And when Silas and Timotheus were come from Macedonia, Paul was pressed in the spirit (R.., By the Word).
Enthusiasm justified
1. Different effects are produced in different minds by the proclamation of the same truths. Some may accept it with a languid spirit, assured of its verity, but wholly indifferent to its real import; others may receive it with all gladness, rejoicing to repeat it with enthusiastic delight. A lighted match falling on a granite rock or pile of sand is extinguished; but the same, when applied to wood, kindles a genial glow, or, to powder, creates a flame and explosion. So with truth. Even Christian minds are affected by the same truth very differently at different times.
2. Paul was familiar with these varying experiences. When he was at Athens his spirit was stirred within him as he saw the prevailing idolatry. At Rome he felt the power of her imperial greatness, and was not ashamed of the gospel of the Son of God. But now at Corinth, though he preached in the synagogue, it does not seem that he was putting forth any special effort to reach the people. He may have been disheartened. But the vision was at hand, and with it the emphatic command, “Speak!” Even now was he “straitened.” The same word is used by the Saviour (Luk_12:50) and by Paul (Php_1:23), when he says that he is “in a strait betwixt two.” Now that the help brought him by Silas and Timotheus released him from labour, he yielded to an urgent and imperative impulse, testifying that, Jesus was Christ. Opposition did not deter. When the Jews blasphemed, he shock his robe, and said (Act_18:6).
3. We are apt to regard the great apostle as a flaming star that burned incessantly. We forget his human moods, though he records them. We rejoice in these recorded imperfections of the good, so far as they show the triumphs of Divine grace, for they encourage us to trust in the same ennobling and overruling grace in the midst of our own infirmities. Rising from his apparently passive condition, urged by the assurance, “I am with thee, and no man shall set on thee,” he boldly and ardently proclaimed the truth as it is in Jesus.
I. This enthusiasm was justifiable; his inertness was not. Moods like this might have led him to say that he was not meet to be an apostle; but when he reflected upon the truth, it filled and thrilled him. Now he was ready to preach to prince or peasant. Man was great in his possibilities. Sin was a terrific evil. He saw, too, the power of the gospel to save man. He believed that eternal life and death hinged on the acceptance or rejection of Jesus Christ. These were the springs of his enthusiasm, and they justified it. A man drops from an ocean steamer into the sea. You shout aloud for help to save him. The occasion justifies your excitement. A trivial occurrence would not warrant an outcry. Fanaticism is sometimes shown in its disproportionate zeal for unimportant matters; but Paul was pressed by an imminent and awful truth that menaced the ungodly. His enthusiasm would be ours if his convictions were.
II. There is an enormous power in such an enthusiasm.
1. So it proved at Corinth when Paul’s soul flamed forth in eager utterance. The power of truth is measured oftentimes by the resistance it awakens. So bitterly did the Jews hate him, they were ready to invoke the aid of Rome--another hated power--to crush Paul. We ought not to be cast down because today atheists assault Christianity. This is but the answer of man’s rebellious will to God’s authoritative voice. Were there no opposition to the Bible we might think that there was no power in it.
2. The work Paul did at Corinth showed that his enthusiasm had a vital energy. Even in that wicked city Paul gained “much people” to the Lord. Did we feel the pressure he felt, we, too, would be eloquent in our advocacy of the truth. The burden of the spirit is relieved by earnest speech; and this secret, subtle power of soul is contagious. Rome felt it, as thousands of martyrs gave up their lives for the Lord Jesus. Mediaeval ages felt it, as Christian missionaries carried to savage tribes the gospel that became the seed of Christian commonwealths. Germany and England felt this intrepid and heroic enthusiasm of the Reformers. Puritan civilisation, modern missionary enterprises--in short, all self-sacrifice founded on conviction of the truth of God, illustrate the abiding and triumphant power of this element of life.
III. We infer, then, what is our great lack. It is the “pressure of the Word.” We do not have it as we ought. We are trying to push a steamer across the sea, only using tepid water. Without this full and mighty pressure of consecrated enthusiasm, our example, teaching, and giving are all defective in impulse and in power.
IV. Therefore we see the duty of prayer for the holy ghost. Kindled as at Pentecost, out love will then make our life vocal with a Divine message. Our inertness will be rebuked as we contemplate the devotion of Paul under the pressure of his illuminated sense of truth and duty. Baptized anew, the Church will go on from conquest to conquest. (R. S. Storrs, D. D.)
Encouragements--Divine and human
1. In Act_18:5 we read that “Paul was pressed in the spirit”; in chap. 17:16 we read that Paul’s “spirit was stirred in him.” In both cases it was not a little transient excitement, it was agony. Would God we could recall our early enthusiasm, our first burning hate of sin. We are familiar with it; we pat its black head. Paul was a man of conviction. He really believed 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.
2. In Act_17:6 we read, “From henceforth I will go unto the Gentiles.” Paul was not the man to lay hold upon the plough and to turn back; Paul would not even keep company with a young man who had broken faith with him in the Christian work. He went clear through with it to the end. Let us never give up the work. 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.
3. A little encouragement would cheer us now. Here it is in Act_17:7-8. Paul “entered into a certain man’s house, named Justus, one that worshipped God”--is there any greater phrase in all human speech? “And Crispus, the chief ruler of the synagogue, believed,” and many of the Corinthians thought they would believe too. Great men are the looking glasses into which ordinary men look to see what they ought to be like. What we want, then, is courage on the part of those whose influence is extensive. If you, the head of the house, could say, “Let us worship God,” many within the house might respond “So be it.” We must have leadership--may that leadership always be in an upward direction.
4. We have encouragement in Act_17:9 in another form. These words were not spoken once for all; they are spoken every day to every earnest labourer. God took the census of Corinth from a religious point of view. 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. God is looking for His own; and one of the most gracious surprises in store for the Church is that there will be more people in God’s pure home than it may have entered into the most generous human heart to conceive.
5. But Act_17:12 seems to contradict the vision. What a violent transition! 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 so, but not really. Evil shall be overruled for good; for the outcome was the Church at Corinth.
6. But we are told by Mr. Buckle, e.g., that Christian missions have failed. He sets side by side with missionary reports the testimony of impartial, independent, well-instructed travellers, who say that whilst many heathen populations have taken upon themselves Christian forms of worship, they are destitute of the spirit of Christianity. It is beautiful to notice the verdant simplicity of men who have just discovered that nominally converted and baptized people are not angels. “Many of the Corinthians hearing, believed and were baptized”; but “impartial and independent travellers” testify that even after that they were not so good as they might have been. Did Paul set them forth to be perfect men? Read his Epistles to the Corinthians. We must not give up missionary work simply because some “impartial and independent travellers” interrupt their geographical business by little scrutinies into the spirit and manners of people who had been baptized into the name of Christ. We do not expect a man to grow in a night. If they have been arrested; if their attention has been turned in the right direction; if they have expressed a desire to enter even into the veriest elementary lines of discipleship, let us be glad, and report at home that the battle is moving towards victory. Things are seen most by contrast. What is black is blackest when seen upon a white surface, and so many of our shortcomings and failures look very black because of the background of the holy Name which we profess to have accepted as our symbol and our hope--the spotless name of the Son of God!(J. Parker, D. D.)
