Acts 11:1-28 - Homiletics

The mystery.

The beginning and the close of this chapter refer to events of precisely similar character, which took place almost simultaneously, at all events without any concert or communication, in Palestine and in Syria; the reception of the Word of God by Gentiles, and their admission into the Church of God. It is difficult for us, after the lapse of eighteen centuries and a half, during which this has been the rule of the kingdom of heaven, to realize the startling strangeness of such an event when first brought to the knowledge of the then Church of Christ. That a wall of partition, which seemed to be built upon immovable foundations, and which had defied every effort to break it down through a period of between one and two thousand years, should suddenly fall flat down at the blast of the gospel trumpet, like the walls of Jericho of old; that a hidden purpose of God, which had been veiled and concealed for so many ages, should suddenly flash out and stand clearly revealed to the eyes of mankind at two remote spots of the earth; must have struck with astonishment the minds of the Jews of that age. St. Paul himself, after many years of successful work as the Apostle of the Gentiles, cannot speak without emotion and wonder of the great revolution in the religion of mankind. The admission of the Gentiles to be partakers of God's promise in Christ by the gospel, and to be fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God, was the great mystery which in other ages had not been made known to the sons of men, but was at length revealed to the apostles and prophets by the Spirit. His heart swelled, and his utterance rose as he recited that "Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; and to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ: to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord" ( Ephesians 3:1-11 ). And certainly we ought not to allow familiarity with this dispensation of the Divine wisdom to breed in us any contempt or overlooking of its infinite importance. The destinies of the human race, in its varieties of intellect, and civilization, and creed, and morals, and social and political institutions, ought ever to be a matter of the deepest concern to us. We have the certain knowledge that the door of repentance and faith is thrown open to all mankind. We know that God is no respecter of persons, and we know that Jesus Christ died for the sins of the whole world. If the Word of God could win its way in a cohort of Italian soldiers quartered in an Oriental city; if much people, in the dissolute city of Antioch, overrun as it was with every kind of superstition and extravagance of vice and luxury and pleasure, listened to the teaching of Barnabas and Saul, and were added to the Lord; surely we ought not to be fainthearted in communicating to the whole world, whether heathen, or Mohammedan, or Buddhist, the Word of truth which we have received of God. Oh for a simultaneous breathing of the Divine Spirit, which may quicken dead souls in every nation under heaven, and make Churches of Christ to spring up in vigor and beauty in all the dark places of the earth, to the praise of the glory of God's grace in Jesus Christ!