James Nisbet Commentary - Acts 19:19 - 19:19

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James Nisbet Commentary - Acts 19:19 - 19:19


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Many … brought their ‘together, and burned them in the sight of all.’

Act_19:19 (R.V.)

One of the results of the preaching of St. Paul was the abandonment by his converts of those ‘curious arts’—magical practices by which a superstitious populace had been deluded. A whole cabalistic literature had, in course of time, grown up, professing to interpret and apply to all the ills that flesh and spirit are heirs to, certain mystic characters covering parts of the hideous image of Artemis, worshipped in the great Temple, portions of which have found a shelter in our British Museum. The public abandonment of these malpractices was common to dupes and professors. These last brought their books together, to the probable value of some £2000 of English money, and burned them, making of them, as one writes, a ‘monte della pieta’ ‘in the street, as at the bidding of the great Florentine centuries later.

If our Faith is to have its due influence in the moulding of our lives in their entirety, if its sway is not to be over a certain circumscribed domain of life, leaving whole tracts unoccupied, uncontrolled by it, if it be true that ‘as a man thinketh, so is he,’ and that ‘every thought’ is to be ‘brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ,’ then the selection of the sustenance we offer to our thoughts is no trivial matter.

I. Of directly vicious literature, little is said beyond reminding you of the deplorable amount that issues from the prostituted presses of this professedly Christian England of ours—from 200,000 to 250,000 copies of distinctly pernicious publications in a week. Testimonies are abundant that bad reading and crime are closely related.

II. What constitutes the difference between a harmless and a harmful book of fiction is not so much the matter and staple of the story, as the manner of its treatment.

III. If thought be a function of spirit, and when the spirit returns to God Who gave it, it passes in the maturity of its intelligence, it is no question of little moment on what the intelligent faculty has been habitually employed through the training time of the earthly life. If ‘for every idle word we speak we shall give account in the Day of Judgment, for by our words we shall be justified and by our words we shall be condemned,’ we must harbour the fear that the idle thoughts of which those words are the expression will be condemned also.

IV. When the pilgrim life begins with us, we may leave nothing behind of our God-given endowments. We are not suddenly to be reduced to a dead dull level of uniformity of character. Individuality is not crushed, but expanded by the Faith. Christianity rejoices in the enlargement of a man’s mental horizon, in the broadening of his views of life, in the enriching of the field of his experience. In fulfilling ourselves we are fulfilling our Creator’s and Redeemer’s purpose concerning us.

Bishop Alfred Pearson.

Illustration

‘In the streets of Vienna is a statue erected in 1807 by Francis I., to the memory of his predecessor, Joseph II. On the pedestal are these words in Latin: “To Joseph II, who, for the weal of the State, lived a whole life, though not a long one”—a succinct testimony to the single-heartedness of a career which politically was something of a failure. Whether your lives and mine shall be long or short rests with God. It belongs to us to resolve that they shall be whole. “Time wasted is existence: used, is life.” ’

(SECOND OUTLINE)

BAD BOOKS GIVEN UP

Though times have changed, the words of the Lord Jesus are as true to-day as they were in the first ages: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.’ Sacrifice and self-denial are required of Christ’s followers still.

I. What are you going to give up?—What sacrifice are you going to make, in time, money, sleep, labour, for Jesu’s sake, for the good of others, for your soul’s health?

II. The scene in Ephesus.—Picture it, the broad street, the crowded thoroughfare, the burning pile of evil books. Listen to some of the scoffers, ‘fools’ and ‘lunatics’ they are calling these men whose conscience God has awakened. But the air is purer, the city healthier, the atmosphere is clearer, after the fire has done its work; even as London was after the great fire had burnt out the lingering plague and purified the air. Young men, have you, literally, burnt your bad books? If you have not, then do so the moment you get home. Burn them. Do not pass them on, do not sell them, or get rid of them in any way. Those books are only fit for the fire. Go and burn them! Then what about those betting books, the only books some men ever look into, the only ‘books’ some consider worth calling by the name? Your gain is another’s loss, and you are glad of that other’s loss. Go and burn your betting books and your gambling records, and you will never regret the day in which you did so.

Rev. J. B. C. Murphy.

Illustration

‘Like Savonarola in later times, Paul bade the Ephesians decide between the world and God, and the believers in Ephesus who up to this time had kept a lingering belief and a lingering hold upon their former worship now confessed and showed their deeds, and as a proof of their renunciation brought their books of magic and of sacred incantations and burned them publicly before all the people, just as the followers of Savonarola renounced their worldliness and burned the tokens of their folly in the market-place. Recent discoveries have shown how widespread the use of these magical papyri was in Ephesus, and the value set upon them. Books of any kind were valuable in those days, but none so rare and precious as books of magic and incantation; and the sacrifice which was made was very great.’