_THE FIRST MIRACLE._
"Now Peter and John were going up into the temple at the hour of
prayer, being the ninth hour. And a certain man that was lame
from his mother's womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the
door of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask alms of them
that entered into the temple; who seeing Peter and John about to
go into the temple, asked to receive an alms. And Peter,
fastening his eyes upon him, with John, said, Look on us. And he
gave heed unto them, expecting to receive something from them.
But Peter said, Silver and gold have I none; but what I have,
that give I thee. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth,
walk."--ACTS iii. 1-6.
The Acts of the Apostles considered as the first history of the Church
may be viewed as typical of all ecclesiastical history. It is in this
respect a microcosm wherein, on a small scale, we see represented the
triumphs and the mistakes, the strength and the weakness, of God's
elect people throughout the ages. Thus in the incident before us,
embracing the whole of the third chapter and the greater portion of
the fourth, we have set forth a victory of the Apostles, their
subsequent persecution, together with the blessing and strength
vouchsafed in and through that persecution. The time of these events
cannot be fixed with any great exactness. They occurred probably
within a few weeks or months of the day of Pentecost. That is the
nearest we can approach to a precise date. There seems indeed to have
been a pause after the excitement and success of Pentecost, and for
this we think that we can see a good reason. The Apostles must have
had plenty to do with the vast multitude gathered upon the day of
Pentecost, striving to lead them into a fuller knowledge of the faith.
We are apt to imagine at first sight that supernatural enlightenment
was vouchsafed to these earliest converts, superseding any necessity
for careful and patient instruction, so that upon their baptism the
whole work was completed. But when we reflect upon other cases in the
New Testament, we can easily see that the three thousand souls
converted by St. Peter's speech must have needed and received a great
deal of teaching. The Church of Corinth was one of St. Paul's own
founding, and upon it he lavished careful attention for a year and a
half; yet we see from his Epistles to the Corinthians how much
guidance was needed by them even in elementary questions of morals,
how rapidly the Church fell into grossest licence when deprived of his
personal ministrations. Theophilus again, to whom the Acts were
addressed by St. Luke, is reminded, in the preface of the Gospel, of
the catechetical instruction in Christian truth which he had
received.[74] Assuredly, then, the small band of the twelve Apostles
and their few male assistants must have had their hands full enough
for many weeks after Pentecost, endeavouring to give their converts
such an insight into the great principles of the faith as would enable
them to carry back to their various distant homes a competent
knowledge of the laws and doctrines of the new dispensation. A few
moments' reflection will show that the newly-baptized had much to
learn about Christ,--the facts of His life, His doctrines, sacraments,
the constitution of His Church, and the position allotted to the
Apostles,--before they could be considered sufficiently rooted and
grounded in the faith. And if this was so with converts from Judaism,
then how much more must such careful instruction after baptism have
been found needful in the case of the Gentiles when the time came for
their admission? Much preparatory work had been done for the Jews by
their Old Testament training. They had not much to learn from the
Apostles in practical morality; they had a right conception of God,
His character, and His service. But as for the Pagans, their whole
intellectual and spiritual life, all their notions and conceptions
about God, and life, and morals, were all hopelessly wrong. The
Apostles and the earliest teachers had then, and missionaries amongst
the heathen have still, to make a clearance of the whole pagan ground,
laying a new foundation, and erecting thereon a new structure,
intellectual, moral, and spiritual. St. Paul recognised the vast
importance of such diligent pastoral work and catechetical training
after baptism when writing his pastoral Epistles, because bitter
experience had taught him their value. At Corinth for more than two
years, and at Ephesus for three years, he had laboured diligently in
building up his converts. And notwithstanding all his exertions, how
quickly the Corinthians fell away into pagan habits of unbridled
licence as soon as he left them! The Acts of the Apostles by this
pause in evangelistic work which we here trace, strikes a note of
warning concerning the future missionary work of the Church, speaking
clearly about the necessity of diligent pastoral care, and
prophesying of the certain relapses into wild excesses which may be
expected to occur among those who have only been just rescued from the
mire of paganism. This is one explanation of the pause in apostolic
work we here seem to perceive.
[74] The apostolic manual called the _Teaching of the Twelve
Apostles_, to which we have already referred, proves that the
Church of the Apostles' day required catechisms and introductory
formularies just as much as we do.
Again, the analogy of the faith, the laws of human nature, suggest the
need of a period of restful calm after the Pentecostal excitement, and
previous to any new and successful advance. So it has been in God's
dealing in the past. The excitement connected with the first attempts
made by Moses to rescue his people was followed by the forty years'
exile in Midian, which again led to their triumphant rescue from
bondage. Elijah's victory over Jezebel and her idol priests was
followed by the retreat of forty days to Horeb. The excitement of our
Lord's baptism was succeeded by the forty days' fast in the
wilderness. The human mind cannot be ever on the strain. Excitement
must be followed by repose, or else the course of action adopted will
be hurried, imperfect, transient in its results. The works of God in
nature are never such. As a modern poet has nobly sung:--
"One lesson, Nature, let me learn of thee;
One lesson which in every wind is blown;
One lesson of two duties kept at one,
Though the loud world proclaim their enmity;--
Of toil unsever'd from tranquillity;
Of labour, that in lasting fruit outgrows
Far noisier schemes, accomplished in repose,
Too great for haste, too high for rivalry."[75]
[75] Sonnet by Matthew Arnold on Rural Work.
There is great calm and dignity in nature; and there was great calm
and dignity in grace when God was laying the foundations of His
kingdom by the hands of His Apostles. There never was an age which
more needed this lesson of nature and grace alike than this nineteenth
century.[76] The religion of the age has been infected by the Spirit
of the world, and men think that the fortresses of sin and ignorance
will fall, provided there be used a sufficient quantity of noise, of
puffing, and of excitement. I do not wish to find the slightest fault
with energetic action. The Church of Christ has been in the past
perhaps a little too dignified in its methods and operations. It has
hesitated, where St. Paul never would have hesitated, to adapt itself
to changed circumstances, and has ofttimes refused, like a timorous
lawyer, to venture on some new and untried sphere because there was no
precedent. The Reformers and their first followers were an
illustration of this. The utter lack of missionary spirit and effort
among the Reformers is one of the darkest blots upon their history.
How sadly they contrast with the Jesuit Society, which started into
existence at the same period of the world's history. No one is more
keenly alive to the faults and shortcomings of that world-renowned
Society than I am, yet I heartily admire the energy and devotion with
which, from its earliest days, the Society of Jesus flung itself into
missionary work, endeavouring to repair the losses which the Papacy
sustained in Europe by fresh conquests in India, China, and America.
The Reformers were so busy in bitter controversies among themselves,
and so intent upon endeavouring to fathom God's decrees and purposes,
that they forgot the primary duty of the Church to spread the light
and truth which it has received; they were deficient in Christian
energy, and thus brought upon themselves the blight and curse of
spiritual barrenness. Controversy evermore brings with it the
desolation of spiritual leanness. Men cease to really believe in a
religion which they only know upon paper, and only think of as a thing
to be discussed. Living contact with human souls and human wants saves
religion, because it translates it from a mere dead dogma into a
living fact. A man who has come to doubt doctrinal statements which he
has never verified, will be brought back to faith by the irresistible
evidence of sinful lives changed and broken hearts comforted.
[76] This line of thought has been already touched upon in Lect.
IV., pp. 61-3.
The Church of England has again and again manifested this spirit. In
Ireland she refused to give the nation the Liturgy and the Bible in
the Irish tongue. In Wales she hesitated in condescending to vulgar
wants, and long refused to bestow a native episcopate upon the Celts
of England, because the evil tradition of centuries, down from the age
of the Norman conquest, had ordained that no Welshman should be a
bishop. But still, while I am opposed to the Church binding itself in
fetters of that kind, I am equally of opinion that there is a middle
course between dignified idleness and extravagant carnal
sensationalism. I have heard efforts advocated for home missionary
work which, I am sure, would never have met with the approbation of
the first missionaries of the Cross. The Church must be energetic, but
the Church need not adopt the methods of quack medicine-sellers, or of
the strolling circus. Such methods were not unknown in the primitive
ages of the Church.
The preachers of the stoic philosophy strove in the second century to
counteract the efforts of the Christian Church by reforming paganism,
and by preaching it vigorously. They adopted every means to attract
the public attention and interest--eccentricity, vulgarity,
coarseness; and yet they failed, and were defeated by a society which
trusted, not in human devices and carnal forces, but in the
supernatural power of God the Holy Ghost.[77] The Montanists again,
towards the close of the second century, fell into the same error. The
Montanists are in many respects one of the most interesting of the
early Christian sects. They tried to retain the customs and the spirit
of apostolic Christianity, but they mistook the true methods of
action. They confounded physical excitement with spiritual fervour,
and strove by weird dances and strange cries, borrowed from the pagans
of the Phrygian mountains, to bind to themselves the sweet influences
of the Heavenly Comforter. The Church of that period diligently
avoided the error of pagan stoics and of Christian schismatics. As it
was in the second century, so was it just after Pentecost. The Church
followed close upon its Master's footsteps, of whom it was said, "He
shall not strive nor cry, neither shall any man hear His voice in the
streets," and developed in quietness and retirement the spiritual life
of the thousands who had crowded into the door of faith which Peter
had opened.
[77] This episode in the history of paganism in the second century
is very little known. It has been well depicted in an interesting
little book, _The Age of the Antonines_, by the Rev. W. W. Capes,
M.A., which only costs a couple of shillings. Chap. VIII. should
specially be consulted.
Again there is a lesson in this period of pause and seclusion, not
merely for the Church in its corporate capacity, but for individual
souls. The spirit of interior sanctity is nourished most chiefly
during such times of retirement and obscurity. Obscurity has indeed
many advantages when viewed from the standpoint of the spiritual life.
Publicity and high station and multiplicity of affairs bring with them
many disadvantages. They deprive us of that peace and calm which
enable a man to contrast the things of time with those of eternity,
and to value them in their true light. Over-activity, fussiness, even
in the most spiritual matters, is a dire enemy of true heart belief,
and therefore of true strength of spirit. The Master Himself felt it
so. There were many coming and going, and they had no leisure so much
as to eat. Then it was He said, "Come ye into the desert, that ye may
rest awhile." The excitement and strain of Pentecost, and all the
subsequent efforts which Pentecost entailed, must have told seriously
upon the Apostles, and so they imitated the Master, that they might
renew their exhausted vigour at its primal fountain. How many a man,
busy in missions, or preaching, or the thousand other forms which
evangelistic and religious work now takes, would be infinitely better
if this apostolic lesson were duly learned. How many a terrible
scandal has arisen simply from a disregard and contempt for it. If men
will think they can labour, as this passage shows the Apostles could
not, without thought and reflection, and interior communion with God;
if they will spend all their strength in external effort and never
make time and secure seasons for spiritual replenishment, they may
create much noise for a time, but their toil will be fruitless, and if
they are saved themselves it will only be as by fire.
The period of retirement and obscurity came however to an end at last.
The Apostles never intended to form an order purely contemplative.
Such an idea, in fact, never could have entered into the mind of one
of those early Christians. They remembered that their Master had
expressly said, "Ye are the salt of the earth," and salt is useless if
kept stored up in a vessel by itself, and never applied to any object
where its curative properties might have free scope. When the spirit
of Eastern gnosticism, springing from the dualism of Persia, invaded
the Church, and gained a permanent hold within it, then men began to
despise their bodies and life, and all that life entails. Like Eastern
fanatics, they desired to abstract themselves as much as possible from
the things and duties of the present, and they invented, or rather
adopted from the farther East, purely contemplative orders, which
spent useless lives, striving, like their prototypes of India, to rise
superior to the positions which God had assigned them. Such were not
the Apostles. They used rest, contemplation, they did not abuse them;
and when their tone and power was restored, they issued forth again
upon the field of religious activity, and joined in the public worship
of the crowd. "Peter and John went up together into the temple at the
hour of prayer, being the ninth hour."
The action of Peter and John in thus frequenting the temple worship
gives us a glimpse into the state of feeling and thought which
prevailed then and for a great many years after in the Church of
Jerusalem. The Church of that city naturally clung longest of all to
the old Jewish connection. Eusebius, in his _Ecclesiastical History_
(iv. 5), tells us that the first fifteen bishops of Jerusalem were
Hebrews, and that all the members of the Church were Hebrews too. It
was only, in fact, upon the final destruction of Jerusalem, which
happened under Hadrian, after the rebellion of Barcochba, A.D. 135,
that the Church of Jerusalem shook itself completely free from the
trammels of Judaism.[78]
[78] See the article on Barcochba in the _Dict. Christ. Biog._,
vol. i.
But in those earliest days of the Church the Apostles naturally could
not recognise the course of the Divine development. They cherished the
notion that Judaism and Christianity would be found compatible the one
with the other. They had not yet recognised what St. Stephen first of
all, and then St. Paul, and most chiefly the author of the Hebrews,
came to recognise, that Judaism and Christianity as full-blown systems
were absolutely antagonistic; that the Jewish dispensation was
obsolete, antiquated, and must utterly and for ever fade before a
nobler dispensation that was once for all to take its place. It is
hard for us to realize the feelings of the Apostles at this great
transition epoch, and yet it is well for us to do so, because their
conduct is full of lessons specially suited for seasons of transition.
The Apostles never seem to me more clearly under the direction of the
Divine Spirit than in their whole course of action at this time. They
proceeded in faith, but not in haste. They held firmly to the truths
they had gained, and they waited patiently upon God, till the course
of His providence showed them how to co-ordinate the old system with
the new truths,--until He had taught them what parts of the ancient
covenant should be dropped and what retained. Their conduct has
instruction very suitable for the present age, when God is giving His
Church fresh light on many a question through the investigations of
science. Well, indeed, will it be for Christian people to have their
hearts grounded, as the Apostles' were, in a spirit of Divine love,
knowing personally in whom they have believed; and then, strong in
that inner revelation of God to the spirit, which surpasses in might
and power all other evidences, they may patiently wait the evolution
of His purposes. The prophetic declaration is true for every age, "He
that believeth will not make haste."
The circumstances of the first apostolic miracle were simple enough.
Peter and John were going up into the temple at the hour of the
evening sacrifice. They were entering the temple by the gate well
known to all dwellers at Jerusalem as the Beautiful Gate, and there
they met the cripple whom they healed in the name and by the power of
Jesus of Nazareth. The spot where this miracle was performed was
familiar to the Jews of that day, though its precise locality is still
a matter of controversy. Some hold that this Beautiful Gate was one
described by Josephus in his _Wars of the Jews_ (v. 5, 3) as
surpassingly splendid, being composed of Corinthian brass, and called
the Gate of Nicanor. Others think that it was the gate Shushan, which
stood in the neighbourhood of Solomon's Porch; while others identify
it with the gate Chulda, which led into the Court of the Gentiles. It
was most probably the first of these which was situated on the eastern
side of the outermost court of the temple, looking towards the valley
of Kedron.[79] Here was gathered a crowd of beggars, such as then
frequented the temples of the pagans as well as of the Jews, and such
as still throng the approaches of Eastern and many Western churches.
Out of this crowd one man addressed Peter and John, asking an alms.
This man was well known to the regular worshippers in the temple. He
was a cripple, and one long accustomed to haunt the same spot, for he
was above forty years old. Peter replied to his prayer in the
well-known words, "Silver and gold have I none: but what I have, that
give I thee. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk;" and then
he performed one of the few miracles ascribed to the direct action of
St. Peter. Here it may be asked, Why was this miracle of healing the
cripple at the temple gate the only one recorded of those earliest
signs and wonders wrought by apostolic hands? The answer seems to be
threefold: this miracle was typical of the Church's future work; it
was the occasion of St. Peter's testimony before the Sanhedrin; and it
led up to the first persecution which the Jewish authorities raised
against the Church.
[79] See Lightfoot's _Horæ Hebraicæ_, Acts iii. 2. De Voguë in his
great work on the Temple of Jerusalem, fully gives the traditions
which attached themselves to this gate. In the fourth century it
was celebrated by the Christian poet Prudentius, and in the fifth
or sixth a gate called the Golden Gate was erected on its site.
This gate still remains, and De Voguë in his plates vii. to xii.
gives a series of views of it.
Viewing the Acts of the Apostles as a type of what all Church history
was to be, and a Divine exposition of the principles which should
guide the Church in times of suffering as well as in times of action,
we can see good and solid reasons for the insertion of this particular
narrative. First, then, this miracle was typical of the Church's work,
for it was a beggar that was healed, and this beggar lay helpless and
hopeless at the very doors of the temple. The beggar typified humanity
at large. He was laid, indeed, in a splendid position,--before him was
extended the magnificent panorama of hills which stood round about
Jerusalem; above him rose the splendours of the building upon which
the Herods had lavished the riches and wonders of their gorgeous
conceptions,--but he was nothing the better for all this material
grandeur till touched by the power which lay in the name of Jesus of
Nazareth. And the beggar of the Beautiful Gate was in all these
respects the fittest object for St. Peter's earliest public miracle,
because he was exactly typical of mankind's state. Humanity, Jew and
Gentile alike, lay at the very gate of God's temple of the universe.
Men could discourse learnedly, too, concerning that sanctuary, and
they could admire its beauteous proportions. Poets, philosophers, and
wise men had treated of the temple of the universe in works which can
never be surpassed, but all the while they lay outside its sacred
precincts. They had no power to stand up and enter in, leaping, and
walking, and praising God. It is very important, in this age of
material civilization and of intellectual advance, that the Church
should insist vigorously upon the great truth taught by this miracle.
The age of the Incarnation must have seemed to the men of that time
the very acme of civilization and of knowledge; and yet the testimony
of all history and of all literature is that just then mankind was in
the most deplorable state of moral and spiritual degradation. The
witness of St. Paul in the first chapter of the Epistle to the Romans
is amply borne out by the testimony, conscious and unconscious, of
pagan antiquity. A writer of the last century, now to a great extent
forgotten, Dr. Leland by name, investigated this point in the fullest
manner in his great work on the necessity of a Divine revelation,
demonstrating that mankind, even when highly civilized, educated,
cultured, lies like a beggar at the door of the temple, till touched
by the hand and power of the Incarnate God.
This miracle of healing the beggar was typical of the Church's work
again, because it was a beggar who thus received a blessing when the
Church roused itself to the discharge of its great mission. The first
man healed and benefited by St. Peter was a poor man, and the Church's
work has ever led her to deal with the poor, and to interest herself
most keenly in their well-being. This first miracle is typical of
Christian work, because Christianity is essentially the religion of
the masses. At times, indeed, Christian teachers may have seemed to
rank themselves on the side of power and riches alone; but then men
should take good care to distinguish between the inconsistent conduct
of Christian teachers and the essential principles of Christianity.
The founder of Christianity was a carpenter, and its earliest
benediction pronounced the blessedness of those that are poor in
spirit, and ever since the greatest triumphs of Christianity have been
gained amongst the poor. Christian hagiology, Christian legend, and
Christian history alike, have combined to attest this truth. The
Church calendar is decorated with lists of saints, some of them of
very doubtful character, while others of them have stories connected
with their careers full of meaning and rich with lessons for this
generation. Thus, for instance, October 25th is the feast of a martyr,
St. Crispin, from whom the great trade of shoemakers is designated.
"The sons of St. Crispin" is a title going back to the earliest ages
of the Church's love. St. Crispin was a Roman senator, brought up and
nourished amid all that luxury with which pagan Rome surrounded the
children of the highest classes. Crispin became acquainted with the
faith of the followers of the Carpenter of Nazareth amid the dire
persecutions which marked the final struggle between Christianity and
paganism under the Emperor Diocletian during the earliest years of the
fourth century. He was baptized, and feeling that a life of gilded
idleness was inconsistent with his Master's example, he resigned his
place, position, and property, retired into Gaul, and there devoted
himself to the trade of shoemaking, as being one which could be
exercised in great quietness. Manual toil was at that time considered
an occupation fitted only for slaves, for we ought never to forget
that the dignity of labour is no human invention, nor is it part of
the religions of nature. Nay, rather, the dignity of idleness was the
doctrine of Greek and Roman paganism. St. Crispin recognized the great
law of labour taught by Christ and taught by His Apostles, and became
the most successful of shoemakers, preaching at the same time the
gospel with such success that the persecutors selected him as one of
their earliest victims in that district of Gaul where he resided.[80]
It has been just the same in every age. The true power of the Church
has been ever displayed in preaching the gospel to the children of
toil. An interesting example of this may be gathered from an age which
we are apt to think specially dark. In mediæval times the secular or
parochial clergy became very lax and careless throughout these
islands. The mendicant friars, the followers of St. Francis, came and
settled everywhere in the slums of the great towns, devoting
themselves to the work of preaching to the poor. And they speedily
attained a marvellous power over men. The Franciscans in the
thirteenth century were exactly like the early Methodists in the last
century. Both societies placed their chapels among the abodes of want;
there they laboured, and there they triumphed, because they worked in
the spirit and power indicated by this first recorded miracle of the
beggar healed at the temple gate.[81] It will be a bad day for
religion and for society when the Church ceases to be the Church and
champion of the weak, the down-trodden, the destitute. Here, however,
lies a danger. Its work in this direction must be done in no one-sided
spirit. Christianity must never adopt the language or the tone of the
mere agitator. I fear that some who now pose as specially the
champions of the poor are missing that spirit of mental balance and
fairness which will alone enable them to be Christian champions,
because seeking to do justice unto all men. It is easy enough to
flatter any class, rich or poor; and it is specially tempting to do so
when the class so flattered chances to hold the reins of political
power. It is very hard to render to all their due, shrinking not from
telling the truth, even when unpleasant, and reproving the faults of
those whose side we favour. A Christianity which triumphs through
appeals to popular prejudices, and seeks a mere temporary advantage by
riding on the crest of popular ignorance, is not the religion taught
by Christ and His Apostles.
[80] The story of St. Crispin is told at length by the Bollandists
in the _Acta Sanctorum_ for October, vol. xi., pp. 495 to 540. St.
Chrysostom in one of his orations paints a vigorous picture of two
imaginary cities, one where all the people were rich, with an
abundance of slaves, and therefore dependent on others for all the
necessaries and conveniences of life; the other city inhabited by
none but poor freemen, where everyone laboured at manual toil and
provided for his wants by his own exertions. He then asks which is
the happier; unhesitatingly giving the palm to the city of
poverty, labour, and freedom.
[81] The analogy I have drawn between the early Methodists and the
Franciscans will be amply borne out if one will take the trouble,
in any of our large towns, to notice where the Franciscans have
left traces of their existence. The name Francis Street and the
ruins of Franciscan foundations will almost always be found just
outside the original walls, among the slums of the people. This
point is noticed by Mr. Brewer in his interesting introduction to
the _Monumenta Franciscana_, in the Rolls Series. He says, on p.
xvii, "In London, York, Warwick, Oxford, Bristol, Lynn, and
elsewhere, the Franciscan convents stood in the suburbs and
abutted on the city walls. They made choice of the low, swampy,
and undrained spots in the large towns, amongst the poorest and
most neglected quarters." The Franciscans proved that splendid
material structures are not necessary for great spiritual
triumphs. An investigation of the topography of our older towns
would show exactly the same great truth about early Methodist
chapels. They were almost always placed in poor localities, as the
name of Preaching Lane, often still connected with them, shows.
See my _Ireland and the Anglo-Norman Church_, pp. 331-34, for more
on this point.
But yet, again, the conversion of this beggar was effected through his
healing; and here we see a type of the Church's future work. The
Church, then, as represented by the Apostles, did not despise the
body, or regard efforts after bodily blessing beneath its dignity.
Spiritual work went hand in hand with healing power. This has been a
lesson which Christian people, at home and abroad, have been slow
enough to learn. The whole principle, for instance, of medical
missions is covered by this action on the part of the Apostles. For a
long time the Church thought it was its solitary duty to preach the
gospel by word of mouth, and it has only been in comparatively modern
days that men have learned that one of the most powerful means of
preaching the gospel was the exercise of the healing art; for surely
if the gift of healing, conveyed from God by supernatural means, could
be an effective help towards evangelistic work, the same gift of
healing, conveyed from precisely the same source by natural channels
indeed, but channels none the less truly Divine, can still be
effective to the same great end. The Church should count no human
interest beyond its sway, and should take the keenest interest and
claim a living share in every portion of life's work. At home or
abroad the bodies of men are her care as well as their souls, because
bodies as well as souls have been redeemed by Jesus Christ, and both
alike await their perfection and glorification through Jesus Christ.
Schools, hospitals, sanitary and medical science, the dwellings and
amusements of the people, trade, commerce, all should be the care of
the Church, and should be based on Christ's law, and carried out on
Christian principles. The Incarnation of Christ has given a deeper
meaning than he ever dreamt of to the pagan poet's words,--
"Homo sum; humani nihil a me alienum puto."
We think, furthermore, that this miracle has been divinely recorded
because it was the occasion of St. Peter's testimony both to the
people and to their rulers. Let us strive to realize the circumstances
and the locality. Peter and John, going up to the temple, met this
impotent beggar at the entrance to the Court of the Women, into which
the Beautiful Gate led. Our modern notions about churches confuse all
true conceptions concerning the temple. The vast majority of people,
when they think of the temple, form to themselves an idea of a vast
cathedral, when they ought instead to think of a large college, with
square succeeding square and court following court. As Peter and John
ascended the temple hill they came first to the Court of the Gentiles,
which served as a market, and in which a crowd of mendicants were
assembled to solicit alms. Out of this Court of the Gentiles the
Beautiful Gate led into the Court of the Women, which was reserved for
the ordinary religious offices of the Jewish people.[82] One of the
beggars addressed the Apostles, soliciting a gift; whereupon the
Apostles worked the miracle of healing. Upon this a crowd collected,
attracted by the excited conduct of the man who had received such an
unexpected blessing. They ran together after the manner of all crowds
which assemble so easily and so rapidly in a city, and then, hurrying
into the cloister, called Solomon's Porch, which was a remnant of the
ancient temple, heard the address of St. Peter. It must have been a
spot filled with cherished memories for the Apostle. Every Jew
naturally venerated this cloister, because it was Solomon's; just as
men in the grandest modern cathedral still love to point out the
smallest relic of the original structure out of which the modern
building grew. At San Clemente, in Rome, the priests delight to show
the primitive structure where they say St. Clement ministered about
the year A.D. 100.[83] At York the vergers will indicate far down in
the crypt the fragments of the earliest Saxon church, which once stood
where that splendid cathedral now rears its lofty arches. So, too, the
Jews naturally cherished this link of continuity between the ancient
and the modern temples. But for St. Peter this Solomon's Porch must
have had special memories over and above the patriotic ideas that were
linked with it. He could not forget that the very last feast of the
Dedication which the Master had seen on earth, He walked in this
porch, and there in His conversation with the Jews claimed an equality
with the Father which led them to make an attempt on His life.
[82] See Lightfoot on the Court of the Women in his _Chorography
of the Holy Land_, chap. xix. in his _Works_, vol. ii., p. 29. The
best modern description will be found in Count de Voguë's _Le
Temple de Jérusalem_, pp. 53-6 (Paris, 1864), with which may be
compared a paper on the site of the Temple by Colonel Warren in
the _Transactions_ of the Society of Biblical Archæology, vol.
vii., pp. 308-30.
[83] In the new edition of _Clement of Rome_, by Bishop Lightfoot,
vol. i., pp. 92, 93, there is an account of this ancient church.
Here, then, it was that within twelve months the Apostle Peter makes a
similar claim on his Master's behalf, in a discourse which extends
from the twelfth to the twenty-sixth verse of the third chapter. That
discourse has two distinct divisions. It sets forth, first the claims,
dignity, and nature of Christ, and then makes a personal appeal to the
men of Jerusalem. St. Peter begins his sermon with an act of profound
self-renunciation. When the Apostle saw the people running together,
he answered and said, "Ye men of Israel, why marvel ye at this? or why
look ye so earnestly on us, as though by our own power or holiness we
made this man to walk?" The same spirit of renunciation appears at an
earlier stage of the miracle. When the beggar solicited an alms, Peter
said, "Silver and gold have I none: but what I have, that give I thee.
In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk." One point is at once
manifest when St. Peter's conduct is compared with his Master's under
similar circumstances. St. Peter acts as a delegate and a servant;
Jesus Christ acted as a principal, a master,--the Prince of Life, as
St. Peter calls Him in the fifteenth verse of this third chapter. The
distinction between the miracles of Christ and the miracles of the
Apostles declares the New Testament conception of Christ's dignity and
person. Compare, for instance, the narrative of the healing of the
impotent man at the Pool of Bethesda, told in the fifth chapter of St.
John, with that of the healing of the impotent man laid at the temple
gate. Christ said, "Rise, take up thy bed, and walk." He made no
appeal, He used no prayer, He invoked no higher name. He simply spake
and it was done. The Apostle Peter, the rock-man, the leader of the
apostolic band, takes the greatest care to assure the multitude that
he had himself neither power nor efficacy in this matter, and that
all the power lay in the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Now,
leaving aside for the moment any question of the truth or reality of
these two miracles, is it not manifest from these two parallel cases
that the New Testament writings place Jesus Christ on an exalted
standpoint far above that of any human being whatsoever; in a
position, in fact, which from the boldness and magnificence of its
claims can only be fitly described in the language of the Nicene Creed
as "God of God, Light of Light, Very God of very God."
St. Peter's words teach another lesson. They are typical of the spirit
which should ever animate the Christian preacher or teacher. They turn
the attention of his hearers wholly away from himself, and exalt
Christ Jesus alone. And such has ever been and ever must be the secret
of successful preaching. Self-consciousness, in fact, injures the
effect of any kind of labour. The man who does not lose himself in his
work, of whatever kind--political, philanthropic, or religious--his
work may be, but is ever thinking of himself and the results of his
actions upon his own prospects, can never become an enthusiast; and it
is only enthusiasm and enthusiastic action which can really affect
mankind. And surely the preacher of Christian truth who thinks of
himself rather than of the great subject of his mission, who only
preaches that he may be thought clever or eloquent, debases the
Christian pulpit, and must be an awful failure in that day when God
shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ. St. Peter here, John
the Baptist in still earlier days, ought to be the models for
Christian teachers. Men came to the Baptist, did him homage, yielded
him respect; but he pointed them from himself to Christ. He was a
lamp, but Christ was the light; and the Baptist's teaching reached
its highest, noblest level when he turned his disciples' gaze away
from himself, saying, "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the
sin of the world." Let me, however, not be mistaken. I do not mean to
say that a Christian teacher, whether writer or speaker, should never
allow a single reflex thought as to his own performances to rise in
his mind, should never desire to preach ably or eloquently. A man who
could set up such a standard must be ignorant of human nature and of
Scripture alike. One cannot, for instance, read St. Paul's Second
Epistle to the Corinthians without noting how sorely he was touched by
his own unpopularity amongst them and the successful machinations of
his opponents. Daily experience will prove that no attainments in the
spiritual life will prevent a man from valuing the esteem and
recognition of his fellow men. But such a desire to please and be
successful must be kept in stern control. It must not be the great
object of a Christian. It must never lead him to keep back one jot or
tittle of the counsel of God. The natural desire to please must be
closely watched. It easily leads men to idolatry, to the installation
of human fame, power, influence, gold, in the place of that Eternal
Saviour whose worship ought to be the great end and the true life of
the soul.
St. Peter, after his act of abnegation and self-humiliation, then
proceeds to set forth the claims and to narrate the history of Jesus
Christ, and in doing so enters into the particulars of His trial and
condemnation, which he charges boldly home upon his listeners, who, as
distinguished from his audience on the day of Pentecost, were most
probably the permanent residents in Jerusalem. The Apostle narrates
the events of our Lord's trial just as we find them in the
Gospels--His interviews with Pilate, the outcry of the people, the
choice and character of Barabbas. He asserts His resurrection, and
implies, without asserting, His ascension, by the words, "Whom the
heavens must receive until the times of the restitution of all
things." The primitive gospel of St. Peter was just like that taught
by St. Paul, as he puts it forward in the fifteenth chapter of First
of Corinthians, "Brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I have
received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the
scriptures: and that He was buried, and that He rose again." The
earliest message, proclaimed by St. Paul or St. Peter, was one and the
same; it was a declaration of certain historical facts, and what it
was then such it must ever remain. Whenever the historical facts are
disbelieved, then men may speak beautifully of the spiritual ideas and
the moral truths symbolised by Christianity, just as Hypatia and the
Neo-Platonists of Alexandria could speak in picturesque language
concerning the deep poetic meaning of the old pagan legends. Poetry
and legends are, however, the veriest husks wherewith to support an
immortal soul under the great trials of life; and when that day comes
for any soul when the great historical facts set forth in the Creed
are rejected, then Christianity may remain in name and appearance, but
it will cease to be the gospel of joy and peace and comfort, for the
human soul can only sustain itself in the supreme moments of sorrow,
separation, and death by the solid realities of fact and truth.
St. Peter, again, in this sermon leaves us a type of what Christian
sermons should be. He was plain spoken, yet he was tender and
sympathetic. He was plain spoken. He does not hesitate to state the
crimes of the Jews in the most vigorous language. God had glorified
His servant Jesus, but they delivered Him up to the agents of the
idolatrous Romans; they denied Him, desired a murderer to be granted
in place of the Prince of Life; urged His death when even the Roman
judge would have let Him go,--and all this they had done to the
long-expected and long-desired Messiah. Peter is not wanting in
plainness of speech. And the Christian teacher, whether clergyman or
layman, whether a pastor in the pulpit, a teacher in the
Sunday-school, or the editor of a newspaper at his desk, ought to
cultivate and exercise the same Christian boldness and courage. The
true Christian ideal will be attained by following St. Peter's example
on this occasion. He combined boldness and prudence, courage and
gentleness. He spoke the truth in all honesty, but he did not adopt an
attitude or use language which would arouse unnecessary opposition.
What courtesy, what sympathetic, charitable politeness is manifest in
St. Peter's excuse, which he offers in the course of his sermon for
the Jews, rulers and people alike! "And now, brethren, I wot that
through ignorance ye did it, as did also your rulers." Some men think
that prudence is an idea which should never enter the head of a
messenger of Christ, though no one impressed more frequently the
necessity of that great virtue than did the Master, for He knew how
easily imprudence may undo all the good that faithfulness might
otherwise attain. Wisdom like the serpent's, gentleness like the
dove's, was Christ's own rule for His Apostles. Boldness, and courage,
and honesty, are blessed things, but they should be guided and
moderated by charity. Earthly motives easily insinuate themselves in
every man's heart, and when a man feels urged on to declare some
unpleasant truth, or to raise a violent and determined opposition, he
should search diligently, lest that while he imagines himself
following a heavenly vision and obeying a Divine command, he should be
only yielding to mere human suggestions of pride, or partisanship, or
uncharitableness.