Acts 9:17-19 And Ananias went his way, and entered into the house; and putting his hands on him said, Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus… We entertain no doubt that we have here a simplest history of what actually occurred. We doubt no less that the chiefest interest and significance of the record lie in the spiritual history that underlies it. Nay, more, though we read facts of outer life, they do nothing mere than outline those of an inner life, which Jesus notices, loves, helps, and even makes. Notice - I. THE CHANGE THAT PASSES ON SAUL. He receives his sight. For three days he had been blind in a bodily sense, but for probably three and thirty years he had been blind in the other sense. And this is just what he had been. He had not been vicious, immoral, sottish, nor an infidel, nor irreverent toward all religious truth and feeling. But he had been blind - blind to the very type of human nature. And his blindness is but the type of that of every one of us, till he "receives his sight from the Lord Jesus." II. THE HUMAN HAND AND VOICE BY AID OF WHICH THE BLESSING IS CONVEYED. If Jesus had been in a literal sense upon the earth, he would have spoken to Saul, he would have laid his own hands upon him. The actual ministry, the visible ministry, is passed, however, now into human agency. This was a plain-spoken statement of it. How great the honor laid on men! and how great their responsibility by this devolution of the highest and holiest functions! How full of solemn and inspiring suggestion, too little traced out in devout thought by us - that the actual work which for a space of time Jesus' own voice and hand had attended to, are now to be attended to by man, fellow-man. 1. That work, that ministry of service to the soul of a fellow-creature, finds out very soon and very surely all that is of the nature of sympathy. It tries sympathy it wakes it, it increases it. The fearful Anamas and distrustful of one hour ago finds, and no doubt honestly, the word "brother" now on his lip - " Brother Saul." 2. Jesus himself became genuinely a Brother to those he came to save, not by virtue of his Divine power and practical pity only. That his might be the very type of brotherliness, he took our nature on him, and made himself Brother (Hebrews 2:11, 17). And when he ascended, his representatives are to be found in those who were men alone. That what might seem the unnecessary thing is here done, in a man being sent with the mere message of regiven sight, and the mere formality of "laying on hands" where no virtue could pass, must mean all the more to set honor on the spiritual work which one man should do for others. III. THE ONE DIVINE SOURCE FROM WHICH, NEVERTHELESS, ALL SAVING HELP CAME. 1. Jesus sends Ananias. He has directed him, and where necessary corrected him also. He has fixed the time, and hastens the lingering step of Ananias. 2. Jesus, who "began the good work," perfects it. The Jesus who met Saul in the way and peremptorily reined up his career is the Jesus who gives him now light and liberty and his commission. The miracle is the miracle of Jesus; his the power, the will, the love, the sovereign grace. Nor can this be too well remembered by the servants of Christ, in all they do now toward the salvation of a fellow man. Those who will most readily admit that the touch of their hand can do nothing to work sight for the blind, are not always quite so clear that their voice, their wisdom, their persuasion, their mental influence on a fellow-being's mental state, are correspondingly impotent in and of themselves. Yet it is so. The love of Jesus and the command of the Spirit, and these alone, "make dead sinners live." Of one thing we may be convinced, that, had Ananias only spoken a hollow word of respect to Jesus, and flattered himself that the healing and sight-giving were going to be his own, the miracle would have broken down in the middle, if it had got so far, as Peter sank in the middle of his walking upon the sea. Does the preacher, does the teacher, does the pastor, remember this principle constantly enough? Do they possess an unfeigned humility of faith in it? IV. THE ASSERTION OF THE INDWELLING OF THE HOLY GHOST. 1. The work of the Holy Ghost is announced. 2. The presence of the Holy Ghost is announced as the result of the sending of Jesus Christ (John 16:7). 3. The commanding need of the Holy Ghost for a renewed man and an enlightened man, that he may remain surely so, is strongly enough implied: "That thou mightest be filled with the Holy Ghost." Nothing so hinders the spread of Christianity, the force of Christian life, the conversion of souls, as the neglect or the indifference shown to the work of the Holy Spirit. Christianity is in the fullest sense "the dispensation of the Spirit," and yet prayer for that Spirit, dependence upon him, understanding of him, arc often all of the vaguest. The power and persuasion and grandeur of Christ and the cross of Christ only move into vitality as the Spirit takes of them and brings them to men's hearts. We do all and always need the Holy Spirit for both conversion and for sanctification, and for knowing and doing acceptably any service for God, for Christ, in man's heart and life. V. THE SIGNS FOLLOWING THE WORD AND THE LAYING ON OF THE HANDS OF ANANIAS. They followed just as though it were by his own "power and holiness" that this miracle was wrought. So in our spiritual work, we should look for results. We should feel their cheering effect. We should delight in them. We should be grateful and honored exceedingly that we are permitted to be instruments in the "mighty hand" for doing them. But, meantime, we are bound never to forget how fearful the robbery and the guilt if we give not all the glory to God, to Jesus, to the Spirit. - B. Parallel Verses KJV: And Ananias went his way, and entered into the house; and putting his hands on him said, Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way as thou camest, hath sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost. |
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