'And when it was day, certain of the Jews banded together, and bound
themselves under a curse, saying that they would neither eat nor drink
till they had killed Paul. 13. And they were more than forty which had
made this conspiracy. 14. And they came to the chief priests and
elders, and said, We have bound ourselves under a great curse, that we
will eat nothing until we have slain Paul. 15. Now therefore ye with
the council signify to the chief captain that he bring him down unto
you to-morrow, as though ye would inquire something more perfectly
concerning him: and we, or ever he come near, are ready to kill him.
16. And when Paul's sister's son heard of their lying in wait, he went
and entered into the castle, and told Paul. 17. Then Paul called one of
the centurions unto him, and said, Bring this young man unto the chief
captain: for he hath a certain thing to tell him. 18. So he took him,
and brought him to the chief captain, and said, Paul the prisoner
called me unto him, and prayed me to bring this young man unto thee,
who hath something to say unto thee. 19. Then the chief captain took
him by the hand, and went with him aside privately, and asked him, What
is that thou hast to tell me? 20. And he said, The Jews have agreed to
desire thee that thou wouldest bring down Paul to-morrow into the
council, as though they would enquire somewhat of him more perfectly.
21. But do not thou yield unto them: for there lie in wait for him of
them more than forty men, which have bound themselves with an oath,
that they will neither eat nor drink till they have killed him: and now
are they ready, looking for a promise from thee. 22. So the chief
captain then let the young man depart, and charged him, See thou tell
no man that thou hast shewed these things to me.'--ACTS xxiii. 12-22.
'The wicked plotteth against the just.... The Lord will laugh at him.'
The Psalmist's experience and his faith were both repeated in Paul's
case. His speech before the Council had set Pharisees and Sadducees
squabbling, and the former had swallowed his Christianity for the sake
of his being 'a Pharisee and the son of a Pharisee.' Probably,
therefore, the hatchers of this plot were Sadducees, who hated
Pharisees even more than they did Christians. The Apostle himself was
afterwards not quite sure that his skilful throwing of the apple of
discord between the two parties was right (Acts xxiv. 21), and
apparently it was the direct occasion of the conspiracy. A Christian
man's defence of himself and his faith gains nothing by clever tactics.
It is very doubtful whether what Paul spoke 'in that hour' was taught
him by the Spirit.
'The corruption of the best is the worst.' There is a close and strange
alliance between formal religion and murderous hatred and vulpine
craft, as the history of ecclesiastical persecution shows; and though
we have done with fire and faggot now, the same evil passions and
tempers do still in modified form lie very near to a Christianity which
has lost its inward union with Jesus and lives on surface adherence to
forms. In that sense too 'the letter killeth.' We lift up our hands in
horror at these fierce fanatics, 'ready to kill' Paul, because he
believed in resurrection, angel, and spirit. We need to guard ourselves
lest something of their temper should be in us. There is a devilish
ingenuity about the details of the plot, and a truly Oriental mixture
of murderous passion and calculating craft. The serpent's wisdom and
his poison fangs are both apparent. The forty conspirators must have
been 'ready,' not only to kill Paul, but to die in the attempt, for the
distance from the castle to the council-chamber was short, and the
detachment of legionaries escorting the prisoner would have to be
reckoned with.
The pretext of desiring to inquire more fully into Paul's opinions
derived speciousness from his ambiguous declaration, which had set the
Council by the ears and had stopped his examination. Luke does not tell
us what the Council said to the conspirators, but we learn from what
Paul's nephew says in verse 20 that it 'agreed to ask thee to bring
down Paul.' So once more the tail drove on the head, and the Council
became the tool of fierce zealots. No doubt most of its members would
have shrunk from themselves killing Paul, but they did not shrink from
having a hand in his death. They were most religious and respectable
men, and probably soothed their consciences with thinking that, after
all, the responsibility was on the shoulders of the forty conspirators.
How men can cheat themselves for a while as to the criminality of
indirectly contributing to criminal acts, and how rudely the thin veil
will be twitched aside one day!
II. The abrupt introduction of Paul's nephew into the story piques
curiosity, but we cannot say more about him than is told us here. We do
not know whether he was moved by being a fellow-believer in Jesus, or
simply by kindred and natural affection. Possibly he was, as his uncle
had been, a student under some distinguished Rabbi. At all events, he
must have had access to official circles to have come on the track of
the plot, which would, of course, be covered up as much as possible.
The rendering in the margin of the Revised Version gives a possible
explanation of his knowledge of it by suggesting that he had 'come in
upon them'; that is, upon the Council in their deliberations. But
probably the rendering preferred in the text is preferable, and we are
left to conjecture his source of information, as almost everything else
about him. But it is more profitable to note how God works out His
purposes and delivers His servants by 'natural' means, which yet are as
truly divine working as was the sending of the angel to smite off
Peter's chains, or the earthquake at Philippi.
This lad was probably not an inhabitant of Jerusalem, and that he
should have been there then, and come into possession of the carefully
guarded secret, was more than a fortunate coincidence. It was divinely
ordered, and God's finger is as evident in the concatenation of
co-operating natural events as in any 'miracle.' To co-ordinate these
so that they concur to bring about the fulfilment of His will may be a
less conspicuous, but is not a less veritable, token of a sovereign
Will at work in the world than any miracle is. And in this case how
wonderfully separate factors, who think themselves quite independent,
are all handled like pawns on a chessboard by Him who 'makes the wrath
of man to praise Him, and girds Himself with the remainder thereof!'
Little did the fiery zealots who were eager to plunge their daggers
into Paul's heart, or the lad who hastened to tell him the secret he
had discovered, or the Roman officer who equally hastened to get rid of
his troublesome prisoner, dream that they were all partners in bringing
about one God-determined result--the fulfilment of the promise that had
calmed Paul in the preceding night: 'So must thou bear witness also at
Rome.'
III. Paul had been quieted after his exciting day by the vision which
brought that promise, and this new peril did not break his peace. With
characteristic clear-sightedness he saw the right thing to do in the
circumstances, and with characteristic promptitude he did it at once.
Luke wastes no words in telling of the Apostle's emotions when this
formidable danger was sprung on him, and the very reticence deepens the
impression of Paul's equanimity and practical wisdom. A man who had had
such a vision last night might well possess his soul in patience, even
though such a plot was laid bare this morning; and each servant of
Jesus may be as well assured, as was Paul the prisoner, that the Lord
shall 'keep him from all evil,' and that if his life is 'witness' it
will not end till his witness is complete. Our faith should work in us
calmness of spirit, clearness of perception of the right thing to do,
swift seizing of opportunities. Paul trusted Jesus' word that he should
be safe, whatever dangers threatened, but that trust stimulated his own
efforts to provide for his safety.
IV. The behaviour of the captain is noteworthy, as showing that he had
been impressed by Paul's personal magnetism, and that he had in him a
strain of courtesy and kindliness. He takes the lad by the hand to
encourage him, and he leads him aside that he may speak freely, and
thereby shows that he trusted him. No doubt the youth would be somewhat
flustered at being brought into the formidable presence and by the
weight of his tidings, and the great man's gentleness would be a
cordial. A superior's condescension is a wonderful lip-opener. We all
have some people who look up to us, and to whom small kindlinesses from
us are precious. We do not 'render to all their dues,' unless we give
gracious courtesy to those beneath, as well as 'honour' to those above,
us. But the captain could clothe himself too with official reserve and
keep up the dignity of his office. He preserved an impenetrable silence
as to his intentions, and simply sealed the young man's lips from
tattling about the plot or the interview with him. Promptly he acted,
without waiting for the Council's application to him. At once he
prepared to despatch Paul to Caesarea, glad enough, no doubt, to wash
his hands of so troublesome a charge. Thus he too was a cog in the
wheel, an instrument to fulfil the promise made in vision, God's
servant though he knew it not.
A LOYAL TRIBUTE [Footnote: Preached on the occasion of the Jubilee of
Queen Victoria.]
'...Seeing that by thee we enjoy great quietness, and that very worthy
deeds are done unto this nation by thy providence, 3. We accept it
always ... with all thankfulness.'--ACTS xxiv. 2-3.
These words were addressed by a professional flatterer to one of the
worst of the many bad Roman governors of Syria. The speaker knew that
he was lying, the listeners knew that the eulogium was undeserved; and
among all the crowd of bystanders there was perhaps not a man who did
not hate the governor, and would not have been glad to see him lying
dead with a dagger in his breast.
But both the fawning Tertullus and the oppressor Felix knew in their
heart of hearts that the words described what a governor ought to be.
And though they are touched with the servility which is not loyalty,
and embrace a conception of the royal function attributing far more to
the personal influence of a monarch than our State permits, still we
may venture to take them as the starting-point for two or three
considerations suggested to us, by the celebrations of the past week.
I almost feel that I owe an apology for turning to that subject, for
everything that can be said about it has been said far better than I
can say it. But still, partly because my silence might be
misunderstood, and partly because an opportunity is thereby afforded
for looking from a Christian point of view at one or two subjects that
do not ordinarily come within the scope of one's ministry, I venture to
choose such a text now.
I. The first thing that I would take it as suggesting is the grateful
acknowledgment of personal worth.
I suppose the world never saw a national rejoicing like that through
which we have passed. For the reigns that have been long enough to
admit of it have been few, and those in which intelligently and
sincerely a whole nation of freemen could participate have been fewer
still. But now all England has been one; whatever our divisions of
opinion, there have been no divisions here. Not only have the bonfires
flared from hill to hill in this little island of ours, but all over
the world, into every out of the way corner where our widely-spread
race has penetrated, the same sentiment has extended. All have yielded
to the common impulse, the rejoicing of a free people in a good Queen.
That common sentiment has embraced two things, the office and the
person. There was a pathetic contrast between these two when that
sad-hearted widow walked alone up the nave of Westminster Abbey, and
took her seat on the stone of destiny on which for a millennium kings
have been crowned. The contrast heightened both the reverence due to
the office and the sympathy due to the woman. The Sovereign is the
visible expression of national power, the incarnation of England,
living history, the outcome of all the past, the representative of
harmonised and blended freedom and law, a powerful social influence
from which much good might flow, a moderating and uniting power amidst
fierce partisan bitterness and hate, a check against rash change. There
is no nobler office upon earth.
And when, as is the case in this long reign, that office has been
filled with some consciousness of its responsibilities, the recognition
of the fact is no flattery but simple duty. We cannot attribute to the
personal initiative of the Queen the great and beneficent changes which
have coincided with her reign. Thank God, no monarch can make or mar
England now. But this we can say,
'Her court was pure, her life serene.'
A life touched with many gracious womanly charities, delighting in
simple country pleasures, not strange to the homes of the poor, quick
to sympathise with sorrow, especially the humblest, as many a weeping
widow at a pit mouth has thankfully felt; sternly repressive of some
forms of vice in high places, and, as we may believe, not ignorant of
the great Comforter nor disobedient to the King of kings,--for such a
royal life a nation may well be thankful. We outsiders do not know how
far personal influence from the throne has in any case restrained or
furthered national action, but if it be true, as is alleged, that twice
in her reign the Queen has kept England from the sin and folly of war,
once from a fratricidal conflict with the great new England across the
Atlantic, then we owe her much. If in later years that life has
somewhat shrunk into itself and sat silent, with Grief for a companion,
those who know a like desolation will understand, and even the happy
may honour an undying love and respect the seclusion of an undying
sorrow. So I say: 'Forasmuch as under thee we enjoy great quietness, we
accept it with all thankfulness.'
II. My text may suggest for us a wider view of progress which, although
not initiated by the Queen, has coincided with her fifty years' reign.
In the Revised Version, instead of 'worthy deeds are done,' we read
'_evils are corrected_'; and that is the true rendering. The double
function which is here attributed falsely to an oppressive tyrant is
the ancient ideal of monarchy--first, that it shall repress disorders
and secure tranquillity within the borders and across the frontiers;
and second, that abuses and evils shall be corrected by the foresight
of the monarch.
Now, in regard to both these functions we have learned that a nation
can do them a great deal better than a sovereign. And so when we speak
of progress during this fifty years' reign, we largely mean the
progress which England in its toiling millions and in its thinking few
has won for itself. Let me in very brief words try to touch upon the
salient points of that progress for which as members of the nation it
becomes us as Christian people to be thankful. Enough hosannas have
been sung already, and I need not add my poor voice to them, about
material progress and commercial prosperity and the growth of
manufacturing industry and inventions and all the rest of it. I do not
for a moment mean to depreciate these, but it is of more importance
that a telegraph should have something to say than that it should be
able to speak across the waters, and 'man doth not live by bread alone,
but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.' We who live
in a great commercial community and know how solid comfort and hope and
gladness are all contingent, in millions of humble homes, upon the
manufacturing industry of these districts, shall never be likely to
underrate the enormous expansion in national industry, and the
consequent enormous increase in national wealth, which belongs to this
last half century. I need say nothing about these.
Let me remind you, and I can only do it in a sentence or two, of more
important changes in these fifty years. English manners and morals have
been bettered, much of savagery and coarseness has been got rid of;
low, cruel amusements have been abandoned. Thanks to the great Total
Abstinence movement very largely, the national conscience has been
stirred in regard to the great national sin of intoxication. A national
system of education has come into operation and is working wonders in
this land. Newspapers and books are cheapened; political freedom has
been extended and 'broadened slowly down,' as is safe, 'from precedent
to precedent,' so that no party thinks now of reversing any of the
changes, howsoever fiercely they were contested ere they were won.
Religious thought has widened, the sects have come nearer each other,
men have passed from out of a hard doctrinal Christianity, in which the
person of Christ was buried beneath the cobwebs of theology, into a far
freer and a far more Christ-regarding and Christ-centred faith. And if
we are to adopt such a point of view as the brave Apostle Paul took,
the antagonism against religion, which is a marked feature of our
generation, and contrasts singularly with the sleepy acquiescence of
fifty years ago, is to be put down to the credit side of the account.
'For,' he said, like a bold man believing that he had an irrefragable
truth in his hands, 'I will tarry here, for a great door and an
effectual is opened, and there are many adversaries.' Wherever a whole
nation is interested and stirred about religious subjects, even though
it may be in contradiction and antagonism, God's truth can fight
opposition far better than it can contend with indifference. Then if we
look upon our churches, whilst there is amongst them all abounding
worldliness much to be deplored, there is also, thank God, springing up
amongst us a new consciousness of responsibility, which is not confined
to Christian people, for the condition of the poor and the degraded
around us; and everywhere we see good men and women trying to stretch
their hands across these awful gulfs in our social system which make
such a danger in our modern life, and to reclaim the outcasts of our
cities, the most hopeless of all the heathen on the face of the earth.
These things, on which I have touched with the lightest hand, all taken
together do make a picture for which we may be heartily thankful.
Only, brethren, let us remember that that sort of talk about England's
progress may very speedily become offensive self-conceit, and a
measuring of ourselves with ludicrous self-satisfaction against all
other nations. There is a bastard patriotism which has been very
loud-mouthed in these last days, of which wise men should beware.
Further, such a contemplation of the elements of national progress,
which we owe to no monarch and to no legislature, but largely to the
indomitable pluck and energy of our people, to Anglo-Saxon persistence
not knowing when it is beaten, and to the patient meditation of
thoughtful minds and the self-denying efforts of good philanthropical
and religious people--such a contemplation, I say, may come between us
and the recognition of the highest source from which it flows, and be
corrupted into forgetfulness of God. 'Beware lest when thou hast eaten
and art full, and thy silver and thy gold is multiplied, and all that
thou hast is multiplied, then thine heart be lifted up, and thou forget
the Lord thy God... and thou say in thine heart, My power, and the
might of mine hand, hath gotten me this wealth. But thou shalt remember
the Lord thy God, for it is He that giveth thee power to get wealth.'
And the last caution that I would put in here is, let us beware lest
the hosannas over national progress shall be turned into 'Rest and be
thankful,' or shall ever come in the way of the strenuous and
persistent reaching forth to the fair ideal that lies so far before us.
III. That leads me to the last point on which I would say a word, viz.,
that my text with its reference to the correction of evils, as one of
the twin functions of the monarch, naturally suggests to us the thought
which should follow all recognition of progress in the past--the
consideration of what yet remains to be done.
A great controversy has been going on, or at least a remarkable
difference of opinion has been expressed in recent months by two of the
greatest minds and clearest heads in England; one of our greatest poets
and one of our greatest statesmen. The one looking back over sixty
years sees but foiled aspirations and present devildom and misery. The
other looking back over the same period sees accomplished dreams and
the prophecy of further progress. It is not for me to enter upon the
strife between such authorities. Both are right. Much has been
achieved. 'There remaineth yet very much land to be possessed.'
Whatever have been the victories and the blessings of the past, there
are rotten places in our social state which, if not cauterised and
healed, will break out into widespread and virulent sores. There are
dangers in the near future which may well task the skill of the bravest
and the faith of the most trustful. There are clouds on the horizon
which may speedily turn jubilations into lamentations, and the best
security against these is that each of us in his place, as a unit
however insignificant in the great body politic, should use our little
influence on the side that makes for righteousness, and see to it that
we leave some small corner of this England, which God has given us in
charge, sweeter and holier because of our lives. The ideal for you
Christian men and women is the organisation of society on Christian
principles. Have we got to that yet, or within sight of it, do you
suppose? Look round you. Does anybody believe that the present
arrangements in connection with unrestricted competition and the
distribution of wealth coincide accurately with the principles of the
New Testament? Will anybody tell me that the state of a hundred streets
within a mile of this spot is what it would be if the Christian men of
this nation lived the lives that they ought to live? Could there be
such rottenness and corruption if the 'salt' had not 'lost his savour'?
Will anybody tell me that the disgusting vice which our newspapers do
not think themselves degraded by printing in loathsome detail, and so
bringing the foulness of a common sewer on to every breakfast-table in
the kingdom, is in accordance with the organisation of society on
Christian principles? Intemperance, social impurity, wide, dreary
tracts of ignorance, degradation, bestiality, the awful condition of
the lowest layer in our great cities, crushed like some crumbling
bricks beneath the ponderous weight of the splendid superstructure, the
bitter partisan spirit of politics, where the followers of each chief
think themselves bound to believe that he is immaculate and that the
other side has no honour or truth belonging to it--these things testify
against English society, and make one almost despair when one thinks
that, after a thousand years and more of professing Christianity, that
is all that we can show for it.
O brethren! we may be thankful for what has been accomplished, but
surely there had need also to be penitent recognition of failure and
defect. And I lay it on the consciences of all that listen to me now to
see to it that they do their parts as members of this body politic of
England. A great heritage has come down from our fathers; pass it on
bettered by your self-denial and your efforts. And remember that the
way to mend a kingdom is to begin by mending yourselves, and letting
Christ's kingdom come in your own hearts. Next we are bound to try to
further its coming in the hearts of others, and so to promote its
leavening society and national life. No Christian is clear from the
blood of men and the guilt of souls who does not, according to
opportunity and capacity, repair before his own door, and seek to make
some one know the unsearchable riches of the Gospel of Christ.
There is no finality for a Christian patriot until his country be
organised on Christian principles, and so from being merely a 'kingdom
of the world' become 'a Kingdom of our God and of His Christ.' To help
forward that consummation, by however little, is the noblest service
that prince or peasant can render to his country. By conformity to the
will of God and not by material progress or intellectual enlightenment
is a state prosperous and strong. To keep His statutes and judgments is
'your wisdom and understanding in the sight of the nations, which shall
hear all these statutes and say, Surely this great nation is a wise and
understanding people.'