Persecution drove the members of the Church apart, and, as a matter of
course, wherever they went they took their faith with them, and, as a
matter of course, spoke about it. The coals were scattered from the
hearth in Jerusalem by the armed heel of violence. That did not put the
fire out, but only spread it, for wherever they were flung they kindled
a blaze. These men had no special injunction 'to preach the Lord
Jesus.' They do not seem to have adopted this line of action
deliberately, or of set purpose. 'They believed, and therefore spoke.'
A spontaneous impulse, and nothing more, leads them on. They find
themselves rejoicing in a great Saviour-Friend. They see all around
them men who need Him, and that is enough. They obey the promptings of
the voice within, and lay the foundations of the first Gentile Church.
Such a spontaneous impulse is ever the natural result of our own
personal possession of Christ. In regard to worldly good the instinct,
except when overcome by higher motives, is to keep the treasure to
oneself. But even in the natural sphere there are possessions which to
have is to long to impart, such as truth and knowledge. And in the
spiritual sphere, it is emphatically the case that real possession is
always accompanied by a longing to impart. The old prophet spoke a
universal truth when he said: 'Thy word was as a fire shut up in my
bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay.' If we
have found Christ for ourselves, we shall undoubtedly wish to speak
forth our knowledge of His love. Convictions which are deep demand
expression. Emotion which is strong needs utterance. If our hearts have
any fervour of love to Christ in them, it will be as natural to tell it
forth, as tears are to sorrow or smiles to happiness. True, there is a
reticence in profound feeling, and sometimes the deepest love can only
'love and be silent,' and there is a just suspicion of loud or vehement
protestations of Christian emotion, as of any emotion. But for all
that, it remains true that a heart warmed with the love of Christ needs
to express its love, and will give it forth, as certainly as light must
radiate from its centre, or heat from a fire.
Then, true kindliness of heart creates the same impulse. We cannot
truly possess the treasure for ourselves without pity for those who
have it not. Surely there is no stranger contradiction than that
Christian men and women can be content to keep Christ as if He were
their special property, and have their spirits untouched into any
likeness of His divine pity for the multitudes who were as 'sheep
having no shepherd.' What kind of Christians must they be who think of
Christ as 'a Saviour for me,' and take no care to set Him forth as 'a
Saviour for you'? What should we think of men in a shipwreck who were
content to get into the lifeboat, and let everybody else drown? What
should we think of people in a famine feasting sumptuously on their
private stores, whilst women were boiling their children for a meal and
men fighting with dogs for garbage on the dunghills? 'He that
withholdeth bread, the people shall curse him.' What of him who
withholds the Bread of Life, and all the while claims to be a follower
of the Christ, who gave His flesh for the life of the world?
Further, loyalty to Christ creates the same impulse. If we are true to
our Lord, we shall feel that we cannot but speak up and out for Him,
and that all the more where His name is unloved and unhonoured. He has
left His good fame very much in our hands, and the very same impulse
which hurries words to our lips when we hear the name of an absent
friend calumniated should make us speak for Him. He is a doubtfully
loyal subject who, if he lives among rebels, is afraid to show his
colours. He is already a coward, and is on the way to be a traitor. Our
Master has made us His witnesses. He has placed in our hands, as a
sacred deposit, the honour of His name. He has entrusted to us, as His
selectest sign of confidence, the carrying out of the purposes for
which on earth His blood was shed, on which in heaven His heart is set.
How can we be loyal to Him if we are not forced by a mighty constraint
to respond to His great tokens of trust in us, and if we know nothing
of that spirit which said: 'Necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto
me, if I preach not the gospel!' I do not say that a man cannot be a
Christian unless he knows and obeys this impulse. But, at least, we may
safely say that he is a very weak and imperfect Christian who does not.
II. This incident suggests the universal obligation on all Christians
to make known Christ.
These men were not officials. In these early days the Church had a very
loose organisation. But the fugitives in our narrative seem to have had
among them none even of the humble office-bearers of primitive times.
Neither had they any command or commission from Jerusalem. No one there
had given them authority, or, as would appear, knew anything of their
proceedings. Could there be a more striking illustration of the great
truth that whatever varieties of function may be committed to various
officers in the Church, the work of telling Christ's love to men
belongs to every one who has found it for himself or herself? 'This
honour have all the saints.'
Whatever may be our differences of opinion as to Church order and
offices, they need not interfere with our firm grasp of this truth.
'Preaching Christ,' in the sense in which that expression is used in
the New Testament, implies no one special method of proclaiming the
glad tidings. A word written in a letter to a friend, a sentence
dropped in casual conversation, a lesson to a child on a mother's lap,
or any other way by which, to any listeners, the great story of the
Cross is told, is as truly--often more truly--preaching Christ as the
set discourse which has usurped the name.
We profess to believe in the priesthood of all believers, we are ready
enough to assert it in opposition to sacerdotal assumptions. Are we as
ready to recognise it as laying a very real responsibility upon us, and
involving a very practical inference as to our own conduct? We all have
the power, therefore we all have the duty. For what purpose did God
give us the blessing of knowing Christ ourselves? Not for our own
well-being alone, but that through us the blessing might be still
further diffused.
'Heaven doth with us as men with torches do,
Not light them for themselves.'
'God hath shined into our hearts' that we might give to others 'the
light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus
Christ.' Every Christian is solemnly bound to fulfil this divine
intention, and to take heed to the imperative command, 'Freely ye have
received, freely give.'