brave souls and Christ-worshippers and Christ-seekers than we have yet supposed. I see no reason why in the presence of this tenth verse we should not take a more hopeful view of human society. "How can I give thee up?" Even yet he expects some of us to pray; even yet he knows that many of us will come home. The Christian Gospel is not an exclusive one; whoever is excluded from its hospitality is self-expelled. God is looking for his own. He is looking for the religious among the irreligious; and one of the most gracious surprises in store for the Church is that there will be more people in God's pure home—heaven—than it may have entered into the most generous human heart to conceive or venture to anticipate.

But the twelfth verse seems to contradict the vision. We no sooner hear of the vision than we learn that "the Jews made insurrection with one accord against Paul, and brought him to the judgment seat, saying, This fellow persuadeth men to worship God contrary to the law." What a violent transition in personal experience! At night, lost in the ecstasies of Divine fellowship, in the morning dragged before the judgment seat by an incensed mob! Is it thus that Providence contradicts itself? Apparently Acts 18:12-17

12. But when [after this quiet year-and-a-half] Gallio was proconsul of Achaia [i.e, in53,54 a.d. Tacitus tells us that Gallio, the brother of Seneca, was likewise put to death by Nero], the Jews with one accord rose up against Paul, and brought him before the judgment seat,

13. Saying, this man persuadeth men to worship God contrary to the [i.e, Moses"] law.

14. But when Paul was about to open his mouth, Gallio said unto the Jews, If indeed it were a matter of wrong or of wicked villainy, O ye Jews, reason would that I should bear with you [suffer you to proceed with the case]:

15. But if they are questions about words and names and your own law [G. "the law which concerns you"] look to it yourselves; I am not minded [G. "inclined"] to be a judge of these matters [this just judgment of the secular judge is styled by the persecutor of Servetus, "atheistic"].

16. And he drave [G. "dismissed," see Dem272 , 11 , 1373 , 12] them from the judgment seat.

17. And they [the bystanders] all laid hold on Sosthenes, the ruler of the synagogue [not the Sosthenes of1Corinthians1 , who was apparently not a Corinthian], and beat him before the judgment seat. And Gallio cared for none of these things [took no official note of them].

Reports of Christian Service

HAVE you ever considered how extremely appropriate to all ages is the sentiment which inspires this report? As usual, our endeavour is to find out what is modern as well as what is ancient in the text. The report which is given of Paul's work in the thirteenth verse is exactly the report which is being given today by hostile journalists, critics, and hearers of Christian truth. Again and again, as you can bear witness, I have begged you, as fellow students of the sacred Word, not to put away from you the apostolic annals as if they belonged to a society that lived nineteen centuries ago. To-day Christianity is suffering from the perverted reports of its spirit and its service, which are being rendered by those who are hostile to its claims. We report ourselves. Even when we attempt to report the most simple and patent facts, we cannot separate the personality of the reporter from the report which he renders. There are bad men who undertake to repor" what Christians are doing! What can be the report of such men but a perversion? Even if the exact letters could be chosen to represent the exact occurrences there would be wanting the subtle music of sympathy, the tender spirit of love, the high influence which comes of personal identification with the thing which is being reported. You cannot report with the hand alone. You must, if you would truly report spiritual doctrine and heroic service, report with the heart. Do not take any bad man's report of any Christian service he may have attended; do not take any worldly man's report of it; do not listen to the unsympathetic narrator of Christian occurrences. All these men lack the one thing that is needful, the inexplicable sympathy, the subtle and wordless masonry of oneness of heart with the worker who is toiling and with the work which is being attempted. This lesson overflows with instruction; it touches an infinite area of thought and service. No man is qualified to report a religious meeting who is not himself religious. He can tell who rose and sat down, and give some kind of abstract of what was said; but there will be wanting from it the aroma, the fragrance, the heavenliness, which gave it all its gracious power. This has a wide bearing upon all matters religious and theological. We misreport one another, therefore, we had better not report one another at all. We believe in God, but we are often reported as only believing something about God. That is a lie! We believe in Jesus Christ the Saviour of the world, and yet we are only reported as believing something about him. Now wherever the word "about" comes in it qualifies the thing that is referred to; and we are not saved by our qualifications of terms and doctrines, but by our inward and often speechless FAITH. We are saved by faith, and we have no explanation of it that can satisfy ourselves. But how little progress I make as a teacher in this direction! You need not discourage me by further obstinacy; I am already sufficiently discouraged. The fussy, mechanical, irrepressible mind wants to write down something about God, and thus create a field of battle, for no two men believe identically, absolutely, inclusively, and finally, the same things about any great question. You can have spiritual faith without Acts 18:18-23

18. And Paul having tarried after this yet many days [after the conclusion of the year-and-a-half of security, and after the Jews" abortive attempt] took his leave of the brethren, and sailed thence for Syria, and with him [sailed] Priscilla and Aquila; having shorn his [not Paul"s, but Aquila's head. G. "and Aquila shorn as to his head," an idiom which the Vulgate rightly translates by, "Aquila, who had shorn his head in Cenchrea, for he had a vow"] head in Cenchrea; for he had a vow [the Revisers, by their punctuation of the Greek text, separate the adjective from Aquila and so shave Paul].

19. And they [Priscilla and Aquila "with Paul," Acts 18:18. They sailed; they came; he left them] came to Ephesus, and he left [ceased to lodge with] them there; but he himself ["by himself," or "for his part"] entered into the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews.

20. And when they asked him to abide a longer time he consented not.

21. But taking his leave of them, and saying, I will return again unto you, if God will, he set sail from Ephesus [the words omitted were supplied by copyists from Acts 20:16].

22. And when he had landed at Csarea, he went up and saluted the [Csarean] Church, and went down to Antioch [for Syria, Acts 18:18, was his destination. Note the summary account of the journey from Corinth to Antioch].

23. And having spent some time there, he departed [on his third missionary journey], and went through the region of Galatia and Phrygia [i.e, Lycaonia] in order [as before], stablishing all the disciples.

Preparing for Labour

PAUL had conquered his position in Corinth. He seemed to have acquired a right to remain there. The battle had raged and Paul had been brought into rest, and confidence had been established, in some degree, between himself and the Corinthian public. Paul, seeing an opportunity of doing very much good, consented to remain there, and to work constructively rather than disputatiously. But Paul "took his leave of the brethren." This is a new tone in the narrative. Paul has not often gone away from a city in this quiet, friendly, and social manner; Paul's going out has often been amidst tumult, battle, evil-feeling, and malignant criticism and treatment. Paul now must take leave of the brethren. He has a purpose which he must carry out; that purpose will presently come before us in a few significant words. The intention was in the Apostle's heart a long time before he expressed it, and it gave, no doubt, a subtle pathos and tenderness to a good deal of his concluding service in Corinth. When his tone became sweeter and tenderer; when his appeals were more urgent and ardent, people around him might wonder at the change of accent and emphasis. They would say, "Is this premonitory? Is the spirit of death already upon him? Is he talking from under a shadow that will presently deepen into the final gloom? How sweetly he now speaks! how gracious is his whole manner! how the old rigour and sternness have become subdued! and how like a little child is this foremost of disputants, this invincible assailant of evil!" The explanation was that Paul had made up his mind to go to Jerusalem and there complete a Levitical obligation. Over part of the road he took with him Priscilla and Aquila. But their names did not come before us in this order when we first made their acquaintance. Then they were husband and wife, new they seem to be wife and husband. There is an order in these things; there is a subtle primacy of influence, character, and spiritual genius which asserts itself naturally, and which has to be carefully looked for because of its unobtrusive-ness. It would be easy to read the eighteenth verse without noticing that Priscilla comes before Aquila. Who noticed that change of relation in the public reading of the Word? Does it not seem as if Priscilla ought to be a greater Christian teacher than Aquila? What can he know of the interior of the faith-temple, the love-life, the sacrifice which is Christianity translated into its native tongue? It is not the man that should preach, but the woman always. The man should be but tolerated, for what can he know of spiritual mystery, of religious instinct, of that sharp, clear vision which, taking little heed of the letter, sees the angel behind it, and that angel, looking back to the woman's heart, what only a woman's heart can see? My wonder Acts 18:24-28

24. Now [—while Paul was progressing through Phrygian Galatia towards Ephesus, God was preparing his way in that city:] a certain Jew named Apollos, an Alexandrian by race, a learned [G. "eloquent"] Acts 19:3-4]:

26. And he began to speak boldly in the synagogue. But when Priscilia and Aquila heard him, they took him unto them, and expounded unto him the way of God more carefully [G. "with fuller accuracy"].

27. And when he was minded to pass over into Achaia, the brethren encouraged him, and wrote to the disciples to receive him [ 1 Corinthians 3:1. Note this evidence of a Church having been founded at Ephesus]: and when he was come, he helped them much which had believed [which he did] through grace:

28. For [as only grace could have enabled him to do] he powerfully confuted the Jews, and that publicly, showing by the Scriptures that Jesus was the Christ [ 1 Corinthians 3:6. Bengel's note on Apollos is, "he watered, but did not plant"].

A New Man In the Church

HOW marvellous is the preeminence of individual men. Herein is the continual miracle of daily Providence. The great man always comes; yet few can tell how or whence. God is pleased to make sudden revelations of power. He is pleased to surprise men themselves by unexpected accessions of strength, so that the feeble man becomes as the mighty, and the obscure man steps up to the very summit of prominence and renown. Elijah comes without warning, and is Elijah all at once. Other men have been found on the same lines and have challenged society with equal suddenness. Men are so much alike up to a given point, and then without potent reason they separate from one another into individualities, assuming distinctive colours, and going out on separate and independent missions. It is not the first hundred feet that give a mountain its name, but the last ten feet. Just that little peak will get the mountain a name among mountains; that little hardly visible outline will create the fame of the hill. It is so that God is always distributing human power, talent, and influence. We have very much in common, and then after that which is common we have that which is individual, and so become particularized into glittering units, each standing alone, yet each having subtle relations to the whole. Study the miracle of the succession of the generations, those of you who have what you call your "doubts" about historical miracles. The anecdotal miracles have passed away, but there is an eternal miracle, and men would see it but for the impoverishing familiarity which takes no notice of the sunlight because it is so regular, so common, and so plentiful. Yet we are all one, centrally and morally. The little bird that can fly seems to have a larger liberty than man who can only walk; but the air is only the wider earth—it is all earth; the air belongs to us, and though birds can fly in it, they never get away from the earth really. So with the great mental eagles, flying souls, minds that open the broad pinions of immeasurable power and flap them at heaven's gate—they all belong to us; they are bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. Argumentative Paul and eloquent Apollos are brethren with us, sitting at the same table and kneeling at the same altar. If we could get that view of our leaders we should destroy all envy, suspicion, distrust, rivalry, and jealousy, because Apollos would be my larger self, and Paul in his noblest moods would be myself transfigured. We should glorify God in the greatness of our brethren.

Let us look at the preeminence of Apollos and study the characteristics which were natural and inimitable and those which were acquired and therefore possible of reproduction by ourselves. Apollos was "an eloquent man," and therefore his temptations were great. It is difficult for any eloquent man to be what is popularly known as honest It is a tremendous trial of integrity, as usually understood, to have great command of language. Do not suppose that the eloquent man hears his own eloquence as we hear it; he is told about it. If he be artificial in his eloquence he hears every tone of it; but if inspiredly eloquent he is himself a hearer as well as a speaker. How does it come to be almost impossible for an eloquent man to be popularly considered as honest? Because he sees so many colours in words, so many critical variations of meaning. He does not speak with broad vulgarity any word that he utters; and when I suggest the difficulty of an eloquent man being honest I am bound to add that he is often thought to be dishonest when he is not really so. He is speaking another language. Some persons have only two colours—black and white. What can they know of the revelations of colour which God has granted to these latter times? Some voices have only two movements—loud and low, they have no internal line, no broken, mysterious, weird tones. They are either speaking very loudly or very lowly, and they know nothing of the mystery of the mind which sees a whole apocalypse in the action of intonation. In English we have only two numbers. We are a concise people; we speak of "singular and plural." But there are other languages that have more numbers than two. In English we have but three cases; but there are other languages that have six cases, as many of my junior hearers know only too painfully. In a language that divides everything into singular and plural there can be, so far, no great mystery. In a language that has only the nominative, possessive, and objective he would be a backward boy who could not master that little variety of case in one short day. But where language becomes more subtle, complicated, and involved, men may be saying things which to the simpler mind appear to be of the nature of tergiversation and even lying, which are in their substance critically and punctiliously true. We know that there are men among us—healthy men—of large and active digestion, who say, "Yes or no!" They mistake their abruptness for frankness, and their violence for candour. "Yes" and "No" are not the poles of truth and integrity. Here Apollos cannot be reproduced by us. Eloquence cannot be acquired; it is the gift of tongues.

Apollos was not only "eloquent," he was "fervent in the spirit." There he may not be imitated. You can paint fire, but it will never warm you. Fire is the gift of God. He fixes the temperature of the blood, the scope and fervour of the mind. Men who are not fervent are not to be blamed. You would not blame a man for being born blind. You are not cruel in your judgment of a man who is lame from his birth. In those physical instances you can see the meaning of the truth; that same truth has also its inner and spiritual meaning with regard to intellectual faculties and moral qualities. Fire can read the Scriptures; fire is at home in the Bible. It is like blaze mingling with blaze when fervent Apollos reads burning Isaiah. How the flames leap together and form one grand oblation at the altar of the sun! The difficulty here is lest men who are not fervent should blame men who are fervent; and lest fervent men should be impatient with men who are not fervent. Here also we belong to one another. Human nature is incomplete without the smallest, youngest, frailest child that ever crawled in the dust. The door must not be shut upon the gathered hosts until the last little creeper has been brought in and sat at the Father's table. Men who are not fervent are often most useful. There is a purpose to be served in the economy of things by ice as well as by fire—only do not let them quarrel. Do not let ice say, "You, fire, exaggerate things"; and do not let fire say, "You, ice, are an offence to every planet that burns in the sky." We are all treated by the same Maker, and we shall be judged by Infinite Justice.

Apollos was not only "eloquent" and "fervid," he was "mighty in the Scriptures." There we cannot imitate him. Might in Bible reading is the gift of God. It is a wondrous word. To read the Bible so as to become mighty in it requires insight, sympathy, kinship with the writers, a spiritual knowledge of the language, identification with the Spirit of God. All men cannot read—some schoolmasters cannot read; some preachers cannot read. Therein so many blunders are made. To become mighty in the Scriptures is to know such a variety of mind: Moses, and the prophets, and the minstrels of Israel, and Christ, and the Apostles—who can comprehend all that gamut of inspired utterance? We may be able to repeat every word of the Bible, and yet know nothing about the inner Scriptures. The Scriptures are in the Bible; the Scriptures are within the Scriptures. "The letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life." We can toil at this service. Some of us can understand one portion of Scripture who cannot understand another. We must not begrudge one another the partial gift, nor endeavour to reduce it to contempt. There are some hearts mighty in the Psalm; there are other minds mighty in the histories of the Bible; there are others with a special gift for taking hold of, and explaining, Christ. We must all work together. No one minister is the whole ministry. To hear the sermon which is preached in London today you must add all the individual sermons, and when they have gathered themselves up into one sublime thunder, you have heard the sermon preached today in the name of Christ. You should go further still and take in, not one capital, but all cities, not one empire, but all kingdoms, nations, and states; add into one mighty sum all that has been spoken in them, and then you will have preached in the ear of inspired fancy the complete sermon heard today respecting Jesus Christ. I claim for every servant his own place; for every minister his own special vocation; and I would have every teacher, minister, speaker, honoured according to the particular gift that is in him.

Apollos was not only "eloquent," "fervent," and "mighty in the Scriptures"; he was "instructed in the way of the Lord." There we may join him. He spoke through instruction, which is the surest basis of inspiration. We are not to suppose that inspiration excludes instruction. Instruction is the proof of inspira-tion—that is to say, the inspired Word so comes down into the life as to prove itself along the line of our intelligence and moral responsibility. How few people are "instructed in the way of the Lord." There is nothing in this world more astounding than its ignorance. There are preachers gifted with an imagination, I know not whence descended, that speak of "this large and intelligent assembly"; you cannot tell anything about the intelligence of an assembly until you have examined man by man alone in any book in the sacred record. There is a gift of kind heaven by which a man can publicly look much wiser than he really is. "Instructed in the way of the Lord." Why, these words involve the devotion of a lifetime. The "way of the Lord" is in the deep waters, and in the secret places, and in the tabernacles of the thunder, and the clouds are the dust of his feet. He speaks riddle and enigma, and utters words that startle us by reason of their peculiarity and utter strangeness. What scope for industry! What a field for teachableness!

So far Apollos out-soars us, but this cannot be all; even in Apollos there must be a weak point. Let us find it out—indeed no long quest is needed, for we are told distinctly in the twenty-fifth verse that Apollos knew "only the baptism of John." If he could be so eloquent about water, what will he be when he comes to speak of blood? We shall find this man doing wonders in the Church. If he could burn so in the very soul when he knew only the initial baptism, what will he be when he sees and feels the Cross, the Blood, the Sacrifice, and understands somewhat of the forgiveness of sins, and the glory of immortality, and the splendour of the Christian heaven? It is possible to teach even the alphabet earnestly. Apollos knew only the alphabet, but he taught the separate letters as if they were separate poems. It is quite possible to repeat the alphabet as though it contained nothing, and it is possible to repeat the letters of the alphabet as if they were the beginnings of temples, libraries, and whole heavens of intelligence and revelation and spiritual possibility. The fervent man touches everything with his fervour; even when he repeats the alphabet it is repeated as with fire. Do not despise the teachers who are not teaching exactly the fulness of the Gospel. If they are teaching up to the measure of their intelligence, thank God for their co-operation. There are men in all great cities who are teaching the baptism of John , who are teaching the elements of morality, and who are endeavouring to save the world by political elevation and the larger political truth. They must not be undervalued; they must not be talked about scornfully; they ought to be treated exactly as Aquila and Priscilla treated Apollos. If the offer of further information is declined or resented, the offer has been made and the responsibility has thus been discharged. But do not despise men who do not teach your particular phase of doctrine. They may be earnest and not belong to your Church; they will, however, show their earnestness by their teachableness. The moment a man, in the Church or out of it, puts on the priest and enters a claim for personal infallibility, that moment he is a trespasser in the sanctuary of God. The oldest of us has hardly begun his lesson; the wisest of us will be the first to receive another suggestion; the most advanced scholar will be the most docile learner. You may not have come to my Gospel of forgiveness of sins through the blood of the Cross, but you are here, in the sacred place, to-day—I will set that fact down to your credit. If you go to church I will make that out a line in your favour. You may not have travelled far along the road, but your face is in the right direction, and that is a circumstance that must not be undervalued. The Cross of Christ was set up not to destroy men's lives, but to save them.

"Aquila and Priscilla took Apollos unto them and expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly." Thus, in an indirect way, Apollos became a pupil of St. Paul himself. Paul will probably one day get hold of him, and when the two fires meet the light will be seen and the warmth will be felt afar. These men are ours. The sun belongs to the very poorest man that lives. The sun belongs to the blind man who can only feel the warm beam upon his dark face. The great things are all ours. We cannot go into the rich man's house or room and warm our cold hands at his blazing fire; but the coldest child can hold up its little hands to God's sun, and, so to speak, bathe them in its impartial warmth. The capital of the country belongs to every villager. The obscure dweller in the obscure hamlet cannot claim the secondary cities in the same way in which he can claim the metropolis. The metropolis does not belong to any one particular set of inhabitants; it is the Imperial city; it belongs to every one in the whole empire. To go to the metropolis is indeed to go to the mother city; to go, in a sense, home, and to have some well-established right to be there. So with the great Pauls and Apolloses, and the mighty speakers and teachers, poets and thinkers—they belong to us, every one. The language of the country belongs to every man, woman, and child in the country, simply because of its largeness. If it were a patois it would belong to its valley, or a particular hill-side; but being the pure speech of the country it belongs to every one who can utter its words; and it is "enough to fill the ambition of a common man that Chatham's language was his mother-tongue." So the higher we go the more we own. "All things are yours; whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours; and ye are Christ"s, and Christ is God's." This is Paul's own inventory of our property; let us claim it, every whit and line.