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Paul's Work at Ephesus. Act_19:1-20
Paul's arrival at Ephesus:
v. 1. And it came to pass that, while Apollos was at Coririth, Paul, having passed through the upper coasts, came to Ephesus; and finding certain disciples,
v. 2. he said unto them, Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed? And they said unto him, We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost.
v. 3. And he said unto them, Unto what, then, were ye baptized? And they said, Unto John's baptism.
v. 4. Then said Paul, John verily baptized with the baptism of repentance, saying unto the people that they should believe on Him which should come after him, that is, on Christ Jesus.
v. 5. When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
v. 6. And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Ghost came on them; and they spake with tongues' and prophesied
v. 7. And all the men were about twelve.
While Apollos was in Corinth, having made the voyage across the Aegean after his stay in Ephesus, Paul, having finished his visitation trip in the upper, the mountainous, districts of Asia Minor, came down to Ephesus. Apparently Paul did not take the main road from Pisidian Antioch, which passed through Colossae and Laodicea (See Col_2:1), but took the very shortest route, farther north, down the Cayster Valley. So he found himself in Ephesus within the briefest possible time. Ephesus, the capital of Proconsular Asia, was, like Athens, a typical city of heathendom, the "home of every Oriental quackery and superstition in combination with its Hellenism. " It stood a mile from the Aegean Sea, fronting an artificial harbor. On the hill above the city rose the Temple of Artemis, one of the most magnificent buildings in Asia Minor. For Paul's purposes it was especially valuable that the system of Roman roads from every quarter of the province made Ephesus easily accessible. Upon his arrival in the city the apostle found a peculiar, a singular condition obtaining in the congregation. Due to the efforts of Aquila, Priscilla, and Apollos, there was an assembly of brethren there, of men and women that accepted Jesus as their Savior;, but there was a wide difference in the state of Christian knowledge. For Paul here found twelve men whom he proceeded to question as to the extent of their knowledge of Christian doctrines. One of his questions was whether they had received the Holy Ghost at the time when they became believers, the sense of the inquiry being whether they had received the extraordinary gift of the Holy Ghost which had been vouchsafed to so many converts. Their answer was rather surprising, for they stated that they had not even heard of the existence of a Holy Ghost in connection with their conversion. Upon Paul's further question into what, then, they had been baptized, that is, what form of baptism they had received, they answered that they had been baptized into the baptism of John. This answer showed Paul that they were lacking in the proper understanding, and he proceeded to give them the necessary instruction, namely, that John had baptized with the baptism of repentance, incidentally telling the people that they should believe on Him that was coming after him, that is, on Jesus Christ. This explanation of Paul fully opened their understanding, and they received Baptism into the name of the Lard Jesus, thus being added to the number of those that belonged to Christ as His own. "The papyri have shown that where the phrase 'baptized into' occurs, that the person baptized becomes the property of the divine person indicated. " And when Paul, who seems to have performed the baptizing personally, laid his hands upon the men, the Holy Ghost came upon them with extraordinary gifts, and they spoke with tongues and prophesied.
The story of these twelve men, as here related, seems very strange if viewed in the light of present knowledge, but the strangeness disappears when me take the circumstances into account. The case is on the order of that of Apollos, whose ignorance of what certainly is an important part of Christian doctrine was just as profound. We must distinguish between the baptism which John personally administered, and that of his later disciples, which is commonly referred to as the baptism of John. The baptism with which John, by a special command of God, baptized, was a valid sacrament, which gave to those that confessed their sins, and believed the preaching of John, forgiveness of sins and the grace of God. But John the Baptist was merely the precursor of Christ; his preaching, as his baptism, was a testimony of Christ, who was to come after him, and who, through His suffering and death, was to earn salvation and forgiveness for all sinners. After Christ had been revealed to Israel and had formally entered upon His ministry, the time of preparation was ended, the work and the office of John ceased to have value. And when Christ then, by His death, had finished His work and after His resurrection had given His disciples the command to baptize all nations in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost; when, above all, the Day of Pentecost had come, and the disciples of the Lord were now baptizing in the name of Jesus Christ, the crucified and resurrected, then the baptism of John no longer had any value, just as the Old Testament sacrament of circumcision, though still practiced by the Jewish Christians, was regarded as a mere ceremony.
But not all the disciples of John had entered into the discipleship of Christ. We find, even after the death of John and after the death of Christ, a small association or communion of disciples of John that did not unite with the Church. They thus became a sect, regarded John as their head, and acted contrary to the will and command of their own master. And therefore their baptism, which they performed and proclaimed as the continuation of I he baptism of John, was no real baptism, but a mere dead ceremony. This ceremony had been performed in the case of the twelve disciples in Ephesus, the one that had administered it to them very likely not testifying to them in the form and with the power of John, that Christ had baptized with the Holy Ghost and with fire. But these men had now heard the story of Jesus in Ephesus; through the mercy and the power of the Holy Ghost they had come to faith. And now they also, by the administration of the sacrament which was the real Baptism, received the extraordinary gifts which had been given to other baptized Christians.