'And on the sabbath day we went forth without the gate, by a river
side, where we supposed there was a place of prayer; and we sat down,
and spake unto the women which were come together.'--ACTS xvi. 13
(R.V.).
This is the first record of the preaching of the Gospel in Europe, and
probably the first instance of it. The fact that the vision of the man
of Macedonia was needed in order to draw the Apostle across the straits
into Macedonia, and the great length at which the incidents at Philippi
are recorded, make this probable. If so, we are here standing, as it
were, at the wellhead of a mighty river, and the thin stream of water
assumes importance when we remember the thousand miles of its course,
and the league-broad estuary in which it pours itself into the ocean.
Here is the beginning; the Europe of to-day is what came out of it.
There is no sign whatever that the Apostle was conscious of an epoch in
this transference of the sphere of his operations, but we can scarcely
help being conscious of such.
And so, looking at the words of my text, and seeing here how
unobtrusively there stole into the progressive part of the world the
power which was to shatter and remould all its institutions, to guide
and inform the onward march of its peoples, to be the basis of their
liberties, and the starting-point of their literature, we can scarcely
avoid drawing lessons of importance.
The first point which I would suggest, as picturesquely enforced for us
by this incident, is--