Acts 22:17-21 And it came to pass, that, when I was come again to Jerusalem, even while I prayed in the temple, I was in a trance;… Ah! there was no prejudice against having the Gentiles made — what? Jews: but to have the Jewish God given to the Gentiles without the instrumentality of the Jews; to have their God distributed outside of themselves by another instrumentality; to have other people enjoy the same right in Jehovah that they did, standing on the same level — this was what they could not endure. To carry the Jews' God out from Judaea, and make Him a God of the Romans, and of the Greeks, and of the Scythians, and of the Parthians, and of the Assyrians — that was what offended them. National gods, in old times, were very valuable property. It used to be supposed that the gods of a nation were very much to it what armies and navies are to a nation nowadays. It was supposed that they defended it; that they took care of it; that they hated other nations that were its adversaries. The idea that Jehovah was a national God, and that He was the God of the Jews, who did not wish their enemies to participate in His power or in His protection, runs through all Jewish history. If one should come into your house, and take all your pictures, and books, and furniture, and provisions, and distribute them along the whole street, you would doubtless raise some objection; if one should come to my table, and receive hospitality at my hands, and then take all my property, and scatter it up and down the street, I should not like it; and men felt very much so about their religion in those old times. It was a part of their national household goods. The Jews' idea was that God was their special property: and to give the world the same right in Him that they had, was just so much to defraud them. The Jews were peculiarly susceptible to these ideas of appropriation, because, for the sake of their faith, and in order to defend the name of Jehovah against idolatry, they had suffered much persecution, and undergone many hardships. Men appropriate truth to themselves; they make it personal, as if they owned it, as if it belonged to them; and so the Jews felt that, as they had defended Jehovah, doubtless He must be grateful to them; that as they had suffered for Him, they had a right to parcel Him out; that He ought to be a gift from them; and to use Jehovah as the property of all mankind was to level the Jew to the plane of other men. This would be humiliation and disgrace to them, since they felt themselves to be ineffably superior to the rest of the world; and they would not bear the degradation if they could help it. From the outbreak of religious intolerance and religious cruelty recorded in the text we may learn several lessons. 1. First, it is possible to hold religion in a malignant spirit. So long as religion is understood to be an external system of ceremonies, laws, usages, ordinances; so long as it consists of a series of beliefs; so long as it is an objective thing, embodied in usages and institutions, or in philosophical creeds; so long as it appeals to the outward senses — it is quite possible to cherish it at the same time with those feelings which belong to the bigoted partisan. Unfortunately, that which we have seen among the Jews we have never ceased to see among men who have held the great institutions of Christianity or institutions that have purported to be Christian — that they held them in rancour, pride, and selfishness, and defended them with bitterness. Christ was the loving, atoning Saviour. And what has been the history of the Church that represented His disinterested suffering, the bounty of His love, and His benignity to His enemies? The long record of Church history has been a record almost unvarying of arrogance, and pride, and violence, and persecution. Men have received the religion of Jesus Christ just as the Jews received the religion of the Old Testament, to hold it in carnal bonds with most malignant human passions. Is the same spirit existing now which broke out in this tumult among the Jews? Do men hold religion in the same malignant way that they did? Is there the same jealousy in respect to the partition of the benefits of Christ that there was in respects to the diffusion of the knowledge of Jehovah? What has been the history of the sects? and what is today the feeling of the sects? Is the Roman Catholic Church unwilling that all the world shall have all the benefits of the mediation of the Lord Jesus Christ? Oh, no. The Roman Catholic Church stands saying to all the world, "Come into our Church, and under our regulations, and you shall have the Saviour. But you cannot have the Saviour outside of our Church. Come to us and you shall have Him, but you cannot have Him and leave us out." Are the derivative Churches, are the hierarchical Churches, are the Protestant Churches, in spirit, different from the Roman Catholics? Are good men, learned men, wise men, unwilling that Christ should be preached among the Gentiles — that is, among Dissenters? Oh, no. Is the Episcopal Church unwilling that the truth of Jesus should be made known to outsiders? Oh, no. It is more than desirous that they should all have the bounty and blessing that is in Christ; but then they must have it in the true Church. They must have it in the line of apostolicity. Well, let us take the great Calvinistic Presbyterian Church. May anyone have Christ's atoning mercy and the hope of everlasting life? Yes, if he believes in the absolute sovereignty of God; in original sin, with enough of actual transgression added to it; in regeneration; in the efficacious compassion and suffering and death of Christ; in Divine penalty, and in the eternity of future punishment. "Come into our creed," says that Church, "and you shall have the mercy and blessing of God." It is the Jewish state of mind over again. It is the same spirit which they manifested who shook their raiment, and threw dust in the air, and clenched their hands, and gnashed their teeth, and cried out against Paul, and demanded that he should be torn in pieces. In this regard, human nature is pretty much the same all the way through. There is everywhere the same conceit, the same arrogance, the same exclusiveness. "What we have is right — of that there is no mistake. And for those who are outside our ecclesiastical connection, and are not of our way of believing, there is nothing but darkness." What, then, is the truth? God, as He has taught both in the Old Testament and in the New, is God over all, blessed forever; and all men, from the rising of the sun until the going down of the same, have children's rights in God as their Father. All men have a right to take part and lot in Him, and to hope in Him. God is the God of all the earth. He belongs to no sect, to no party. He has given to no class the right to appropriate Him. There is not a creature on the face of the earth that is not dear to God. There is not a man so imperfect, or so full of infirmity, that God does not care for him and sustain him; and the best men living are pensioners on Divine grace and bounty: If God takes the worthiest of His creatures, out of the fulness of His own graciousness, and not on account of their desert, can He not take the others also, out of that same graciousness? And does He not take them? The whole tide of the Divine thought through the world is a thought of goodness; the whole heartbeat of God along the earth is a heartbeat of mercy; and that thought, that heartbeat, is for all mankind. God is working for them; He is shaping His providences for their benefit, and that just as much when He chastises them as when He gives them pleasure. He is preparing them for something better than this life. "Well, then, do I understand," you will say, "that an unconverted man is as good as a converted man?" No, I do not say that at all. But if you were to ask me, "Who owns the sun?" I should say, "Nobody owns it; it belongs to the globe, and everybody has a right to it." Here are men who are surrounded by ten thousand climatic influences which may be turned to good account; but they never reap ample harvests. Why? Because they do not know how to make use of those influences in cultivating the soil. Those who do, sow their seed. and reap abundant harvests. There is a vast difference in the results of these men's farming; and yet, the sun stands offering as much to one as to another. Now, it is with God's mercy as it is with the sunlight. What does the sunlight bless? It blesses industry, integrity, knowledge. It is ready to bless everybody who will partake of its bounty. The right to it is not conferred by magistrate, legislature, or government. Sunlight is everybody's; and yet everybody does not get good out of it. It is shame to some; it is torment to others; it is rebuke to others; and it is blessing, endless and fathomless, to yet others. Whether it is beneficial to a person or not depends upon how he uses it. God's love, and mercy, and bounty are universal, and men appropriating them find them personally useful; but rejected and excluded, they find them no good. Two men are walking in a garden. One walks in the alleys, and everywhere sweet and pleasant shade falls upon him; the fragrance of the orange greets him on every side; he enjoys all the beauty of prodigal luxuriance; he is surrounded by blossoming flowers and ripening fruits; and to him it is a garden of grand delights. The other man lies drunk under the shade of a tree. There are the same fruits, the same flowers, the same fragrance for him that there is for the other man, only he is not in a condition to appropriate them. One goes out of the garden full of gladness, and laden with its treasures. The other has no more of the garden than if he had never seen it. It is the nature of the men, and not any partiality in the garden, that makes the difference. We are prepared, then, to answer some questions. May an unconverted man pray to God? This is a question which has disturbed many persons. Some think that when they are Christians they have a right to pray, but not till then. But why may not anyone pray to God? And does a man need to go through a technical experience inside a church before he has a right to pray to God? There is no man that wants to pray who has not a right to pray. Take heart, then, sinning, wicked, desponding man! If there is nobody else that cares for you, God cares for you. If every tongue is out against you; if all manner of prejudices hedge up your way; if the Church has surrounded you with obstacles, God thinks of you, and will help you. You have an interest in the heart of Jesus; and if God be for you, who can be against you? Therefore, take courage. You are not a churchman? You are not much educated in matters of religion? Ah, but you know something of sin! You desire to be released from its grasp. A sinner no right in God! Think a moment. Has he not a right to a Saviour? May he not partake of Divine goodness? Especially has he not a right to invoke God's blessing? It is because God is what He is that all men have rights in Him. It once used to be said that men had no rights which God was bound to respect. A better thought has come over the Christian community. Men have rights. God gave them, and they are at liberty to exercise them. Has not a child rights, because his parent is his superior, and has authority over him? The law says Yes; public sentiment says Yes; and the voice of Nature says Yes. And because a man is formed subordinate to God, and under His authority, has he not rights of mercy, of justice, of love, and of truth? May we hope, then, that the dissolute and the wicked shall have mercy? There is not a man who lives who has not a right to food, and, through food, to strength, and, through strength, to executive efficiency. Men also have the right to joy — manly joy. Yet, you say to me, "May a man have joy, though he be an old glutton, swollen with superabundance of blood?" Why, yes; but not as a glutton. If he will become temperate, and purge away his humours, and restrain himself to due moderation, he may. If I am cold, and wish to protect myself against the weather, I can, if I will seek the proper shelter. If I am shivering on the north side of a rock, I can get warm if I have a mind to, but not so long as I remain on the north side. There are infinite mercies of God toward men; and all are wicked, for there is not a man on earth who is righteous, perfectly so, not one. Every man is imperfect in this mortal state. Nevertheless, the bounty of God is proffered to each. And it is received and enjoyed by all who take it as it is to be taken. The condition of Divine favour, of pardon, and of salvation, is not that you shall be inside of any Church; is not that you shall be Jew or Christian in the sectarian sense; is not that you shall be in the Roman, or Episcopal, or Presbyterian, or Baptist, or Methodist, or Congregational, or Lutheran, or Unitarian, or Universalist, or any other Church. What you want is simple personal sympathy With God, who is above all Churches, and who is offered to men without any regard to Churches. It is true that a man may be more likely to come into an intelligent knowledge of God, and His requirements and promises, in the sanctuary than out of it. The help which we receive from God is a gift springing out of the infinite resources of His love. But there are external and incidental helps. Churches are helps — not masters; servants — not despots. You are free. God is the God of all the earth; He is the God of every human being; and nothing separates between you and God but — what? Your creed? No. Your ordinances? No. Your pride and selfishness? Do these turn God sour? No. Nothing separates between you and God but your own will. Here I stand, holding out a handful of gold; but can a man receive that gold unless he comes and puts out his hand and takes it? No. Still the hand is open and held out to him. So long as men clench their fists they cannot take it, but if they will open their hands and make the necessary movement they can. Much of God's bounty, and forgiveness, and help, and succour, will come upon you, at any rate, through the incidental influence of Divine providence; but the personal mercies of God, the sweetness of His grace, the effluence of His love — these may be yours, they may succour you, restore you, strengthen you, inspire you, and build you up in time for eternity, if you will; but it all lies with you. (H. W. Beecher.) Parallel Verses KJV: And it came to pass, that, when I was come again to Jerusalem, even while I prayed in the temple, I was in a trance; |
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