Acts 20:1-6

Chapter 74

Prayer

Almighty God, thy house is full of light. There is morning in the tabernacles of the Most High cloudless morning dewy morning. Here our souls listen to music from above, and here our hearts are quieted with a holy peace. There is no house like thine; it is the soul's great home; there is enough to feed us in our hunger and to quench our hearts' burning thirst. Here we have all things. We have all things here in Christ. This is the place of unveiling, so that we see almost the Invisible. Our souls are touched with high amazement as they look out into the shining beyond. We see across the river. We behold pinnacles glittering in the light of a higher sun. In the wind we catch tones of other voices, known, yet unknown, the old voices with new power, the old friends risen into nobler stature. We see heaven opened; we see the connecting ladder; we see the descending and climbing angels, and we know of a truth that thy creation is large yea, to our imagining, infinite. The heaven, and the heaven of heavens, cannot contain thee; but thou wilt rest in the broken heart. Thou dost affright us sometimes, but only to comfort us with tenderer consolations. When thy judgments are abroad, men look towards the heavens who never looked in that direction in the time of bountiful harvest and quiet winds. When thou dost shake the rod of thy lightning over the heads of the people, they are quiet, they are dumb. Thou dost now and again show us our littleness and our helplessness; thou dost drive us before the furious storm, and we cry for rest. We bless thee for such chastening; it brings us to our knees; it lays us low in the lowest dust, and makes us hope for a protection we have so often disbelieved. Then thou dost comfort us in Christ thy Son with tender mercy, thou dost draw us near to thy heart. Thy love is the greater because of the tempest; the sky is bluer because of the infinite gloom which made it frown. Thou dost lift us up, gather us to thyself, fold us within the almightiness of thy love, and then send us forth again to do our work in Christ our Saviour, with renewed power, and with rekindled love. We bless thee that the storm has left us alive. But a handful of hours ago, and there was no spirit in us; but thy sanctuary was at hand; we saw its gates ajar; we yearned for their full opening that we might enter in and feel the sweet security of home. Thou wast a sanctuary in the tempest and a pavilion in the wilderness of desolation. Thou canst find honey among the rocks, and thou knowest where the wine and the oil and the milk abound, when in our hearts there is no hope. We will love thee more, thou Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. We will always come to thee by the only way. We will not fret ourselves into vexation, and sting ourselves with cruel disappointment by seeking to climb the heavens by a way of our own. We will come to the cross; we will follow the path made red by blood; we will look up through the wounded Son of God and find the reconciled Father. Thus will we come, and as we come the way widens, the road brightens, the whole pathway is crowded with joyous companionships, and great and abundant is the entrance which thou dost grant to those who come by the appointed way. Our sins, which are many, thou canst with a word forgive; our disease, which is vital, thou canst with a smile heal for ever more; our helplessness, which is complete, thou canst turn into enduring strength by the blessing of thy right hand. Thou knowest us wholly. Blessed be God, thine eye searches into all things. Thou knowest our frame, thou rememberest that we are dust; thou art pitiful to us; thou dost apportion the burden according to the strength. Make our houses glad with new lights every day. Surprise us by new brightnesses of the old sun. Show us some new writing amid the flowers with which we are most familiar; and as for the odours which we love, send amongst them the fragrance of the better land. Rock the cradle, and the little one will sleep well. Make our bed, and we shall forget our affliction in slumber. Fasten our door, and we shall be left without anxiety. Spread our table. Find for us a staff. Comfort us in the dreary time, and bring us, life's journey through, pilgrims glad to be at home, welcomed by old comrades and by angels now unknown. Then may our education begin in the higher light, and in the wider spaces. May our worship be then profounder, truer, tenderer; and remembering the little earth and its temporary tents, its transient joys and symbolic pleasures, may we thank God for all the little happinesses of the road, and find them in their infinite fruition in the heavens of thy light and peace. We say our prayer upon our knees; we put out our hands and clasp the sacred Cross; we know that we have not a moment to wait, for whilst we are yet speaking thine answer is in our hearts. Amen.

Act 20:1-6

1. And after the uproar had ceased, Paul having sent for the disciples and exhorted them, took leave of them, and departed [according to his previous determination Act 19:21 ] for to go into Macedonia.

2. And when he had gone through those parts, and had given them much exhortation, he came into Greece [Acts 19:21 , "Achaia," i.e., Corinth.

3. And when he had spent three months there, and a plot was laid against him by the Jews, as he was about to set sail for Syria [see Act 19:21 ], he determined to return [to Asia] through Macedonia.

4. And there accompanied him as far as Asia Sopater [perhaps the Sosipater of Rom 16:21 ] of Berea, the son of Pyrrhus; and of the Thessalonians, Aristarchus, and Secundus; and Gaius of Derbe, and Timothy; and of Asia, Tychicus [see Ephesians 6:21 ; Colossians 4:7 ; 2 Timothy 4:12 ; Tit 3:12 ], and Trophimus [ Act 21:29 ; 2Ti 4:20 ].

5. But these had gone before, and were waiting for us at Troas.

6. And we sailed away from Philippi [Acts 16:40 , Luke was left behind here] after the days of unleavened bread, and came unto them to Troas in five days; where we tarried seven days.

Reading Between the Lines

There does not seem to be much in this section of the Apostolic history. It is one of the sections which any lecturer would gladly omit with a view of finding something more exciting and pathetic in richer pastures. We must not, however, judge by appearances. Paul is still here, and wherever Paul is there is much of thought and action. The personality is the guarantee. Wherever you find the great man you find the great worker. Even amongst this commonplace there seems to be something unusual. Paul does nothing like any other man. Look at the variety of personal movement: Paul "embraces" the disciples a word which hides in it the pathos of a farewell salutation. It was not a mere good-bye; there was in it no hint of meeting again on the morrow. Whatever might happen in the way of reunion would happen as a surprise, and would not come up as the fulfilment of a pledge. Paul will often now say "Farewell." He is not quite the man he was when we first made his acquaintance. Sometimes he straightens himself up into the old dignity and force, and we say, "Surely he will last many a long year yet"; but in this narrative he crouches a good deal; he sits down more than has been his wont; he is tortured with a dumb discontent. I see age creeping upon his face, and taking out of his figure and mien the youth which we once recognized.

Having "embraced" the disciples, he "departed to go into Macedonia." We like to go back to old places. We cannot account for this longing just to see old battlefields, the marks of old footprints. We like to see that the old flag is still flying yea, we, strange as it may appear, like to steal away to the green grave to see if it is still there. Paul will go back to Thessalonica, to Berea the city of readers to Philippi, where he was lacerated and thrust into the innermost prison. Who can tell what happened in those repeated visits? At first, when we go to a place, there is nothing to speak about but that which is common to all other places; but having worked there, having made our signature there, when we return we talk over old themes as if we were discoursing upon ancient history, and we quote old sayings and ask for old friends with a tender familiarity, with a questioning that has a doubtful tone in it, lest we may be treading upon sacred ground, and lest we may be asking for the living who have been long numbered with the dead. Before asking such questions we look as if we would read the answer before we put the inquiry. We listen, if haply we may hear some word that will guide us as to the manner of our interrogation, lest by one inquiry we should rip up old wounds and tear open the deepest graves of the heart. These are the things that make life sacred and precious; these are the influences that quiet us with religious dignity, and that make life no longer a little fussy game, but a sad, pathetic, yet noble, mystery.

When Paul had gone over the old parts "he came into Greece, and there abode three months." Some say that perhaps he did look into Athens a second time. It is not a matter of certain history, but, being in Greece, it is just possible that the Apostle looked in upon Athens once more. It was the city in which he had met with the most stubborn indifference that had ever hindered his mission. Certainly he went to Corinth, but Corinth was changed. The decree which made many exiles had been annulled, and Aquila and Priscilla, the tent-makers, the old companions, the teachers of Apollos, were no longer there. The friends are the town; the firesides are the city; the old walls are there; the old churches, the old towers; but, if the old friends are not there, we are mocked by mouldering masonry. Humanity lives in itself; man looks for man not any man, but the friend-man, the companion-heart, the other self that completes the identity. This feeling, properly interpreted and enlarged religiously, becomes a species of prayer. When we return to the familiar city, and go in quest of a friend, what is it but a kind of praying? If the seeking were upward instead of lateral, it would be prayer; but may we not from human instances gather hints of Divine meaning? There is a Friend that sticketh closer than a brother; there is a Friend immortal; Aquila and Priscilla will leave the city, will return to the native locality, but Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and for ever, always at home, always accessible, always with us, until the end of the world. He alone makes a right use of human mutations and social histories who finds in them incitements towards the companionship that is immortal, and the history that goes for ever forward in an ascending line. From empty places turn to the ever-abiding heavens; from the empty Corinths let the soul go up to the metropolis of the universe, and find bread enough and to spare in the Father's house.

Paul "abode" in Greece three months. The word "abode" misleads us; a man blind and deaf and dumb might abide in a city or in a country three months. The word which should have been there in place of "abode" throbs like a pulse, quivers and palpitates with tremendous life. Paul cannot merely abide to be is to fight, to be is to suffer, where the personality of a man like Paul is concerned. The reading ought not to be of a negative kind. The word "abode" carries with it energy, service, work, activity, according to the measure and quality of the actor. We sometimes say of one another, "What is he doing now?" We might say that of Paul within the four corners of this narrative. He is moving about a good deal; he is staying in Greece three months; he was in Troas five days; he went over old ground. But what is he doing? That we cannot always tell. Have confidence in faithful men; it is not needful that we should know all that they are doing. If you have only confidence in your friend so long as you can see every action, you deceive yourself in supposing that you have any confidence in him at all. The confidence comes in where the sight fails. It is when we do not know what men are doing, and yet are sure that they are doing much, that we show our confidence in them. What, then, has history shown that Paul was doing amidst all this commonplace movement? Within this period Paul wrote his first letter to the Corinthians. How easy to say this! how impossible to measure it! Paul did more within the period of this narrative he wrote his second letter to the Corinthians, and he probably wrote his great letter to the Galatians. There is a written ministry. It is beautiful to read what Luke has to say about Paul, but how infinitely better to read Paul's own words, written by his own hand or spoken by his own tongue! We do not always want to hear about a man, we long to hear the man himself; one sight of him, and we understand much that can never be explained; one utterance of his voice, and we are able to fill up gaps that vexed us by their mocking emptiness. What we would give for the writing of some men! It was better that Christ should write nothing: there he stands out as always, the one exception to the common rule. To have written something would have belittled Christ; he is the Word the Living Word, the spoken Word, the mystery of Being. He wrote in the dust, and the common footprint obliterated the marvellous hieroglyphics; but he spoke, and spoke to every heart, so that every heart knows just what he said much better than if it had been put down in so many measurable lines and words. We know the words of Christ. Quote something that is not Christ's, that is opposed to the Spirit of Christ, and the heart casts it out. Sometimes the apostles quote something that is not in the Gospels, and yet we instantly feel that it ought to have been in the Gospels, that it belongs to the Gospels, that it is a marble worthy of the temple. Take an instance: "Ye remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, It is more blessed to give than to receive." The words are not found amongst the recorded sayings of Jesus, but in truth he never said anything else; that was the one thing he did say; that was the one thing he did do; he never did anything else. The quotation falls into the harmony of the massive music of his life, and belongs to it, and is at home in that alliance. The Acts of the Apostles would have been much impoverished but for the Pauline and other epistles which fill up and illustrate their highest and broadest meanings.

Not only is there great variety of personal movement, but there is in this narrative a period of waiting. Let us see once more how Paul "waits." We saw how he waited at Athens; whilst he waited "his spirit was stirred within him." Paul had written a letter to the Corinthians which is now lost; he wished to know the effect of that letter upon the Corinthian Christians, and Titus was charged to hasten back to Troas with a report. Paul is now waiting at Troas. How did he wait? Read 2 Corinthians 2:12-13 : "Furthermore, when I came to Troas to preach Christ's gospel, and a door was opened unto me of the Lord, I had no rest in my spirit, because I found not Titus my brother." That is the same spirit we found at Athens; he soon fell into restlessness. Read 2 Corinthians 1:8 : "For we would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure, above strength, insomuch that we despaired even of life." I thank God for those words and for that trouble. It brings Paul down amongst us; it shows that Paul was bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. Read 2 Corinthians 12:7 : "And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure." These are the experiences that occurred within the limits of a narrative which at first we supposed to be but a commonplace diary. See how Paul was being educated educated by a thorn, a goad thrust into the flesh by impatient waiting, by longing for answers that seemed never to come, by pressure of the spirit, by disappointment with time, by discontent that made the soul ill at ease. Where is the commonplace now? The narrative itself is full of gaps, but when they are filled up by Paul's own records, we find that within a framework of sentences that merely indicate locomotion we have experiences of the most intensely spiritual nature. So, men of business, among all your movements, anxieties, restlessnesses, and disappointments, who can tell what processes of education are going on? If we could read the letters you are now writing, we might find that after many a busy day's work you write messages of comfort to the bereaved and the desolate. Perhaps you may snatch a moment from the very pressure of commercial engagements to write a brief line of healing and of hope to some broken heart. We cannot tell all we are doing. There is a public life, there is a life that the neighbours can see and read and comment upon; but there is a within life, an interstitial life, that fills up all the open lines and broken places, and only God sees that interior and solemn existence. You go amongst men as worldly, avaricious, devoted only to meanest pursuits and to commonest altars. You may have an answer to such calumny, but may not think it worth while to give it to such low-minded critics. There may be those who "cannot make you out," and "do not know how you spend half your time." They have no right to know; they were not appointed to investigate your life. What you have to do is to hold your life in trust; you are trustee, and steward, and servant, and will one day hand in your own account to the only Judge who has a right to overlook your life. Fill up your days well; do not ask human criticism to approve you; be up with the sun; work far into the darkness; seem as if you did not want to sleep; and live ever in the great Taskmaster's eye; and at the last it may be found, that whilst others could not make out your busy life, and put its days together so as to make a continuous sum total of them, you have been amongst those servants so loyal as never to waste a moment, so industrious as to have deserved the rest which follows labour. Part of the life is seen, part is unseen; part is spoken, part is written. I have nothing to do with the way in which you spend your life when I cannot follow you into all the secret investigation of your career. We have one Master; to him we stand; he is Judge. At the last it will be seen who the sluggards were, and who were the industrious and faithful men that turned every moment into an opportunity, and found in every day a new field for action or a new altar for sacrifice.