Acts 17:16-34 - Homiletics.

The cross of Christ in the metropolis of art and philosophy.

There is a singular interest in this first encounter of the gospel with the art and philosophy of Athens, and it is instructive to note the attitude taken by the great preacher in the encounter. Whether St. Paul had artistic taste we have no means of knowing. But probably, as a devout Jew, seeing that sculpture was so largely employed in the images of the gods and the deified emperors, his eye would not have been trained to look with pleasure even upon the masterpieces of Grecian art. In like manner Greek architecture was mainly devoted to glorify the temples of the gods. The Parthenon at Athens, the temple of Diana at Ephesus, the temples of Apollo and Diana at Antioch, at Baalbec, in the many cities of Asia adorned by the Seleucidae, were indeed materially beautiful, but that material beauty was eclipsed by the moral deformity of their consecration to idolatry, to imposture, and to falsehood. The devout eye of the apostle would therefore be more shocked by the dishonor done to God, and the injury to the moral nature of man, than gratified by mere beauty of form, or architectural grandeur and grace. Hence, as far as we learn from the inspired narrative, the dominant effect upon his mind of the sight of the unrivalled statues and temples of Athens was grief and indignation at their homage to idolatry, rather than admiration of the artistic genius which produced them. In like manner he found himself face to face with philosophy. He was treading the courts of the academy where Plato had taught; he was in the city where Socrates had lived and died; there Aristotle had both learnt and taught; there the successors both of Zeno and Epicurus were still inculcating the tenets of their-respective schools. What was to be the attitude of an evangelist in the presence of these august representatives of human intellect? In what language was the apostle of Jesus Christ to address himself to them? In that of apology? In that of compromise? in that of conscious inferiority? or as if the possessors of so much wisdom had nothing to learn from him? Or, on the other hand, was he to speak the language of scorn and indignation—was he to shut his eyes to all that might be true and noble in the sentiments of those men, and to put them on a level with the vilest of mankind, because they were ignorant of the great truths of revelation? The actual conduct of St. Paul was as modest as it was wise, and as dauntless as it was modest. Looking around him at the altars of the gods, he seized upon the one favorable aspect of them—their witness to a worshipful spirit in the people towards the Unseen. Gathering from Greek literature a true description of the relation of man to the living God, he proceeded with wonderful simplicity and force to enunciate those truths of natural religion which an untainted reason perceives and approves. And then, rising to those higher truths which are the domain of revelation, he preached, as he had done before in the Agora, Jesus and the resurrection. He bid them repent of their sins done in ignorance; he told them of the coming of the day of judgment; he spoke to them of the awful Judge, and of his unerring righteousness. There was no faltering in his speech, no watering down of the severity of the gospel, no wincing at the subtle wits or the pretentious wisdom of those who heard him. He spoke as a man who knew that he had the truth of God, and that that truth would prevail. And such should ever be the attitude of the Christian teacher before the powers of the world. Humble, charitable, confident, and firm; owning all that is good and beautiful and true in the world around him, but always feeling, and acting as if he felt, that the gospel of Jesus Christ is better and truer and more beautiful than all; valuing true wisdom, and prizing the great gift of reason as the brightest jewel of our human nature; yet always remembering that in our fallen state reason could bring no remedy for sin nor cast a light upon the world to come; but that the only Name whereby we may be saved is the Name of Jesus, and that he alone has abolished death, and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. To him be glory for ever and ever. Amen.